A LODE-STAR, TOPSHAM, 1844

"TOPSHAM.  - On Tuesday, this hive of industry was the scene of unusual gaiety and activity, the whole population, including numerous visitors, having assembled on the quays and points of vantage to witness the launch of the Jeannette, the magnificent schooner yacht of the Earl of Egremont, from the yard of Mr. Bowden, where she had been undergoing substantial repair, and been lengthened about twelve feet.

"Adjoining the dock was an awning, erected by the noble owner of the lode-star, in which were Earl and Countess of Egremont,  lady of the Ven. Archdeacon Stevens and the Misses Stevens,  Captain and Mrs. Roberts, Mr. and Mrs. Williams and the Misses Williams,  Captain Heringham R.N., the Revds J. Thompson and G.H.O. Pedlar, Mr. Walker, and several members of the Royal Yacht Squadron.

"The Town Band was stationed in a barge off the wharf, and played the inspiriting airs of "Rule Britannia,"  "See the Conquering Hero comes," &c.  Upon the bosom of the waters were numerous craft,  from the huge steamer gaily decorated with the flags of all nations,  to the little cock-boat; the weather being delightfully fine the whole was a brilliant affair.

"The time appointed was seven o'clock, and about half an hour previously, the arrival of carriages with distinguished visitors, which was announced by the rettle of artillery, set expectation on the tiptoe.

"Precisely at seven o' clock the word was given, the numerous supports were simultaneously removed, and he gallant vessel, which is really a noble craft, majestically glided into the yielding bosom of the deep.

"Some little delay occured from the fact that the tide did not rise so high as usual, but this was of little moment.  it was some time before the immense crowd that were assembled dispersed to their respective homes, highly delighted with the scene they had witnessed."

Lode-star here means an attraction.  (This is how Shakespeare used the word in A Midsummer Night's Dream).   Here it is the schooner Jeannette that is meant although the lords and ladies there assembled would also have been an attraction, not to mention the over-the-top gunfire and the floating Town Band.

George Wyndham, 4th Earl of Egremont had been a naval officer before, in 1837, he became an earl, hence the strong naval presence under the awning.  He was 56 when his refitted yacht was launched at Topsham and he had less than two years to live.  He was the builder of Silverton Park, a great house some 8 miles from Exeter, long since demolished.

The Exe at Topsham had attracted numerous craft,  that a huge steamer was lying off Topsham sounds a bit hyperbolic. I find cock-boat a charming word for a small boat.

Too many bosoms?

The immense crowd that were assembled....!  Tut tut!

Source The Exeter and Plymouth Gazette, 20th July, 1844.

A SONNET IN PRAISE OF EXETER, 1844.

 "TO A LADY.- In Praise of Exeter. 

By the Rev. W.  Pulling, M.A.

Lady! with thine my spirit dwells delighted

On grand Exonia; she with charms is glowing:

Nature and Art therein, with powers united,

A picture form,  fresh beauties ever showing!

Painters and bards might there become excited

By her stream clear, fair-bridged, and softly flowing;

Peter's bold towers,  streets rising, myrtles blighted

By Winter scarcely, trees luxurient growing!

High on her Rougemont she a terrace raises;

A thick grove stands below, whereon th'eye gazes

With rapture!  Once beheld, her features never

Can be forgot, and Memory hymns her praises!"

Well, it's a long time since I blogged a bad poem and the Reverend William Pulling, of Sidney Sussex College,  M.A.  A.L.S, surely qualifies!  Welcome, William Pulling, to the Bad Poets' Society! (Of which I too can claim to be a proud member!) 

The Exeter and Plymouth Gazette of 6th July 1844 printed this poem in their Poets' Corner while , on the same sheet, noting that William had just published a neat little volume which contained 123 sonnets written strictly in the Italian style.  

Pulling was a native of Chudleigh and was, for some time, a master at the Grammar School there.  He was born in 1782.  Hence he was sixty-two or so when his sonnets were published. His promotion in the Church was slow but sure. He was nearly fifty when he was appointed Chaplain to the Cambridge Town Gaol and it was a good while later that he became Rector of Dymchurch in Kent.  He was 'instituted' by the Archbishop of Canterbury into the rectory at Old Romney in 1853, which I take to mean that the old man was given somewhere to live, and he died in his own house in Cambridge aged 78.  He seems never to have married.

The Gazette wrote of his work:  "we have great pleasure in recommending this little volume, as it is rarely that modern poetry is presented to us, not only so faultless, but containing so much to awaken the best feelings of the reader."

I have given this brief  'life' of William besause the internet seems not so far to have taken any notice of him and anyone who can write, probably, many more than 123, sonnets, strictly in the Italian style, surely deserves recognition.  He published some poems in the local (Kent) newspapers and his neat, little volume must still exist.

The A.L.S .the letters that he liked to put after his name, are a mystery to me.

The 'Grove' at Northernhay clearly caught his, and so many other people's, imagination.  Nowadays that part of the Gardens is a boring flat stretch of turf.  Bring back the Grove!

