The Letter Box graveyeard and other posty stories

In The Woolwich Drill Hall circa 1965

Now one of the places I wish I had visited back in 1965 was the old Woolwich Drill Hall in the company of my friend Jean because there I would have seen a pretty impressive collection of old Victorian pillar boxes.

I suppose we take the pillar box like the telephone kiosk for granted and only really begin noticing them as they disappear from our streets.

And as you would expect here there is a rich and fascinating history, which is best told by Jean.

Victorian Letter Box

“In 1963 the Post Office began to replace all the single-aperture posting boxes in Central London with double-aperture ones.  

Concerned about the loss of so many Victorian examples, which were now being sold for their scrap metal value, I persuaded the manager of the SE London Postal District to send all those he recovered to the former Drill Hall in Woolwich, where I could try to identify the rarest examples and find them a Good Home.   

This he did, and I spent many Saturdays there in the task selecting boxes of all types for donation to a suitable museum. 

As I was in the early stages of researching the history of the many different kinds of Victorian letter boxes (which was to lead to my book The Letter Box, published in 1969), this gave me a unique opportunity to examine at close quarters and in one place the great variety in size and design. 

One of these recovered boxes was donated to The Eltham Society, which then (in 1965) had hopes of opening a small museum of local history in the Orangery. 

The first of many, 1952 Whitehall

Today, I am still looking after this 'Penfold' pillar box (named after its designer, J W Penfold, and dating from the 1860s) in my garden.

One of the replaced pillar boxes (of which all trace was sadly lost ) was England's first pillar box of the present Queen’s reign - erected in Whitehall, near the Horseguards' Parade in November 1952. 

Scotland's first pillar box of the present reign was unveiled at the Inch Housing Estate, Edinburgh, on 28 November. 

Within 36 hours it had been daubed with tar and, after a few more such incidents, it was blown-up by a home-made bomb.  Why?  

This was because it bore not only the legend Post Office and the crown of St Edward but also the E11R cypher, which was offensive to Scots as there had been no previous Scottish monarch of that name and, even worse, England's Elizabeth 1 was responsible for the execution of Mary, Queen of Scotland. 

A little bit of Scotland in Yorkshire

Early in 1953, the Secretary of State for Scotland proposed that future posting boxes and mail vans intended for use in Scotland should bear no cypher at all. 

His suggestion was taken up by the Post Office and, henceforth, these bore only the legend Post Office and the Scottish Crown. 

One of these Scottish post boxes was inadvertently sent to Keighley in Yorkshire- but this went unnoticed by the locals!

Many years later Royal Mail, in order to meet the demand for period letter boxes in special locations, commissioned facsimile 'Penfolds' for places such as Chislehurst in Kent.”

Story and research by Jean Gammons, November 2013

Source; The Letter Box – a history of Post Office Pillar and Wall boxes by Jean Young Farrugia-(Centaur Press 1969).  Further information can be obtained from the Letter Box Study Group www.lbsg.org

Pictures from the collection of Jean Gammons

So why did the Jacobite’s have the best songs?

Now for those who don’t know, the Jacobite cause was the forlorn attempt  to restore the Stuart royal family to the throne.

And in the process do away with the Hanoverian’s who had assumed the throne in 1714.

There had been two attempts by the Jacobite’s to achieve this reassertion of ownership in 1715 and again in 1745.

The first involved James Francis Edward Stuart, referred to by some as the Old Pretender, and the second by Charles Edward Stuart, variously known as the Young Pretender, or Bonnie Prince Charlie.

Now I was brought up on the romance of Bonnie Prince Charlie, and the last Jacobite attempt to regain the throne for the Stuarts, which isn’t surprising since our family only crossed the border into England at the start of the last century, and ours was a long journey south from the east Highlands.

So, I grew up with songs of that Jacobite rebellion, from those chronicling the brave Highland clans to the lament at the defeat at Culloden, and the departure of the Young Pretender.*

They still make wonderful listening but hide the reality of the savage aftermath of the last battle, the feudal nature of the Highlands and the betrayal of the cause by the Prince himself who left the Jacobite’s to their fate and died in Rome in 1788.

