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Your lettersMedical mystery

Page 4 Blood, guts,treachery, infidelityand good taste

Page 6

Page 8Coronation fleet

THE language may be old anddusty – but it is full of prom-ise: “A journal of the proceed-ings on board theDreadnought privateer,

James Leisman com(m)ander,mounting 14 four pounders:for a four months cruiseagainst the enemies ofGreat Britain.”

That is the title of a per-sonal journal that was leftto Bristol Record Office in thewill of a woman who lived in theUSA but who hailed from Wiltshire. Itis thought that the diary was passeddown through generations of her fam-

ily, so until recently it has notbeen available to the public.

Since arriving at theBRO, it has been tran-scribed by Nigel Som-

merville, a retired solicitorwho works there as a volun-

t e e r.The journal describes a voyage

taken by the Dreadnought in 1757.The owners of the ship had obtained a

letter of marque from the Government– issued March 22, 1757 – which li-censed the ship to cruise againstenemy vessels. This document named

TURN TO PAGE 2

As part of a nationalcampaign to encouragepeople to use their localarchives more, BristolRecord Office hasrevealed a diary kept bya man travelling on aBristol privateer in the18th century.Eugene Byrne puts onhis tricorn hat to plunderthe tale.

A LIFE ON THEOCEAN WAVE

� Ships at anchor at King Road. The Mouthof the Avon is in the background. Thepainting by Joseph Walter was done in the1830s, 80 years after the voyage of theDreadnought, but gives a good idea of whatKing Road would have looked like in thedays of sail. Courtesy of Bristol Museums, Galleriesand Archives BMAG K462

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2 Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013 3Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013w w w. bristolpost.co.uk w w w. bristolpost.co.uk

these owners as John Harbord,Jonah Thomas, Samuel Thomas andWilliam Wasbrough, who were mer-chants from Bristol.

The author of the diary, the ship’ssurgeon, is unknown. The surgeonwas named Samuel Pye in the letterof marque – but a later advert forcrew in Felix Farley’s Bristol Journal(May 7, 1757) stated that “an ablesurgeon is wanted”.

Britain was at war with France, sojoining a privateer could be verylucrative for the crew who were paida proportion of each prize captured.

The amount varied by rank, withthe surgeon receiving six times morethan a regular seaman. His financialaccount at the back of the diaryshows that he earned more than £340for the cruise. This was at a timewhen a skilled working man earningan honest living would be very for-tunate to make £5 in a month.

The ship was well armed and had acrew of about 120 men. The surgeonmentioned treating about 50 of theseduring the cruise – everything fromdislocated thumbs to musket-ballwo u n d s.

Our anonymous surgeon’s journalcovers a four-month journey frombeginning to end, during which theDreadnought cruised areas frequen-ted by French ships, probably head-ing towards the Bay of Biscay. TheDreadnought chased and capturedmany vessels in case they wereFrench. Those that were could becaptured and sold, along with theirc a r g o.

On June 1, the Dreadnought cap-tured the Lyon, which was travellingfrom St Domingo to Bordeaux with acargo of coffee, sugar and indigo fromslave plantations in the West Indies.

At 4am saw three sail to the east-ward and perceived them to steer dif-ferent courses. We singled out thelargest and gave chase. At 1pm firedthree guns at her and she struck hercolours. She proved to be a large snowfrom St Domingo to Bordeaux ladenwith coffee, sugar and indigo. Onboarding her we found 16 red-hot shotto fire at us. Sent officers and crew onboard her to steer her home.

The Dreadnought brought theLyon home to Kingroad, an anchor-ing point at the mouth of the Avon,where it would lie until the windsand tide were suitable for sailing intothe port of Bristol. On July 16, anauction of the ship and goods wasadvertised in Felix Farley’s BristolJour nal, which valued the prize at£20,000.

Meanwhile, the Dreadnought had

continued its cruise, with morechases and encounters. The surgeondescribed stopping on Lundy Island.

Mr Crisp our linguist and self wentashore to kill some rabbits, returnedin six hours with a great many coupleof rabbits and good many murrs(guillemots) after a good deal of di-version. Lundy is an island aboutthree miles long, full of rabbits and inthe winter has plenty of woodcocks.There is but one family (on the island)which consists of a man, his wife andfour children. They rent the island at£10 per annum and pay their rent withthe skins of rabbits, and murr feath-ers. About 12 o’clock at night all handswere called to quarters – for there wasa privateer come round the point with-in gun shot of us. We hailed her andfound her to be the Tygress of Bid-

deford. She with other privateers hadtaken six outward-bound St Domingomen.

Two days later the surgeon wentashore with the linguist (presumablya French interpreter), the captainand first lieutenant to shoot morerabbits and guillemots.

The surgeon recorded: “This day Iwas very near being shot – on theisland by the carelessness of ourc ap t a i n . ”

In another incident, the captain ofanother ship invited the captain ofthe Dreadnought to dine with him.The surgeon reported that the cap-tain “we n t … and returned at 10o’clock at night, after getting sodrunk that he tumbled out of theb o at ”.

Occasionally the crew members

were unruly – and towards the end ofthe cruise, they were keen to returnhome. But the captain insisted onstaying at sea for several more days.

Throughout the text, the surgeonincluded notes on medical treatmenthe provided. And there are furtherdetails in two sections at the end – ‘Anaccount of the sick men with theirdiseases’ and ‘An account of the casesin surgery’.

Most of those treated suffered fromfever – although there were singlecases of dysentery and smallpox – bu tdeath, accidents and injuries werealso recorded.

In an attack on a French ship, “oneman was shot through the heart –dead”, another lost an ear to a cannonball and more suffered other injuries.On the same occasion, the surgeondescribed how the ship’s carpenter

� RETIRED solicitor NigelSommerville is one of thevolunteers at the Bristol RecordOffice. He transcribed the journal,and will be giving a free talkabout it at M shed at 6pm onThursday, November 21.

He got into volunteering atBRO when he inherited some oldElizabethan-era legal documents.

He said: “When I retired 12years ago I thought I would takethem down to the BRO so thatthey could be looked afterproperly. While talking to the staffthere the idea emerged ofvolunteering to do some amateurarchiving, cataloguing some ofthe documents, particularly oldlegal documents, which had notyet been catalogued. I have beendoing that ever since.”

Transcribing the journal wasnot that difficult as it was fairlylegible. Parts of it are amusing.Mr Sommerville said: “Thesurgeon did not seem to have avery high opinion of the captain. NOWADAYS we talk of privat-

isation of state enterprisesas though it was somethinginvented only in the 1980s.But our 18th-century fore-

bears would have understood the ideai m m e d i at e ly.

In wars, the British Governmentlicensed merchant ships as privateers– legally entitled to prey upon enemyshipping and keep most or all of theproceeds. It was a way of damagingthe enemy’s economy that came at nocost to the taxpayer. Ship owners andtheir crews took all the risk – alongwith the businessmen who usuallyflocked to invest in privateer voy-a g es.

Bristol was never a naval port andonly occasionally built, refitted andhosted warships. But the city’s mer-chant classes knew a potential profitwhen they saw one.

The most famous Bristol privateervoyage was that of the Duke and theDuchess, during the War of SpanishSuccession.

Commanded by Woodes Rogers andnavigated by William Dampier, the

was sent “raving mad” with fear.There were also several accidents onthe ship, such as men falling from therigging or overboard.

There is little reference to the fateof the French crews except for:“When I came on board I found theFrenchman dead as was wounded inthe abdomen, sewed him up in hishammock and tossed him over-b o a rd ”.

The diary ended when the shiparrived at Hungroad, another an-choring point on the River Avon.While the cruise had been a com-mercial success, the crew were gladthat it had ended.

On this date, October 31, the sur-geon wrote: “Cast anchor at Hung-road and all people went ashore. AndGod be praised I am once morelanded in old England safe.”

FROM PAGE 1

two Bristol ships spent the years 1708to 1711 preying on Spanish shipping.They also rescued Alexander Selkirk– later the model for Daniel Defoe’sRobinson Crusoe – from a desert is-land along the way. It was a stu-pendous feat of leadership andnavigation which travelled fullyaround the world and brought back animmense haul of plunder.

During the Seven Years’ War (1754to 1763), Britain was at war withFrance and, later, Spain. The enemy’sseaborne commerce provided richpickings – so rich that Bristol’s busi-nessmen fitted out and put to sea atleast 60 ships, including Dread-

nought.At first, the privateer crews were

popular heroes and their exploits cel-ebrated. In April 1758, the Phoenix –16 guns and 90 men – captured theFrench privateer Bellona, which had20 heavier guns and 120 men. ThePhoenix came within hailing dis-tance of the Frenchman at night andpretended to be the Royal Navy shipTartar, which at this time was theterror of French privateers. TheFrench crew surrendered at once. Afew weeks later, a Bristol ship ran intoa French port, cut out 14 French ves-sels from their moorings and broughthome two of them, along with theirvaluable cargoes of wine. This wasdone in broad daylight in full view of11 French warships.

Meanwhile, the Royal Navy was notidle. Later in 1758, French first-raterBelliqueux was reported lying offLundy. The news was brought to Cap-tain Saumarez of HMS Antelope, 60guns, lying in Kingroad. Captain Sau-marez was at a ball at Hotwells thatevening, and rushed to his ship, ac-companied by several thrill-seeking

Bristolians who volunteered on thespot. Antelope moved along the Bris-tol Channel as fast as she could, cap-tured the Belliqueux and her crew of470 and towed her to Kingroad.

The privateer crews, drawn by thepromise of adventure and big money,were often a rough lot, terrorisingdockside areas. If the authorities evertried to arrest any of them, they wouldturn out mob-handed to rescue theirshipmates. Likewise they collectivelyresisted attempts by press gangs to getthem into the Navy. This could get sovicious that at pubs in Long Ashtonand Marsh Street, press gangs andprivateersmen exchanged gunfire.This also happened in Cardiff, wherethe gang tried to press 70 men of theBristol ship Eagle – at least one manwas killed and several wounded.

By 1759, most French ships hadbeen swept from the sea, and Bris-tolians were fed up with the lawless-ness of the privateers. There was nomore profit to be made and that yearonly one privateer was fitted for sea.The golden age of Bristol’s legalisedpiracy was over.

