Mad Hatters

Boys at Eton’s ‘4th June’ in with their decorated boaters prepare for the 2011 Procession of Boats.

Tim Koch writes:

Yesterday, the 15 May, was ‘Straw Hat Day’, the date when men traditionally put away their felt hats (which they had donned on 15 September, ‘Felt Hat Day’) and put on their straw hat(s) for the warmer weather. This ‘rule’ was only recognised in North American, I do not think it was known in Britain where men made their own judgements. Indeed, so seriously was it once taken in the United States that non-observance caused a three day riot in New York in 1922 and in 1925 The New York Times ran a headline “Discard Date for Straw Hats Ignored by President Coolidge” when he wore ‘straw’ four days into ‘felt’ time. I suppose the modern equivalents would be ‘Baseball Cap Day’ for the summer and ‘Knitted Cap Day’ for the winter. Current etiquette seems to be that, while the baseball cap is never actually removed, it should be turned the correct way around for all formal occasions.*

Henley 2013. Straw Hat Day marks 47 days until Henley 2014.

*(Including indoors in fancy restaurants – editor’s remark.)

A Victorian Ladder: Eton College at Henley

A Victorian ladder

HTBS’s Greg Denieffe writes,

In an earlier post on HTBS called “Toad, Tom, Jack and Billy!”, I mentioned that I had researched the story of The Rowing Bunburys of Lisnavagh. Recently, Turtle Bunbury sent me some old photographs that he found in the archives of the Bunbury family home at Lisnavagh House, Rathvilly, County Carlow.

Included was the wonderful but undated photograph on top described by Turtle as a Victorian Ladder. There is no mistaking the trophy which is The Ladies’ Plate from Henley Royal Regatta and I think the photograph is of the 1896 winning crew from Eton College. What do other HTBS readers think?

If, as I would expect, they are recreating the positions of the crew when they are in the boat, then the names from top to bottom would be as follows:
Bow Hon. M. C. A. Drummond
2 C. M. Black
3 F. W. Warre
4  E. L. Warre
5 J. L. Philips
6 J. A. Tinne
7 W. Dudley Ward
Str. Hon. W. McClintock Bunbury
Cox R. A. Blyth

Stroke of the 1896 crew and standing behind the seated coxswain would be Hon. W. McClintock Bunbury, known to his family and friends as Billy Bunbury (1878-1900). Can you see a similarity to the young boy in the ladder?

William McClintock Bunbury was born at Lisnavagh in 1878, the eldest son of Thomas Kane (Tom) McClintock Bunbury, 2nd Baron Rathdonnell, and his wife, Lady Katherine Anne (Kate) Rathdonnell. Billy was educated at the Dragon School in Oxford and Eton College [April 1892 – December 1897] where he was in Rev S. A. Donaldson’s House. Donaldson was successor to Rev Edmund Warre and like him an enthusiastic rowing coach. As was his father before him, Billy was captain of boats at Eton and stroked the winning Ladies’ Plate crews of 1896 and 1897. He joined the Scots Greys shortly after leaving Eton. He was posted to South Africa in December 1899 and died ten weeks later, on the 17 February, 1900, having been shot in both legs in a raid on a Boer position eight miles outside Kimberley.

In the seven-seat and standing behind Billy Bunbury would be William Dudley Ward (1877-1946), one of the rowers depicted in The Rowers of Vanity Fair.

William Dudley Ward, ‘seven’ in 1896 - Famous for having a far-away-look in his eyes! (© National Portrait Gallery, London. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.)

In the three-seat and third from the top would be Felix Warre (1879–1953) depicted above in the Illustrated London News in 1898 as part of the Oxford University Boat Race crew.

Also included in the Bunbury archives was a photograph, again undated, but a similar photograph on the Balliol College website identifies the race as the final of the Ladies’ Challenge Plate in 1896:

Photo [C. R. Dunlop, Balliol College, Oxford] reproduced by kind permission of Balliol College.

Two photographs were identified as from Henley. The one above is in good condition and was captioned: Ladies’ Plate 1896 – Eton & Jesus (Oxford).

This one was also captioned: Henley Regatta 1896, Ladies Plate Final, Eton v Balliol – Billy stroke Eton.