And of course, you have to question the whole escapade which was designed to substitute one dynasty for another, but was bound up with the dominance of England and the Lowland Scots, and today by the renewed interest in Scottish independence set against the huge chasm which is Brexit.

But those songs still resonate today, while the anti Jacobite ones have faded from popular culture.

So why is this? 

I suppose because the Jacobite cause was lost, and the repression that followed was so savage that there is that nostalgic lament for what might have been tied up by the romantic image of Bonnie Prince Charlie, which was then worked on in the 19th century when the Jacobites were no longer a threat and so it became “safe” to treat them as that romantic and lost cause, which has been sustained by an appeal to Scottish nationalism.

Added to which the tunes are very good and made better by the addition in some cases of the pipes.

That said not all of them date from 1745, or the immediate after years.

I listen regularly to a slew of Jacobite songs, but confess to only humming along to one anti Jacobite song which is the "Ye Jacobites by Name", which attacked the Jacobites  but was rewritten by Robert Burns  around 1791 giving a version with a more general, humanist anti-war, but nonetheless anti-Jacobite outlook.

So that is it …… answers on a postcard care of Rome.***

Pictures; "Gentlemen he cried, drawing his sword, I have thrown away the scabbard", from Scotland's story: a history of Scotland for boys and girls, Marshall, H. E. 1907, Manchester in the 18th century, from Shaw William, Manchester Old and New, 1894, and The Battle of Culloden, David Morier, 1746

*Jacobite Songs by the Corries, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAEA7D750B5002C1F

**Lasting resting place of Bonnie Prince Charlie who escaped Scotland ...unlike most of his Jacobite supporters who ended up in the West Indies as indentured labour.

And the footnote, "The Acts of Union (Scottish Gaelic: Achd an Aonaidh) were two Acts of Parliament: the Union with Scotland Act 1706 passed by the Parliament of England, and the Union with England Act passed in 1707 by the Parliament of Scotland. 

They put into effect the terms of the Treaty of Union that had been agreed on 22 July 1706, following negotiation between commissioners representing the parliaments of the two countries. By the two Acts, the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland—which at the time were separate states with separate legislatures, but with the same monarch—were, in the words of the Treaty, "United into One Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain"

Acts of Union, 1707, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acts_of_Union_1707

A play .... the horrors of the Clearances and that statistic ... 7:84

 You do not have to be political to be shocked at the story of The Highlands Clearances or the simple statistic that in the 1970s, 84% of the wealth of the country was in the hands of just 7% of the population.*

Ruined croft houses on w:Fuaigh Mòr, 2006

And that was the starting  point for a new theatre company and an exploration of Scotland's history.

All of which is an introduction to What kind of Scotland on Radio 4, all about the theatre company and The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil.   

"Allan Little takes us on a journey into Scotland’s recent history. 

Fifty years ago a radical theatrical event captured the nation’s state of political and social flux, and helped fuel a growing debate about devolution and independence. As Scotland once more considers its future place in the UK and Europe, what part did 7:84 theatre company’s The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil play in shaping attitudes in the decades since?

John McGrath’s play was first performed in April 1973 at a conference in Edinburgh called ‘What Kind of Scotland?’ The audience of academics, activists and writers had gathered to debate Scotland’s economic and political future at a time when nationalism was on the rise and concern was growing about the fair distribution of North Sea oil revenues.

The play charted the exploitation of Scotland’s natural resources, starting with the Highland Clearances of the 18th and 19th centuries, when crofters were forcibly evicted from their homes to make way for more profitable Cheviot sheep. 

The Stag refers to the later commercialisation of deerstalking and grouse shooting for the benefit of landowners on large Highland estates. As for the oil – North Sea reserves had only recently been discovered when the play was written 50 years ago. 7:84 believed the windfall profits from oil and gas would fall into the hands of American corporations.