There are some sarcasticcomments about the captain,particularly when he got drunk –which he did several times duringthe cruise, on one occasioncausing the surgeon and thelieutenant to move out of thecabin ‘to mess where twas morea g re e a b l e ’.”

So if Mr Sommerville had beenaround in the 1750s, would hehave sailed on a privateer?

He said: “If I was a seaman inmy early 20s I would have beenvery tempted to sign up on aprivateer, for the excitement andthe chance of earning asubstantial sum by way of prizemoney. The ordinary seamen onthe Dreadnought got more than£57 prize money each from afour-month cruise, whichcompares with an averagem e rc h a n t - s e a m a n ’s wages of £2a month. If I was the age I amnow, nothing would have inducedme to join the crew of ap r i v a t e e r. ”

Treasure trovePrivateer diaryreveals life onocean wave

EXPLORE Your Archive – w w w.explor eyourarchive.org – is anational campaign to encouragepeople to discover more abouta rc h i v e s .

Bristol Record Office is takingpart to tell the story of theD re a d n o u g h t .

There are talks and tours, andyou can follow the story of theDreadnought online or use BRO’sonline guides to find sources foryour own research into the city’smaritime past.

EVENTS:

� The Dreadnought journal: acruise against the enemies ofGreat Britain.

Thursday, November 21, Mshed, 6pm to 7.30pm,admission free and no need tobook.

Hear more about theDreadnought from NigelSommerville, who hastranscribed and researched thejour nal.

The event is part of theUniversity of the West ofEngland Regional History Centreand M shed seminarp ro g r a m m e .

EXPLORE YOUR

ARCHIVE 2013

� Bristolprivateersfrom a laterperiod, thistime theNapoleonicWars, tiedup atH u n g ro a din the early1800s.Painting byArthurWildeParsons.Courtesy ofBristolMuseums,Galleries andA rc h i v e sBMAG K442

Nothing new about privatisation

Retired solicitor’s 12years of cataloguing

� Bristol RecordOffice volunteerNigel Sommervillewith theD re a d n o u g h tjournal; above, itscover and titlepage Courtesy ofBristol Museums,Galleries andArchives BRO 44938

The privateer crews,drawn by the promise ofadventure and bigmoney, were often arough lot, terrorisingdockside areas.

“

� Explore Your Archivebehind-the-scenes tours atBristol Record Office –Wednesday, November 20, 2pm;Tuesday, November 26, 2pm;Wednesday, December 4, 2pm;Thursday, December 5, 6pm,Bristol Record Office, B BondWarehouse, Smeaton Road,Bristol, BS1 6XN.

Join Bristol Record Office staffbehind the scenes and hear howthe city’s archives are preservedand used. These tours will havea special focus on records of theport, overseas trade andBristol’s privateering past. Toursinvolve walking, standing andusing a lift. Cost – £5. To book aplace, call Bristol Record Officeon 0117 922 4224 (Tuesdays toFridays).

� OnlineExtracts from the diary will be

serialised online from November16.

Tw i t t e r :w w w. t w i t t e r. c o m / b r i s t o l r o

Facebook:w w w. f a c e b o o k . c o m /bristolr ecordoffice

Storify: h t t p : / / s t o r i f y. c o m /BristolRO/dr eadnought

RESEARCH

� Bristol Record Office haspublished two source guides onits website for people interestedin researching Bristol’s maritimeh i s t o r y.

See w w w. b r i s t o l . g o v. u k /explor eyourarchive to downloadthese free guides.

� Mshed

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2 Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013 3Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013w w w. bristolpost.co.uk w w w. bristolpost.co.uk

these owners as John Harbord,Jonah Thomas, Samuel Thomas andWilliam Wasbrough, who were mer-chants from Bristol.

The author of the diary, the ship’ssurgeon, is unknown. The surgeonwas named Samuel Pye in the letterof marque – but a later advert forcrew in Felix Farley’s Bristol Journal(May 7, 1757) stated that “an ablesurgeon is wanted”.

Britain was at war with France, sojoining a privateer could be verylucrative for the crew who were paida proportion of each prize captured.

The amount varied by rank, withthe surgeon receiving six times morethan a regular seaman. His financialaccount at the back of the diaryshows that he earned more than £340for the cruise. This was at a timewhen a skilled working man earningan honest living would be very for-tunate to make £5 in a month.

The ship was well armed and had acrew of about 120 men. The surgeonmentioned treating about 50 of theseduring the cruise – everything fromdislocated thumbs to musket-ballwo u n d s.

Our anonymous surgeon’s journalcovers a four-month journey frombeginning to end, during which theDreadnought cruised areas frequen-ted by French ships, probably head-ing towards the Bay of Biscay. TheDreadnought chased and capturedmany vessels in case they wereFrench. Those that were could becaptured and sold, along with theirc a r g o.

On June 1, the Dreadnought cap-tured the Lyon, which was travellingfrom St Domingo to Bordeaux with acargo of coffee, sugar and indigo fromslave plantations in the West Indies.

At 4am saw three sail to the east-ward and perceived them to steer dif-ferent courses. We singled out thelargest and gave chase. At 1pm firedthree guns at her and she struck hercolours. She proved to be a large snowfrom St Domingo to Bordeaux ladenwith coffee, sugar and indigo. Onboarding her we found 16 red-hot shotto fire at us. Sent officers and crew onboard her to steer her home.

The Dreadnought brought theLyon home to Kingroad, an anchor-ing point at the mouth of the Avon,where it would lie until the windsand tide were suitable for sailing intothe port of Bristol. On July 16, anauction of the ship and goods wasadvertised in Felix Farley’s BristolJour nal, which valued the prize at£20,000.

Meanwhile, the Dreadnought had

continued its cruise, with morechases and encounters. The surgeondescribed stopping on Lundy Island.

Mr Crisp our linguist and self wentashore to kill some rabbits, returnedin six hours with a great many coupleof rabbits and good many murrs(guillemots) after a good deal of di-version. Lundy is an island aboutthree miles long, full of rabbits and inthe winter has plenty of woodcocks.There is but one family (on the island)which consists of a man, his wife andfour children. They rent the island at£10 per annum and pay their rent withthe skins of rabbits, and murr feath-ers. About 12 o’clock at night all handswere called to quarters – for there wasa privateer come round the point with-in gun shot of us. We hailed her andfound her to be the Tygress of Bid-

deford. She with other privateers hadtaken six outward-bound St Domingomen.

Two days later the surgeon wentashore with the linguist (presumablya French interpreter), the captainand first lieutenant to shoot morerabbits and guillemots.

The surgeon recorded: “This day Iwas very near being shot – on theisland by the carelessness of ourc ap t a i n . ”

In another incident, the captain ofanother ship invited the captain ofthe Dreadnought to dine with him.The surgeon reported that the cap-tain “we n t … and returned at 10o’clock at night, after getting sodrunk that he tumbled out of theb o at ”.

Occasionally the crew members

were unruly – and towards the end ofthe cruise, they were keen to returnhome. But the captain insisted onstaying at sea for several more days.

Throughout the text, the surgeonincluded notes on medical treatmenthe provided. And there are furtherdetails in two sections at the end – ‘Anaccount of the sick men with theirdiseases’ and ‘An account of the casesin surgery’.

Most of those treated suffered fromfever – although there were singlecases of dysentery and smallpox – bu tdeath, accidents and injuries werealso recorded.

In an attack on a French ship, “oneman was shot through the heart –dead”, another lost an ear to a cannonball and more suffered other injuries.On the same occasion, the surgeondescribed how the ship’s carpenter

� RETIRED solicitor NigelSommerville is one of thevolunteers at the Bristol RecordOffice. He transcribed the journal,and will be giving a free talkabout it at M shed at 6pm onThursday, November 21.

He got into volunteering atBRO when he inherited some oldElizabethan-era legal documents.

He said: “When I retired 12years ago I thought I would takethem down to the BRO so thatthey could be looked afterproperly. While talking to the staffthere the idea emerged ofvolunteering to do some amateurarchiving, cataloguing some ofthe documents, particularly oldlegal documents, which had notyet been catalogued. I have beendoing that ever since.”

Transcribing the journal wasnot that difficult as it was fairlylegible. Parts of it are amusing.Mr Sommerville said: “Thesurgeon did not seem to have avery high opinion of the captain. NOWADAYS we talk of privat-

isation of state enterprisesas though it was somethinginvented only in the 1980s.But our 18th-century fore-

bears would have understood the ideai m m e d i at e ly.

In wars, the British Governmentlicensed merchant ships as privateers– legally entitled to prey upon enemyshipping and keep most or all of theproceeds. It was a way of damagingthe enemy’s economy that came at nocost to the taxpayer. Ship owners andtheir crews took all the risk – alongwith the businessmen who usuallyflocked to invest in privateer voy-a g es.

Bristol was never a naval port andonly occasionally built, refitted andhosted warships. But the city’s mer-chant classes knew a potential profitwhen they saw one.

The most famous Bristol privateervoyage was that of the Duke and theDuchess, during the War of SpanishSuccession.

Commanded by Woodes Rogers andnavigated by William Dampier, the

was sent “raving mad” with fear.There were also several accidents onthe ship, such as men falling from therigging or overboard.

There is little reference to the fateof the French crews except for:“When I came on board I found theFrenchman dead as was wounded inthe abdomen, sewed him up in hishammock and tossed him over-b o a rd ”.

The diary ended when the shiparrived at Hungroad, another an-choring point on the River Avon.While the cruise had been a com-mercial success, the crew were gladthat it had ended.

On this date, October 31, the sur-geon wrote: “Cast anchor at Hung-road and all people went ashore. AndGod be praised I am once morelanded in old England safe.”

FROM PAGE 1

two Bristol ships spent the years 1708to 1711 preying on Spanish shipping.They also rescued Alexander Selkirk– later the model for Daniel Defoe’sRobinson Crusoe – from a desert is-land along the way. It was a stu-pendous feat of leadership andnavigation which travelled fullyaround the world and brought back animmense haul of plunder.