The official result of the final was that Eton College beat Balliol College, Oxford by 2½ lengths in a time of 8 min. 6 sec.

Here is another undated photograph, again showing the trophy for the Ladies’ Plate. Seated second left is probably John William McClintock Bunbury (Jack Bunbury), 1851 - 1893.

Jack’s first success at Henley Royal Regatta was in the two seat of the Eton crew that won the Ladies’ Plate in 1868. The boat was stroked by his brother Tom and for the next two years Jack would stroke the Eton eight to two more victories in the same event.

After finishing at Eton College in 1870 Jack went up to Oxford University where he quickly joined the Brasenose College Boat Club, the oldest collegiate boat club in the world. In his short stay at the university, he won The Trial Eights (1870), The Silver Sculls (1871) and The Silver Challenge Oars for pairs (1871).

Jack Bunbury as depicted in the Illustrated London News in 1871 as part of the Oxford University Boat Race crew.

Jack was originally selected in the stroke seat of the Oxford crew for the 1871 Boat Race but was switched to the seven-seat close to race day.  It seems to have worked better for them and by March 18, the Penny Illustrated favoured Oxford over Cambridge. On Saturday, 1 April, the two crews set off but it was Cambridge who, despite a last minute spurt by the Oxford crew by the Mortlake brewery, won by a length in 23 min. and 5 sec. (‘with a foul wind from the north east’).

At Henley in July 1871, Jack was defeated by Mr. William Fawcus of the Tynemouth Rowing Club, shortly before Fawcus defeated Mr. Long, the winner of the Wingfield Sculls. Jack was also in the four seat of the Oxford Etonians crew that won the Grand Challenge Cup. This was the sixth and final time that the Eton old boys would win the premier event at the premier regatta in the country. It was Jack’s finest hour in a boat and probably his last. The up-and-coming London Rowing Club was beaten in the final by 1½ lengths in a time of 8 min. 5sec.

Jack was only at Oxford until December 1871 when he left to pursue a career in the army. Sadly, he died in 1893 at the age of only 42 and was buried in the graveyard at St. Helen’s Church, Tarporley, Cheshire.

Maybe other HTBS readers can help positively identify the undated photographs and their subjects?

There were a few more photographs found at Lisnavagh but they are of rather poor quality and undated. The following photo is clearly the Eton College boathouses and perhaps there is a Bunbury in the crew. The close-up shows the presence of the photographer was indeed an occasion that the boys were not going to miss.

Thanks to Turtle Bunbury for sending these interesting photographs.

Vandals In Subfusc?*

Rowing as a sport started at Eton College – though not all of its practices, such as those shown here on the 4th June Celebrations, were universally adopted.

HTBS's Tim Koch writes,

On my way to the 2013 ‘Henley Boat Races’ at Eton College’s Dorney Lake (which was also the site of the 2012 Olympic Regatta) I  crossed the footbridge over the river from Windsor into Eton and was saddened to see that some of the boathouses on the site known as ‘Rafts’ have been demolished with the intention of replacing them with luxury apartments. This is especially significant as it was from this site that rowing at Eton College started and this is important as it is generally accepted that the school itself was the birthplace of rowing as an amateur sport.

Rafts in June 2011. The boathouses from left to right are River House, Winters (both c. 1890), Tin Shed (the red brick building, c. 1947) and Pilkington’s (c. 1900).

Rafts in March 2013. River House remains but Winters, Tin Shed and Pilkington’s are gone.

In his four-volume, 2,500-page work entitled The Sport of Rowing, Peter Mallory devotes an entire chapter to Eton. It starts:

You may be surprised to discover that the origin of the sport of rowing can be pinpointed to a single location in the English countryside. Rowing, not as a regulated guild profession of the British working class but as an organized recreational activity of the privileged British upper class, uniquely began during the last half of the 18th Century at a single site, Eton College, an English (fee paying) school.

Mallory points out that, without any support from the school authorities 250 years ago, the boys were taking to boats during the spring and summer months, renting boats from the waterman establishments along the Windsor and Eton shorelines. The most important of these ‘waterman establishments’ were at ‘Rafts’, a 200-metre site between Windsor Bridge and Brocas Meadow on the Eton side of the river.

