A story, not about the Town Crier, but about his wife who was sent to a lunatic asylum.

This is a story about a postcard of Robert Lang Martin who was described as the only mounted Town Crier in the country.  Not only was he based in Ilfracombe, where my relative died in the 1887 Monarch boating disaster, but I thought it would be interesting to discover the role of such a person before mobile phones, the internet and, of course, facebook were ever heard of.  However, I was surprised to find there was already quite a lot of information on the web about him including :

• He was born in Crediton in 1871 and worked on a farm outside Ilfracombe (Pludd Farm 1881 census) before joining the 17th Lancers.
• Each evening he would ride through the town ringing his bell and shouting out the news of the day and telling of the various attractions visitors could enjoy in the area.
• He blotted his copy book slightly in 1913 when a policeman spotted him "swaying in the saddle" and he was charged with being "drunk in charge of a horse on the highway".  In court the policeman said "..... his head gradually fell forward on to the horse's mane, and he murmured something nobody could understand".  Robert Martin tried to convince the Court he was trying to read something on a notice which was faintly written in pencil, but he was nevertheless found guilty and fined £1.
• In August 1914, Robert rode his horse through the town in front of a large marching contingent of volunteers who were off to serve King and Country in what would become the First World War.  The rest of the population of the town crowded the streets cheering them on.  At least 160 of the volunteers died during the course of the War. 

Certainly portrayed as a local character !

What caught my eye, however, was the fact that on the 1901 census Robert's wife, Amelia Martin, was incarcerated in the Devon County Lunatic Asylum in Exminster. Why ?  I felt she deserved some research. 

Amelia Vound was born in Ilfracombe in about 1870.  She married Robert Martin in 1888 (aged just 18) and their first child, a son, was born in 1893.  Robert probably served with the 17th Lancers in South Africa during the Second Boer War (1900 - 1902) and it was during this time that Amelia appears on the census in the Lunatic Asylum.  Having presumably returned from the War, Robert and Amelia have a daughter in 1904.  Amelia eventually died aged 83 in 1954.
​
The 1911 census has Amelia at home living with her husband and two children in High Street, Ilfracombe with occupation "Wife Home Duties".  There is nothing in the final column of the census where "lunatic" would go if appropriate.

​I started by looking in the local newspapers to see if I could find any more background to this family. I was shocked by what I found and which had been seemingly airbrushed from earlier stories appearing on the web.
​
In August 1903 (roughly 8 and a half months before the birth of Robert Martin's daughter, Ethel) Mrs Annie Austin was summoned for assaulting Robert Martin.  Robert claimed that Annie, who was his sister-in-law, used language which was "very disgusting" and she had "abused him very violently".  He also said she had "struck him on the left cheek" and that "this had been going on for years".  However, her defence was that her brother-in-law had cruelly ill treated his wife and "she could not put up with it ...... He was a brute and it was through him that she was in the condition she was".  Annie had been speaking to Robert about the ill treatment of his wife and he had struck her in the chest first before she slapped his face "in self defence".  Robert said Annie had "tempted his wife with drink" and was why there was such unhappiness.  However, he admitted "he kicked his wife because she spat in his face".  A neighbour said she had seen Mrs Martin "much bruised".  Surprisingly from what was in the newspaper articles, Annie was bound over to keep the peace for six months in £5.
  
In 1906 Robert Martin was charged with "driving a horse and cart without a light attached".  His defence was that he had lost his lamp on the way home and there were no farm houses on the road where he could borrow one from.  He was fined one shilling.

The following year, in 1907, he was charged with "furious riding" and pleaded guilty.  He did however add that "the pace was quite 12 miles an hour, and that he was going faster than usual, but he was only cantering.  He did not go at the pace of motor cars through the High Street". The policeman who gave evidence said he had cautioned Robert Martin the previous year and that several people had complained.  Robert was fined five shillings.

Robert Martin's violent temper was again in the Courts in 1912 when, the charge of assault having been dropped because of a public apology, he was before the Magistrates charged with "obscene language" against Henry J. Ford of Ilfracombe.  It seems he used "disgusting language" towards someone he had a financial quarrel with.  He shouted, "as loud as when he town cried" to someone on a boat coming into the quay with the complainant on board that "he would give him 5 shillings to throw the (censored) over-board".  On reaching the Quay, the "defendant seized him by the throat and used most disgusting language; he also threw the complainant to the ground ...... hurting his elbow so much he had to go to a doctor".  After the altercation, Robert Martin had said sorry for assaulting him and that "it was owing to having a drop of drink.  They then went and had a drink to put matters right". He admitted "having had a little drink on the day ..... He was neither drunk nor sober but mixed muddly".  He denied using bad language but said the complainant had been "making statements about the town which were injurious to him".  He was fined five shillings and costs with half the advocates fee.  One month was allowed for payment.
​
In 1913 Robert Martin filed for bankruptcy.  His assets were £13 and his liabilities £79.  The cause he claimed was "losses on wood business, want of capital, loss of a horse in October 1912 and high street rent".  The Court heard that he had been invalided out of the army in 1893 with a pension of 3 shillings and sixpence per week. He had since worked as a luggage porter and town crier at Ilfracombe.  Also, most interestingly, for the past four years he had "sold picture postcards" and retailed firewood.  As can be seen from the note at the top of this postcard, it was sold by him to the recipient.  He had "kept no books of accounts, but his profits and earnings were estimated for the past twelve months at £70, exclusive of his pension".  He said there were no profits at all from the wood retailing business and that "the sale of postcards had been his principal source of income".  In the previous November his creditors had forced him to sell all his assets, except household furniture, and for this he received £21.  The horse, in respect of which a loss of £20 appeared in the deficiency account, was killed by lightning".

What do we know about the County Asylum in Exminster ?  They have a website dedicated to research into the period while it was an asylum and the practices of the day.  It seems poor Amelia was probably admitted under the 1890 Lunacy Act and, like all female patients, would have been engaged in helping with domestic duties in the laundry or kitchen with some needlework to ward off the boredom ! 

The huge 800 bed Asylum opened in 1845 as being an institution for pauper lunatics with learning difficulties or other mental health issues and eventually closed its doors 140 years later after it had become Exminster Hospital.  The land was sold for housing and it is now apartments and town houses in an area known as Devington Park. 

TO DO : Go to the Devon Heritage Centre (just outside Exeter) to find admission records.  Once the admission date is known, it is easy enough to find a patient in the admission registers, 3769A/H3, and papers, 3769A/H2, from Exminster Hospital, deposited at the Devon Record Office.  The admission documents contain the patient’s number, which can help to find the patient in the Medical Case books, 3769A/H9.  Using these hospital records, it is possible to discover information on a patient’s age, religion, address and next of kin and details of their illness, its supposed cause, duration and treatment.

Sources :
Devon Heritage www.devonheritage.org/Places/Ilfracombe/RobertMartin.htm
Visit Ilfracombe www.visitilfracombe.co.uk
Devon Family History Society www.devonfhs.org.uk/forewords/D069.pdf
Devon County Mental Hospital dcmh.exeter.ac.uk

What would your reaction be if a complete stranger contacted you and said they had found a postcard with a romantic poem sent to their grandmother by an admirer ?  Well, I purchased this postcard off e-bay and am trying to find out as much as I can about the recipient and the sender.  My daughter thinks I'm a genealogical stalker !  
 