A DISTINGUISHED PARTY, EXMOUTH, 1844.

"EXMOUTH. - On Monday, the King of Saxony attended by the Duc de Staacpoole, aide-de-camp, the Baron de Gersendorff, Saxon Minister, and Dr Canes, the celebrated botanist, his Majesty's physician, arrived at this agreeable watering-place in two carriages and four, and dined and slept at Bastin's Marine Hotel.  His Majesty expressed himself much pleased with the Hotel,  and was engaged from an early hour in taking sketches from the drawing-room window.

"After breakfasting at half-past eight o' clock, the distinguished party were rowed to the Saltworks on the Warren and proceeded to Dawlish and Teignmouth, en route to Plymouth."

This routine notice of a middle-aged, all-male, royal party touring Britain is of more interest than it appears.  The King of Saxony whose party arrived in style at Bastin's Hotel was Friedrich August ll.  He had just come from Lyme Regis where he had purchased an ichyosaurus from Mary Anning.   He was remembered as an intelligent and benevolent monarch.

Richard, Duc de Stackpoole, was a French aristocrat but more British than French and must therefore have made an excellent ADC for the tour. He is remembered because his ghost, so men say, still haunts his old mansion of Glasshayes in the New Forest. 

Carl Gustav Carus (not Canes!), acting as the King's physician, was the most interesting of the party.  He made a name for himself not only as a botanist but as a physiologist and as a painter who studied under Caspar David Friedrich.   

I like the idea of the King of the Saxons making sketches of (?) Exmouth Bay and I like to imagine this distiguished party being rowed across the Exe to the Warren. 

I read here of the Saltworks on the Warren for the first time but I'm sure the Exmothian local historians know all about them.   The Works must have offered a superior landing place, one fit for a king.

Dr Carus wrote a book The King of Saxony's Journey through England and Scotland, 1844.  which I have not yet seen.

Source:The Exeter and Plymouth Gazette, 6th July 1844.

OUT ON "A LARK", EXETER, 1844

From The Exeter and Plymouth Gazette of 3rd August, 1844:

" ....in consequence of the anticipated Regatta at Budleigh Salterton, between ninety and a hundred persons, inhabitants of the faithful city, embarked at Exeter quay in the Owner's Good-will, W. Barratt, Commander, for that place, - the consideration for the trip being only two shillings and sixpence;  the excellent arrangements on board the vessel, we understand, including the agreeable provision of a band of music.

"When the vessel arrived at Turf, the Commander's "weather-eye" having detected certain signs of very bad weather not to be mistaken, he expressed his intention of not going over the Bar: but the company, who considered themselves out on "a lark" which would serve for anything, insisted upon it, and a steam-tug towed the vessel over.

"Many of them, however, were by this time getting sick of their amusement.  The ship hove-to a mile from Budleigh; when, to the company's great disappointment, they found that the Regatta was over, -  and  the only attraction to the good people of the town being themselves and their bark tossing on the bosom of the agitated ocean.

"A number of them, admirers of the principle of self-preservation, then disembarked in the first shore boat that could accommodate them, and departed for Exeter in two chaises and pair;  but the remainder, more courageous and less apprehensive, determined, with praiseworthy confidence, to continue to submit themselves to the experience and care of Capt. Barratt whose exertions throughout the day, under the most trying circumstances, are beyond eulogium.

"They got under weigh, and left Salterton about 4 p.m., everything presaging a gale, which came on with increasing fury.  The jib was split to shivers, - and to add to the distress, they lost the ship's boat.  The sail was split; and all but "the tars"" were compelled to go below, the hatches being battened down, and a tremendous sea making a complete breach over the vessel: her qualities as a sea boat, however, were here conspicuous, as were also the courage and skill of her commander and the crew.

"Below, the greatest confusion prevailed; the females being in a state which precluded that interchange of amenities which renders their society on pleasurable trips so charming; whilst the elegant adornments of their persons suffered considerably by the discharge, - and the males, terriified by their cries, and their reiterated and hurried enquiries of "where are we?" must have been enabled to conceive a vivid idea of a wreck at sea.

"At 7 p.m., the vessel was off Exmouth, signals of distress having  for some time been displayed.  Here a steamer bore down to their assistance, and towed her to Turf, when the state of things began to revive, and about 11 o'clock p.m. they arrived safe amid the sleeping shades of cathedral-capped Exon."

I kave heard locals speak of pleasure-boats as "sixpenny-sicks" but The Owner's Good-will was a "two-and-sixpenny sick".   You had more for your money - battened hatches,  shivered bow-sprits, torn sails, lost lifeboats.

Reported in the same newspaper is the Budleigh Regatta which went very well and without undesirable incident.  

Captain W. Barratt seems rather to have deserved censure than an eulogium, after all he subordinated the warnings of  his own prescient weather-eye to the will of his landlubber passengers. 

Cathedral-capped Exon is an echo from a time when from every direction there was a glorious view of 'St.Peter's Church'. 

  A good story?,  -  as I have written before -  it's  the way they tell them!