In An Eton Camera 1920-1959 (1983), PSH Lawrence wrote:

Rafts like so many Eton institutions was for many years free enterprise. The six separate sections were at various times run by different local boatmen ... Not until 1909 did the whole length come under the ownership of the Eton College Boathouse.

Searle’s were at Eton between 1850 and 1870. © Royal Windsor Website (RWWS).

By 1895 Searle’s had become Halliday’s.

 A picture of Halliday's in 1898. © Royal Windsor Website (RWWS). 

It is undeniable that, following the construction of its world-class rowing facility at Dorney Lake, Eton will have much less use for the boathouses at Rafts which, in any case, have long been ‘unfit for purpose’ and used mostly for rowing ‘below team level’. They are not particularly old or attractive buildings – especially the ugly late 1940s red brick building strangely known as ‘Tin Shed’. Perhaps worse damage was done in the 1970s when an attractive building between the current development and Windsor Bridge was demolished and replaced by the existing soulless structure. Also near the bridge is the former Eton College Boathouse, now in residential use. A fine early 18th century red brick construction, it survives not least because it has a ‘Grade II’ Preservation Order.

Eton College and the site developers, Bewley Homes, have produced a very complex, elaborate and (naturally) self-justifying website showing their plans to provide 13 new residential units, boat shed space..... and public realm enhancements including providing public access to the river front...’.

The website includes a very full ‘Heritage Statement’. This may be a legal requirement but I think that its depth shows that Eton is taking its responsibilities as a custodian of a great historical legacy seriously. The Statement is a large document but HTBS readers may find Appendix 6 (a history of the boathouses) and Appendix 7 (Eton’s future use of non Dorney boathouses) the most interesting.

Appendix 6 concludes:

The (boathouses) broadly illustrate local social and economic trends associated with rowing, both commercial and in relation to the college, at Eton in the 19th and 20th centuries. They are not of national historic interest and do not have an exclusive historic link with the college....... They are essentially sheds for storage and manufacture that were converted and altered at different times .... Very little remains internally today, particularly in the earlier buildings, to illustrate these uses.... the buildings stand today as an unremarkable group of disparate structures built by a variety of owners for a variety of specific uses.

Reassuringly, Appendix 7 states that, for both ‘practical and emotional’ reasons:

There is a real and genuine enthusiasm within Eton College to continue a rowing presence at Rafts....

As this drawing shows, the sites of the previous four boathouses will still be distinctive and Pilkington’s will be redeveloped to include a boathouse for use by the School, at least in the near future. Fours, including the special coxed fours used in Eton’s version of ‘bump racing’ will be racked here (though the new storage will not be able to take eights).

The rear of Pilkington’s in Brocas Street in June 2011.

The site of Pilkington's in April 2013. River House can be seen over the fencing.

My initial instinctive reaction to the development at Rafts was to be opposed to it, dismissing it as a money grabbing exercise by a very wealthy body that already enjoys enormous tax advantages. On reflection I have concluded that, while the site has great emotional appeal, the actual buildings that stood until recently were not especially important and perhaps the worst losses were suffered some time ago. The inclusion of a new Eton boathouse in the development, even with very guarded remarks about its future use, is of course to be welcomed. Importantly, rowing in some form will continue at Rafts. In his conclusion to his chapter on Eton, Peter Mallory wrote:

There is no competitive rowing program at any level on earth with such a cornucopia of facilities..... with such historic ritual.... with such a long tradition of excellence.

The school motto - Floreat Etona (May Eton flourish).

Sadly, the 20th century incarnation of Rafts is an unavoidable casualty of the ongoing development of rowing at Eton. Hopefully its twenty first century embodiment will continue to play some role in the evolution of the sport at this unique institution.

Dorney Lake - also known as The Eton College Rowing Centre. How many schools can boast such a world-class facility.
 
*Subfusc: Formal academic dress worn by Eton College teaching staff such as the headmaster is wearing here.

© Colour Photographs Tim Koch

Toad, Tom, Jack and Billy!