The show went on the road, playing at schools and community halls across the Highlands, sometimes to as few as a dozen people. Many audience members had never been to see a play before. They were farmers and fisherfolk, and often the direct descendants of families who had suffered in the Clearances. 

In the north-east, the show resonated with communities whose lives were rapidly changing because of the burgeoning North Sea oil boom. While many were excited by the prosperity and opportunity oil would bring, others feared that Scotland’s resources would once more be plundered, this time by American multinationals and the Westminster exchequer.

Through archive sources and fresh new interviews with cast members, historians, campaigners and writers, Allan explores the ways in which The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black Black Oil influenced not just the politics of the time but cultural perceptions of Scotland and Scottishness.

Producer: Hugh Costello"

Picture; Ruined croft houses on w:Fuaigh Mòr. The remains of houses and sheep fanks on the deserted island. The island was cleared of its inhabitants in 1841, and is now only used for grazing sheep. w:Loch Roag, August 4th, 2006, Geograph depth small.png This image was taken from the Geograph project collection. See this photograph's page on the Geograph website for the photographer's contact details. The copyright on this image is owned by Sarah Egan and is licensed for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license, and poster for The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black Black Oil, National Library of Scotland, and from the Clyde Theatre.

*The Highland Clearances, was the "eviction of the Gaels") which were the forced evictions of a significant number of tenants in the Scottish Highlands and Islands, mostly in two phases from 1750 to 1860.

**What kind of Scotland, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001kprx

Postcards I wish I had sent ……… and places I have yet to visit

Now, I have always been a fan of the picture postcard.

And over the years I have trawled old collections, using the images to describe how places have changed, and as a bonus commenting on the messages on the back.

But I am also drawn to the ones produced in the second half of the last century, which were usually in colour and with the passage of time have also become a bit of history.

Most do what the caption on the back says and faithfully record a tourist spot. 

But then there are those which must even at the time have posed a challenge to the photographer to find something interesting.

And here I have to be careful, because each one that has made it into the modern collection was chosen by someone who a] liked the picture postcard or b] thought it perfectly captured the scene.

So, I apologise in advance to Linda if I appear to be a little disrespectful of the odd one from her wonderful set of picture postcards which I have in front of me.

Most are fascinating glimpses of British tourist spots with more than a few from far away places, like Thailand and Malaysia, with more from Greece and Malta.

But then there is Port William and the Pier, on a day when the only people to make an appearance were two young girls.

And like so many from the period the colour has that slight yellow tint, which is even more apparent in the one from the Hagar Qim Neolithic temples in Malta, where the photographer has managed to capture two slightly older young women.

Leaving me just to close with Scotland Where Motoring is Still a Pleasure, and reflect in the age of the mobile phone, your souvenir memory of a special day is now just a click and a text message away.

All of which makes me a tad nostalgic for Dixons and all those other picture postcard companies.

Location; Scotland, & Malta 

Pictures; from the collection of Linda Rigby

The Davidian Revolution ...... a bit of Scotland's story ..... on the wireless today

Now I have never really seen our history just through the prism of Kings and Queens or great shapers, but I am interested  in David 1 of Scotland, if for no other reason than one side of my family originated in the East Highlands and only crossed the border at the start of the 20th century.

Great Seal of David I

So I shall be listening to The Davidian Revolution today on the wireless today.

"Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the impact of David I of Scotland (c1084-1153) on his kingdom and on neighbouring lands. 

The youngest son of Malcolm III, he was raised in exile in the Anglo-Norman court and became Earl of Huntingdon and Prince of Cumbria before claiming the throne in 1124. 

He introduced elements of what he had learned in England and, in the next decades, his kingdom saw new burghs, new monasteries, new ways of governing and the arrival of some very influential families, earning him the reputation of The Perfect King.

