Ian Marriott: Memories of Collar and Cousins

After having run the entry about oar markers Collar and Cousins on 2 May, HTBS received an interesting e-mail from Ian Marriott (on the right), sculling coach at the Dragon school in Oxford.

Ian writes:

I loved the video about F Collar and their foreman Ron Cousins, which brought back some wonderful memories.

The small blade presented to the Oxfordshire museum was finished in my club, Abingdon Rowing Club (ARC) colours of yellow and green. Ron was an active member of ARC and at one time its captain.

I used Collar blades made by Ron to row in a coxed pair at two World Junior Rowing Championships. We were told that 12 of the best blanks had been selected for an order for the New Zealand national team 8 (eight blades plus two spares) and that we had the best two, the New Zealanders got the others!

Timber selection was critical for making high quality oars and masts. Collars would buy a whole standard of high grade timber, select the best 10% for their use then sell the remainder on for other carpentry uses. I needed some good quality timber for the keel and longerons of a sculling boat I was building and Ron sourced me 28 ft lengths of ½ by ½ and 1 by ½ cut from one piece of timber without joints.

Having Ron at the club allowed us to experiment with blade shapes. We ended up rowing in the 2+ with macons about 4 inches wider than normal, with another set slightly narrower for head winds/rough water. Same area as modern big blades, but 20 years earlier. Any changes in blade shape Ron would do and return immaculately varnished a few days later.

Later I used two pairs of Ron Cousins crafted Collar sculls (one pair of which I still have and use) to get to the semi-finals of the Diamonds.

I was fortunate to have Ron show me how to carry out blade repairs, and went to the works to see my own sculls being made. I asked how I could buy the curved wooden planes used to hollow out the blade cheeks and Ron informed me that all his curved faced planes, including the steel blades were hand crafted by the oar makers as part of their apprenticeship. Watching Ron rough out the loom shape by eye with a 12 inch spokeshave was amazing, the sound of razor sharp steel on wood was almost musical.

I now work as a sculling coach at the Dragon school in Oxford. We have found a unique pair of wooden F Collar racing sculls in the back of the boathouse. They are longer than standard and the end of the shaft is laminated into about a 20 degree curve (towards the stern) and carries a small triangular plywood blade. They must be of late manufacture as they have what appears to be a carbon insert at the front. Looking at the profile I am guessing they are designed to exploit the aerofoil lift of the blades at the catch.

One of Collars former employees is now the St Johns College boatman, so I plan to see him to make further enquires. If I find anything of interest I will let you know. I am also planning an outing with them but waiting till the water gets a bit warmer!

Thanks for finding this video!

Thank you, Ian, for your interesting feed-back.

Was the First Wanker a Belgian Oarsman?

The Belgian “vainqueurs” or victors of the 1907 Grand Challenge Cup at Henley Royal Regatta.

HTBS is proud to welcome famous rowing historian and collector Thomas E. Weil as a guest writer of today’s blog post. Thomas has a special take on the word “wanker”, which he thinks may have originated in the rowing world.

Thomas writes:

“Wanker” is a disparaging term, used widely throughout the Commonwealth countries, which has been “ranked as the fourth most severe pejorative in English” (Wikipedia, citing Advertising Standards Authority, December 2000, accessed via Wayback Machine. Retrieved January 14, 2012. (pdf)). While a number of sources trace its origins to post-WW1 (the Online Etymology Dictionary, for instance, cites its earliest appearance to “British naval slang for ‘midshipman’ (1929)”, I am inclined to agree with the statement that “The terms wank and wanker originated in British slang during the late 19th and early 20th century” (Wikipedia, citing A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English. Eric Partridge, Paul Beale. Routledge, 15 Nov 2002).

Falling squarely within this earlier time frame, my hypothesis for the origin of the term points directly to the results of the Grand Challenge Cup event at Henley Royal Regatta in 1906, 1907 and 1909, when, to the shock and horror of the English rowing world, the premier eights prize of the kingdom was won by non-English crews.

Several American eights had crossed the Atlantic to be vanquished over the almost three-quarters of a century that the Grand had been contested, but European crews had only rarely bothered to venture the short distance across the English Channel to challenge for the trophy before 1906. So, when Belgian crews from two clubs in Ghent won England’s most precious rowing prize three times in four years (and skipped the fourth because it was an Olympic year), English oarsmen were inconsolably traumatized. What was a frustrated Englishman to do?

It probably didn’t help matters much when the Royal Club Nautique de Gand struck a commemorative medal that showed a toga-wearing woman seated on a Roman galley deck victoriously blowing a trumpet while the British lion cowered at her feet.

The commemorative medal struck by the Royal Club Nautique de Gand. On the other side of the medal it says: "De Stad Gent/Great [sic!] Challenge Cup/Henley".

Nor would the British have been pleased at the sight of postcards touting the victories that popped up in the mail following the Belgian accomplishments. The postcards, which showed the crews posed on a bench or seated in their boat, were often headed “Vainqueurs au Grand Challenge Cup a Henley” (see image on top of a 1907 postcard).

Was the choice of “vainqueurs” (or “victors”), rather than the more typically English and modest term “winners”, particularly provocative? Perhaps it was. Was it so provocative as to have instigated a vicious verbal counter-volley?  It could have been ...

“Vainqueur”, for practical purposes, is pronounced “vang-cur”, with the emphasis on the second syllable. Given the not uncommon practice in some circles of pronouncing a “v” like a “w”, could annoyed Englishmen have picked up on the Belgians’ own term, and started sarcastically and disparagingly referring to them as “wang-curs”, or “wankers” (with the accent on the first syllable)? Certainly they could have!

Did they? Who knows, but all of the ingredients for an international slanging war were there, and the timing is right for the supposition that first uses occurred some time in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. And that usage may easily have been exacerbated in later years by the contempt for the Europeans who crumbled so quickly in the face of Germany’s WWI advances, only then to be saved at the cost of so many British lives.