The always alert Greg Denieffe writes,

Colonel 'Toad'

Everyone loves The Wind in the Willows and the recent post Colonel F. C. Ricardo was Toad? – by HTBS editor Göran R Buckhorn reminded me that there are numerous online personality quizzes that can help you decided what character in the book you are. The one on quibblo.com satisfied my curiosity and revealed that I am in fact, Ratty (which I knew anyway!): “He is devoted to his interests, he loves nature and peacefulness. He is very intelligent and he is very outspoken and poetic”.

I would go as far as to say that you don’t need online quizzes to find out which character in the book someone is; a little people-watching in the Stewards Enclosure at Henley Royal Regatta soon reveals all!

Something else that was of interest to me in Göran’s post was the fact that ‘Toad’ was in the Eton crews that won the Ladies’ Challenge Plate at Henley in 1869 and 1870, and he was Captain of the Boats at Eton in 1870 and 1871. All throughout 2011 and up to May of this year, I was researching the story of The Rowing Bunburys of Lisnavagh. This is the story of the McClintock-Bunbury family from Lisnavagh, Rathvilly, County Carlow, Ireland, who between them won the Ladies’ Plate seven times (1867, 1868 (2), 1869, 1870, 1896 and 1897), all for Eton College; the Grand Challenge Cup once in 1871 for Oxford Etonians and had a seat in the Oxford crew in the 1871 Boat Race. The decorated pencil oars for seven of the Henley wins are now displayed in my home club – Carlow Rowing Club. The research of 6,000 words and numerous photographs rambles through the wins of Tom (later Lord Rathdonnell), his brother Jack and Tom’s son Billy and the characters they encountered and rowed with at Eton College. It was published recently in Carloviana, the journal of the Carlow Historical and Archaeological Society.

From “The Oarsman’s Farewell to his Oar” by R. C. Lehman (1901)

Many oars have I had – lo! These cups are a token –
Since first a raw Freshman I splashed in a crew;
Their shafts may be warped and their blades may be broken,
But their staunchness lived on to be centered in you.
Lo! All these old oars that I lost with or won with
Return to remind me of failure or fame.
The traditions are yours of those blades I have done with;
The wood may have changed, but the soul is the same.

Four of the seven McClintock-Bunbury oars on display in Carlow Rowing Club.

1869 Ladies’ Plate winning oar with F. C. Ricardo at ‘2’.

1870 Ladies’ Plate winning oar with F. C. Ricardo at ‘4’.

Eton’s best-known holiday takes place on the so called ‘Fourth of June’, a celebration of the birthday of King George III. The day is celebrated with the Procession of Boats, in which the top rowing crews from the top four years row past in vintage wooden rowing boats. The ‘Fourth of June’ is no longer celebrated on 4 June, but on the Wednesday before the first weekend of June. The first boat in the procession is the ten-oar Monarch. This is followed by the rest of the fleet in the following order and seniority of crew; Victory, Prince of Wales, Britannia, Thetis, Hibernia, St. George, Alexandra, Defiance and finally Dreadnought. There are two excellent articles by Tim Koch on the procession on HTBS. The entry dated the 11 May 2010  is called Etonians and their Boaters and that on the 5 June 2011 is called Tim Koch on the 2011 Eton’s Procession of Boats.

The above photograph originally appeared in Vivian Nickalls’ autobiography Oars, Wars and Horses which was published in 1932. It reappeared on page 50 in Peter Mallory’s epic 2,500 page The Sport of Rowing in 2011. Colonel F. C. Ricardo is seated left, beside him, Tom Bunbury (Lord Rathdonnell) is seated center, being the elder “Captain” with his son Billy standing on the right. Unfortunately, there appears to be two errors in the caption both of which relate to the Bunburys. The Eton Registers published in 1901 and 1906 list Tom as Captain of the Boats in 1868 (not 1863) and J. L. Philips as Captain of the Boats in 1897 and not Billy. It is still a wonderful picture and I am very grateful to Peter for the scan of the photograph.

Tim Koch On The 2011 Eton’s Procession Of Boats

The boys' Matrons ('Dames' in Eton speak) decorate their boaters. Some clearly make more effort than others. Also note 'fixed pin' gates & fixed seats.