I believe the card was sent to Jessie Harris, who was just 16 years and ten months old, living in Fore Street in the small village of Pool in the far south west of Cornwall.  She had been born in Dalton, Lancashire so was a northern lass. 
 
I originally thought I had discovered Jessie marrying in 1914 and having a number of children.  I found a living relative and contacted them but unfortunately this was a different Jessie Harris who was a servant girl living in Truro in 1911 rather than 10 miles away in Pool.  Not only did I not find her marrying, but I am afraid to say I am pretty sure she died a spinster aged 84.  According to a tree on Ancestry, Jessie and her sister Ada are buried in same plot at St Stephens Parish Church, Treleigh, Scorrier with Ada’s husband, William John Thomas.  Maybe she never found the love of her life ?

I then tried to discover who "R.F.J" was who sent the card.  The postcard was sent in September 1905.  Was the sender older or younger than the recipient ?  My guess is that he was younger or he would have perhaps approached Jessie face to face rather than taking what must have been an unusual approach of asking her out ‘by post’. 

Jessie was born in 1888, so my guess is the sender was born after this.  Assuming the sender was living in Cornwall, I have searched the 1901 and 1911 censuses and there is only one possible “R.F.J” but he was only 12 when the card was sent, so is probably too young to be our man.  Of course the sender may have been visiting Cornwall or been down there temporarily.  However extending the search country wide is like looking for a needle in a haystack. 
 
Perhaps Jessie and he met on that Saturday evening and had a dalliance, but then again, perhaps his love was unrequited.  We will probably never know.  
 
In order to bring everything together, I tried to find a living relative of Jessie's sister, Ada Harris. I sent messages to two individuals on Genes Reunited who are also listing the same father, Frederick Harris who was born in St Erth in 1863 but, so far, have not had any response. ​

​Postcard set to an RSO address
 
An RSO address means it was posted using the "Railway Sub Office" system whereby local correspondence could avoid going to the main sorting office and taking longer to be delivered.  Carn Brae was a railway sub office and could deliver its own mail.  
 
RSOs ceased to exist, officially, on 1 August 1905, just before this postcard was franked.  By 1905 there was a properly surfaced road system in place with mechanised road-going vehicles and, hence, it wasn't as necessary to use all the old methods to speed the mail. However, the basic system continued for many years and postmarks including RSO were apparently still in use as late as 1944.
 
TO DO :
 
Visit St Stephens Parish Church, Treleigh near Redruth TR16 4AY. 

​
​I purchased this postcard sometime ago off ebay as it was of Padstow. I had no idea it was going to provide a mystery story to savour.

For a bit of fun I started researching the Miss J. Williams who the card was sent to. I discovered that she was Jessie Rawle Williams, born in Padstow in 1881 and her father farmed at Tregonna in Little Petherick (PL27 7QT).  The farmhouse on the 1911 census had 9 rooms so it was quite large.
 
In 1901 Jessie was 20.

​The postcard was postmarked 24th October 1902 and, although there was no message, the suggestion is that it was sent by "J.C" or perhaps "F.C".  Why would you send a postcard to a 20 year old girl without a message from Padstow to somewhere about a mile away ?
 
I thought that perhaps it was sent by an admirer and I searched to see if I could find her subsequently marrying someone with those initials.  Sadly that was not to be, but I did discover something which deserved further investigation.  Eight years later in 1910 she married Henry Francis Whitefield who was 77 and, on the 1911 census, among the resident staff was a "sick nurse" !

​I have come across quite large age gaps when researching some of my own ancestors but I don't think I have come close to nearly a 50 year gap.  That must surely be unusual.
 
This is where my love of attending murder mystery weekends takes over and speculation runs rife.  What could her motive for marriage be ?
 
Maybe she wanted his money ? Well, I discovered he died at their home of "Tolcarnia" in Newquay eighteen months later leaving an estate, in today's money, worth £1,612,000. I ordered a copy of his Will and apart from some relatively small pecuniary legacies (including provision in trust for looking after his aged sister - see below - and something to a cousin and her family in Canada) the bulk of the estate was left in trust absolutely to Jessie. 

Maybe her family didn't want to continue their responsibility for her ?  She was the only daughter sandwiched between two brothers and, at 29, I guess her family might have thought she would be left on the shelf and forced her to marry an elderly gentleman who needed a companion.

Maybe they were in love ? 
 
Henry was an interesting person.  He was a retired Solicitor and had not previously been married. Perhaps the reason for this is that he had previously led a life of being a Carer. Not only did he live with a brother who was blind and 13 years older than him (until this brother died in 1882) but also he had a sister slightly older than him and they were still living together (with two young servant girls) on the 1901 census. She died in 1912 having moved to another large house in Newquay.

Was there life for Jessie after Henry ?  Well, "yes" !  Having previously been married to a man 48 years older than her, in 1916 Jessie remarried to Arthur Horace Riche who was 8 years younger than her !  They married in Woodford, Essex (where he was living) but it seems they must then have returned to Newquay as both of their children were probably born in the property which Jessie had inherited and (see right) she is advertising for staff between 1922 and at least 1928.  Arthur died in 1955 but Jessie lived until 1963 when she died at the ripe old age of 83.  

Post script : Needs more research, but I believe that "Tolcarnia" overlooked what is now Tolcarne Beach in Newquay.  The beach is a crescent shaped sandy beach with 150 foot cliffs and is one of the most popular of the beaches in Newquay with great surf.  Unfortunately you can only get to it by taking over 200 steps down from the town, so it's not one I have been to ..... or are likely to visit !  The advert (above) placed in The Times in May 1901 was about the time Henry may have retired and moved from nearby Station Road in Newquay where he was living on the census a few months earlier.
​
TO DO : Visit Tolcarne Beach in Newquay TR7 2QN

Something so simple which seems to have been around forever was in fact only begun in the late 19th century.
The Europeans had discovered the postcard in Austria in 1869 and Britain had the following year. 
It wasn't until 1894 that Royal Mail gave publishers permission to sell and send picture postcards through the post with just a stamp. The British postcard then took off and became a quick and simple means of sending a message or greeting to someone.  Their huge popularity continued until around 1920.

It was in 1902 that Britain first introduced the idea of splitting the reverse between the message and the address, so that the picture could be shown in full on the front.  Prior to that the message had been on one side and the address on the other. 

Up until WW1 the postcard was generally used as a means of communication, much like a text is today, but after then the telephone became more widely available.  It is difficult to imagine today, but in those days there were up to seven deliveries each day.  Millions of postcards were posted every week ! 

After the War, the postcard became a means of showing friends and family where the sender had traveled or gone on holiday. ​People collected them as cheap souvenirs both to send to friends and to keep for themselves ..... similar to taking a photo today and sending it to friends on your i-phone in order to show them where you are.

Collections now exist which are interesting to the genealogist showing how a particular place has developed, how the fashions changed and how modes of transport have got faster. 