Should our breasts not swell with pride to think that the sport we love may have been the source of “the fourth most severe pejorative in English”? Absolutely. (And might we be grateful that it was the Belgians and not the French who first succeeded at Henley, in which event we might be using the term “grenwee” instead of wanker? Peut-être ...)

Lowry’s Grim Fairy Tale

Rowing historian and writer, Chris Dodd, believes that he has found a sculler in L. S. Lowry’s painting Industrial Landscape 1950 which right now is showing at the Tate Britain in the exhibit "Lowry and the Painting of Modern Life". Is there a sculler just above the bridge centre left of canvas? (Click on image to enlarge.)

Chris Dodd of the River & Rowing Museum in Henley-on-Thames writes,

L. S. (Lawrence Stephen) Lowry (1887-1976) was an artist who lived in Manchester and Salford all his life. He was a rent collector by day and a painter by night, attending Manchester Art College under the French impressionist Pierre Adolfe Valette, and afterwards at Salford Royal Technical College School of Art. In Lowry’s time Manchester ranked among the world’s top ten industrial cities and Lowry made the stark industrial landscapes of the Industrial Revolution his own while populating his pictures with life he observed in the streets while collecting rents, always with sketch book in hand. Lowry’s pictures now sell for millions, and a large retrospective is now showing at Tate Britain in London, "Lowry and the Painting of Modern Life", which will end on 20 October 2013.

The Pond, from Tate Britain.

Manchester didn’t rank as a major rowing place, although Agecroft Rowing Club (now in Salford docks) braved the dank River Irwell through the centre of the city from Victorian days, and the world’s great professional scullers, such as Ned Hanlan, took on the top Mancunians, such as Mark Addy, from time to time. Lowry’s sporting observations seem to be restricted to football (Bolton Wanderers supporter), cricket on waste ground and children’s street games, but I detect that one painting in the Tate show – Industrial Landscape 1950 – contains what looks like a sculler on the waterway that winds through it. Much more famous from a rowing point of view is Lowry’s The Pond, depicting a large municipal boating lake, which is also in the exhibition. Every industrial, mill and seaside town in Britain worth its salt had a boating lake from Victorian times – and many still do. For lots of Lowry canvases, visit Tate Britain or their website, here.

A Royal Tea Cruise

Gloriana flies the Royal Standard on the bow indicating that the Queen is on board. Photo © Sue Milton.

The tireless Malcolm Knight, a great promoter of traditional rowing, reports on a special event that took place on the River Thames on a hot day last July. HTBS has previously written about Malcolm in our report on the Tudor Pull.

Malcolm writes,

After six months, the plans were finally in place for the most important event so far in the life of the Queen’s Row Barge Gloriana.

The Royal Watermen who rowed wearing their heavy woolen costumes on one of the hottest days of the year.

On 9 July, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in the company of the Duke and Duchess of Wessex, the Duke of York, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester and the Duke of Kent boarded QRB Gloriana at Albert Bridge, Home Park, Windsor, to be rowed by eighteen of the Royal Watermen under the helm of HM Barge Master Paul Ludwig for an afternoon tea cruise to celebrate the 60 years since her Coronation.

The Queen’s Barge Master, Paul Ludwig, and Malcolm Knight.

The Countess of Wessex chats to the Watermen. Sir Steve Redgrave, on the right, looks on.

The flotilla of four invited craft, under the control of Malcolm Knight aboard the Gentleman’s launch Verity, moved off upstream to the surprise and delight of other boats on the river. The QRB went up the weir stream to Eton College where invited members of staff and their families cheered the spectacle.

Malcolm Knight meets The Queen. On the right is Lord Sterling, the man who initiated the Gloriana project as a tribute to the Queen on Her Diamond Jubilee. He also provided much of the finance.

Whilst the Watermen took a well-earned breather, tea was provided to the Royal guests by the Waterside Inn after which the QRB turned and returned downstream to moor below Victoria Bridge where the Royal party went ashore.

The Queen and the Royal Party on the deck of the Gloriana. On the left is the Duke of Kent, a cousin of the Queen. Next to him is Brigitte, the Danish-born Duchess of Gloucester. To her left is Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex, the Queen’s forth child. In the centre, Queen Elizabeth and a Waterman acting as coxswain. On the right of the group is Prince Richard, Duke of Gloucester, also a cousin of the Queen. Behind Richard, but obscured by a flag, is Prince Andrew, Duke of York, the Queen’s third child. His other rowing engagement this year in Vancouver, Canada, was also covered by HTBS. On the far right is Sophie, Countess of Wessex, the wife of Prince Edward.

The Queen thanks her Watermen at the end of her day on the river. The Earl of Wessex and the Duke of York followed on behind.

A ‘little piece of history’ was made as it is believed that this was the first time in nearly 200 years that a reigning monarch had been rowed in an 18-oared Royal barge by the Royal Watermen – a memorable day for all of us involved and one that has confirmed Gloriana as The Queen’s Row Barge.

Buggy Jerwood: Ideals of English Gentlemanliness

Thomas Merton. Photo: Wikipedia.

HTBS received a nice e-mail yesterday from Meredith Alcock of ZLAC Rowing Club (San Diego). She writes, “I follow your blog and enjoy it very much. My husband Robert came across something interesting recently I thought I would pass along. He is reading Thomas Merton for Lent and wrote up this summary and quote for me, possibly for you to use…”

Thomas Merton attended the English public school Oakham, in the town of the same name located in the county of Rutland in the central England and which Merton described as so obscure that “there were not even any main roads or main railway lines running through Rutland”. The school was founded in 1584 and Merton attended from 1929 to 1932 when he went up to Clare College, Cambridge.

Merton did not row at Oakham, and only briefly at Clare and Columbia, however he left a vivid image of the mania for rowing that one can develop in his description of the chaplain at Oakham during his time there. Merton writes,

Buggy Jerwood, the school chaplain, tried to teach us trigonometry. With me, he failed. Sometimes he would try to teach us something about religion. But in this he also failed.