On 1st June, HTBS’s Tim Koch witnessed the Eton Procession of Boats. Here is his report:

The recent HTBS posting by Hélène Rémond on the French magazine 6 Mois picturing the boys of Eton School rowing during their ‘Fourth of June’ celebrations pre-empted a plan of mine to see the 2011 Procession of Boats in person. As Hélène points out, I have already written about the history of this unique occasion but I have now taken some nice pictures to illustrate it.

Eton School (more correctly called ‘Eton College’, though the boys are aged 13 to 18) is the most famous fee paying school in the world. Founded in 1440 by Henry VI to provide himself with some reliable civil servants, it has produced nineteen British Prime Ministers and innumerable oarsmen. Today, rowing and sculling at Eton is divided into four groups:

Boys aged 13 and 14 only race in inter school events, in single sculls and quads.

Fifteen year olds are called ‘Junior Colts’ and race in events held under the rules of British Rowing in the J15 class.

Sixteen and seventeen year olds are called ‘Colts’ and race in British Rowing events in J16, Novice and Intermediate 3 classes if eligible.

Seventeen and eighteen year olds can row in ‘Upper Boats’ at J18, Intermediate 3, 2 and 1, Senior and Elite if eligible.

Eton College Boat Club (ECBC) has a website that is open for anyone to view but, as it is intended for internal consumption, an outsider will find the organisation, argot and acronyms of the ancient institution difficult to understand.

The programme for the row past by the (mostly Victorian) boats is almost exactly the same today as in this programme of 1885. The first four crews are from the ‘Upper Boats’.

The 10-oared Monarch

The first boat to stand and salute the School and Her Majesty the Queen is Monarch, the ten-oar. It is usually stroked by the Captain of the Boats (there is an interview with the current Captain here) and crewed by senior boys who help administer internal rowing. Here are two extracts from the rules of ECBC:

'Members of the Monarch assist, under the supervision of aquatics masters or coaches, with discipline and safety on the river, and the administration of internal races.' and 'All instructions given by members of the Monarch must be followed without argument.'

The next boat is Victory, the First Eight, or (more commonly) just ‘The Eight’. They presently hold the Princess Elizabeth Challenge Cup at Henley Royal Regatta and the Queen Mother Cup for Championship Eights at the National Schools Regatta. Unfortunately, they do not hold the ‘Triple Crown’ as they came second in the 2011 Schools’ Head. The VIII (they usually use Roman numbers) has their own blog but it has not been updated recently.

1st VIII Victory

Monarch and Victory have swivel rollicks with the normal closed gate so the boys cannot hold their oars erect when they stand to salute. To compensate for having the advantage of their oars on the water, they all stand together. The remaining eight boats have open ‘fixed pin’ gates. Thus 4 and 5 will hold their oars up and then stand, followed by 3 and 6, then 2 and 7, and finally bow and stroke. All ten boats are fixed seat.

Of the remaining Upper Boats, Prince of Wales (2nd VIII) is followed by Britannia (3rd VIII).

2nd VIII Prince of Wales

3rd VIII Britannia

The ‘Colts’ A, B and C crews then pass in Thetis, Hibernia and St George respectively.

The Colts Thetis

The Colts Hibernia: Note the button on the oar.

The Colts St George: Note the fixed pin gate and the oar.

Finally, the ‘Junior Colts’ A, B and C crews pass in Alexandra, Defiance and Dreadnought.

The Junior Colts Alexandra: two more to go...!

The Junior Colts Defiance with Windsor Castle in the background.

The Junior Colts Dreadnought: Tim's comment, "I like the clear authority and confidence of the coxswain!".

Even these delightful pictures do not fully capture the feel of the occasion. The Procession is viewed from a lush meadow on (in 2011 at least) a warm summer’s day. Behind are the ancient and noble buildings of the College. On the other side of the sparkling river is lush woodland with the tower of Windsor Castle peering above the trees in the distance. A school band is playing The Eton Boating Song.

Beware of a coxswain with a sword!

On the water, young Corinthians play out an old, strange and slightly silly tradition in archaic dress. There are people who would not be moved by this - but they can stay at home and play video games in a darkened room. The rest of us (who are lucky enough) will spend a delightful day on the riverbank and hold that it is always ‘jolly boating weather’.