With, Richard Oram, Professor of Medieval and Environmental History at the University of Stirling, Alice Taylor, Professor of Medieval History at King’s College London, and, Alex Woolf, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of St Andrews

Producer: Simon Tillotson"

Picture; Steel engraving and enhancement of the reverse side of the Great Seal of David I, King of Alba (Scotland), 1859, from The Pictorial History of Scotland from the Roman Invasion to the close of the Jacobite Rebellion. A.D. 79-1646, 2 vols, vol. i, (London, 1859), facing page 64, Unknown author

*The Davidian Revolution, In Our Time,  Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0016xty

Genealogical Adventure ..... another story from Tony Goulding

After a pause for a couple of months I have decided to return to writing some more History. 

I thought would kick-off by relating a few of interesting discoveries from my own family history research with the justification, should I need one, that it may inspire others to undertake their own investigation. 

I have previously on this blog written a little about the family of my grandfather the photographer Arthur Harold Clarke. On this occasion I wish to focus on his wife, my maternal grandmother’s forbears. Her mother, Harriet Kate Ross (née Walters) was the daughter of Harry and Mary (née Joynt). Harry Walters was a veteran of the American Civil War and as such was awarded a war disability    pension. 

He served in the Union Navy on four vessels, Ohio, Iroquois, North Carolina, and Preble. The last of these blew up in somewhat suspicious circumstances in Pensacola Bay on the Florida coast on the 27th April, 1863. (1)

U.S.S. Preble (1839)

U.S.S. Preble (1839)

After leaving the Union Navy Harold returned to Walsall, England and married Mary (née Joynt). The surname “Joynt” is quite an uncommon one and is thought to be derived from the French Huguenot name “Joyant”. Soldiers with this name were apparently awarded land in the west of Ireland as a reward for serving in William of Orange’s army in his campaign against James 11’s Catholic army culminating in William’s victory at the battle of the Boyne on the 11th July, 1690(2). Mary Joynt’s father, Oliver, was born in Kilala, Co. Mayo, Ireland where his father was one of a number of farmers with the same surname.

     

My grandmother’s maiden name was Ross and as the name suggests her father, Alexander William Stewart Ross was Scottish born in Edinburgh in 1868. His father, Neil Stewart, had been born in Perth, Scotland in 1827 the son of a shoemaker.  This man, Neil Stewart, was something of a black sheep of the family in that he served at least two prison terms for theft in Edinburgh’s Calton Jail and also had a very unconventional relationship with the mother of his children as he had a first wife still living who he had not divorced. This first wife, Mary (née Christie) is a bit of an enigma as after appearing in the records with her husband in Dundee, Scotland in the 1850’s she then “vanishes” for several years in which she may or may have not been committed to a mental asylum. Her story epitomises the frustration of stalled research often faced by family historians widely referred to as “a brick wall”. Neil Stewart died in 1874, not long after his release from jail, leaving two young children. 

My grandmother’s father and his older sister were raised by their mother, Jeanet Scott in Hawick, Roxburghshire in the Scottish Borders.

Carlton Hill Edinburgh showing Jail in the foreground

Neil Stewart Ross’s father and grandfather, both named Alexander, were both shoemakers in Perth, Scotland. His grandfather marks the furthest trace back I have on my family tree so far. I know he was married to Janet Stewart in Perth on the 12th November, 1798 at which time he was serving as a soldier in the 72nd Regiment of Foot. From these facts it was possible to estimate his birth year to cc 1769 and as the 72nd was a Highland regiment it is quite possible that Alexander Snr. was born further north. (3)

I have been researching my ancestors for over 20 years now and while writing this I found a guide to myself which I wrote in the early days of my quest. I must admit that I have never been very good at following through on them! As they were compiled before the explosion of genealogical information being available online some of the “tips” are a little dated. Whatever, I thought to close I would just share a couple of them which I found helpful (after updating them to fit the internet age)

1) Always start researching records from a known fact never an assumed one.

2) Spend some time exploring the website you are using for easier navigation.

3) When looking at electoral rolls always be aware of changes in the franchise.

4) Be prepared to try different spellings of names in records. They can be mis-transcribed or may have been alternatively spelt by your ancestor. (Common in days of lower levels of literacy).