During the Seven Years’ War (1754to 1763), Britain was at war withFrance and, later, Spain. The enemy’sseaborne commerce provided richpickings – so rich that Bristol’s busi-nessmen fitted out and put to sea atleast 60 ships, including Dread-

nought.At first, the privateer crews were

popular heroes and their exploits cel-ebrated. In April 1758, the Phoenix –16 guns and 90 men – captured theFrench privateer Bellona, which had20 heavier guns and 120 men. ThePhoenix came within hailing dis-tance of the Frenchman at night andpretended to be the Royal Navy shipTartar, which at this time was theterror of French privateers. TheFrench crew surrendered at once. Afew weeks later, a Bristol ship ran intoa French port, cut out 14 French ves-sels from their moorings and broughthome two of them, along with theirvaluable cargoes of wine. This wasdone in broad daylight in full view of11 French warships.

Meanwhile, the Royal Navy was notidle. Later in 1758, French first-raterBelliqueux was reported lying offLundy. The news was brought to Cap-tain Saumarez of HMS Antelope, 60guns, lying in Kingroad. Captain Sau-marez was at a ball at Hotwells thatevening, and rushed to his ship, ac-companied by several thrill-seeking

Bristolians who volunteered on thespot. Antelope moved along the Bris-tol Channel as fast as she could, cap-tured the Belliqueux and her crew of470 and towed her to Kingroad.

The privateer crews, drawn by thepromise of adventure and big money,were often a rough lot, terrorisingdockside areas. If the authorities evertried to arrest any of them, they wouldturn out mob-handed to rescue theirshipmates. Likewise they collectivelyresisted attempts by press gangs to getthem into the Navy. This could get sovicious that at pubs in Long Ashtonand Marsh Street, press gangs andprivateersmen exchanged gunfire.This also happened in Cardiff, wherethe gang tried to press 70 men of theBristol ship Eagle – at least one manwas killed and several wounded.

By 1759, most French ships hadbeen swept from the sea, and Bris-tolians were fed up with the lawless-ness of the privateers. There was nomore profit to be made and that yearonly one privateer was fitted for sea.The golden age of Bristol’s legalisedpiracy was over.

There are some sarcasticcomments about the captain,particularly when he got drunk –which he did several times duringthe cruise, on one occasioncausing the surgeon and thelieutenant to move out of thecabin ‘to mess where twas morea g re e a b l e ’.”

So if Mr Sommerville had beenaround in the 1750s, would hehave sailed on a privateer?

He said: “If I was a seaman inmy early 20s I would have beenvery tempted to sign up on aprivateer, for the excitement andthe chance of earning asubstantial sum by way of prizemoney. The ordinary seamen onthe Dreadnought got more than£57 prize money each from afour-month cruise, whichcompares with an averagem e rc h a n t - s e a m a n ’s wages of £2a month. If I was the age I amnow, nothing would have inducedme to join the crew of ap r i v a t e e r. ”

Treasure trovePrivateer diaryreveals life onocean wave

EXPLORE Your Archive – w w w.explor eyourarchive.org – is anational campaign to encouragepeople to discover more abouta rc h i v e s .

Bristol Record Office is takingpart to tell the story of theD re a d n o u g h t .

There are talks and tours, andyou can follow the story of theDreadnought online or use BRO’sonline guides to find sources foryour own research into the city’smaritime past.

EVENTS:

� The Dreadnought journal: acruise against the enemies ofGreat Britain.

Thursday, November 21, Mshed, 6pm to 7.30pm,admission free and no need tobook.

Hear more about theDreadnought from NigelSommerville, who hastranscribed and researched thejour nal.

The event is part of theUniversity of the West ofEngland Regional History Centreand M shed seminarp ro g r a m m e .

EXPLORE YOUR

ARCHIVE 2013

� Bristolprivateersfrom a laterperiod, thistime theNapoleonicWars, tiedup atH u n g ro a din the early1800s.Painting byArthurWildeParsons.Courtesy ofBristolMuseums,Galleries andA rc h i v e sBMAG K442

Nothing new about privatisation

Retired solicitor’s 12years of cataloguing

� Bristol RecordOffice volunteerNigel Sommervillewith theD re a d n o u g h tjournal; above, itscover and titlepage Courtesy ofBristol Museums,Galleries andArchives BRO 44938

The privateer crews,drawn by the promise ofadventure and bigmoney, were often arough lot, terrorisingdockside areas.

“

� Explore Your Archivebehind-the-scenes tours atBristol Record Office –Wednesday, November 20, 2pm;Tuesday, November 26, 2pm;Wednesday, December 4, 2pm;Thursday, December 5, 6pm,Bristol Record Office, B BondWarehouse, Smeaton Road,Bristol, BS1 6XN.

Join Bristol Record Office staffbehind the scenes and hear howthe city’s archives are preservedand used. These tours will havea special focus on records of theport, overseas trade andBristol’s privateering past. Toursinvolve walking, standing andusing a lift. Cost – £5. To book aplace, call Bristol Record Officeon 0117 922 4224 (Tuesdays toFridays).

� OnlineExtracts from the diary will be

serialised online from November16.

Tw i t t e r :w w w. t w i t t e r. c o m / b r i s t o l r o

Facebook:w w w. f a c e b o o k . c o m /bristolr ecordoffice

Storify: h t t p : / / s t o r i f y. c o m /BristolRO/dr eadnought

RESEARCH

� Bristol Record Office haspublished two source guides onits website for people interestedin researching Bristol’s maritimeh i s t o r y.

See w w w. b r i s t o l . g o v. u k /explor eyourarchive to downloadthese free guides.

� Mshed

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4 Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013 5Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013w w w. bristolpost.co.uk w w w. bristolpost.co.uk

Gory story Bookuncovers howc a st l e ’s ownersmet a grisly end

IF YOU live in the Bristol area,you know you are going up in theworld if you dine at ThornburyCastle, or get invited to a dothere. It is a prestigious hotel –

and wedding venue – in a very pres-tigious building.

Thornbury Castle is not, strictlyspeaking, a proper castle. But it isvery old. There was a medievalmanor house on the site, and parts ofthe present building date from theearly 1500s. And it has an aston-ishingly-colourful history.

In Anglo-Saxon times the manor ofThornbury was among the landhold-ings of Earl Bethric (sometimes speltBrictric). He was part of a diplomaticmission to the court of Baldwin,Count of Flanders, when Baldwin’sdaughter Matilda took a shine to him.The silly man spurned her advances,so she married someone else. Too badfor Earl Bethric that she had trans-ferred her affections to William theConqueror. Following the Norman in-vasion, she saw to it that Bethric’slands were confiscated and that hewas left to rot and die in prison.

By the middle ages the manor wasin the hands of the earls of Stafford.And in the 15th century HumphreyStafford was created first Duke ofBuckingham. These were people ofgreat consequence.

The builder of Thornbury Castlewas Edward Stafford, third Duke ofBuckingham. He was the wealthiestpeer in England.

His estates, spread across Englandand Wales, included 11 castles, 124manors and numerous smaller prop-erties. He owned vast woodlands, and8,000 deer roamed his nine forests and24 parks.

Buckingham, however, got too bigfor his boots. It was his misfortune tobe an alpha male during the reign of

The newly-published history of Thornbury Castle isa tale of blood, guts, treachery and infidelity, as wellas good taste, as Eugene Byrne explains.

the greatest alpha male in Englishhistory – King Henry VIII.

The circumstances around Buck-ingham’s fall from grace are mys-terious. What we do know is that heliked pomp and show as much asHenry did. Buckingham was alwaysdressed very richly, followed aroundby a train of retainers and flunkeys.

What we also know is that Henry’sclaim to the throne was almost asrickety as his father’s had been. If youwant to spend time studying the fam-ily trees of the English nobility fromthe time, you can spot plenty of peoplewho could lay just as plausible aclaim to being the rightful king asHenry could.

Buckingham was one of them. TheStaffords had been top dogs for gen-erations. Many of them had died aviolent death during the Wars of theRoses, and were related to most of theother great families of the land. Buck-ingham kept in touch with all his

relations, and by 1520 Henry sus-pected he was plotting against himand began to gather evidence.

Historians cannot agree whetheror not Buckingham genuinely waslooking to overthrow Henry. It wouldnot have been surprising if he was.Henry summoned him and he wasput on trial, accused of treason.

Whether he was guilty or innocentwas irrelevant. The outcome of thetrial was a foregone conclusion, andBuckingham was executed on TowerHill on May 17, 1521.

Tony Cherry – a local historian anda volunteer at Thornbury museum –takes up the story.

He said: “It was in the genes thatBuckingham would not die of naturalc a u s e s.

“His great, great grandfather hadbeen killed at the Battle of Shrews-bury in 1403, his great grandfatherhad been killed at the Battle ofNorthampton in 1460, his grandfath-

20th, the castle remained a familyresidence. The castle was sold in 1959and the estate broken up over thefollowing decades.

It is only now that the whole storyfrom the times of Earl Bethric to thepresent has been told in book form.

Mr Cherry said: “Meg and I arevolunteers at Thornbury and DistrictMuseum.

“We often got visitors asking if wehad anything on the castle and wehad nothing to offer. For years wehave been accumulating informationbut never had it in a form to hand outso I thought I would put a book to-gether. This was with museum'sbl e s s i n g .

“I wrote the book but Meg has aninsatiable desire to hunt out moreand more facts. Without her input thebook would have been much duller.Thornbury and District Museum isrun by volunteers and there is aculture of collaboration. Everyone

shares their information and sup-ports each other.”

One of Ms Wise’s contributions, forinstance, was uncovering the will ofHenry Howard, Earl of Stafford, whoowned the castle in the early 1700s. Hehad married Claude Charlotte, thedaughter of the French Comte deGramont, who may have been at onepoint a mistress of the son of LouisX I V.

Henry did not really like his wife.In his will he said: “I give to the worstof women (except being a whore) whois guilty of all ills, the daughter of MrGramont, a Frenchwoman who I haveunfortunately married, five and 40brass halfpence, which will buy her apullet supper, a greater sum than herfather can often make her; for I haveknown when he had neither money orcredit for such a purchase, he beingthe worst of men, and his wife theworst of women, in all debaucher-i e s. ”

Mr Cherry said that the biggestsurprise in researching the full storywas “just how many of the Staffordfamily came to a gruesome end”.

He said: “When Edward Staffordwas beheaded he was the fifth gen-eration to die a violent death. Thenone of his grandsons was be-headed.”

Mr Cherry’s favourite charactersin this colourful tale are the Duke ofBuckingham and Henry Howard.