Rowing Photographs Of Eton Boys

Knowing my interests for magazines, HTBS’s Hélène Rémond sent me an e-mail about a new French magazine, 6 Mois, which is such a rare thing as a new photo magazine. Hélène writes,

A new photo magazine called 6 Mois (‘6 Months’) has been launched in France by publisher Les Arènes. It focuses on current news’ photography. It is a 350-page, 880-photo magazine printed on quality paper – and with no advertising! It is listed as a book and cost 25€. In the first issue, there is a report by Christopher Furlong, who spent a few weeks at Eton College, home of ‘the English elite’. Whereas the school boys have a reputation of being pretentious and arrogant, it is not the case, he says. Furlong was surprised by their enthusiasm. Some of the photos have been shot during the celebration of the birthday of King George III (1738-1820), Eton’s greatest patron, on June 4th. A previous post on HTBS (11 May, 2010) explains well the history of this celebration!


Thank you, Hélène, and good luck to 6 Mois!

George Sims Was The Winner In 1947

Regarding last Thursday's entry about Cambridge dropping its Empacher for a Hudson, HTBS's Tim Koch in London makes some reflections about 'the good old days'. Tim writes,

The recent news about Cambridge choosing a Canadian boat (in preference to a German one!) for the 157th race against Oxford on the 26th March prompts me to write about a time when, not only were the boats used, British, they were both made in the same place, the Rutland Boathouse, Hammersmith, very near to the mid point of the four and a half mile course. The Auriol Kensington Rowing Club archive holds the following cutting from the Daily Mail of 24th March 1947:

"THE MAN WHO'LL WIN THE BOAT RACE.

Light or Dark Blues first, come Saturday, George Sims of Hammersmith is the winner. He built both boats.

Sims' family connection with the race goes back to 1899, when George's grandfather built the Cambridge boat which stopped the Dark Blue sequence of nine wins.

Light Blue stroke then was Brigadier J.H. Gibbon, Cambridge coach this year.

George Sims started his own boat building business in 1937 by building the Oxford craft which broke the run of 13 wins by the Light Blues.

Boats are built entirely without blueprints or drawings, to plans carried in George's head. They are made of Empire woods, Honduras cedar for the skin, English sycamore for the ribs, Canadian silver spruce for the keel. Orders come from all over the world - Canada, the U.S, Holland, Norway and Sweden."

The Rutland Boathouse backs onto Auriol Kensington clubhouse. As my picture above shows it is now, sadly, derelict. It is owned by the brewery that runs the adjacent 'Rutland' pub but they have no use for it. AK wanted to buy it and 'knock through' but the cost was prohibitive.

Some wonderful images of George and his men at work are here:

The always interesting British Pathe site shows wooden boat building at Eton in 1950.

BOAT BUILDING

Plastic boats must be 'better' I suppose but wooden boats made a few yards from the Thames from 'Empire woods' by third generation craftsmen wearing collar and tie has a certain appeal.

Tim, I can only agree. Thank you for an interesting report. It is going to be exacting to see how Cambridge is doing on Boat Race Day in their new boat.

The Bournes: 5 - Carring The Family Tradition

Here is the fifth and final entry about The Bournes.

It must have weighed heavily on a young man’s shoulders to be the grandson of the famous coach Gilbert C. Bourne and the son of the great stroke Bob Bourne. In the book The Boat Race, Gordon Ross states that “R.M.A. Bourne was a great disappointment to his father because he could not get into the Eton boat.” R.M.A. (‘Bobbie’) Bourne, who was born in 1919, only made it into the 2nd eight at Eton which indeed must have felt as a dissatisfaction coming from a renowned rowing family like the Bournes. However, during his last summer at Eton, Bobbie Bourne did reach the final of the School Pulling (pair), and he did win the School Mile which both his grandfather and father had done before him.