5) Try to be methodical and keep clear records.

(Not something I have been very good at doing)

Pictures; U.S.S. Prebble by Per Honor et Gloria - (Drawing of USS Preble (1839). This is a faithful photographic reproduction of a two-dimensional, public domain work of art.) Carlton Jail, Edinburgh by Cornell University Library - originally posted to Flickr as Edinburgh from Calton Hill, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7295173

 Notes

1) The official inquiry attributed the explosion as due to a fire caused by the carelessness of a crew member.

2) This battle and its aftermath remains a focal point in the tensions between the two communities of Northern Ireland. The protestant, loyalists' parades on the 12th July by the Orange Orders celebrate William’s victory. The catholic, nationalists, however, regard these parades as triumphalism and resent their incursions into areas which they now see as “their” areas.

3) The 72nd Regiment of Foot was raised in 1778 by the Earl of Seaforth in the western highlands. The vast majority of men enlisted were highlanders. The recruitment was no doubt fuelled by the twin forces of the economic pressure and political oppression. The eviction of tenant farmers to create more profitable largescale farms for the landowners, known as the Highland Clearances, compounded the impact of the oppression of highland culture in response to the Jacobite risings of the 18th century. (The Earl of Seaforth himself was of a family of Jacobite sympathisers). One of the measures enacted in the Act of Proscription of 1746 was the prohibition of the wearing of traditional highland dress unless on military service. All of which gives a great background to the life of my great4 - grandfather and his family.

For me the family connections to great historical events are the most exciting discoveries from my genealogical research.

Shops in the time of Tier Three ....... whisky....walking sticks .... and piles more

So, with Tier Three about to imposed on us, and with essential journeys stripped back to the minimum, here for the next few weeks are shops I have visited or wished I had visited.

All will be from far away places which soon will be but a distant memory, for at least a while.

And this one comes from Barabrella who write, “It was a shop in Crieff. I only took a picture of the whisky section but it was a proper grocery. Had cheese at the back, tinned food, fresh bread and crackers. The grocer was wearing a brown robe on top of his clothes and he was quite old. And, there were walking sticks on sale as well, outside”.

Crieff is a Scottish market town in Perth and Kinross. It lies on the A85 road between Perth and Crianlarich, and the A822 between Greenloaning and Aberfeldy. 

"It has become a hub for tourism, famous for its whisky and history of cattle droving. Attractions include the Caithness Glass Visitor Centre and Glenturret Distillery. 

The nearby Innerpeffray Library (founded about 1680), is Scotland's oldest lending library. 

St Mary's Chapel, adjacent to the library, dates from 1508. Both are open to the public: the library is run by a charitable trust, while the chapel is in the care of Historic Scotland".*

Picture; the shop in Crieff, 2019, from the collection of Barbarella Bonvento

*Crieff, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crieff

When St Andrew’s Day and a little bit of south east London come together with stories of Canada, Germany and maybe even India

Uncle George, circa 1918

Now St Andrew’s Day pretty much went unremarked in our house and that I find odd given that my grandparents crossed the border in to England just a century and a bit ago and three of my uncles were born  in Scotland.

Added to which I share the saint’s name and both Uncle George and Uncle Fergus served in the Black Watch and I grew up with stories of Robert the Bruce, the Young Pretender and our own tartan.

But south east London was a long way from the east Highlands where we originated from and Alloa which was the stepping off point for England for my grandparents is a place far away.

And  father had made the journey south by the 1930s so if he did ever talk about his youth it was of Gateshead and not of a time across the border.

So for me Scotland was pretty much just a place, and one that I didn’t even visit until 2006 but during the past year as I have been rediscovering my childhood in Lausanne Road thoughts of Scotland have also begun to bubble to the surface.

The tent of family stories, circa 1955

They are a mix of daring tales of the Highland clans mixed with the victories of Scots armies over the English and a string of laments from the Flowers of the Forest and farewells to the boy who would have been King to the haunting sound of the pipes.