It occurs to me that now everyone is posting more and more about their holidays and trips on social media, that the days of the postcard being used to communicate with friends and relatives is dying, because :

• Photos are postcard quality so why would you buy a postcard and spend money on a stamp which probably costs more than the postcard ? 
• By not writing a dozen postcards it saves the sender an hour of time they could use doing something more productive. 
• Postcards usually arrive after the sender has returned home from their holiday and you have spoken to the person you sent it to.

However, having taken a sample of my friends views, there still seems to be a place for sending postcards in the post :

• to those who aren't using social media.
• to parents.
• just because people just like receiving a postcard in the post to stick up in their kitchens etc.

It was the first day of census, and all through the land;
The pollster was ready ... a black book in hand.
He mounted his horse for a long dusty ride;
His book and some quills were tucked close by his side.

A long winding ride down a road barely there;
Toward the smell of fresh bread wafting, up through the air.
The woman was tired, with lines on her face;
And wisps of brown hair she tucked back into place.

She gave him some water ... as they sat at the table;
And she answered his questions ... the best she was able.
He asked of her children... Yes, she had quite a few;
The oldest was twenty, the youngest not two.

She held up a toddler with cheeks round and red;
His sister, she whispered, was napping in bed.
She noted each person who lived there with pride;
And she felt the faint stirrings of the wee one inside.

He noted the sex, the color, the age...
The marks from the quill soon filled up the page.
At the number of children, she nodded her head;
And saw her lips quiver for the three that were dead.

The places of birth she "never forgot";
Was it Kansas? or Utah? or Oregon ... or not?
They came from Scotland, of that she was clear;
But she wasn't quite sure just how long they'd been here.

They spoke of employment, of schooling and such;
They could read some .and write some .. though really not much.
When the questions were answered, his job there was done;
So he mounted his horse and he rode toward the sun.

We can almost imagine his voice loud and clear;
"May God bless you all for another ten years."
Now picture a time warp ... its' now you and me;
As we search for the people on our family tree.

We squint at the census and scroll down so slow;
As we search for that entry from long, long ago.
Could they only imagine on that long ago day;
That the entries they made would effect us this way ?

If they knew, would they wonder at the yearning we feel;
And the searching that makes them so increasingly real.
We can hear if we listen the words they impart;
Through their blood in our veins and their voice in our heart.

Author Unknown

A poem written by an unknown author : 

Your tombstone stands among the rest;
Neglected and alone.
The name and date are chiseled out
On polished, marbled stone.

It reaches out to all who care
It is too late to mourn.
You did not know that I exist
You died and I was born.

Yet each of us are cells of you
In flesh, in blood, in bone.
Our blood contracts and beats a pulse
Entirely not our own.

Dear Ancestor, the place you filled
One hundred years ago
Spreads out among the ones you left
Who would have loved you so.

I wonder if you lived and loved,
I wonder if you knew
That someday I would find this spot,
And come to visit you.

I used to be Chairman at St Albans Lawn Tennis Club (SALTC) and, during my tenure in 2004, we celebrated the Clubs centenary. Being someone who was both interested in history and in the Club, I thought it would be fun to write a short history of the Club for those coming to our celebrations.

Luckily my predecessors had left me well kept minute books of every meeting ever held and, as I read through them, I was amazed at the wealth of information I had available to me. They weren't that easy to read as the early one's were mostly handwritten and the more modern one's were invariably typed using a dodgy typewriter.   

It was great fun researching the changes which the Club had faced over those one hundred years - from the hire of the horse to pull the roller over the grass courts, to the what now seem petty arguments about abolishing the all white clothing rule. However, the icing on the cake was my discovery that we used to have a Wimbledon Champion playing at our Club - Kay Stammers.  

Her story starts in 1912 when Hubert Stammers married Alice Curchod and they moved to 31 Glenferrie Road in St Albans. Katherine, or Kay as she was known, was born in April 1914. According to an article in a 1945 edition of Picture Post, "she began playing tennis at 10 years old" (1924) at their local tennis club, St Albans Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club, then located in nearby Hillside Road.  When she was 14 (1928) the family moved to a house called "Wood Walk" in Sandpit Lane where her parents built a grass tennis court in their back garden. The Stammers' lived there between 1929 and 1956. 

Kay was educated at the St Albans High School for Girls.

As a teenager, Kay won SALTC's mixed doubles championships in 1929, aged 14 or 15, with a D.H.Scott, before going on to win the clubs ladies singles championship two years later in 1931, the same year as she made her first Wimbledon appearance, having qualified aged just 17.  Sadly, that first appearance at Wimbledon ended in round 2.  It is believed she wore her hair in pigtails at the time. 

Kay must have been a junior at SALTC at a time when the Club records suggest juniors were not generally accepted as being of equal status to the adult members whatever their standard. Perhaps it was because of her parents also playing at the Club that she was allowed to take part in the club tournaments. It is also interesting that in the year she took part in her first Wimbledon, June / July 1931, that she should be winning our little singles event in possibly July or August 1931. 

Her parents, were also members at SALTC for many years.  Her father, Hubert Charles Stammers, is also on the winners board having won the mens doubles in 1933 with a Mr H.E.Wortley, later to become a chairman of the club.

In June 1935 a newspaper article written just before Wimbledon says "We English people expect much from Kay Stammers, but whether she can stay on her best game for 12 days in a row is doubtful. On her most brilliant days she is practically unbeatable. But those shots of hers have so little margin of error that should they go wrong disaster may befall her".

Contrary to the decision taken by the other British players, who decided to stay in America, Kay flew back from playing in the Wightman Cup and the US Open when war broke out. Kay married Michael Menzies a few months later and they went on to have two sons and a daughter, Virginia, born in a St Albans nursing home in 1943.

During the War, Kay played exhibition matches raising money for the Red Cross and served as an ambulance driver.

Kay and her husband emigrated to Johannesburg in South Africa in 1949 on account of Michael’s work and, nearly 20 years later, they moved to America, again because of work. They divorced in 1974 and a year later Kay married an American lawyer, Thomas Walker Bullitt, and went to live in Kentucky. Thomas predeceased her and she carried on living there until she died aged 91 in 2005.

For as long as her health allowed, Kay returned to Wimbledon every year.  

Her records show she was the Wightman Cup Captain and two time Wimbledon ladies doubles Champion no less !  Who knows how many more titles she would have won had the War not intervened.  

I realise each and every adoption case is entirely different but there are common threads and lessons which I certainly learnt and hope that I can perhaps pass these on to at least one person out there.

Knowing how crucial First Contact would be, I joined an excellent adoption discussion group on Family Tree Forum 
(www.familytreeforum.com/forumdisplay.php/8-Adoption-Reunion) 
and found a group of individuals who I could bounce thoughts and idea's off.  Making contact is a 50:50 spin of the wheel and getting in the successful 50% could be down to research and taking advise from others who have been there before. 

When I was starting out I read about the experiences of others and it was obvious that everyone had different tales and there was no ‘right’ way of doing things. A lot is down to luck, but you can weight that ‘luck’ in your favour by following a few very basic rules :

• Don’t build up your hopes and you will never be disappointed.