After Eton, Bourne went up to New College in 1937, but the following year, he joined the Army. During the Battle of Dunkirk in 1940, Bobbie Bourne was captured by the Germans and he spent the rest of the War in a prison camp. When the War ended, he went back to study at Oxford, and, although “thin and wiry as ever”, as John Langfield writes in his obituary about Bourne, published in Regatta in March 1996, Bobbie Bourne made it into the Blue boat in 1946. The dark Blues won The Boat Race by 3 lengths in 19 min. 54 sec. The same year, he was in the Leander eight that took the Grand and on the same day he won the Stewards’. In 1947, his eight lost The Boat Race to Cambridge.

Here is a newsreel of Oxford training in 1946. Young Bourne can be seen early on, 5 seconds into the film, before the crew goes on the water.

OXFORD BOAT RACE AND TRAINING

Bobbie Bourne was soon elected a Henley Steward, and he went back to Eton to become a classical master. He was very well liked at Eton, though he got himself into trouble, Langfield writes in his obituary, “having set his classes to compose limericks on the four evangelists.” Of course, Bourne also coached rowing at Eton and his crews had great success winning Princess Elizabeth Cup and the Ladies’ Plate. Bobbie Bourne died in 1996.

The Bournes: 4 - 'Beja', The Old Master Coach

Here continues the story of Dr. Gilbert Charles Bourne, famous coach at Oxford.

In A Text-Book of Oarsmanship Bourne agrees that the orthodox style has changed since Warre’s days, and that the style has been taught differently by different coaches, all being campaigners for the English orthodox style. The general factor that all the 'orthodox' coaches of the day could agree upon was that the Cambridge coach Steve Fairbairn’s new 'style' was wrong and therefore should be rebuked, which Bourne also does in his book. One error among many that Bourne found with Fairbairn’s Jesus College crews, who fully rowed according to Fairbairn’s method, was that they “always had an air of dreaminess about it.”

The year after, in 1926, Steve retorted Bourne in the book Rowing Notes. Regarding his dreamy Jesus crews, he writes, “Dr. Bourne […] says my crews look dreamy. They could not have given higher praise, especially as the criticisms were intended to be against the style in which I coach my crews. [- - -] Does not looking dreamy only mean being very smooth? In my opinion the dreamier a crew looks, the nearer it approaches to the poetry of motion.”


A jocular rhymester gave his view of the orthodox style in the Cambridge student magazine The Granta:

Beware the Orthodox, my son,

The slides that check, the arms that snatch;

Beware the drop-in blade, and shun

The Bourneish shoulder-catch.

A few oarsmen and coaches thought that a mix of the two styles were to be preferred, “each style has its own particular merits, and when the best points of each are blended then, in my opinion, perfection is very nearly achieved,” Vivian Nickalls wrote in 1932. But to “blend” the two different styles would be a rare thing to suggest during Bourne’s and Fairbairn’s lifetime. It would however be a more openly discussed subject during the 1950s and 1960s. Vivian Nickalls’s thoughts to “blend” the styles would be expressed some thirty years later by H. R. A. ‘Jumbo’ Edwards in his The Way of a Man with a Blade (1963) where he writes: “… by ‘orthodox’ I mean teaching the best method of moving the body to achieve maximum muscular efficiency in propelling the boat. The Fairbairn method was to teach the oarsman to perfect his bladework and to apply the maximum power to it throughout the stroke. Of course, the ideal is achieved by a combination of these two methods. Putting it another way, orthodoxy was the teaching of the pure art of rowing, while Fairbairnism was the application of the art to winning races. […] It is the greatest pity that Steve and Beja [Dr. Gilbert C. Bourne] never worked together. They would have produced wonderful crews.”

‘Jumbo’ Edwards should know as he had rowed for them both, at Oxford and later for The London RC. It is significant that Edwards dedicated his luminous book “to the memory of the greatest of Old Masters Steve and Beja”.

Dr. Bourne only published one book on rowing during his life time. However, the year after his death, in 1933, his manuscript about his younger days was published, Memories of an Eton Wet-Bob of the Seventies, which is a very exciting read for anyone interested in Eton and Oxford of those days. It is not, however, an easy book to find in an antiquarian bookshop nowadays.

In tomorrow's entry the story about the Bournes continues, then about Bobbie Bourne.