Mr Cherry said: “Henry Howardrevived the castle in the 1850s.Without his love of hunting and hisconsiderable fortune, the castlewould, at best, be a ruin.”

A History Of Thornbury Castle isonly available from Thornbury andDistrict Museum, Chapel Street,Thornbury, priced £15. Visitwww.thornburymuseum.org.uk orcall 01454 857774.

Latimer’sDiary

Time to stand upfor pedestrians

ALLRIGHT? There’s a lot ofwhat Bristol East’s formerMP Tony Benn would call“ishoos” in the Po s t at themoment, isn’t there?

Frinstance, last week the ChiefConstable was reportedly looking tore-start some of the speed camerasRound These Parts.

Igor! My soap-box and megaphone,if you please!

Turning the Gatsos on again isobviously a good thing. Yesireebob.All good. Catching speeding motor-ists. Marvellous. Go for it.

Just as long as, for every car-driverfined for speeding, they impose anequal and corresponding fine onsomeone for riding a bike on thep ave m e n t .

I know this is an issue that gets a lotof people hot under the collar, andthat the war between the motoristand the cyclist is one of the thingsthat keeps the Post’s letters page andwebsite comments sections in busi-ness, but this here column franklycalls a pox on both their houses.

This column SUPPORTS THE PED-ESTRIAN, and I think it’s high timeus pedestrians RECLAIM our cityfrom selfish, irresponsible IDIOTSON BOTH TWO WHEELS ANDFOUR!

To the barricades comrades! Who’swith me?!!!

[Sound of crickets]W h at ’s all this rant-

ing got to do with his-tory?

I’ve been doing alittle research intothe history of speed-ing in Bristol. I’ve notyet unearthed the firstspeeding fine imposed on a driver, buth e re ’s a case from 1906 …

In August that year William Fraserof Peckham was charged with drivinga motor car at a dangerous speedalong St Augustine’s Parade. Bristolmagistrates fined him £5 (equivalentto a month’s pay for a skilled workingman at this time) plus costs. Chair ofthe magistrates, Colonel Coates, said:“Some of you fellows are a perfectnuisance and a pest to society andd o n’t care what you knock down andwho you run over!”

Fraser said he was unable to paythe fine as he only had £2, but thebeak – God love him! – w a s n’t going toput up with any nonsense and said:“You will have to pay the fine or go toprison. People who keep these in-fernal things [i.e. cars] can afford topay fines.”

And the speed the wretched Fraserhad been doing at the time of theoffence? The arresting constable es-timated it was a breakneck 15 milesper hour.

A few years later Bristol’s WatchCommittee – the council body re-sponsible for law and order – con-sidered imposing a 10mph speed limitin the city, but decided in the end thatthey would leave it to the police todecide on a case-by-case basis wheth-er or not anyone was driving reck-l e s s ly.

A whole different world, I tell you.

1954-1974’ and traces not just thehistory of the school itself duringthis period, but also its teachingstaff and large numbers of pupils.

If you’re an Old Hengrovian andyou don’t already possess a copy,then you really need to get hold ofone. If you are not, but have an OldHengrovian in your life, that’s theirChristmas present sorted. Betterstill, if you know a Hengrovianamong the Bristol diaspora world-wide, out in Oz, America, New Zea-land, wherever, you’re in good timeto mail them a copy for Christmas.

Trust me on this – there are notenough superlatives in the thesaur-us to do this book justice. If someonehad produced a book a tenth as goodabout my old school, I would happilypay twice the price – £16.99 – they’reasking for this one.

Your money gets you almost 400pages. There’s the serious history ofone of Bristol’s first comprehensiveschools and a wealth of old pressclippings ranging from serious news

stories through to reviews of schoolproductions. There are school doc-uments too, prizegiving pro-grammes, lots and lots of groupphotos of teams and productioncasts and loads ofwhere-are-they-now material aboutformer pupils.

Oh, and there’s also a CD of musicfrom a couple of school perform-ances from back in the day.

My predecessor-but-one at BristolTimes, the late, and genuinely great,David Harrison, gets a mention as aformer pupil. He would have thor-oughly approved of this book.

Copies are available, price £16.99,from Broadwalk News newsagentsat 11 Broad Walk, Knowle, Bris-tol.BS4 2RA. Tel: 0117 9777814. Oryou can order it by post from Hen-grove School History Project, c/o 262Wells Road, Knowle, Bristol BS42PN. This costs £19.84 to include£2.85 P&P. Cheques should be pay-able to ‘Hengrove School HistoryP ro j e c t . ’

A go on the sliderAND finally, one of those little thingsthat make this one of the best jobs inthe world …

We had a phone call the other dayfrom Mrs Eileen Tomlin about theBristol Times Picture of the Weekfrom two editions ago.

This was of the famous rock slideclose to the Observatory and CliftonSuspension Bridge. She said that’sher son, aged four, in the picturelooking on as the other children arehaving a go on the slider. Youwo u l d n’t know it from this photo, butyoung Mark Tomlin would one daycaptain Bristol Rugby Club.

“We used to keep a pub in CliftonVilla g e,” Mrs Tomlin told us. “T hePortland Vaults, at the end of Port-land Street, though it got pulled downa long time ago.

“We didn’t have a back garden or

anything, so my mother used to takethe children up to the Downs to play.At the slide she would put my daugh-ter Sonia on her lap … She’d say, ‘Doyou want to slide down? Don’t tellyour mother, mind!’ So at the age of 69she’d be sliding down with my daugh-ter, who’d have been two years old, onher lap.

“I didn’t find out about this foryears! My daughter never told meabout it until she was about 12.”

See, I have this theory that the rockslide was not just created by children,but also by adults using it down thedecades – maybe centuries – too. MrsTo m l i n’s delightful story is a smallshred of evidence.

Cheers then!

� Get in touch: EmailBristol.Times@b-nm.co.uk or writeto Bristol Times, Bristol Post,Temple Way, Bristol BS2 0BY.

Atte n t i o nOld HengroviansI LOVE this here picture. It’s 1966and a Russian ship has docked inBristol. It’s the height of the ColdWar and the visitors are obviouslyvery exotic. The Soviet Union ismysterious and enigmatic, but oneof the things everyone knew aboutthe Ivans was that they love a gameof chess.

So one of the teachers at HengroveSchool fixed it so that some of hisstar chess players could go head tohead with sailors from the world’sgreatest chess-playing superpower.In this picture we see Hengrovepupil David Bagshawe playing one ofthe Russians. Looks a fairly evengame to me.

This is only one of a huge col-lection of photos and memories in astupendously wonderful book that’srecently been published by the Hen-grove School History Project Team.

It’s titled ‘Hengrove School Bristol

er had probably died from woundsacquired at the Battle of St Albans in1458 and his father had been be-headed in 1483.”

Mr Cherry has just published AHistory Of Thornbury Castle. Writtenin association with Meg Wise, it is afine read. But then it has some greatmaterial to work with.

B u ck i n g h a m ’s land and posses-sions were confiscated by the crown,so Henry became the owner of thenew and as-yet unfinished Thorn-bury Castle. He and Anne Boleynstayed there for ten days in 1535.Henry was meant to visit Bristol butcancelled the trip on hearing reportsof an outbreak of plague there.

So the castle passed through vari-ous royal and aristocratic handsdown the years, eventually becomingthe property of the Howard family.

Henry Howard started to renovateand restore it in the 1850s. Throughthe 19th century and well into the

� Right, Thornbury Castle today; above, a computer-generated image ofwhat Thornbury Castle probably looked in like Tudor times, complete withknot garden Photo: Thornbury and District Museum

� Left, Tony Cherry andfriend. Mr Cherry said:“We often got visitorsasking if we had anythingon the castle and we hadnothing to offer.”� Right, members of theHoward family on theirbikes at ThornburyCastle, 1872. Tony Cherrysaid: “Given thatphotographs needed avery long exposure atthat time, how did theymanage to take a photoof people moving whileriding a bike? If you lookcarefully you can see thepoles they are restingtheir feet on.”Photo: Thornbury and DistrictMuseum

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Gory story Bookuncovers howc a st l e ’s ownersmet a grisly end

IF YOU live in the Bristol area,you know you are going up in theworld if you dine at ThornburyCastle, or get invited to a dothere. It is a prestigious hotel –

and wedding venue – in a very pres-tigious building.

Thornbury Castle is not, strictlyspeaking, a proper castle. But it isvery old. There was a medievalmanor house on the site, and parts ofthe present building date from theearly 1500s. And it has an aston-ishingly-colourful history.

In Anglo-Saxon times the manor ofThornbury was among the landhold-ings of Earl Bethric (sometimes speltBrictric). He was part of a diplomaticmission to the court of Baldwin,Count of Flanders, when Baldwin’sdaughter Matilda took a shine to him.The silly man spurned her advances,so she married someone else. Too badfor Earl Bethric that she had trans-ferred her affections to William theConqueror. Following the Norman in-vasion, she saw to it that Bethric’slands were confiscated and that hewas left to rot and die in prison.

By the middle ages the manor wasin the hands of the earls of Stafford.And in the 15th century HumphreyStafford was created first Duke ofBuckingham. These were people ofgreat consequence.

The builder of Thornbury Castlewas Edward Stafford, third Duke ofBuckingham. He was the wealthiestpeer in England.

His estates, spread across Englandand Wales, included 11 castles, 124manors and numerous smaller prop-erties. He owned vast woodlands, and8,000 deer roamed his nine forests and24 parks.

Buckingham, however, got too bigfor his boots. It was his misfortune tobe an alpha male during the reign of

The newly-published history of Thornbury Castle isa tale of blood, guts, treachery and infidelity, as wellas good taste, as Eugene Byrne explains.

the greatest alpha male in Englishhistory – King Henry VIII.

The circumstances around Buck-ingham’s fall from grace are mys-terious. What we do know is that heliked pomp and show as much asHenry did. Buckingham was alwaysdressed very richly, followed aroundby a train of retainers and flunkeys.

What we also know is that Henry’sclaim to the throne was almost asrickety as his father’s had been. If youwant to spend time studying the fam-ily trees of the English nobility fromthe time, you can spot plenty of peoplewho could lay just as plausible aclaim to being the rightful king asHenry could.

Buckingham was one of them. TheStaffords had been top dogs for gen-erations. Many of them had died aviolent death during the Wars of theRoses, and were related to most of theother great families of the land. Buck-ingham kept in touch with all his

relations, and by 1520 Henry sus-pected he was plotting against himand began to gather evidence.