• There is no template of the right or the wrong way.


• When you do get the opportunity to make contact, remember, you usually only get one shot at it.


• Give them your story without asking or expecting anything in return. Any information you get back from them must be voluntarily given without conditions.


• Never be confrontational and always give them a get out but at the same time leave the door open.

Good luck ..... if it was meant to be it probably will be, but sometimes it really could be down to luck.

To commemorate the centenary of the 1914 Christmas Truce, a leading supermarket filmed a poignant and emotional advert depicting events that day.  I had and still have mixed emotions about it.  

Is it right to use the most deadly war in human history, when 15 million people died, to encourage your customers to shop at your supermarket rather than one of your competitor's ?  I will put my head above the parapet of my trench and say a loud "NO".  

Having said that, by showing a clean, unbloodied version of what undoubtedly took place during the period between Christmas Eve and New Year's Day, it has made the story much more accessible to todays youngsters who may not have been aware of the fact ordinary soldiers from both sides, under no orders from their superiors, decided Christmas was not a time for killing but a time for joining hands, singing, giving each other presents and perhaps, although not necessarily true, having a game of football in No Man's Land.   

I could write more but instead would like you to read the transcript of a recently discovered powerful, well written letter home from a soldier who was in the trenches at the time, Private Frederick W.Heath.  The letter is out of copyright and thanks go to Marian Robson for transcribing it. I found it on the website www.christmastruce.co.uk which has a lot of interesting and detailed research about the truce. 

Despite having spent numerous holiday's in Cornwall, I can't recall having been here on St Piran's Day. Now that I am a resident, I felt I ought to do a little research and find out a bit more about the day which is named after one of the three patron saints of Cornwall ..... the other two being St Michael who is associated with St Michael's Mount and St Petroc associated with Padstow.

​St. Piran was an Irishman who was said to have performed many miracles, such as raising soldiers slain in battle from the dead.

It was reported that he was flung into the sea in Ireland with a millstone around his neck and miraculously floated across the water to Pirran Beach in Perranporth where he built a small chapel in the sand dunes.

​The Saint Piran Trust website says : According to legend, St Piran was born in Ireland in the 6th century. He was renowned for his miraculous deeds but a group of tribal kings grew afraid of his powers and jealous of his influence. They put a millstone around his neck and threw him off the top of a high cliff into the sea. As Piran fell, lightening and thunder raged, but as he reached the sea the storm ceased and the Irish watched St Piran float on the millstone towards the Cornish shore. After many days at sea, he safely landed on the beach that bears his name today – Perranporth.  He built his chapel in what is today a large expanse of sand dunes and it is said that his first converts were a fox, a badger and a boar.  The Cornish people flocked to see him as news of his teaching spread.

According to an article in the Western Morning News in 1909, on his arrival, St. Piran led a hermit like existence and occupied his plentiful leisure by studying rocks and crystals, collecting many specimens. Before long, it chanced that one of the stones which composed his fireplace was missing, whereupon St. Piran, searching among his collection for a suitable replacement, chose one which was black and of unusual weight. The fire was lit and in due time a stream of white metal flowed over the ground – the first indication of Cornwall's future of wealth. Thereupon the neighbours were summoned and were initiated into the secret of digging and smelting tin. In connection with this legend, the 5th of March became St. Piran’s day and was invariably celebrated by the tinners with much hilarity. 

​According to the Gospel of Wikipedia, there is little description of specific traditions associated with this day apart from the consumption of large amounts of alcohol and food during 'Perrantide', the week leading up to 5 March. The day following St Piran's Day was known by many as 'Mazey Day'. The phrase 'drunk as a perraner' was used in 19th century Cornwall to describe people who had consumed large quantities of alcohol.

St Piran is believed to have lived for 200 years although no date of his death was recorded. He was fond of a drink and met his end falling down a well.  It is said that in 1281 the church at Perran possessed a box containing his head.

​It seems St Piran's Day is always held on 5th March each year. Tinners have a tradition that there are some secrets regarding the manufacture of tin which were communicated to their ancestors by St Piran and that, on that day, they stop work and treat the day as a holiday. It has only been since the late 19th century that Celtic revivalists managed to introduce a day of celebration to Cornwall. Saint Piran's Day has been celebrated throughout the County since the 1950's and now almost every Cornish community holds some sort of event to mark the day.

Thanks to St Piran there is a good excuse for the consumption of much alcohol !   

Reports made by returning escapees

All of these reports were made by officers and men of the armed forces and merchant navy and usually provide: service details; when and where captured; home address and civilian occupation.

For Royal Air Force personnel details can include: where based, type of aircraft, when, where and how the aircraft was lost, and the presumed fate of the other aircrew. Every report includes a narrative, of variable length, which describes an individual's experiences as an escaper, evader or prisoner of war.  In addition, many reports include appendices which can provide the names and addresses of civilian helpers, nature of help given, and relevant dates; details of the escape method and fellow PoWs who assisted in an escape; the usefulness of officially provided escape aids, which ones were used, and suggested improvements and / or additions. 

Escape and Evasion reports are in the National archives at Kew.  The following record series WO208 are included: 

• Pieces 3298 to 3327 – MI9 escape and evasion reports numbered 1 to 3,122, dating from 1940 to 1945 
• Pieces 3343 to 3345 – 843 miscellaneous interrogation reports from 1945 
• Pieces 3348 to 3352 – 3,048 escape reports from 1945 
• Pieces 4238 to 4276 – reports of prisoner of war escapes from Italy to Switzerland 1943-1944 
• Pieces 4368 to 4371 – sundry additional reports on prisoner of war escapes via Switzerland 1943-1944 
• Pieces 5393 to 5404 – MI9 reports on escapers and evaders through enemy lines in Italy 1943-1944 
• Pieces 5582 to 5583 – interrogation reports on repatriated allied prisoner of war escapers and evaders 1942-1946, including some appendices to reports in pieces 3305 to 3327 

A couple of weeks ago we visited an antiques fair in Harpenden. You never know what you will discover and on this occasion it was some old postcards. The lady selling them had packaged them into neat packs of 12 and, when I said I was specifically looking for pre WW1 cards which had been posted, she started looking through some of these packs and extracted the odd card here or there for my perusal. There weren't that many as it turned out but, what was unusual, was that they were all sent to a Miss Busby of Abbots Langley. I purchased three of them in the hope that I could research her further. 

I knew that Abbotts Langley was a small village so there was a good chance of tracing Mary. I did and she was actually quite a local celebrity.

Mary was born on 5th September 1884. She was the daughter of the village undertaker, Homer Busby, and as a child, earned many a sixpence for holding gentlemen’s top hats at funerals. In fact the family business consisted of much more than just the undertaking business as Homer was a builder who had built a number of the larger houses in the area.

​When her father died on Christmas Day in 1929, aged 73, Mary took over the undertaking business to become the only female undertaker in Hertfordshire and one of only a few in the whole country.  She soon became a familiar sight at funerals dressed in her ankle length, dark grey worsted costume and large, broad brimmed, black straw hat. She later reminisced about the good old days when "we had beautiful black horses with plumes, and the gentlemen all wore black crepe around their top hats".