In any case, his religious teaching consisted mostly in more or less vague ethical remarks, an obscure mixture of ideals of English gentlemanliness and his favorite notions of personal hygiene. Everybody knew that his class was liable to degenerate into a demonstration of some practical points about rowing, with Buggy sitting on the table and showing us how to pull an oar.

There was no rowing at Oakham, since there was no water. But the chaplain had been a rowing “blue” at Cambridge, in his time. He was a tall, powerful, handsome man, with hair greying at the temples, and a big English chin, and a broad, uncreased brow, with sentences like “I stand for fair-play and good sportsmanship” written all over it.

From Thomas Merton’s The Seven Storey Mountain (Fiftieth Anniversary edition, Chapter Three)

Information on Jerwood, who was bow in the winning Cambridge boat in The Boat Race in 1908 and won a bronze medal rowing for Great Britain in the Olympics that year, is here.

Cambridge crew of 1908, winner of The Boat Race, Olympic Bronze Medallists. In bow, Frank Jerwood.

Warm thanks to Meredith and Robert for passing along this interesting piece of rowing history! More information about the 1908 Cambridge crew can be found here.

John Beresford: My Dad as an Inspiration

Greg Denieffe writes from England: Jack Beresford’s son, John, was the guest speaker at the Christmas Dinner for the boys and members of staff of the Upper Sixth Form of Pemberley House, Bedford School, held on 13 December, 2012. He has kindly given HTBS the following report on his talk with the theme of ‘Inspiration’.

John Beresford.
Photo: Pemberley House Blog.

After my father Jack, my uncle Eric and my cousin Michael, who were all successful oarsmen, I was the fourth Beresford to board at Pemberley and I last dined here in 1964. The food tonight is excellent (unlike 48 years ago!) and the camaraderie and spirit evident here is a great tribute to you all and particularly to Peter Sherwin and his wife, Roz, who are an inspirational House Master and wife. You boys are lucky!

My contact with Bedford School was rekindled by Mr Sherwin when he proposed naming the Pemberley House games room, ‘The Jack Beresford Room’. As I was abroad Michael Beresford opened the Room. This was held during the 150th Boat Club Anniversary, which I was sorry to miss, as I had stroked the 1st VIII for two years and been Captain of Boats.

Dad was keener on rugby than rowing at school, playing in the 1st XV for three years and as captain. I would like to give you his 1st XV blazer badge, mounted in a shield, to pair with the 1st VIII one I previously gave you.

(I then referred to the HTBS blog, which Peter Sherwin has a copy of and which aptly describes Jack’s life at Bedford as ‘The making of a man’. I then read the ballad about the Bedford v Shrewsbury race taken from the blog, which went down well).

I want to give you his inscribed 1916 Bedford 1st VIII oar, which is really a return home for it. I also want to give you his 1932 Los Angeles Olympic gold medal winning oar. These Peter Sherwin has told me will make a good pair to be hung in ‘The Jack Beresford Room’.

The 1932 Olympic champions: Felix Badcock, Jack Beresford, Jumbo Edwards and Rowland George. Jack is holding the oar that his son John donated to Pemberley House, Bedford School. Photo: River and Rowing Museum.

Jack’s rugby career ended in 1918, after he was shot in the leg in the trenches. Part of his recuperation at Fowey was rowing a dinghy round the coast and as his father ‘Berry’ had won silver at the Stockholm Olympics in 1912 in the IV, this set him on the path to five consecutive Olympic medals, three gold and two silvers. I won’t go into his achievements here except to say that he described his 1936 gold in Berlin as ‘the sweetest race he ever rowed’.

It wasn’t until Sir Steve Redgrave’s fifth consecutive Olympic Gold medal win in 2000 that I fully appreciated what my father had achieved. I’d simply grown up with his success and there wasn’t the media coverage or interest in those days that there is today.

I know from Peter Sherwin that ‘The Jack Beresford Room’ has been a great inspiration to many of his boys. Having been to the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics and witnessing the immense success of these Games, I now fully understand what he said.

Do you think the London Olympics and Paralympics can justly be referred to as ‘Inspiring a Generation’? (There was general agreement to this).

There were so many inspiring aspects about the Games in addition to the incredible sporting achievements of the athletes. To name a few: the Olympic Park regeneration, the architecture, the on-time completion, the Games-Makers, the transport system and the Opening and Closing ceremonies.

This surely showed that Great Britain has the talent and ability to do many things supremely well and to be truly world class. It is boys like you here this evening who will make this happen in the future.

I’d like to end by saying that sport, at whatever level you play, is a vital basis for life’s enjoyment, for health and for building confidence. It will always give you friendships through common interests which you are less likely to find through your work.

I’m so delighted that my Dad, Jack, has helped to give you some inspiration for your future lives.  He was always keen to help younger people. Thank you for creating a Games Room here at Pemberley where he will long be remembered.

John Beresford

Greg's comments: HTBS readers may like the following links as they contain a few interesting photographs:

The Bedford School website also has a short report on the dinner, with the title Olympic Legacy. It also has a 1923 photograph showing Jack in a single in the colours of Thames Rowing Club.

The Pemberley House Blog has a photo journal of the Christmas Dinner and you will find a fine photograph of John Beresford (no. 23 and on top of this entry) entertaining the guests.

World Rowing Magazine has a bilingual article about Jack in the Fall 2006 edition, simply called Hero of the past: Jack Beresford and in French Un héros du passé: Jack Beresford. There are three nice photographs showing Jack at the Olympics, in a single (1920), in the eight (1928) and in the double (1936).