Historians cannot agree whetheror not Buckingham genuinely waslooking to overthrow Henry. It wouldnot have been surprising if he was.Henry summoned him and he wasput on trial, accused of treason.

Whether he was guilty or innocentwas irrelevant. The outcome of thetrial was a foregone conclusion, andBuckingham was executed on TowerHill on May 17, 1521.

Tony Cherry – a local historian anda volunteer at Thornbury museum –takes up the story.

He said: “It was in the genes thatBuckingham would not die of naturalc a u s e s.

“His great, great grandfather hadbeen killed at the Battle of Shrews-bury in 1403, his great grandfatherhad been killed at the Battle ofNorthampton in 1460, his grandfath-

20th, the castle remained a familyresidence. The castle was sold in 1959and the estate broken up over thefollowing decades.

It is only now that the whole storyfrom the times of Earl Bethric to thepresent has been told in book form.

Mr Cherry said: “Meg and I arevolunteers at Thornbury and DistrictMuseum.

“We often got visitors asking if wehad anything on the castle and wehad nothing to offer. For years wehave been accumulating informationbut never had it in a form to hand outso I thought I would put a book to-gether. This was with museum'sbl e s s i n g .

“I wrote the book but Meg has aninsatiable desire to hunt out moreand more facts. Without her input thebook would have been much duller.Thornbury and District Museum isrun by volunteers and there is aculture of collaboration. Everyone

shares their information and sup-ports each other.”

One of Ms Wise’s contributions, forinstance, was uncovering the will ofHenry Howard, Earl of Stafford, whoowned the castle in the early 1700s. Hehad married Claude Charlotte, thedaughter of the French Comte deGramont, who may have been at onepoint a mistress of the son of LouisX I V.

Henry did not really like his wife.In his will he said: “I give to the worstof women (except being a whore) whois guilty of all ills, the daughter of MrGramont, a Frenchwoman who I haveunfortunately married, five and 40brass halfpence, which will buy her apullet supper, a greater sum than herfather can often make her; for I haveknown when he had neither money orcredit for such a purchase, he beingthe worst of men, and his wife theworst of women, in all debaucher-i e s. ”

Mr Cherry said that the biggestsurprise in researching the full storywas “just how many of the Staffordfamily came to a gruesome end”.

He said: “When Edward Staffordwas beheaded he was the fifth gen-eration to die a violent death. Thenone of his grandsons was be-headed.”

Mr Cherry’s favourite charactersin this colourful tale are the Duke ofBuckingham and Henry Howard.

Mr Cherry said: “Henry Howardrevived the castle in the 1850s.Without his love of hunting and hisconsiderable fortune, the castlewould, at best, be a ruin.”

A History Of Thornbury Castle isonly available from Thornbury andDistrict Museum, Chapel Street,Thornbury, priced £15. Visitwww.thornburymuseum.org.uk orcall 01454 857774.

Latimer’sDiary

Time to stand upfor pedestrians

ALLRIGHT? There’s a lot ofwhat Bristol East’s formerMP Tony Benn would call“ishoos” in the Po s t at themoment, isn’t there?

Frinstance, last week the ChiefConstable was reportedly looking tore-start some of the speed camerasRound These Parts.

Igor! My soap-box and megaphone,if you please!

Turning the Gatsos on again isobviously a good thing. Yesireebob.All good. Catching speeding motor-ists. Marvellous. Go for it.

Just as long as, for every car-driverfined for speeding, they impose anequal and corresponding fine onsomeone for riding a bike on thep ave m e n t .

I know this is an issue that gets a lotof people hot under the collar, andthat the war between the motoristand the cyclist is one of the thingsthat keeps the Post’s letters page andwebsite comments sections in busi-ness, but this here column franklycalls a pox on both their houses.

This column SUPPORTS THE PED-ESTRIAN, and I think it’s high timeus pedestrians RECLAIM our cityfrom selfish, irresponsible IDIOTSON BOTH TWO WHEELS ANDFOUR!

To the barricades comrades! Who’swith me?!!!

[Sound of crickets]W h at ’s all this rant-

ing got to do with his-tory?

I’ve been doing alittle research intothe history of speed-ing in Bristol. I’ve notyet unearthed the firstspeeding fine imposed on a driver, buth e re ’s a case from 1906 …

In August that year William Fraserof Peckham was charged with drivinga motor car at a dangerous speedalong St Augustine’s Parade. Bristolmagistrates fined him £5 (equivalentto a month’s pay for a skilled workingman at this time) plus costs. Chair ofthe magistrates, Colonel Coates, said:“Some of you fellows are a perfectnuisance and a pest to society andd o n’t care what you knock down andwho you run over!”

Fraser said he was unable to paythe fine as he only had £2, but thebeak – God love him! – w a s n’t going toput up with any nonsense and said:“You will have to pay the fine or go toprison. People who keep these in-fernal things [i.e. cars] can afford topay fines.”

And the speed the wretched Fraserhad been doing at the time of theoffence? The arresting constable es-timated it was a breakneck 15 milesper hour.

A few years later Bristol’s WatchCommittee – the council body re-sponsible for law and order – con-sidered imposing a 10mph speed limitin the city, but decided in the end thatthey would leave it to the police todecide on a case-by-case basis wheth-er or not anyone was driving reck-l e s s ly.

A whole different world, I tell you.

1954-1974’ and traces not just thehistory of the school itself duringthis period, but also its teachingstaff and large numbers of pupils.

If you’re an Old Hengrovian andyou don’t already possess a copy,then you really need to get hold ofone. If you are not, but have an OldHengrovian in your life, that’s theirChristmas present sorted. Betterstill, if you know a Hengrovianamong the Bristol diaspora world-wide, out in Oz, America, New Zea-land, wherever, you’re in good timeto mail them a copy for Christmas.

Trust me on this – there are notenough superlatives in the thesaur-us to do this book justice. If someonehad produced a book a tenth as goodabout my old school, I would happilypay twice the price – £16.99 – they’reasking for this one.

Your money gets you almost 400pages. There’s the serious history ofone of Bristol’s first comprehensiveschools and a wealth of old pressclippings ranging from serious news

stories through to reviews of schoolproductions. There are school doc-uments too, prizegiving pro-grammes, lots and lots of groupphotos of teams and productioncasts and loads ofwhere-are-they-now material aboutformer pupils.

Oh, and there’s also a CD of musicfrom a couple of school perform-ances from back in the day.

My predecessor-but-one at BristolTimes, the late, and genuinely great,David Harrison, gets a mention as aformer pupil. He would have thor-oughly approved of this book.

Copies are available, price £16.99,from Broadwalk News newsagentsat 11 Broad Walk, Knowle, Bris-tol.BS4 2RA. Tel: 0117 9777814. Oryou can order it by post from Hen-grove School History Project, c/o 262Wells Road, Knowle, Bristol BS42PN. This costs £19.84 to include£2.85 P&P. Cheques should be pay-able to ‘Hengrove School HistoryP ro j e c t . ’

A go on the sliderAND finally, one of those little thingsthat make this one of the best jobs inthe world …

We had a phone call the other dayfrom Mrs Eileen Tomlin about theBristol Times Picture of the Weekfrom two editions ago.

This was of the famous rock slideclose to the Observatory and CliftonSuspension Bridge. She said that’sher son, aged four, in the picturelooking on as the other children arehaving a go on the slider. Youwo u l d n’t know it from this photo, butyoung Mark Tomlin would one daycaptain Bristol Rugby Club.

“We used to keep a pub in CliftonVilla g e,” Mrs Tomlin told us. “T hePortland Vaults, at the end of Port-land Street, though it got pulled downa long time ago.

“We didn’t have a back garden or

anything, so my mother used to takethe children up to the Downs to play.At the slide she would put my daugh-ter Sonia on her lap … She’d say, ‘Doyou want to slide down? Don’t tellyour mother, mind!’ So at the age of 69she’d be sliding down with my daugh-ter, who’d have been two years old, onher lap.

“I didn’t find out about this foryears! My daughter never told meabout it until she was about 12.”

See, I have this theory that the rockslide was not just created by children,but also by adults using it down thedecades – maybe centuries – too. MrsTo m l i n’s delightful story is a smallshred of evidence.

Cheers then!

� Get in touch: EmailBristol.Times@b-nm.co.uk or writeto Bristol Times, Bristol Post,Temple Way, Bristol BS2 0BY.

Atte n t i o nOld HengroviansI LOVE this here picture. It’s 1966and a Russian ship has docked inBristol. It’s the height of the ColdWar and the visitors are obviouslyvery exotic. The Soviet Union ismysterious and enigmatic, but oneof the things everyone knew aboutthe Ivans was that they love a gameof chess.

So one of the teachers at HengroveSchool fixed it so that some of hisstar chess players could go head tohead with sailors from the world’sgreatest chess-playing superpower.In this picture we see Hengrovepupil David Bagshawe playing one ofthe Russians. Looks a fairly evengame to me.

This is only one of a huge col-lection of photos and memories in astupendously wonderful book that’srecently been published by the Hen-grove School History Project Team.

It’s titled ‘Hengrove School Bristol

er had probably died from woundsacquired at the Battle of St Albans in1458 and his father had been be-headed in 1483.”

Mr Cherry has just published AHistory Of Thornbury Castle. Writtenin association with Meg Wise, it is afine read. But then it has some greatmaterial to work with.

B u ck i n g h a m ’s land and posses-sions were confiscated by the crown,so Henry became the owner of thenew and as-yet unfinished Thorn-bury Castle. He and Anne Boleynstayed there for ten days in 1535.Henry was meant to visit Bristol butcancelled the trip on hearing reportsof an outbreak of plague there.

So the castle passed through vari-ous royal and aristocratic handsdown the years, eventually becomingthe property of the Howard family.