If she wasn't in her funeral attire she would mostly be seen dressed in a capacious blue gingham wrap around apron making for the churchyard with a gardening fork over her shoulder, to tend the graves she was commissioned to keep in order. 

One of the postcards I purchased was sent to her in August 1913 from a friend which suggested some trauma in Mary's life. "So very sorry, my dear", the sender says, who hopes Mary will be able to get to the seaside as it is "the best reviver one can get". I wondered if some relation had died so I started looking into Mary's background. Unfortunately I didn't find out what the postcard was alluring to but I did discover some very sad facts about her father's siblings.

Her father, Homer, was one of four children born to Benjamin and Elizabeth Busby who were publicans at The Kings Head public house opposite the graveyard. I found that Homer's three siblings had all died relatively young, even for those days, so I sent for their death certificates :

• Agnes, who had been born two years after Homer, died aged just 16 on 23rd May 1875.
  
• A few months later on 19th September 1875, Elizabeth, the oldest daughter, died aged 20.

Both died from a form of tuberculosis which in those days was incurable and led to millions of deaths ...... as it still does today despite the existence of a vaccine. TB is a disease found in the lungs and is spread through the air by coughing, sneezing, even speaking. You can imagine the young adults living together in a limited space unknowingly infecting each other leading to their painful and possibly lingering deaths. Coincidentally, twenty years later, the other sibling, 34 year old Leonard Raynor, died of the same disease. 

In her life Mary referred to her customers as having "gone over the garden wall" and she went over her garden wall in 1973, aged 89. At her funeral, as a tribute to her love of flowers and gardens, the organist played "In an English country garden". Mary is buried underneath an avenue of lime trees in the graveyard she so carefully looked after. 

Amazing what you can discover from the back of an old postcard !
​

Having been an Accountant and a member of the Institute of Taxation for over 30 years, I have always wondered why this country remains the only one in the modern world to retain the archaic 6th April as being the beginning of the tax year.  

​I had dozens of clients who referred to their income "last year" as meaning their income in the previous calendar year rather than in the previous tax year. Explaining that a year runs from 6th April to the following 5th April confused the client even before I started on the intricacies of how tax worked and when it was payable !  

So why 5th April ?

You have to go back a long way and I won't be going into too much detail as, if you are really interested, you can Google it and find out. Suffice to say that in 1582 Pope Gregory XIII ordered a change from the Julian Calendar, named after Julius Caesar, to the Gregorian Calendar, named after ....... himself !

The Gregorian calendar was based on the time it took the earth to travel around the sun, which was eleven and a half minutes more per annum than a year under the Julian calendar. By the late 1500's this meant the difference in time since the year zero was 10 days. As the Brits were in dispute with the Catholic Pope, we ignored the decree and carried on using the Julian Calendar. It wasn't until 1752 that we thought we should align our New Year's Day, previously Lady Day on 25th March, to the same as was being used in Europe i.e. 1st January.

To do this the Government decided that in 1752, when there were now 11 accumulated lost days compared to the rest of Europe,  2nd September would be followed by 14th September. This was very unpopular with the masses and they allegedly rioted in the streets complaining that they had been robbed of 11 days of their lives. The main focus of their fury was that they were still going to have to pay a full year's tax despite the fact the year was only going to be 354 days long. To pacify the proletariat, but at the same time getting the New Year into line with our European friends, it was decided that when the old tax year ended on 25th March 1752 it would be immediately followed by the beginning of the new tax year on 5th April, thus loosing the 11 days in a hole nobody noticed.

In 1800 a further day of trickery pokery had to be found in order to maintain alignment with Europe, so the start of the new tax year was again moved, this time to 6th April, where it has remained ever since.

One of the gravestones in St Stephens Parish Church, St Albans, looked interesting, so I took some photographs. When I got home, I went on the internet to see if I could find out more about Anthony James Fairbrother who has a gravestone with a carving of what looks like an old Comet aeroplane. 

Tony Fairbrother was born in 1926 in Coventry. After leaving school and college, he went to the de Havilland Aeronautical Technical School in Hatfield. After working in the design and aerodynamics departments he joined the company's new flight test department in 1948.

On 27 July 1949, still only 23, he was chosen to be the flight test engineer on the historic 31 minute maiden flight of the world's first jet airliner, the de Havilland Comet 1. The revolutionary aeroplane was designed and built in secret and doubled the cruising speed and altitude of the conventional propeller-driven planes of the time. 

Today, when we take for granted trans Atlantic flight, it is hard to appreciate the charisma of the Comet which, in technology terms, was the Concorde or space shuttle of it's day. Tony was quoted as saying : "The Comet must have been one of the all-time technical achievements. I don't think it is too much to say that the world changed from the moment it's wheels left the ground". It was this phrase which had caught my eye on the back of his gravestone.

Tony went on to became head of the de Havilland flight development team for the next 30 years. He managed the development, flight testing and certification of more than 15 new types of both civil and military aircraft including the Comet 4 which, even up until recently, was being used, in a vastly modified form, as the The Nimrod reconnaissance aircraft. 

Tony Fairbrother died on 7th December 2004.

It was just after the second World War that Bob Pelham formed a company called "Wonkey Toys" in Marlborough, Wiltshire, with the purpose of making novelty wooden toys. He got the unusual nickname of "The Wonkey Donkey Officer" during the War as he made small donkeys which moved when you compressed the spring in the bottom - not unlike the modern version (see right).

After seeking advice from the team behind the TV phenomenon, Muffin the Mule, Bob hit on the idea of making marionettes simple enough to be manipulated by children - not something that had previously been considered realistic. He was a resourceful man without funding. He built prototypes with legs made from war surplus duffel coat toggles and the bodies were made out of bits off ammunition boxes. ​Although early heads were machine made, he soon began to make them from wooden balls previously intended for coconut shies. 

​Despite initial indifference from toy retailers, he managed to persuade Hamleys to let him demonstrate the puppets from behind his own counter in their Regent Street shop. They were an instant hit and Bob later recalled "By explaining how simple string puppets really were to work and showing a somewhat surprised audience their comical antics, the first puppets began to sell". A year after the formation of Wonky Toys Ltd, the company was renamed Pelham Puppets. 

​Millions of puppets were made between 1947 and 1993 by Pelham and it is believed that, at any one time, there are around 500 on sale on ebay. 

One of the ranges they made was The Jumpette Range, and mine is one of these. It was particularly aimed at very young children and was a simple three string affair with a single bar control held by the child.
​
My Jumpette Girl (see left) has a small round wooden head with yellow woollen hair, painted features, blue eyes, early composite open hands, bamboo arms and legs, with white blouse and purple shirt and blue demi-ball feet.

There is a single string attached to each hand going through the control bar and the head is on a separate piece of elastic also connected to the bar. When the bar is moved the puppet automatically jumps on the elastic, hence the name "Jumpette".