My earliest memories are of sitting with Uncle George in our tent in the garden of Lausanne Road on hot summer’s days when the sun beat down heating the canvas and releasing that distinctive smell which mixed with his pipe smoke and was only interrupted by the buzz of insects.

A long time later he told me the more personal stories which pitched our family across the Highlands and involved tales of  itinerant traders, ships engineers who plied the oceans and barrel makers, shop keepers and many more.

All of which has made me reflect on our lost identities and how it is often very hard to draw them up from half told tales, family myths and a big dollop of romantic tosh.

But the last few years of trawling our own family history across south east London, the Midlands and into Scotland, and on to Germany and Canada have confirmed that the myths and half remembered stories will have more than an element of fact.

Family tombstone, Markinch, Fife, 1976

So the cocoa factory of Kender Street was real, our links to Canada are more extensive than I could have thought and the history of Well Hall and Eltham is very much mine.

And what has made it possible to confirm so much that was folklore and vague memory is the growing body of historical information now on online which has allowed me to call up army records from the Canada, opened up endless census returns, and read contemporary accounts which sit on dusty shelves in libraries as far away  as California and Australia.

Above all it has also allowed me to correspond with people engaged in similar research across the world and although there can be a time delay those links will pretty much be done in a few hours.

Now that may seem a long way from St Andrew’s Day, the garden of Lausanne Road or even our house in Well Hall but I think not.

St John River, New Brunswick home to great uncle Roger, 1914

The common thread is that search for identity and the desire to give a context to family members who we know little about.

For me hoovering up a family tree which finally gets lost two centuries ago is not enough.

I want to know how their lives were lived out and how their achievements and contributions were part of something bigger.

Grandmother's home Cologne, circa 1930

So I shall be crossing that border, and continuing the search for my great uncle migrated to Canada in 1914 and in the fullness of time explore a link with India.

Mother always maintained that my grandmother’s maiden name of Bux was not common in Germany where she had been born in 1895 but was from the sub continent.

It was for me a link to far and yet there in the historical records the name Bux is prominent amongst seamen who worked the ships that sailed from India to Europe in the 19th century.

All of which leaves me yet again with that simple observation that history is messy and full of surprises.

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Painting Mr Millar’s Institute in Cromarty

Now everyone packs something different in their holiday suitcase.

In the case of Peter it’s a guide book to those interesting if quirky buildings and his paint box.

And armed with these two essential holiday requirements he not only came across the Hugh Miller Church Street Institute in Cromarty but did it in acrylics on his visit to Scotland at the beginning of the year..

Of course that is to underestimate just what he does but like the Philosopher’s Stone no matter how many times he explained his technique I might as well have been listening to a medieval alchemist.*

But there is no denying that he has captured the Institute perfectly and I suspect Mr Miller's fans  would have been pleased and might even have snapped up the painting placing it amongst the fossils he had collected and the religious tracts he had written.

And that pretty much was Mr Miller.  He was born in 1802, was a self taught geologist and writer but was also an evangelical Christian and died with still much to contribute in 1852.

According to one source “he left a heritage of new discoveries of several Silurian sea scorpions and many Devonian fishes, including and though he had no academic credentials, he is today considered one of Scotland's premier palaeontologists.”**

It was fitting then that the Institute should carry his name and was partially funded by Andrew Carnegie that the Scottish industrialist who having made a shed load of money on the backs of American steel workers chose to return some of it as gifts to the workers and their families in the form of libraries and institutes.

The Cromarty Building was opened in 1903, listed in 1980 and just thirty-six years later was waiting for Peter to do it in acrylics.

Now it is easy to over romanticise men like Mr Miller but there is no doubt at his achievements and all those other self taught men.

Painting; the Hugh Miller Institute, Cromarty, © 2016 Peter Topping, Paintings from Pictures, Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

* Philosopher’s Stone, the legendary substance, allegedly capable of turning inexpensive metals into gold

** Hugh Miller, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Miller