Henry Howard started to renovateand restore it in the 1850s. Throughthe 19th century and well into the

� Right, Thornbury Castle today; above, a computer-generated image ofwhat Thornbury Castle probably looked in like Tudor times, complete withknot garden Photo: Thornbury and District Museum

� Left, Tony Cherry andfriend. Mr Cherry said:“We often got visitorsasking if we had anythingon the castle and we hadnothing to offer.”� Right, members of theHoward family on theirbikes at ThornburyCastle, 1872. Tony Cherrysaid: “Given thatphotographs needed avery long exposure atthat time, how did theymanage to take a photoof people moving whileriding a bike? If you lookcarefully you can see thepoles they are restingtheir feet on.”Photo: Thornbury and DistrictMuseum

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6 Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013 7Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013w w w. bristolpost.co.uk w w w. bristolpost.co.uk

Footsteps into history

The story behind pupils’ bun bonanzaYESTERDAY, November 11, was theSociety of Merchant Venturers’ a n nu a lCharter Day.

That is the day on which the societycelebrates the charter it was grantedby King Charles I in 1639.

The society usually marks the day onNovember 10 each year. However, itpicks November 11 or 12 if November 10falls on a weekend.

It is a time-honoured tradition, andone of the most colourful in Bristol’scivic calendar.

Charter Days sees the new master ofthe society for the coming year takeof fice.

And he, together with two wardens,12 assistants and the treasurer, aresworn in at Merchants’ Hall after aservice in Bristol Cathedral.

The thing that many people knowabout Charter Day is that school pupilsare each given a bun and 10p.

And if you are thinking to yourself

that nowadays it might be more ap-propriate to give them a bag of crisps, acan of cola and a £10 note, you aremissing the point of tradition.

The custom of giving buns probablygoes back to Edward Colston, whoattended the Christ’s Hospital school inLondon.

Every Easter, Christ’s Hospital pu-pils were each given a cake and a smallbun known as a starver.

They were meant to eat the smallerconfection to stave off hunger whilethey were taking the bigger oneh o m e.

The society continues the custom astrustee of the Colston Hospital Found-ation – which supports the Colstonschools – and in memory of EdwardColston who was born on November 2by the Julian calendar or November 13by the modern, Gregorian, calendar.

Staunch Anglican that he was, Col-ston would probably have disapproved

of the Gregorian calendar as a Catholici nve n t i o n .

Britain was well behind most of therest of Europe in adopting the newcalendar, which had originally beenpromoted by the Pope, and did notswitch over until 1752, leading to amyth that the lower orders rioted in thebelief that they had been robbed of 11days of their life.

After Colston, later Merchant Ven-turers chipped in, so that the boys –there were no female pupils at this time– were given money as well as buns.

In his will, dated 1798, WilliamVaughan left £125 to the society to bespent on Colston’s Day by giving “e a chboy in his hospital a shilling (5p) and toboy No 49 half a crown (12.5p), with anyremaining interest buying a greatcoatand gloves for the doorkeeper and anyspare sixpence (2.5p) going to the lastpupil to collect his shilling.”

A few years later Philip Jones gave

� Pictured in 2011, thesociety’s then-master DavidMarsh, left, at Charter Daycelebrations with pupilsfrom the three schoolssupported by the society –Colston’s School, Colston’sGirls’ School andM e rc h a n t s ’ Academy – pluscakes and starver buns

£500 in Navy bonds – which werehelping to pay for the Napoleonic Wars– to the Colston’s Hospital Trust to giveeach boy a shilling a year, plus £5 peryear to be put aside for the head boyand given to him when he left.

At this time two shillings would havebeen a considerable sum of money, onethat would help a poor family’s budgetvery nicely for a few weeks.

It is impossible to translate it ac-curately into modern values – but ifyou think in terms of around £100 youwould not be too far wrong.

More recently, society master DenisBurn donated £12,500 to the MerchantVe n t u re r s ’ Charity in 2008. This wasthe year that Merchants’ Academy wasset up in Withywood, sponsored jointlyby the society and the University ofBristol.

The interest on this donation is usedto enable as many pupils as the prin-cipal of Merchants’ Academy so dir-ected to participate in the custom ofreceiving buns and shillings in cel-ebration of Charter Day.

The pupils of the Colston schools alsopar ticipated.

From Romansto a black hole

�A TALK and display about CrewsHole will be held on November 27.

St George History Group presentsa talk and photo display: ‘C rew sHole: Romans, Baptists, Press Gangs,Industry and its People’ on Novem-ber 28 at Summerhill Over-50s Club,Summerhill Road, St George,7.20pm, £2. All welcome. Furtherdetails from Dave Stephenson on0117 940 6202.

The talk will begin with the Ro-mans and then move to the earlyBaptists, who were tolerated by thelocals when they couldn’t preachanywhere else.

They sheltered sailors from thepress gangs and were against theslave trade. The civil war came heretoo, to Troopers Hill.

Finally we look at the industrieswhich changed it from an idyllicvillage compared to Clovelly inNorth Devon to a black hole, withdeath no stranger.

The main part of the talk will beabout the locals, a very distinct,tightly-knit and fiercely independ-ent community that emerged.

I have had access to an old schoollog book that tells us a lot about whatwas going on inside and outside theschool – such as the time when theschool was almost empty becausethe parents had taken their kids tothe Bath races!

Now Crews Hole has returned tobeing a somewhat isolated village,but many locals still can’t dig toodeep in their gardens; remnants ofthe tar works are still there.

Dave Stephensonby email

Searching for greatuncle’s memorial

�CAN any of your readers help? Ihave been searching for a WWI me-morial in St. Werburgh’s in honour ofmy great uncle, Ernest FrancisJames Orr, who died at the age of 24on the Invincible ship during thebattle of Jutland on May 31, 1916.

My 89-year-old uncle remembersseeing the memorial, which he be-lieves was made of marble and about2ft x 3ft, as a young boy, along with mylate father who was named after Ern-est.

The memorial was sited on MinaRoad School which was later re-named Cutlers Brook School and isnow currently named St. MatthiasPupil Referral Unit.

I have already contacted the BristolRecords Office, St Werburgh’s Com-munity Centre, St Werburgh’sChurch and local historians withoutsuccess. If anyone knows of its where-abouts or has a photograph of it Iwould be very grateful if they couldcontact me.

My e-mail address is l i n d a j b i gg @go o gl e m a i l . c o m .

Linda Bigg

We are still very much a family company

Shed light on a medical mystery

LISTENING to the news re-cently, when it was stated thatt o d ay ’s young children needextra vitamins, triggered amemory – and I am wonder-

ing if any other Bristol Times re a d e r scan recall a similar experience.

I can remember sometime in themid 1940s attending Tower Hill Clinicaccompanied by my mother, and as Irecall there were about a dozen or soother children attending at the samet i m e.

After confirming names and ad-dress we were told to strip off (leaving

Does anyone recallthis Cotham school

�I WOULD like to hear from anyonewho remembers Essex Lodge schoolin Cotham. I went there from 1955 to1957 then went to La Retraite schooluntil 1959.

Although born in Preston, Lancs in1950 and returning to live in Black-pool in 1959, I still have fond memor-ies of Bristol, especially theSuspension Bridge and the Downs, asmy mother took me there almostevery day after school.

I would love to hear from anyonewho may remember me. My namewas Susan Cope then. Incidentally ona recent flying visit to Bristol I foundI can no longer walk across thebridge, it’s much too high!!!

Susan DennettBlackpool, Lancs Tel: 01253 314520

School’s doubleprize success

�IN 1933 Paul Dirac (p i c t u re d ), whowas educated between 1914 and 1918at the Merchant Ventur-ers SecondarySchool won theNobel Prize forP hy s i c s.

CothamGrammarSchool wasthe directsuccessor tothat school, re-named when itwas taken over bythe city.

This year, 80 years later, an OldCothamian shares the Nobel Prizefor Physics. Peter Ware Higgs at-tended the school between 1941 and1946. Many people have heard of theHiggs Boson, which some have calledthe “God Particle”.

There cannot be many schools withtwo such successes. I was there from1938 to 1946. Peter and I were friendswhen we were in the upper sixthfor m.

Michael YoungFuengirola, Spain

Picture of the week

our pants on I must add for modesty’ssake.) We were then herded into alarge room which contained a hugetent-like contraption which appearedto be made of heavy-duty canvas.

We were told to put on heavy blackgoggles, then led into this “tent”,seated on long forms, and then thenurse made a hasty exit. We werethen exposed to very bright, verystrong ultra violet portable lamps.

After a while we were told to getdressed and go home. I think thisritual went on on a weekly basis for afew weeks.

As far as I can recall it took place alittle while after I was dischargedfrom Ham Green Hospital where Iwas kept in isolation after contract-ing measles and pneumonia – bu they! That’s another story.

I presume this treatment was tobuild us young children up.

Chris TaylorRedfield

� Editor’s reply: Your letter triggereda memory here too and had meracing off to consult the children’shistory of Bristol which was

Soldier father was aprisoner of war�AFTER reading your article in thePo s t last night I started thinking ofmy father’s wartime history. I am inmy early eighties. My father’s namewas Thomas Bellamy and he livedwith my mother and his mother inAvonvale Road, Redfield when hewent to war.

He joined the Glosters during theFirst World War. I don’t know howlong he was in the army before he wascaptured and sent to a camp – notknown by the Red Cross. He wasstarved and ill-treated and often usedto say when I was a little girl: “Eat upthat food. I would have given a goldwatch for mouldy food.” He used tohave to eat mouldy scraps in order tostay alive.

Then he and another PoW managedto escape, and got into Belgium wherea family hid them in their barn andfed them, all in secret.

Meanwhile my Mum had notific-ation from the War Office that he wasmissing and presumed dead, and re-ceived widow’s pay. He eventuallymanaged to get back somehow toAvonvale Road. He was like a skeleton– very thin and covered in sores, andwith a huge belly.

He suffered a lot over the years. Hehad several operations to have agrowth from his throat removedwhich kept returning.

He kept in touch with the Belgianfamily. I wonder if any of them re-member him? Dad had several no-tifications when he got home,including a welcome back letter fromthe King.

Dad lived until he was 85 yearsold!

Peggy JKingswood

published by Frys in 1945.T h e re ’s a page or two in this book

about how Bristol is looking after itscitizens nowadays and it includesthis photo – shown above – ofchildren getting UV treatmentsomewhere in Bristol.

We ’re not rightly sure what thetreatment was for, or whether allchildren had it. We think it mighthave been for skin complaints, butreally don’t know.

If anyone out there is up onmedical history perhaps they’d liketo let us know.