Australian Inter-University Rowing

Louis (on the right) and yours truly

HTBS is happy to introduce Mr. Louis Petrin, an Australian rowing history buff, whom I have actually spent some pleasant hours with this summer when Louis passed through Connecticut. We managed to squeeze in quite a lot about rowing those few hours we spent in the rowing exhibit and boat storage place at Mystic Seaport. In an e-mail, Louis writes about HTBS: “You need some Aussie stuff to give a global view of rowing, which I am happy to gather for you.” And I can only agree. So here it is, Louis first contribution to HTBS. May there be many more to come! He writes,

This week sees virtually all the universities of Australia competing in 30 different sports at the Australian University Games in Adelaide, South Australia. Of interest will be the rowing. Finals are raced on Friday, 28 September.

The earliest race between two of the Australian universities, Sydney and Melbourne, was rowed in 1870. This was the first race of an interstate or international nature known to have taken place in Australia, although the Parramatta River is known to have been the site of races as early as 1863.

The University of Melbourne met with great success in these early races, for not only did it win the first race, but when Sydney challenged Melbourne the following year on the Parramatta, Melbourne once again finished first. Melbourne’s contentment and Sydney’s disappointment might have been responsible for the abandonment of the race until 1888, as an “official” reason is not known.

The revival of a boat racing contest between the universities in 1888 was due to a suggestion made by Dr. W. Fleming Hopkins, a member of the Melbourne University Boat Club. Dr. Hopkins was deputed by Mr. C. H. Freeman (Hon. Secretary of the M.U.B.C.) to speak to the Adelaide University rowing men on the subject of sending Melbourne a challenge to row a race. This challenge for a race in eight-oared boats on the Yarra River was received from Adelaide University by Melbourne University rowing men, bearing the date 27 January, 1888. Sydney University Boat Club was approached, and decided also to send a crew.

So, it was that the first eight-oared race between Australian universities was conducted on 6 October, 1888. Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide Universities met on the Homburg reach course of the Yarra River, a distance of just over 4 kilometres (2 ½ miles).

Melbourne was recorded as having won by four lengths over Adelaide in a time of 13 min. 5 secs. and six lengths to third placed Sydney.

Adelaide achieved its first win on 21 December, 1889, at their home course on the Port River, and again in 1896. Sydney’s first win was on 16 June, 1890, by five lengths. Here is a short note about the race in a newspaper:

It was not until 1893 that a significant trophy was first competed for, the Oxford and Cambridge Challenge Cup.

The Oxford and Cambridge Challenge Cup

This fine trophy was presented by Old Blues of Oxford and Cambridge Universities Boat Clubs. Dr. Edmond Warre, later headmaster of Eton College, was mainly responsible for securing the handsome and interesting trophy, which is held as a perpetual trophy for the race, and is kept by the winning boat club for the year in which it is Head of the River.

Frederick Halcomb (Captain of the Adelaide University Boat Club) had rowed against Warre in earlier years. As a good friend of Warre, Halcomb wrote him a letter with an account of the inter-university race that had just begun. A proposal was laid before the university boat clubs at Oxford and Cambridge, and both signified their approval and added a substantial donation. In addition a very large number of past university “oars”, coxswains, and coaches joined in subscribing to fund the trophy. In looking over the list of sympathisers it is pleasant to recognise names of men who made their mark between Putney and Mortlake so long ago as the 1850s, as Judge (Joe) Chitty, Elers, Hornby, Lonsdale, Meade King, and others for Oxford; while the Cambridge’s subscription list includes the name of Tom Egan, who was coaching and steering Cambridge in the 1840s, and who in a memorable year transferred his services to Oxford. In view of such generous sympathy and support from the old universities of England, it was hoped that this tangible show of empathy would foster rowing in Australia. In an 1890 letter, Warre wrote to Halcomb stating that “the idea was accepted by them with alacrity” and that they were “proud of the opportunity afforded them of showing their brotherhood, goodwill and interest in the welfare of their kinsmen in the antipodes”.

The Oxford and Cambridge Challenge Cup was sent out to Australia in time for the 1893 competition, where it was competed for and won by Melbourne.

The Cup has scenes of both Cambridge and Oxford engraved on the sides, pictures of rowing along with floral emblems of the countries of England, Scotland and Wales. The Angel on the top is pictured in the traditional pose of the Toast to Rowing. This long standing and traditional toast is afforded the winners of the Challenge Cup.

The Women’s Eight Champions compete for the Professor Godfrey Tanner Cup. The first winners in 1978 were University of Melbourne.

The Professor Godfrey Tanner Cup

Whereas in the beginning, only three universities competed, nowadays all the other Australian universities send crews for the Cup.

Louis Petrin lives in Sydney, Australia, and enjoys all that the good waters there offer. He rows for the Drummoyne Rowing Club and is part of a crew called the Grumpy Oar Men. The crew started 4 years ago joining fathers rowing at a corporate regatta to raise funds for their daughter’s school rowing programme. Louis is also became a Boat Race Official to give back something to the sport that has given his daughter, Nicole, six memorable years as she continues to row for Sydney University. Louis has a love of history which has lead him to collect books on rowing (300) as well as trophies and memorabilia.

Eric Fairbairn - Olympic Oarsman, Soldier In The Great War, Part 2

Two Blue Boats in 1911: (closes to the camera) Cambridge crew studying their opponents rowing by: bow S. E. Swann; 2 P. V. G. Van der Byl; 3 F. E. Hellyer; 4 C. F. Burnand; 5 C. R. le Blanc-Smith; 6 J. B. Rosher; 7 G. E. Fairbairn; stroke R. W. M. Arbuthnot; cox C. A. Skinner. Oxford crew: bow C. E. Tinne; 2 L. G. Wormald; 3 R. E. Burgess; 4 E. J. H. V. Millington-Drake; 5 C. W. B. Littlejohn; 6 A. S. Garton; 7 D. Mackinnon; stroke R. C. Bourne; cox H B Wells. With Bourne as stroke, Oxford would have a four-year winning streak, starting in 1909.

Here continues Stephen Cooper’s article from yesterday about Eric Fairbairn. The article is an abridged extract from Cooper’s book The Final Whistle: The Great War in Fifteen Players, which will be published in September 2012.