The Bournes: 3 - The Theoretical Coach

Bob Bourne’s father Gilbert Charles Bourne, was born in 1861. At the age of six, the family doctor declared him unfit for sports as he had a heart disease. However, at a new medical examination at Eton, young Bourne was given a ‘clean bill of health’. He immediately began to row competitively but, as The Time’s obituary put it, “as his style was unpleasing to the authorities, he was given only a humble position in Lower Boat choices.” It all changed in the spring of 1878, when Bourne unexpectedly was picked for Trail Eights, and he rowed bow of the Eton eight, and the crew reached the final of the Ladies' Plate at Henley that year. He was Captain of the Boats in 1880 and 1881.

G. C. Bourne rowed in the bow seat in Oxford’s winning Blue boat, both in 1883 and 1884. In front of him sat, at two-seat, R.S. de Havilland and they would later become advocates for the English orthodox style taught by the famous Dr. Edmond Warre, head-master and their rowing coach at Eton.

G.C. Bourne, who became a famous professor and coach at Oxford, used his studies in zoology, marine biology, and mathematics to mix in with his coaching. He coached Oxford for several periods from 1885 to 1927 (12 of his Blue boats won The Boat Race). His love for theory, whether it was to coach, to build boats, or the best dimensions of oars – their length and the width of the blades – is clearly seen in his wonderful book A Text-Book of Oarsmanship with an Essay on Muscular Action in Rowing, which was published in 1925 (reprinted in 1987).

Here is a 5-minute newsreel from 1925, Getting Well Together, “by courtesy of Doctor Bourne” [who is coaching the dark Blues in this film!]:

GETTING WELL TOGETHER

More about Dr. G.C. Bourne in tomorrow's entry!

Etonians And Their 'Boaters'

This time, Tim Koch, was very quick sending me some comments about my entry from yesterday about Eton and ‘boaters’. I hand over to Tim - and this time let's call him 'Guest writer' - who writes:

Your recent comments about 'boaters' (flat topped straw hats) at Eton School in England prompts me to send a picture of such an item from my collection of rowing memorabilia [see above]. It was worn sometime in the 1880s by one of the crew of the boat 'Victory' in the 'Procession of Boats' which takes place every year on the school's ‘parents' day" known as the 'Fourth of June'.

Eton School (more correctly called 'Eton College', though the boys are aged 13 to 18) is the most famous fee paying school in the world. Founded in 1440 by Henry VI, it has produced eighteen British Prime Ministers (however, by the time you read this, David Cameron could have made the number nineteen). Our interest is in the fact that it can lay claim to have invented rowing as an amateur sport - though Westminster School, founded 1179, may disagree. The earliest record of rowing for pleasure at the school dates from 1793. Until perhaps the First World War, it produced the majority of University Boat Race and Henley winners.

The 'Fourth of June' is a celebration of the birthday of King George III (1738-1820), Eton's greatest patron. This year it is on 2nd June. Various events take place on this day but the most famous is ‘The Procession of Boats’, in which the best crews from the top four years row past in clinker built, fixed pin eights. They wear uniforms of eighteenth century midshipmen, with the cox dressed as an admiral. The rowers have boaters sporting the name of their boat on their hat-bands and the school arms in metal, all decorated with fresh flowers. At a certain point, the entire crew and cox stand up in the boat with their oars erect. They face Windsor Castle, remove their hats and cheer the memory of George III. The ever reliable British Pathe web-site provides filmed evidence of these seemingly unlikely events.

This film from 1904 also shows Edward VII's Royal Barge which would have been rowed by professional Watermen:

(KING EDWARD VII AT ETON)

Here is some nice colour film from 1960. Interestingly, the boys seem less confident than those in 1907:

(ETON - THAMES / POWER BOATS)

Some nice sound film from 1938. At forty seconds in, there is a brief shot of the 'Monarch', a ten-oar.

FOURTH OF JUNE AT ETON

The 'Monarch' was retired in 1990 after at least 100 years service and is now in the National Maritime Museum in Falmouth here in England.

My collection also contains a programme from 'The Procession of Boats' of 1885. It shows many famous rowing names, notably Guy Nickalls, S.D. Muttlebury, C.M. Pitman and Lord Ampthill.


Many thanks to Tim for this lovely contribution!