​The puppets can be aged from the colour of their box :

• The 50's had brown boxes with a dark blue and white label (and other colours) 
• In the 60's the boxes were yellow and had pictures of other puppets from their range.
• By the end of the 60's, the boxes had cellophane fronts so that the puppet could be seen inside.
• Throughout the 70's the yellow cellophane fronted boxes continued, reinforced with a band of card across the front.
• The late 80's saw a change to red and yellow striped boxes.

My box is marked with a cost of 14 shillings and 6 pence which, assuming it was from the early 1960's, using the retail price index, equates to about £14 today. They weren't cheap toys and it was probably a Christmas present. Apart from a few rarities, the puppets are not valuable even with the box in mint condition. My box is far from mint as either me or my sister must have decided it would be fun to colour in the letters and generally draw all over it !

After Sheila Burton had stood down as Chairman at the 2003 AGM I was asked by the Committee to take over - an honour I was pleased to accept.

In my first newsletter I said that having spent a lot of money over the past few years on the courts and the patio, the continuation of our ten year plan meant we would now be concentrating on improving the inside of the clubhouse. In the summer of 2004 we put in "new windows and frames to replace the rather worn, tired looking ones, and decorated the kitchen" to comply with health and safety standards.

It was October when all the Chairmen since 1990 got together for this photograph.

The Clubs Centenary celebrations started with an over subscribed American Tournament in November 2004 followed by a centenary sit down dinner which was attended by around 100 members. I had put together a collage of attendees who had supplied photos of themselves in their younger days and everyone enjoyed trying to identify their table mates :  

Celebrations peaked and culminated in June 2005 with the 'Centenary Day', held on one of the hottest days of the year. Dozens of members helped organise and set everything up. The courts were surrounded by bunting and a huge white marquee covered both the top two hard courts. Mike Probert and Liam Adams were on guard duty at the Club overnight to watch for any would-be vandals or thieves. 

​There were displays of memorabilia, organised tennis, ploughmans lunches and afternoon teas. In the evening we held a thrilling barn dance with a professional caller together with a huge barbecue to feed everyone. 

​We estimated that, throughout the day, we shared the celebrations with over 350 past and present members and friends of the Club. A function to end all functions !

Charles Allistone who had joined the committee in 1956 sadly died in 2005. He had been Chairman of the Club throughout the 1980s and was instrumental in overseeing the work done to upgrade the courts.

John Allen, treasurer on and off for 29 years, stepped down at the 2005 AGM. 

The 2006 AGM reported that a small sub committee were looking at ways in which to reinvigorate the clubhouse. ​ On a relatively small budget this was partly accomplished in 2007 with a much more comfortable and modern looking small bar area.

The next stage in this rejuvenation programme was the complete renovation of the kitchen area which was completed in early 2009.

In October 2009 a remarkable £1,250 was raised by members for charity over one weekend. On the Saturday, my Super Quiz raised £615 for Star Scope and was used to purchase some much needed equipment for a local disabled child. The following afternoon, a massive £642 was raised for Children in Need after we held an American Tournament held in memory of Mike Probert who had tragically died while skiing.  

At the AGM a few weeks later I stood down and handed over the reins to new blood. In my retirement statement I said "This has been a very difficult decision to make as we are such a good team and the club is buzzing with first rate facilities and a rising record membership.  All the goals we set in 1998 have been achieved. However, 14 years is a long time and I think the time is right to step down".  

I must say, even now, 7 years later, how much pleasure it gives me to think of the changes we were able to bring to the Club over this period - although I am the first to say that it was done as a team effort and everyone concerned should be equally proud of their contribution.

The new millennium started with the inside of the clubhouse being redecorated and our logo painted above the bar. In the autumn newsletter, Sheila Burton, our new Chairman, reported that :

• the Club had one of the most successful years for some time with membership, court lettings to local schools, bar income and visitors fees - all up.  
• "the Club is debt free, having paid off all its loans". This meant we were finally in a position to plan and budget without pressure from third parties.

She reiterated our vision "to have a family focused tennis club at the centre of the community where members enjoy themselves".  ​

The old patio had been on three different levels and was dangerous, certainly not accessible to buggies or wheelchairs. ​In July 2001 plans were drawn up to create a new patio with ramps to enable disabled access at an estimated cost of around £25,000 (actual cost over £30,000). 

It was announced at the 2001 AGM that John Harris, Chairman when I came onto the committee, had agreed to become the Club President. Everyone looked up to John and, personally, he gave me so much support during my time as Chairman. As Sheila said in her report, "as the club moves forward we can have no better advocate for us than John".  

At the 2002 AGM Sheila was proud to report that "the refurbished patio was the final project in phase one of a rolling programme of improvements that were initiated by your new Board in 1998. During the period both sets of carpet courts (8 to 13) have been renewed with astroturf, macadam courts (3 and 4) have been relaid and courts 1 & 2 resprayed. The clubhouse has been redecorated internally and the bar refurbished".

All of this was done using club funds and no external borrowing - something which could not have possibly have been envisaged four years previously. It was primarily possible due to increased membership and monies received from the telecom mast. ​

​The next phase of the master plan was discussed at the 2002 AGM. "It seems to be generally accepted that in the days of all year round tennis, the grass courts have reached their sell by date". The Committee felt that we needed to dig up the final three grass courts and replace them with artificial grass. There was not a lot of opposition apart from some of those older members who just liked playing on grass. The fact they were only usable for three months of the year and were expensive to maintain made it a no brainer. They would have to go as soon as we could afford about £90,000 to replace them with astro turf.

​As it was, the final three grass courts began to be dug up in October 2003, soon to be replaced with fully floodlit acrylic. The passing of the grass was the end of an era. The importance of the event was recognised by the holding of a Wooden Racket Tournament where everyone had to play using a wooden racket. Us oldies went up into our lofts and supplied the youngsters with our prehistoric Dunlop Maxplys. Some dressed up in long white trousers and boaters. It was a memorable afternoon. Ironically, the winners were two youngsters who had never even held a wooden racket in their life before that day !

At the 2003 AGM Sheila stood down as Chairman and as a Director. She said that "five years ago I agreed to become chairman of the club for a five year period on the understanding that I wanted to drive through a large refurbishment programme. Any corporate business would be proud of the growth and successful financial position that we can now demonstrate". Shortly after the AGM, the Committee gave Sheila Honorary Membership and I can think of very few others who deserved it more.

​This was the point at which the Club had reached when I wrote the Clubs potted history of "The First 100 Years" in the build up to our centenary celebrations. I summed up where we were at that time by saying :

"We should be proud of our past and the trials and tribulations which have got us to where we are today. We have a Club that will have nine excellent fully floodlit carpet courts and a new patio admired by both members and visitors. We have an increasing membership and money in the bank. Most of all we have a friendly club where everyone seems to enjoy their tennis. Not a bad way to end the first 100 years !"

At the end of the twentieth century there was an abyss between those who thought tennis should still be played with wooden rackets on manicured grass courts and the younger generation who embraced change. In 1997 the club had deteriorating courts, was in debt and loosing members.

Our new chairman, Robert Graham, set up a fresh sub-committee to draw up radical proposals which could be put to the members for discussion. Myself, Peter Ward and Sydney Ratcliffe initially floated some ideas in a July 1997 newsletter and at the subsequent AGM. 