The following year, 1909, Eric captained the College Boat Club, but missed a second Blue when he fell ill a week before the Boat Race. Jesus entered the Grand at Henley, but lost the final to those pesky ‘Men of Ghent’. They would have to wait a while for the rematch, but in May 1911 set out on what coxswain Conrad Skinner called the ‘Belgian Expedition’. Later to be the Reverend Skinner, he had no hesitation in likening Jesus to Biblical underdogs in his expeditionary account:

‘The enterprise of taking a crew drawn from a single college to race the Belgians on their own waters was greeted for the most part with the scorn ridicule and cynical indifference which David evoked in his hardy challenge to Goliath of Gath.’

But this crew was not lacking in experience or motivation. It boasted six of the crew beaten in the 1909 Grand Challenge by the Belgians. Coaches were Uncle Steve and Stanley Bruce, who would later become Prime Minister of Australia. Thanks to Mr Bruce they ‘came to the post in the pink of physical fitness… able to turn out 43, 45 and even 47 strokes a minute without the least discomfort’. To their astonished pleasure, they were hailed as superstars:

‘The race became the primary topic in press and popular conversation. English ideals of sport were paramount and my cutting book is an almost unbelievable revelation of Belgian devotion to English sport and representative sportsmen.’

Over 100,000 spectators lined the canal at Terdonck on 25 May to see Jesus win ‘amid an uproar that was little short of deafening’. The acclaim continued off the water. A march composed in their honour was played at the gala dinner; ten thousand people waited four hours outside the banquet hall to catch a glimpse of the Jesus crew; a set of race postcards sold 170,000 copies in one week. Skinner later admitted: ‘No crew was ever feted as we were and many of us took shame at the poverty of England’s welcome to Belgian crews at Henley in past times. Never will any member of the crew forget the amazing generosity of the Gantois, in fact of the Belgians as a nation’.

Jesus College did not forget. Moved by the fate of tiny Belgium as Germany overran it in the first weeks of August 1914, the College started a Belgian relief fund in gratitude for the hospitality they had received at Ghent and raised £800 (or £60,000 today). Eric Fairbairn joined up immediately the recruitment offices opened after August Bank Holiday: his Belgian rivals were now allies in need. He was commissioned into the 10th Durham Light Infantry (DLI).

Eric Fairbairn was also an accomplished sculler.

In all, 150 College members, including fifty from the Boat Club, were to give their lives in the War. The members of the ‘Belgian Expedition’ were hardest hit. Like Eric, they rushed to volunteer for the defence of their gracious hosts, outraged by reports of German atrocities. Hugh Willoughby Shields, who won the Lowe Double Sculls with Eric in 1910, was the first to die in October 1914, tending a wounded guardsman at Ypres; Lt Henry Goldsmith of the Devonshires was killed at Ploegsteert in May 1915; Thomas Crowe, died at Gallipoli in June; and Gerald Hudson was killed in January 1916. All four men vanished without trace; their names are to be found on memorials to those with no known grave.

Eric Fairbairn stood once again on Belgian soil on 12 June in trenches west of Wijtschate. He was a few miles from Ypres, and fifty from Ghent where the reception had been so tumultuous on that far-off day. On the night of 17 June Eric moved into the frontline: there was no attack over the top, just the sapping attrition of nightly shelling and mortar fire, and the ritual ‘stand-to’ at dusk and dawn. The War Diary for 20 June records: ‘All companies returned from trenches early this morning… D. Coy reports 2/Lt Fairburn [sic] dangerously wounded’. Like so many of the New Army’s inexperienced junior officers, Eric’s war did not last long: he was fatally wounded in his first week at the front.

Two silk handkerchiefs are the only personal effects returned to his mother. In February 1919, she also received his ‘Death Penny’ bronze plaque, to place alongside his Olympic silver medal. On the outer edge of the 12 cm disk are the words, ‘He died for freedom and honour’.

One Ghent winner who survived, Conrad Skinner, remembering his friends from that glorious day of innocent sporting battle in 1911, wrote: ‘it is a melancholy coincidence that the whole stern four of the Jesus crew, and also Shields, lost their lives in the Great War. Yet there is a feeling of just pride that this should occur in aiding Belgium in her gallant defence.’

Eric Fairbairn - Olympic Oarsman, Soldier In The Great War, Part 1

The 1908 winning Boat Race crew, Cambridge: bow F. H. Jerwood; 2 G. E. Fairbairn; 3 O. A. Carver; 4 H. E. Kitching; 5 J. S. Burn; 6 E. G. Williams; 7 E. W. Powell; stroke D. C. R. Stuart; cox R. F. R. P. Boyle.

George Eric Fairbairn (1888-1915), Australian and GB Olympic oarsman, is featured in a new book by Stephen Cooper: The Final Whistle: the Great War in Fifteen Players, which will be published in September 2012. Fairbairn occasionally played rugby, but was better known as part of the Fairbairn rowing dynasty. This is an abridged extract from the Cooper’s book.

Eric Fairbairn came from a large Australian family in Melbourne. He went up to Jesus College, Cambridge in 1906, the latest in a line of rowing Fairbairns, and by no means the last. ‘The most frequent name in Boat Race annals is that of Fairbairn, for their name has appeared in the Cambridge lists in no less than seven past contests: Mr A. A. Fairbairn rowed in 1858 and 1860; Mr C. Fairbairn in 1879 and Mr S. Fairbairn in 1882, 1883, 1886 and 1887.’ Eric’s Times obituary commented:

‘His rowing achievements are rather connected with Jesus College, Cambridge, which owes no small part of its fame as a rowing college to that great oarsman of the eighties, Mr Stephen Fairbairn.’

The river, not academic study, was to preoccupy Eric at Cambridge. He spent five years there, won Blues in 1908 and 1911, but did not do enough to earn his degree. However, ‘his rowing career has been one unbroken chain of successes … Like all geniuses, he has his idiosyncrasies. He hates collars, takes no milk in his tea through fear of dead flies, and is a confirmed Peripatetic after bump-suppers.’ (i.e. he was given to wandering about in a drunken state after the Boat Club dinners.)