Hinds leaving the shop in the early1950s. In the picture are ArthurRoberts, the branch manager andTom Robinson the company secret-ary, Frank was my father and I wellremember visiting the shop on many

o c c a s i o n s.We now have 111 branches, the

nearest being in Cribbs CausewayShopping Centre and at Yate.

We are still very much a familycompany and I am the Chairman and

� THIS is the Lord Mayor ofBristol Alderman ThomasUnderdown, accompanied by theLady Mayoress. It’s 1940 or ’41and they’re in Exeter, visiting aparty of young Bristolians atAlphington School as part of atour of South Devon to seechildren evacuated from the city.

We ’re also running it as a sortof apology to AldermanU n d e rd o w n ’s descendants as anarticle about the Bristol Blitz in BTmistakenly called him ThomasUnderwood. We got awell-deserved telling-off on thatone from his grandson AndyBrown of Westbury-on-Trym.

Apparently BT is not the onlyoffender in this department, butthat’s no excuse. Won’t happenagain.

Meanwhile, if you’re one of thekiddies in the picture, or youknow any of them, the BT Letterspage awaits your stories of life asan evacuee.

we have just been joined by my grand-son who is the sixth generation to beinvolved since we started in 1856.

Roy HindsChairman, F. Hinds Ltd,

Uxbridge, Middlesex

�RE: Christine Taylor’s letter ofSeptember 17th, we are very inter-ested in her comments concerningCastle Street after the war and theF. Hinds branch in particular.

This photograph shows Frank

� The F. Hindsbranch inCastle Street

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6 Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013 7Tu e s d a y, November 12, 2013w w w. bristolpost.co.uk w w w. bristolpost.co.uk

Footsteps into history

The story behind pupils’ bun bonanzaYESTERDAY, November 11, was theSociety of Merchant Venturers’ a n nu a lCharter Day.

That is the day on which the societycelebrates the charter it was grantedby King Charles I in 1639.

The society usually marks the day onNovember 10 each year. However, itpicks November 11 or 12 if November 10falls on a weekend.

It is a time-honoured tradition, andone of the most colourful in Bristol’scivic calendar.

Charter Days sees the new master ofthe society for the coming year takeof fice.

And he, together with two wardens,12 assistants and the treasurer, aresworn in at Merchants’ Hall after aservice in Bristol Cathedral.

The thing that many people knowabout Charter Day is that school pupilsare each given a bun and 10p.

And if you are thinking to yourself

that nowadays it might be more ap-propriate to give them a bag of crisps, acan of cola and a £10 note, you aremissing the point of tradition.

The custom of giving buns probablygoes back to Edward Colston, whoattended the Christ’s Hospital school inLondon.

Every Easter, Christ’s Hospital pu-pils were each given a cake and a smallbun known as a starver.

They were meant to eat the smallerconfection to stave off hunger whilethey were taking the bigger oneh o m e.

The society continues the custom astrustee of the Colston Hospital Found-ation – which supports the Colstonschools – and in memory of EdwardColston who was born on November 2by the Julian calendar or November 13by the modern, Gregorian, calendar.

Staunch Anglican that he was, Col-ston would probably have disapproved

of the Gregorian calendar as a Catholici nve n t i o n .

Britain was well behind most of therest of Europe in adopting the newcalendar, which had originally beenpromoted by the Pope, and did notswitch over until 1752, leading to amyth that the lower orders rioted in thebelief that they had been robbed of 11days of their life.

After Colston, later Merchant Ven-turers chipped in, so that the boys –there were no female pupils at this time– were given money as well as buns.

In his will, dated 1798, WilliamVaughan left £125 to the society to bespent on Colston’s Day by giving “e a chboy in his hospital a shilling (5p) and toboy No 49 half a crown (12.5p), with anyremaining interest buying a greatcoatand gloves for the doorkeeper and anyspare sixpence (2.5p) going to the lastpupil to collect his shilling.”

A few years later Philip Jones gave

� Pictured in 2011, thesociety’s then-master DavidMarsh, left, at Charter Daycelebrations with pupilsfrom the three schoolssupported by the society –Colston’s School, Colston’sGirls’ School andM e rc h a n t s ’ Academy – pluscakes and starver buns

£500 in Navy bonds – which werehelping to pay for the Napoleonic Wars– to the Colston’s Hospital Trust to giveeach boy a shilling a year, plus £5 peryear to be put aside for the head boyand given to him when he left.

At this time two shillings would havebeen a considerable sum of money, onethat would help a poor family’s budgetvery nicely for a few weeks.

It is impossible to translate it ac-curately into modern values – but ifyou think in terms of around £100 youwould not be too far wrong.

More recently, society master DenisBurn donated £12,500 to the MerchantVe n t u re r s ’ Charity in 2008. This wasthe year that Merchants’ Academy wasset up in Withywood, sponsored jointlyby the society and the University ofBristol.

The interest on this donation is usedto enable as many pupils as the prin-cipal of Merchants’ Academy so dir-ected to participate in the custom ofreceiving buns and shillings in cel-ebration of Charter Day.

The pupils of the Colston schools alsopar ticipated.

From Romansto a black hole

�A TALK and display about CrewsHole will be held on November 27.

St George History Group presentsa talk and photo display: ‘C rew sHole: Romans, Baptists, Press Gangs,Industry and its People’ on Novem-ber 28 at Summerhill Over-50s Club,Summerhill Road, St George,7.20pm, £2. All welcome. Furtherdetails from Dave Stephenson on0117 940 6202.

The talk will begin with the Ro-mans and then move to the earlyBaptists, who were tolerated by thelocals when they couldn’t preachanywhere else.

They sheltered sailors from thepress gangs and were against theslave trade. The civil war came heretoo, to Troopers Hill.

Finally we look at the industrieswhich changed it from an idyllicvillage compared to Clovelly inNorth Devon to a black hole, withdeath no stranger.

The main part of the talk will beabout the locals, a very distinct,tightly-knit and fiercely independ-ent community that emerged.

I have had access to an old schoollog book that tells us a lot about whatwas going on inside and outside theschool – such as the time when theschool was almost empty becausethe parents had taken their kids tothe Bath races!

Now Crews Hole has returned tobeing a somewhat isolated village,but many locals still can’t dig toodeep in their gardens; remnants ofthe tar works are still there.

Dave Stephensonby email

Searching for greatuncle’s memorial

�CAN any of your readers help? Ihave been searching for a WWI me-morial in St. Werburgh’s in honour ofmy great uncle, Ernest FrancisJames Orr, who died at the age of 24on the Invincible ship during thebattle of Jutland on May 31, 1916.

My 89-year-old uncle remembersseeing the memorial, which he be-lieves was made of marble and about2ft x 3ft, as a young boy, along with mylate father who was named after Ern-est.

The memorial was sited on MinaRoad School which was later re-named Cutlers Brook School and isnow currently named St. MatthiasPupil Referral Unit.

I have already contacted the BristolRecords Office, St Werburgh’s Com-munity Centre, St Werburgh’sChurch and local historians withoutsuccess. If anyone knows of its where-abouts or has a photograph of it Iwould be very grateful if they couldcontact me.

My e-mail address is l i n d a j b i gg @go o gl e m a i l . c o m .

Linda Bigg

We are still very much a family company

Shed light on a medical mystery

LISTENING to the news re-cently, when it was stated thatt o d ay ’s young children needextra vitamins, triggered amemory – and I am wonder-

ing if any other Bristol Times re a d e r scan recall a similar experience.

I can remember sometime in themid 1940s attending Tower Hill Clinicaccompanied by my mother, and as Irecall there were about a dozen or soother children attending at the samet i m e.

After confirming names and ad-dress we were told to strip off (leaving

Does anyone recallthis Cotham school

�I WOULD like to hear from anyonewho remembers Essex Lodge schoolin Cotham. I went there from 1955 to1957 then went to La Retraite schooluntil 1959.

Although born in Preston, Lancs in1950 and returning to live in Black-pool in 1959, I still have fond memor-ies of Bristol, especially theSuspension Bridge and the Downs, asmy mother took me there almostevery day after school.

I would love to hear from anyonewho may remember me. My namewas Susan Cope then. Incidentally ona recent flying visit to Bristol I foundI can no longer walk across thebridge, it’s much too high!!!

Susan DennettBlackpool, Lancs Tel: 01253 314520

School’s doubleprize success

�IN 1933 Paul Dirac (p i c t u re d ), whowas educated between 1914 and 1918at the Merchant Ventur-ers SecondarySchool won theNobel Prize forP hy s i c s.

CothamGrammarSchool wasthe directsuccessor tothat school, re-named when itwas taken over bythe city.

This year, 80 years later, an OldCothamian shares the Nobel Prizefor Physics. Peter Ware Higgs at-tended the school between 1941 and1946. Many people have heard of theHiggs Boson, which some have calledthe “God Particle”.

There cannot be many schools withtwo such successes. I was there from1938 to 1946. Peter and I were friendswhen we were in the upper sixthfor m.

Michael YoungFuengirola, Spain

Picture of the week

our pants on I must add for modesty’ssake.) We were then herded into alarge room which contained a hugetent-like contraption which appearedto be made of heavy-duty canvas.

We were told to put on heavy blackgoggles, then led into this “tent”,seated on long forms, and then thenurse made a hasty exit. We werethen exposed to very bright, verystrong ultra violet portable lamps.

After a while we were told to getdressed and go home. I think thisritual went on on a weekly basis for afew weeks.

As far as I can recall it took place alittle while after I was dischargedfrom Ham Green Hospital where Iwas kept in isolation after contract-ing measles and pneumonia – bu they! That’s another story.

I presume this treatment was tobuild us young children up.

Chris TaylorRedfield

� Editor’s reply: Your letter triggereda memory here too and had meracing off to consult the children’shistory of Bristol which was

Soldier father was aprisoner of war�AFTER reading your article in thePo s t last night I started thinking ofmy father’s wartime history. I am inmy early eighties. My father’s namewas Thomas Bellamy and he livedwith my mother and his mother inAvonvale Road, Redfield when hewent to war.

He joined the Glosters during theFirst World War. I don’t know howlong he was in the army before he wascaptured and sent to a camp – notknown by the Red Cross. He wasstarved and ill-treated and often usedto say when I was a little girl: “Eat upthat food. I would have given a goldwatch for mouldy food.” He used tohave to eat mouldy scraps in order tostay alive.