We argued that as the Club could not afford to maintain 13 courts, given its poor membership, that the solution would be to either utilise some of the courts by introducing a second sport - archery and bowls were suggested - or we should seek planning permission to put up a bubble for indoor tennis. Because of opposition from the traditionalists, nothing came from our efforts.

In  May 1998 a new group, consisting of enthusiastic members, met to brainstorm ideas as they felt the club had declined and they wanted to turn around the Club's fortunes. Members of the group became known as the WAGs - The Way Ahead Group - and we were lead by Sheila Burton, St Albans Mayor in 1993. Other members were myself, Archie McDonald, Marsha Boyes, Anne Swallow, Ann Toogood and Tony Wilkins. A meeting at the Clubhouse was arranged for September when members were invited to help us draw up an action plan to move the club forward. Over 70 attended in what was probably the watershed for SALTC.

In July 1998 the Club signed an agreement with Orange to erect a phone mast. This was a controversial decision but financially enabled much needed funds to flow into the coffers on an annual basis for the next ten years.

Unexpectedly on 22nd September Tony Pritchard who had served as Secretary for many years resigned from the Committee. I was appointed in his place and, at the AGM in November, four of the other WAGs not already on the Committee were voted on. Robert Graham stood down as Chairman which, he said, was due to the "emergence of the Way Ahead Group and its envisaged integration within the Club's Board of Directors" and he saw "the Club's potential future as bright and in good hands".

The revolution at SALTC was complete. Sheila Burton became our new Chairman and she would take us safely into the next millennium. Membership numbers reportedly stood at 184 adults and 154 juniors.

​​The new Committee knew that things had to change and that increasing membership numbers must be a priority. As a sign of how things were changing the Club introduced a new logo, designed by Marsha Boyes, which proved very popular.

Other immediate innovations were :

• the issue of a regular newsletter providing news and information to members
• the development of a new website, largely provided by Jenny Stokes.
• the issue of a membership consultation document to find out what members wanted (36% of all households responded).

The three old acrylic 'carpet' courts, nearest to the Clubhouse, were replaced in September 1999, utilising what funds we had. At the AGM, the Club voted to remove the reference to "croquet" from their name. 

We all then waited for the impending Millennium Bug to hit causing untold damage to our computers and the country in general ....... and we waited ......... and waited !

I have been a member of St Albans Lawn Tennis Club (SALTC) for over twenty three years and have enjoyed hundreds, possibly thousands, of games of tennis with some wonderful people. As a past Committee Member, Company Secretary, Chairman and soon to be ex-Club Archivist I have seen many characters come and go.

I wrote "SALTC - the first hundred years" in 2004 when the Club celebrated it's centenary. It is now twelve years on and I am looking forward to my retirement on the Cornish Coast. Before I leave, I am passing the archives back to the Club which I hope will provide amusing ammunition for a future historian to reminisce about when he or she comes to write the next installment of the club's history. In order to bring the History more up to date, I thought I would write about some of my own memories of playing tennis and of the Club which has been a large part of my life for so long.   

Pre SALTC

I was probably about 12 when I joined a very small club in Willifield Way, Hampstead Garden Suburb called Cranbourne 20 and can remember the thrill of playing my first junior match. Not long after joining, the Club folded and I was 'transferred' to Temple Fortune Tennis Club (TFC) in Bridge Lane. This was a bigger club and, I seem to remember, they had six courts. Unfortunately these were En Tout Cas red dusty clay which meant you were continually dirty. During my time there, they built two squash courts and I enjoyed playing although it didn't do much for my tennis as it was all wrist. When it was wet we played cards or table tennis and there was such a friendly atmosphere - families even had their Sunday dinners down at the Club.

As we got older, us teenagers would get together for all sorts of social activities as well as for tennis and we spent more than one summer holidaying together in small tents on grassy fields. I thought every tennis club would be like TFC and I guess I subsequently strived to recreate what was good about TFC at SALTC.

Sadly, after what seemed a lifetime, we all went our separate ways, to College or University, and most moved out of the area. A couple of years ago a lot of us met up for a BBQ and, even though it was 25 years since most of us met, it seemed like yesterday.

After I married in 1977 the commuting between Watford and Temple Fortune became too much and I stopped playing. Children arrived and my life as a husband and an Accountant took over. I briefly joined a tennis club in Chesham but it wasn't like TFC so I didn't enjoy it and left. After having moved to St Albans in 1985 I became a couch potato.  

One day, I decided this wasn't good and I really needed to get some exercise so I thought "Why not join the local tennis club ?" ​

Open Day at SALTC

They say that first impressions are lasting impressions and this was so true on this occasion. Rather nervously, after a break from tennis of about 15 years, I turned up for the Clubs Open Day in May 1993.  I was met by Anne Swallow on the patio and was immediately welcomed and put into a four which, I think, included Robert Thomson. The standard was fine and I was assured that even though the Club had a playing in test I wouldn't have a problem passing. That was how my love affair with SALTC started.

At this stage, the Club had three acrylic grass and four hard courts, all floodlit, plus six unlit grass courts. In September 1994 planning permission was obtained to put floodlights on the remaining grass courts - although the lack of money stopped any being erected. 

Development Sub Committee

By October 1994 I had already been invited to join a long standing sub-committee looking into the possibility of converting the Clubs six grass courts to some form of new surface and adding floodlighting. There were lots of ideas floating around and numerous detailed reports on the pros and cons of different surfaces, or the possibility of even putting up a bubble. Unfortunately, for all of these options, funding was a major problem. The Club had previously paid for the replacement of court surfaces by borrowing from the LTA. As such, they had to make regular repayments and had a commitment to maintain a sinking fund to replace these courts after their useful lives - there was very little cash, if any, to spend. On top of this, the membership was falling as the Club couldn't afford to maintain the 13 courts it had. Any new expenditure was predominately going to have to be funded by borrowing.

The Mike Broad Affair

When I wrote my potted history of the Club it was too soon after to mention it. Even today, it is still only spoken about in hushed words. This was obviously a difficult time for the Club and we were approached for comment by both local and national newspapers. The fact Robert Graham, a lawyer by profession, was our Chairman and "spokesman", was very fortuitous as he was able to field all requests for interviews with a knowledgeable, friendly and indefatigable "No comment" in his broad Scottish accent. 

New Coach

It was a critical time for the Club and we had to appoint a suitable replacement coach. Luckily, Tony Wilkins, with his wife Frances, applied for the post. Tony had been a part time coach at the club throughout the 1980s but had moved away to further his business career. There were two other candidates but in all honesty Tony was the perfect person to steady, what was, a rocking boat.  

My next blog will cover the transition from the old guard to the new which put in motion the building blocks to the highly popular club we have today. 

I was looking for something 'glass' to take to an "Antiques and Collectibles" group I belong to and was struggling to find anything glass and antique, let alone something interesting enough to talk about.

However, I went up into the loft and recovered one of the many nick nacks which I had wrapped up when sorting out my Mother's belongings after her death. They were three miniature glass perfume bottles with their original stoppers. 