His annus mirabilis was 1908, although it was not without controversy. Eric stroked the victorious coxless four in Michaelmas term. Jesus rowed over as Head of the River in the Lents and won the Ladies’ Plate at Henley Regatta for the first time in thirty years. Eric Fairbairn also won the Colquhoun Sculls. Greater challenges were to come.

At Putney Bridge on 4 April, at precisely 3.30 p.m. he sat in the two seat of the University eight for the annual Boat Race against Oxford. Cambridge, although hot favourites having won the two previous encounters, did not draw away until after Barnes Bridge to win by two and a half lengths, in 19 min. 20 sec. The Tideway course, rowed against the stream, is one of the most gruelling sporting events in the world. The New York Times reported that ‘the Oxford men who had gamely rowed a losing race were much distressed at the finish’. In his blue blazer at dinner on that triumphant night in 1908, he would have been as peripatetic as a newt.

But the victory was deemed a lacklustre performance from the Eight nominated to represent Great Britain in the London Olympic Games that summer. The selectors, fearful of losing at home, hedged their bets and invited ‘some of the older men to try to get fit with a view to rowing in the Olympic Regatta’. A second crew of veteran Blues, long retired from the river, rowed under the flag of Leander. The Light Blue crew was reshuffled: the only man to lose his seat was Eric, replaced by fellow Jesus man and former Cambridge President, Henry Goldsmith. No explanation is given, and he remained a substitute; was there some prejudice against an Australian in the Blue Riband event of the Olympic regatta? It did not stop him competing for Britain in another boat; Eric would have the last laugh.

The rowing was held at Henley-on-Thames, spiritual home of the sport. The regular course of 1 mile 550 yards was lengthened in the hope that the heavyweight GB/Leander crew might take advantage, which they initially did over the renowned Canadian Argonauts. In the second semi-final, the student Eight faced the mighty Belgians, of the Royal Club Nautique de Gand [Ghent], twice winners of the Grand Challenge Cup at Henley. The Light Blues ‘showed unmistakable signs of staleness…and when the strain came, the crew disintegrated’. This was the only heat in which Britain was defeated by a visiting nation. ‘Team GB/Cambridge’ had to be content with Bronze but Leander saved the Empire’s blushes by pulling through for final Gold over the Belgians.

Watching from the bank, Eric Fairbairn would see the red, yellow and black of Belgium again, and more than once. Meanwhile he teamed up with Jesus colleague Philip Verdon in the coxless pairs. The All-British final saw John Fenning and Gordon Thomson take gold from Verdon and Fairbairn. But Eric had his silver Olympic medal, one up on his erstwhile colleagues in the Eight.

Stephen Cooper’s article about Eric Fairbairn continues tomorrow.

Stockholm 1912 – London 2012: An Olympic Centenary, Part 2

Leander's eight is getting ready for an outing, in the foreground Ben Wells, cox, and Philip Fleming, stroke.

Here continues Victoria Fishburn’s article Stockholm 1912 – London 2012: An Olympic Centenary from yesterday:

The Leander oarsmen had rowed together many times. The British rowing world of the early twentieth century was refreshingly casual and laidback. Some members of the crew representing Britain were brought together almost by chance. The man who rowed in fifth position, Angus Gillan, was twenty-seven and had been working abroad for the Sudan political service. He had won a gold medal at the 1908 Olympics and four years later, when on leave, he bumped into a fellow rower in London who asked if he was available to join the Olympic crew for 1912. He did so with alacrity. Stanley Garton, rowing at No. 6, received a letter from a friend saying “Now we must get Horsfall” to join the eight. None of the gruelling selection process for the Olympic teams of 2012 was evident in the getting-together of the eight of 1912. But the rowers were talented and dedicated and Harcourt Gold, who had himself been a Henley cup-winning oarsman, put together an eight that could win a medal, just as he had done for the 1908 Olympics when a Leander eight had taken the gold medal.

Although none of them knew it, it was the eve of the First World War in which they all went on to fight. It is remarkable when so many died that only one of the rowers, Alister Kirby, lost his life. He had survived the Battle of Ypres, but died in France of a tumour on his knee in 1917. Others were luckier. Ewart Horsfall, like Kirby, had joined the Rifle Brigade and then transferred to the RAF. Unusually, he won both a Military Cross and a Distinguished Flying Cross. He went on to take a silver medal in the eights at the 1920 Olympic rowing regatta on the Grand Willebroek Canal, outside Brussels, and to be manager of the 1948 Olympic rowing eight, together with Angus Gillan. After working in Sudan, Gillan played a key role at the British Council and at the Royal Overseas League. Leslie Wormald joined the Royal Field Artillery and won a Military Cross in 1918 in France.

Swann (on the left), who also rowed in the 1920 Olympic silver eight, joined the church and went to France as chaplain to the forces. His career led him to Kenya, Egypt and India. Between 1941 and 1952, he was Chaplain to the King and later Chaplain to the Queen, from 1952 to 1965. Philip Fleming went to Europe with the Queen’s Own Oxfordshire Hussars and after the war was a partner of the family bank. Henry Wells became a distinguished barrister. Stanley Garton, coached subsequent Oxford eights but died young in 1948. His daughter, Rosalind, married the son of his friend ‘Don’ Burnell of the famous rowing family. Don’s son, ‘Dickie’, won a gold medal for Britain rowing in the double in the 1948 Olympics.

In rural Berkshire, the granddaughters of Wormald and Garton decided to celebrate their illustrious grandfathers. By chance, they had found another Berkshire descendant: the grandnephew of Edgar Burgess. They planned a party and began a tentative search for descendants of the others in the eight. They made contact with both the River & Rowing Museum and the Leander Club in Henley and the detective work started to pay off. First of all, someone living in Henley had a feeling that her next door neighbour had an Olympic grandfather and passed on contact details. Sure enough, the neighbour was the granddaughter of Ewart Horsfall. Next, Leander put a photograph of the eight in Hippo Happenings, their monthly eShot newsletter. Helpful ex-rowers from around the country wrote in, including the first of the generation of rowers’ children, Allan, the son of Angus Gillan.

