A SCUFFLE WITH THE MILITIA, EXETER 1772

 A Letter from Exeter September 21st 1772

"A great Concourse of People assembled on Sunday Evening last, to see the Militia at Roll-call. in a large spacious Green at the back of this City;  but the Company being so great, crowded rather too close to the Officers.   Col. Ackland then addressed the Company, and begged they would draw back; which not being readily complied with, he addressed them a second Time, though in a different and somewhat rougher Stile, bidding them stand off, or he would force them to it.  His Threats, however, were attended with just the same Effect as his Entreaties.  Finding all his Endeavours to persuade the Company to draw back, fruitless, he had Recourse to other Means:  He applied to Capt. Chase to march his Company of Light Infantry among the Crowd and knock down all who obstructed the Passage, among whom were several Women with Child, old Cripples, &c.  This Behaviour soon raised the Resentment of the Mob, who, in their Turn, discharged a Volley of Stones, &c. at the Soldiers, and collared and struck the Colonel several times.  The Officers and Soldiers in an Instant, with their Swords drawn, rushed among the Crowd, and endeavoured to seize some of the Ringleaders, on which a dreadful, though not very bloody, scuffle ensued;  the Mob endeavoured to mark the Fellows by cutting their Clothes off their Backs, in doing which they sometimes cut rather too deep.

The Worshipful the Mayor, attended by the Stewards and Constables, repaired to this Scene of Confusion and by taking two Fellows into custody, restored matters to Order.  On examining the Prisoners it appeared that the Officers first collared and drew their Swords on them, without the least Provocation, in Consequence of which they were immediately discharged.  This is not the first Scuffle we have had with these Men-ofWar."

  Derby Mercury 2nd Oct 1772

Eighteenth Century life seems to have been as rumbustious as Hogarth painted it.   Here in Exeter it seems you could spend your Sundays scuffling.   If you were a part-time soldier you could hope to knock down a few old cripples and pregnant women and even to wave your sword at the 'mob'..  If you were with 'the People' you could heave a few bricks at a light-infantryman or even collar a colonel. 

I like the capitalisation of nouns in these old newspaper reports,  'Volley of Stones' is so much more graphic than 'volley of stones'.

SIR REDVERS BULLER

From:  The Stamford Mercury  5th June 1908:

"Fifty thousand admirers subscribed for the equestrian statue of Sir Redvers at Exeter - a memorial which, as Lord Wolseley said when it was unveiled, "will remind future generations of Western men of the brilliant services performed by Devonshire's most illustrious sons of this period, and cannot fail to inspire them with a desire to serve our Sovereign in their turn as well and faithfully as Sir Redvers Buller has done throughout his long and brilliant career."

Fifty thousand proud Devonians subscribed to put him where he is.   Who would pull him down?

THE EXE FROZEN

It is no secret that the world is warming but the degree (le mot juste!?) to which winters in Exeter have changed is surprising,

 Mr James Commins, the corresponding tobacconist,  whose Reminiscences of Exeter Fifty Years Ago were first published in 1877, addresses his younger readers:   "The young reader must understand,"  he writes, "the winters were much more severe than now;  skating almost a certainty, and snow falling at various times for two or three days and remaining on the ground for several weeks."  

Have not old people been saying something like this to young  people for ever?  And were not the summers always sunnier?  Mr Commins is remembering the early years of the century, perhaps the same hard winters that inspired Dickens' white Christ masses (no other plural seems to me satisfactory) in Pickwick,  Christmas Carol  &c.    In Dickens' day not so old Exonians could tell tall tales, by way of example, of the excessive fall of snow of 1751 when the snow in Devon was three foot deep  and there were many melancholy accidents, waggons overturned, coaches axle-deep on the roads, sheep lost on the farms, extensive damage to property and death through accident..   

The  Januaries, however, of Mr Commins' own times seem severe enough to us today.  There was a heavy fall of snow on New Year's Day 1880 and the Exe froze in 1881.  Typical is the report of Trewman's Exeter Flying Post of January  4th  1871:  The Exe had again frozen over and "New Year's Day and Christmas Day were very much alike, and neither of them differed in any material point from the six days which intervened;  Sunday was, in fact, the twelfth day of hard frost." 

In February 1855,   the Gloucester Journal  had reported: "The whole of the country has alike been influenced by the long-continued frost.  The poor have suffered severely by being thrown out of  employment, and the prosperous and well-to-do have enjoyed themselves by various amusements on the ice,  The tiver Exe was frozen over at Exeter, and a dinner for a convivial party was cooked on the ice by means of a gas-stove; games of skittles and other amusements have taken place, and skaters have abounded on various parts of the river."

I  think it likely that even some of 'the poor' found time for fun and games on the ice but two centuries ago newspapermen, as today, liked to demonstrate a social conscience and to signal their own virtue,  not that I doubt there were enough citizens who suffered from the cold.   Skittles on the ice sounds fun and one would certainly have liked to have had an invitation to that convivial dinner-party.

There have been notably hard winters since then  but the trend is  clear.   Today as I write, the sun is shining and the temperature is at seven degrees centigrade - positively balmy!   
   

THE EXETER WAR MEMORIAL

England can boast many fine war memorials but the bronze group which Devon-born-and-bred sculptor John Angel created for the City of Exeter's War Memorial is as good as any.  Angel was a consummate artist.  His later career was in the United States where there are many examples of his  excellent work. The famous bronze doors of St Patrick's Cathedral in New York are his.   