Then he and another PoW managedto escape, and got into Belgium wherea family hid them in their barn andfed them, all in secret.

Meanwhile my Mum had notific-ation from the War Office that he wasmissing and presumed dead, and re-ceived widow’s pay. He eventuallymanaged to get back somehow toAvonvale Road. He was like a skeleton– very thin and covered in sores, andwith a huge belly.

He suffered a lot over the years. Hehad several operations to have agrowth from his throat removedwhich kept returning.

He kept in touch with the Belgianfamily. I wonder if any of them re-member him? Dad had several no-tifications when he got home,including a welcome back letter fromthe King.

Dad lived until he was 85 yearsold!

Peggy JKingswood

published by Frys in 1945.T h e re ’s a page or two in this book

about how Bristol is looking after itscitizens nowadays and it includesthis photo – shown above – ofchildren getting UV treatmentsomewhere in Bristol.

We ’re not rightly sure what thetreatment was for, or whether allchildren had it. We think it mighthave been for skin complaints, butreally don’t know.

If anyone out there is up onmedical history perhaps they’d liketo let us know.

Hinds leaving the shop in the early1950s. In the picture are ArthurRoberts, the branch manager andTom Robinson the company secret-ary, Frank was my father and I wellremember visiting the shop on many

o c c a s i o n s.We now have 111 branches, the

nearest being in Cribbs CausewayShopping Centre and at Yate.

We are still very much a familycompany and I am the Chairman and

� THIS is the Lord Mayor ofBristol Alderman ThomasUnderdown, accompanied by theLady Mayoress. It’s 1940 or ’41and they’re in Exeter, visiting aparty of young Bristolians atAlphington School as part of atour of South Devon to seechildren evacuated from the city.

We ’re also running it as a sortof apology to AldermanU n d e rd o w n ’s descendants as anarticle about the Bristol Blitz in BTmistakenly called him ThomasUnderwood. We got awell-deserved telling-off on thatone from his grandson AndyBrown of Westbury-on-Trym.

Apparently BT is not the onlyoffender in this department, butthat’s no excuse. Won’t happenagain.

Meanwhile, if you’re one of thekiddies in the picture, or youknow any of them, the BT Letterspage awaits your stories of life asan evacuee.

we have just been joined by my grand-son who is the sixth generation to beinvolved since we started in 1856.

Roy HindsChairman, F. Hinds Ltd,

Uxbridge, Middlesex

�RE: Christine Taylor’s letter ofSeptember 17th, we are very inter-ested in her comments concerningCastle Street after the war and theF. Hinds branch in particular.

This photograph shows Frank

� The F. Hindsbranch inCastle Street

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8

IN 1953 I was working with theBristol Aeroplane Company atFilton as a draughtsman. I joinedthe company in 1951 followingtwo exciting years with the Royal

Air Force, with most of that timespent in what was then SouthernRhodesia.

I found it difficult at first to adjustto a different way of life after thevariety and travel I had enjoyed in theRAF. I joined the Royal Naval Vo-lunteer Reserve in Bristol for afive-year commitment, with one even-ing a week training, an occasionalweekend, and two weeks per year –for four years out of five – servingwith the Royal Navy.

Training and serving as a seamanwould make a complete change frommy full-time job in engineering. SoonI became very familiar with HMSFlying Fox, a veteran ship of the FirstWorld War moored at Mardyke Wharfin Hotwells, where we were based.

My first two weeks of annual train-ing were on HMS Finisterre, a des-troyer, on gunnery trials in theEnglish Channel.

The following year, 1953, my annualRNVR training was rather special asI took part in the coronation review ofthe fleet at Spithead. Several ratingsfrom the Severn division were in-volved and we were all allocated dif-ferent ships. The review took place onMonday, June 15 but I travelled toPortsmouth on Sunday, June 7.

Her Majesty’s ships began to as-semble on the following day. Foreignwarships began to assemble on theWednesday. There was close to 300vessels from around the world. Theseincluded warships, lightships, mer-chant ships, fishing boats, lifeboats,yachts and pleasure boats. It was aremarkable sight.

I was assigned to HMS Adamant, asubmarine depot ship which hadbeen in mothballs for some time andneeded our care and attention. I wastaken out to the ship in a small boatand welcomed aboard by the mas-ter-at-arms who warned me to expect

a degree of discomfort. Apparentlythe ship was to host a large con-signment of servicemen from theCommonwealth countries who hadtaken part in the coronation pro-cession in London. I was issued witha hammock and was warned that Iwould just have to make do withsleeping on deck.

The ship had been prepared for seaand we steamed around the Isle ofWight before taking up our allottedposition in one of the lines. Our timewas spent making the ship tidy bymoving accumulated rubbish, andpainting everything. We also had toprepare the rigging and flags to beused for dressing the ship overall.

On Wednesday, June 10 the shipswere dressed overall to celebrate thebirthday of HRH the Duke of Ed-inburgh, with a royal salute beingfired at noon. Although we were busy,we were able to see the arrival ofships from all nations including themagnificent Russian cruiser Sverd-lov and the Italian training shipAmerigo Vespucci, whose crewmanned the yards for the review.

Next in line to us was the aircraftcarrier HMS Perseus which hadgrandstand seating on the flight deck.These seats were to be occupied bydignitaries on the day of the review.We were intrigued to see that theseseats were facing away from theplanned route of Her Majesty’s re-view ship. But precise calculations ofwind and tidal current ensured that

the whole fleet swung into the correctposition in time for the review.

Thursday, June 11 marked the of-ficial birthday of Her Majesty theQueen. And once again the shipswere dressed overall and a royal sa-lute was fired at noon.

Each morning we assembled ondeck for colour-hoisting. On severaldays the ships were dressed overalland we were amazed to see how

quickly the entire fleet could displayan array of coloured flags.

In the days leading up to the reviewwe witnessed ocean liners returningfrom voyages across the world mak-ing steady progress through the linesto give their passengers a sight tore m e m b e r.

Boats of all descriptions broughtsightseers from the mainland and theIsle of Wight, and liberty boats werekept busy taking sailors ashore for aspot of leave. A trip ashore for libertymen was very exciting and not

This year the countrymarked the60th anniversary ofQueen Elizabeth’scoronation. Back inJune 1953 the eventwas celebrated with areview of the fleet. Thiswas when Britain had amuch larger Navy.Bristol Times re a d e rTerry Male was there,and here shares hismemories with us.

Ship, ship, hurrah for Her Majesty

� Left, HMS Flying Fox, floatinghome of Bristol’s Royal NavalReserve, and the old Mardyke Ferry,photographed in the 1950s. Above,souvenir programme of theCoronation Fleet review

without adventure. With sailors of somany nationalities crowding thestreets and bars it was inevitable thatthere was a great deal of rivalry. Thiswas mostly friendly – but occasion-ally tempers flared and we werepleased to return to the safe haven ofour ship.

With the arrival on board of mem-bers of the Commonwealth forces,sleeping arrangements left a bit to bedesired, with hammocks being slungin gangways and anywhere on deckwhere a stanchion could be utilised.

During the review we sailors wouldbe lining the side of the ship to cheerthe Queen, and in true Navy traditionthis was rehearsed until the author-ities were satisfied. We were observedby an officer from the deck of a shipwhich followed the route to be takenby the review ship. Instructions andcriticism were shouted into al o u d - h a i l e r.

At the command of “off caps” wehad to remove our caps with our righthand and ensure that our arm wasextended at 45 degrees. At the com-mand “three cheers for Her Majestythe Queen” we had to turn our caps ina circular motion above our heads –then each command of “hip, hip” wasfollowed by our rousing response of“hur rah”. We were remindedthrough the loud hailer that a num-ber of “hur rays” had been heardwhich were more reminiscent of afootball crowd and certainly not theRoyal Navy. After these rehearsals we

Precise calculations ofwind and tidal currentensured that the wholefleet swung into thecorrect position in timefor the review!

“

came to realise why we had won theBattle of Trafalgar.

Sunday evening, June 14, was ahive of activity in preparation for thereview the following day. Ships weredressed overall, a royal salute wasfired and the Royal Standard brokenout as Her Majesty embarked in HMSSurprise, a frigate which was per-forming the duty of royal yacht.

We were awake very early on theMonday morning. The ships weredressed overall, a procession of shipswas assembled and the review tookplace in the afternoon. The reviewships passed through the lines of thefleet to the cheers of the sailors, witha fly-past of Navy aircraft overhead.

Later in the evening the fleet wasilluminated, with each ship beingoutlined with lights.

There had been speculation aboutwhether or not the Russians wouldparticipate. But we were delighted tosee the Russian cruiser Sverdlov out-lined in lights which seemed to il-luminate every feature of the ship.The eventful day ended with a mag-nificent fireworks display, the biggestcheer of the day coming when theQueen sent a signal to her shipsaround the world – “splice the main-brace”.

The following morning, ships weredressed overall for the final time anda royal salute was fired by the fleet asHMS Surprise weighed anchor andreturned to harbour. As the Queenand the Duke of Edinburgh disem-barked to return to London, a furtherroyal salute was fired by the Navysaluting battery as the Royal Stand-ard was struck in HMS Surprise.

Later in the day the fleet started todisperse and I stayed on in HMSAdamant for the rest of the week,enjoying the space and freedom andrealising how fortunate I was to havebeen a participant in such a historicand spectacular event.

PE

TE

R

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Prestig

e Coaching

DORCHESTERHOTELTEAAT THE

ROYAL ALBERT HALL

CLASSICALSPECTACULAR

Adult £92.95 60Plus £89.95

Thur 12 Dec

ChristmasAfternoon

DORCHESTERTEAAT THE

Thur 12 Dec

TEL:01275 839 839

www.petercarol.co.uk

STRICTLYCOME DANCING

Adult £79.9560Plus £78.95Child £75.95

SAT 18 JAN,SUN 19 JAN

DUNSTER BYCANDLELIGHT

Fri 6 / Sat 7 DecAdult £29.95, 60Plus £28.95

£20 OFFOR

NOW ONLY £79.95

THEATRE MATINEE SPECIALSCHARLIE & THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY OR MATILDA

WED 4 DECEMBERTop price seats • All coach transfers

FREE time for lunch/shopping etcSUN 24 NOV

A magnificent combination of thevery best in classical music and

state of the art technology.Adult £99.95, 60Plus £97.95