A member of Leander handed in some pages from a Swedish book which he had found in a junk shop. It had images of the 1912 crew and of the Stockholm Olympics, which they had never seen before. Contacts with the Fleming family found Robin Fleming, son of Philip. A wonderfully helpful Horsfall connection led us to the family of Henry Wells, the cox. We discovered from his two grandsons that he was always known as Ben. Having found the cox, it emerged quite how famous the coach, Harcourt Gold was. He had, as the first person, been knighted for his services to rowing in 1949, the second being Sir Steve Redgrave in 2001. We found not one, but two of Gold’s grandsons and two granddaughters. There just remained Sydney Swann, or ‘Cygnet’ as he was known to his rowing friends. Research on the internet gave names for his granddaughters and Leander found an address in Scotland for one of them. A friend in their village said, “Yes, they still live there and yes, the house is simply stuffed with oars.” We had found Swann’s granddaughters and, through them, his daughter Celia. Of all the oarsmen Kirby alone, having died, left no descendants.

 1912 Olympic champions - Leander Club

The detective hunt had found descendants of every one of the eight that went to Stockholm. One hundred and twenty-four of them got together yesterday, on Sunday, 29 July, at the start of the 2012 Olympics, to celebrate the centenary. Children of the rowers and their grandchildren, great grandchildren and great-great grandchildren were there. They brought with them the collected memorabilia of their ancestors: Olympic oars and a rudder, two sections of a boat, several of the gold medals, a laurel wreath and many photograph albums. A member of each family made a short speech about their forebear. All then raised a glass to toast the fine achievement of these great rowers, their illustrious ancestors.

Stockholm 1912 – London 2012: An Olympic Centenary, Part 1

1912 Olympic champions in the eights. L to R. Ewart Horsfall, Edgar Burgess, Angus Gillan, Alister Kirby, Stanley Garton, Leslie Wormald, Philip Fleming and Sidney ‘Cygnet’ Swann. Sitting Henry ‘Ben’ Wells.

It is with great pleasure that HTBS is posting a two-piece article by Victoria Fishburn (on the right), who is living in Berkshire, England. She has an MA in Biography and is writing the life of Daisy, the Countess of Warwick (who was mistress to Edward VII and became a reforming socialist). Fishburn’s grandfather was Leslie Wormald, Olympic gold medallist in the eights at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics. As it is one hundred years since Wormald and the other oarsmen of Leander Club became Olympic champions in the eights, Fishburn and her friend, Georgie Woods, whose grandfather was Stanley Garton and rowed in the same boat as Wormald, decided to celebrate their grandfathers’ triumph. This is the story about the Leander eight, and how two ladies worked together to assemble one hundred and twenty-four descendants of the oarsmen in that eight. The celebration of their rowing ancestors was held yesterday, Sunday, 29 July.

When London won the competition to host the 2012 Olympics, two Berkshire women realised that it would be a fitting time to celebrate a family Olympic centenary. They had long known that their grandfathers had rowed together in 1912. It was now one hundred years ago Leslie Wormald and Stanley Garton won a gold medal for Great Britain rowing in an eight in the Stockholm Olympics. And the Olympic excitement of 2012 made some kind of centenary celebration a must. Their grandfathers, like the rest of the rowers who made up the eight, were amateurs: gilded young men of the Edwardian era who had gone to the best public schools: Eton, Winchester, Rugby and Edinburgh Academy. Similar types of British sportsmen were to run for their country in the 1924 Olympics, as famously portrayed in the re-released film Chariots of Fire.

The 1912 rowers had spent the preceding years gaining reputations as talented oarsmen rowing first for their schools and then their universities. One of them had rowed in the 1908 Olympics which were held in London, with the rowing taking place at Henley. Most of the 1912 eight had won both the University Boat Race and the Grand Challenge Cup at Henley in 1911. Apart from the Metropolitan rowing clubs, the university eights were the best around, so it was to Oxford and Cambridge that the Olympic committee went to choose the British eight for the Stockholm Olympics.

Harcourt ‘Tarka’ Gold (on the right) was the rowing coach for Magdalen College, Oxford, and had himself been a respected oarsman in his day, stroking the Oxford boat at four Boat Races in 1896-1899. He chose most of his eight from his own college, though he included one Cambridge man, Sydney Swann from Trinity Hall. Leather photograph albums are still in the collections of all the rowers’ families today. From these album pages good-looking young men look steadily back at you. Their public schools had taught them team spirit and the importance of doing your best whether you won or lost. In the eight of 1912 rowed Edgar Burgess in the bow and next to him Sydney Swann. Rowing at positions in the middle of the boat were Leslie Wormald, Ewart Horsfall, Angus Gillan, Stanley Garton and Alister Kirby. Philip Fleming, rowed stroke and another Magdalen man, Henry ‘Ben’ Wells, was the cox. They rowed under the name of the Leander Club. Its iconic status in the rowing world was reconfirmed in July 2012 as the five-time Olympic gold medallist Steve Redgrave rowed the 2012 Olympic torch up the Thames to land at Leander’s dock.

The British Leander eight was joined in Stockholm by a second eight from New College, Oxford, led by one of Oxford’s best strokes, R.C. Bourne (on the left). The other countries that sent eights were Australia, Canada, Sweden, Norway, Germany and Hungary. Germany and Sweden, like Britain, each fielded two eights but, even though the Australian eight had beaten Magdalen in the Grand final at Henley two weeks earlier, it was the British crews that proved to be the strongest. After exciting heats rowed over three days it was an all-British final on Friday 19 July between two old rivals: Magdalen/ Leander and New College. Henley’s traditions travelled with them: the banks of the bay Djurgårdsbrunnsviken in the central parts of Stockholm were named ‘Berks’ and ‘Bucks’. Magdalen chose the Berks bank and, in a fine race, won by about a length. The eight itself remains at the Riksidrottsmuseet, the national sport museum in Stockholm. The Leander Club of 1912 could not afford to bring it back to England.