On the first of August  1923,  shortly after the memorial was unveiled,  The Exeter and Plymouth Gazette published some rather bad couplets under the heading  Exeter War Memorial.  They were  composed by one C.E.B.  

THE SAILOR

Guard of the Seas I sit with eyes that gaze afar;

Foes around me, beneath, affright not the British Tar.

THE SOLDIER.

Ward of the Trenches I sit (I have marched full many a mile)

I have fought, I have suffered,  - I win - and that's why I wearily smile.

THE PRISONER OF WAR.

Prisoner of War I sit behind the fast closed gates.

Unconquered, unbroken, I wait in trust for my rescuing mates.

THE WOMAN.

Woman of Pity ,  I sit and prepare the healing hands

For the shattered and wounded limbs of my Brothers from many lands.

VICTORY.

High above all I stand, bay wreath uplifted to Heaven, 

The Dragon beneath my feet, I honour the men of Devon.

I publish these verses again here because, crude though they are, they remind us of the spirit of the times and of the real sacrifice which these figures represent.   The heroic and colossal four are still sitting in Northernhay Gardens and they are well worth a second look. Victory soars high above their heads like Marianne at the barricades.  Many who pass by do not see her.  Some seem not able to raise their eyes from their mobile phones.  She is truly magnificent.  She rises triumphant, one foot clear of the ground and her lovely arm raised on high.   She is a wonder to gaze on from any angle,  perhaps most glorious  against  summer skies, which  at the moment we do not have, and from Northernhay Gate.    

 

SEMPER FIDELIS

Fidelis is a lovely word and was a favourite name for faithful dogs in the Victorian years. (Willie Maddison's father's old dog was called Fidelis) and, in its shortened form of Fido, (Abraham Lincoln's favourite dog was called Fido ) there are still enough faithful hounds to be found.

Exeter, as every Exonian knows, has the motto Semper Fidelis which translates as Ever Faithful. This is something of a distinction. Most cities have to manage without a motto and none has one so simple, straightforward and honourable as is ours. It is ancient too. It was suggested in the year of the Armada, 1588, in a letter written by Queen Elizabeth l to the citizens of Exeter thanking them for a gift of money towards the expense of seeing off the Spanish. We who today are citizens of Exeter should not forget that mighty monarchs have written thank-you letters to us.

In the preface to his 1878 Reminiscences, Mr James Cossins, the corresponding tobacconist of Paris Street, likes to use Ever Faithful and Semper Fidelis as synonyms for Exeter.  For example he writes in his preface that his book will be perused with some feeling of interest by those who like myself, have always felt a warm attachment to the "Ever Faithful" and elsewhere he writes. :"Persons who have been absent from "Semper Fideis" for many years, on re-visiting the old city, declare that it is improved and so much altered they cannot recpgnise some of the localities." This seems to me a worthy usage to which we, in our modern age, might well return. One might then perhaps expect to hear on the Cathedral Green snatches of conversation such as: "The homeless seem to be attracted to Semper Fidelis like fleas to a faithful old dog."

UNWELCOME LONDON VISITOR, EXETER, 1862.

I have been looking at Mr James Cossins' book Reminiscences of Exeter Fifty Years Since, the Second Edition 1878 and I am grateful to Mr Cossins, who died in 1883 and was a tobacconist in Paris Street, for introducing me to the Norfolk Howards. Norfolk Howards, I was delighted to learn, are bugs. No more, no less! Their story starts in 1862 with this hilarious advertisement in the Times of London:

  " I Norfolk Howard, heretofore called and known by the name of Joshua Bug. late of Epsom. in the county of Surrey, now of Wakefield, in the county of York, and landlord of the Swan Tavern in the same county, do hereby give notice. that on the 20th day of this present month of June, for and on behalf of myself and heirs, lawfully begotten. I did abandon the use of the surname of Bug, and assumed, took and used, and am determined at all times hereafter; in all writings, actions, dealings, matters and things, and upon all other occasions whatsoever, to be distinguished, to subscribe, to be called and known by the name of Norfolk Howard only. I further refer all whom it may concern to the deed poll under my hand and seal. declaring that I choose to renounce the use of the surname of Bug and that I assume in lieu thereof the above surnames of Norfolk Howard, and also declaring my determination, upon all occasions whatsoever, to be called and distinguished exclusively by the said surnames of Norfolk Howard, duly enrolled by me in the High Court of Chancery. - Dated this 23rd day of June,1862. Norfolk Howard, late Joshua Bug." 

The originator of this little masterpiece, this prime example of English humour, is apparently unknown but my bet is that it was marinated in wine and/or spirits and penned at either a London club or an Oxbridge college. None of which has anything to do with the city of Exeter except that I first met the Norfolk Howards in Mr Cossins' book where, a decade or more after The Times advertisement, he writes:

"Visitors arriving from London - the great dread was the uninvited ones, 'Norfolk Howards' of which at this time every house in London was suppose(sic) to have more than agreeable, and to avoid any importation of the above-named, trunks, boxes, &c., were taken to the rear of the premises, opened and examined previous to anything being taken to bedrooms, and, if necessary, underwent the process of fumigating with brimstone."

I am alarmed at the idea of these Georgian hotel or boarding-house servants in Exeter rummaging through the trunks and cases of the London visitors and fumigating the contents with poisonous sulphur-dioxide. Yet is there not in these days of plague, someting thought-provoking, perhaps even heuristic, about Exeter's pragmatic attitude to new arrivals?