I had never really looked at them before or given any thought as to where they might have come from or how they got into my mothers possession. ​The only clue as to their identity is on their bottom. They are all marked "Bottle made in France", one with "JP 0" after and the other two with "JP 1". Not much to go on !

It was my wife who made the connection to a well known French designer, Jean Patou. This was confirmed when we found an identical bottle which had been sold on ebay described as a "Jean Patou perfume bottle, vintage mini miniature size, hobnail style, all glass stopper dauber, retro 1930's era, vanity boudoir decor". 

Who was Jean Patou you ask ? He was born in 1880 and was a highly successful couturier making original garments to order for private clients. In addition to his clothing range, in 1925, he launched a perfume business and in 1928 he created the first sun tan lotion.

​He became known for eradicating the 1920s flapper look by lengthening the skirt and designing sportswear for women. He is considered the inventor of knitted swimwear and the tennis skirt. Notably he designed the then daring sleeveless and knee length tennis dress worn by Suzanne Lenglen.

He was also the first designer to popularize the cardigan and helped move fashion towards the more natural and comfortable.

​The Yorkshire Evening Post in 1930 said of his designs that he "hurled upon the dress world that bomb of the long skirt. It burst so suddenly that the whole fashionable world was convulsed. Finally, after being cautiously approached - like the mouse approaching the piece of cheese - it was graciously accepted. We submitted to the entanglement of its added folds". 

Like most men, I hate walking around clothes shops with my wife. Jean had a novel approach to keeping his clients' husbands and men friends on board which might have even got me into his shop. He put a bar in his showrooms "to quench the thirst of bored husbands and other men during clients fittings, an amenity which was much appreciated, and helped to curb the impatience which experience had taught him often led to the loss of sales". He also introduced a perfume bar at which a woman could mix their own perfume in a shaker. 

Patou's clothes were marketed mostly to rich American women. However, when the American stock market crashed in 1929 a lot of his customers became bankrupt and his brand only survived through his perfumes.

​It was during the Great Depression that Jean Patou created a fragrance "designed as a work of art and as a gift for his good customers to chase the Depression blues away. No expense was to be spared and the finest raw materials were to be used. The costliest fragrance in the world was named 'JOY' in defiance of grim headlines and hard times with a mission to spread a message of JOY around the world" (source : current Jean Patou website). 

'Joy' has a heavy floral scent, based on the rose and jasmine and remained the costliest perfume in the world until 1972. It remains the world's second best selling scent after Chanel No 5. 

Patou died aged just 49 in 1936 although his brand lived on and can still be purchased around the world and in the UK in up market stores such as Harrods, Selfridges, House of Fraser and John  Lewis.

It was this fact which made me wonder whether the fact my mother worked as a children's hairdresser in Selfridges (for Mr Selfridge !) might have been the cause and source of her having these miniature bottles. Perhaps they were gifts from Mr Selfridge, sample bottles given to the staff or a Christmas gift Dad bought Mum ? 

As I said earlier, one of these bottles was sold on ebay. Am I in possession of a valuable antique ? Sadly not. It was sold for £15 which means the bottle is only of scentimental value !

However, they might try but you can't stop the masses from enjoying their annual festivities. In 1647 there were major riots in London when the authorities forcibly attempted to stop people celebrating Christmas. As a mark of protest shops closed for the day and holly was hung in doorways. ​

​The unrest led to a resumption of the civil war which eventually saw the execution of the King in 1649. The subsequent republican regime, partly under the rule of Oliver Cromwell, neither officially sanctioned nor suppressed Christmas.

​After Charles II came to the throne, all legislation passed between 1642 and 1660 was declared null and void which meant everyone could once again enjoy their over eating and debauchery.

The attack on Christmas failed in 1647 - let's hope it fails again in the 21st century.

When writing about my ancestors, I try to think of them in context to what was going on in the world around them at the time. Everyone would draw up a different list of crucial things which have happened over the last two hundred odd years, but I have chosen some which are most relevant to the modern day genealogist : 

The more family history I do, the more interesting it becomes to research what is going on in the background of these ancestors. They have names, dates of birth, marriage and death, even details of their occupation and places they lived, but unless you put their lives into the context of what is going on around them you only have part of their story.  

We think of governments raising taxes and budgeting expenditure but long before we became a parliamentary democracy the King or Queen would need to do much the same - although their outgoings included their own personal household costs. They came up with  a number of strange ways in which to raise money, some of which, much like the modern so-called 'bedroom tax', were very unpopular. This blog is about one such tax.    

All governments at some point say that they are going to 'simplify' the tax system. This invariably means more red tape and hundreds more pages of legislation which taxpayers' advisers will do the utmost to get round. One of the problems with taxing people is that unless there is a full proof system, they will tend to make themselves invisible and outside the law. The dastardly plan which King Charles  II, who had been restored to the throne in 1660, came up with was to impose a tax on something which was much easier to count and immovable - the fireplace !

In 1662 the King passed a law that every house occupier was required to pay a tax of two shillings a year for each hearth or stove within his property - the tax was to be collected half yearly. 

Those who were not required to pay were :

• the occupiers of houses or land worth less than £1 a year
• the possessors of property worth less than £10
• those that paid neither church nor poor rate and
• those who received poor relief or were inmates of almshouses or hospitals.

These people had, however, to petition for an exemption certificate from the minister and parish officials. However, nobody with more than two hearths could apply for exemption. 

​There was some fairness to this tax as the wealthier you were, the more fireplaces you would have. However, what was so disliked was that tax officials were authorised to enter your house unannounced in order to count the number of fireplaces there were in your house. A newspaper report said "the hearth tax was considered one of the most obnoxious and unjust of taxes, as it was both inquisitorial in its action and pressed (by the Collectors of the tax) with undue severity upon the poor in comparison with the rich".

By coincidence this tax was imposed just before the Great Fire of London in 1666. Records show that the tax inspector counted five hearths and one oven in a property in Pudding Lane, little knowing that these would soon be the source of one of the most important events in the history of this country. There is an excellent searchable website with details of these records, not just for London, at Hearth Tax Online.  
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Tax avoidance

Everyone responded by blocking up their chimneys which effectively made the fireplace obsolete. This enabled them to avoid paying the tax.
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​The tax didn't last very long and was repealed in 1689.

In the late 18th century both men and women were wearing large wigs which required whitening in order to give them their distinctive white or off-white colour. This was done by administering hair powder. It was therefore unsurprising that William Pitt the Younger came up with a dastardly plan which he hoped would bring in funds to help pay for the war he was waging against Napoleon.  

The 'Duty on Hair Powder Act 1795' said that everyone using hair powder must visit a stamp office to purchase an annual certificate. There were exemptions including :

• the Royal Family and their servants
• clergymen with an income of under £100 a year
• non-commissioned officers, privates in the army, artillery, militia, mariners, engineers, fencibles, subalterns, officers in the navy below commander, yeomanry, and volunteers.

An understandable relief was given to the master of a household who could buy a certificate for  his servant which would also be valid for their successors within that year. Also a father with more than one unmarried daughter could buy two certificates which would be valid for all his daughters.