The Olympic final in the eights: Leander has a comfortable lead over New College BC when there is only a couple of hundred metres to go to the finish.

New College felt aggrieved by what they saw as bad sportsmanship by Magdalen/Leander. Sportsmen have always tried to behave like gentlemen and, in 1912, New College argued that Magdalen did not. The saga is chronicled in the New College archives. The New College captain in Stockholm had won the toss to choose banks but, in a gentlemanly fashion, had offered the choice to Magdalen/Leander. Then, according to the archives, the decidedly ungentlemanly Magdalen/Leander crew went against convention and chose to row on the best bank. The bank they rejected had the disadvantage of a protruding bathhouse which had to be rowed around. New College were not able to pick up speed after this ‘blockage’. Archives at Magdalen that might have given another side to the story were destroyed in the 1940s and the controversy has lasted to this day. On 11 June, 2012, New College held a 100th Anniversary Match Race with two races against Magdalen. They each won one and lost one. Although, in a spirit of friendship, they invited Magdalen to celebrate afterwards. ‘God Damn Bloody Magdalen’ is still the toast at meetings of the New College Boat Club.

Victoria Fishburn’s article continues tomorrow!

Anglian Boat Club: The Anglo-Scandinavian Races

Chiswick Bridge

HTBS is happy to introduce a guest writer, Colin Cracknell,* who is the club historian at the Mortlake Anglian & Alpha Boat Club which rows out next to Chiswick Bridge in south west London. Colin writes about some club races in the early 1880s:

In 1927, at the annual dinner of the Anglian Boat Club, celebrating its 50th anniversary, Mr. Musgrave spoke of the early days of the Club. Amongst other things, he referred to the influx of Scandinavians in the early 1880s and the good they did for the Club. Somehow Swedes and Norwegians joined the Club in such numbers to enable them to boat eights at two consecutive Club Regattas in 1882 and 1883 to challenge the English members. At this time, Anglian was established in the Devonshire Boathouse, at Strand on the Green below Gunnersbury Railway Bridge, an establishment operated by Frank Maynard who built and hired boats as well as leasing rooms and racking to the Club.

The first Anglo-Scandinavian race was held at the Club’s annual regatta and the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News reported, in the rather florid manner of the time that:

“Special interest was manifested in the proceedings owing to one of the events being an oared race rowed between the English and Scandinavian members of the Association. The prizes for this event were given by Mr. T. Nordenfeldt [often spelt Nordenfelt], and the course was from the Club House to Barnes Bridge. There was a good struggle throughout, the home representatives ultimately proving the visitors by three quarters of a length.”

The Scandinavian crew was made up of Norwegians and Swedes who were mainly clerks in the timber and other trades. Thorsten Nordenfelt (on the right), also a Swede, was a manufacturer of machine guns for the Royal Navy and president of the Club. He lived in some style in Paddington with his family, their Irish butler, Swedish cook, and two servants.
   
The English crew comprised a more varied background, including John Musgrave, a music professor, John Hoole, a medical student, and James Evans, a shipping clerk who provided Anglian with its first ever victory in an open regatta, the Junior Sculls at Barnes & Mortlake in 1883. George Dewhirst later rowed at 5 in the eight which won the Juniors at the Metropolitan Regatta, Anglian’s first crew win. Dying, age 37, in 1891, Dewhirst was remembered by a trophy for coxless fours to be raced at Club regattas. In 1882, the English were lighter than the Scandinavians by half a stone, (3 kg), per man and similarly their cox was two stone lighter. The final record of the 1882 race is a letter from the Scandinavian Club in London, in December, asking for their flags back.

A second race was held at the Club Regatta in 1883 and Musgrave remembered that the Scandinavians were very strong and fancied themselves to the degree that they offered in advance a handsome dinner. Why they thought themselves so much stronger is unclear as they boated a crew more or less unchanged from the previous year. The race was again reported by the Illustrated Dramatic and Sporting News, which noted that “the weather was anything but propitious” and that the English again beat the Scandinavians, although they were confused about the distance which was either half or three quarters of a length. Perhaps too much hospitality had been enjoyed. Spectators could follow the races on the steamer Citizen C, and as was a tradition followed into the late years of the following century, it was almost dark when the regatta concluded. Prizes were again presented by “Mr. Nordenfeldt, the energetic and liberal president of the society.”

Soon after 1883, it would seem that the Scandinavian influence at the Club diminished. Thorsten Nordenfelt’s company merged with the Maxim Gun Company, but he was later declared bankrupt and moved to France, later to return to Sweden. Henrick Waern relocated to Paris and donated his sculling boat to one of the rowing clubs in Gothenburg, Sweden. However, he failed to specify who should pay the shipping costs leading to a long correspondence between the parties involved. Bergh, who rowed in both races for the Scandinavians, was also a member of the London Rowing Club for which he won the Grand Challenge Cup at Henley in 1883 and 1884. In 1884, Lyne, who rowed in the English crew in 1883, won Thames Challenge Cup at Henley for London as he did again in 1885 and 1886. Musgrave joined Thames Rowing Club and was a Wyfolds finalist in 1889. However, he coached the Anglian Thames Cup eight at Henley in 1895 and continued to compete at Club regattas until 1906 before finally appearing at the Club dinner in 1927 to give his invaluable reminiscences.

Crews:
1882

‘English’	‘Scandinavian’
F.W. Pike	D. Hummell
W.J. Leeman	H. Waern
J.G. Evans	F. Löwenadler
J. Hoole	M.S. Sorensen
J. Kerr	J.O. Nygren
G.S.K. Dewhirst	S. Silfversparre
J.T. Musgrave	H. Winther
R.G. Davey	W. Bergh
A.H. Davey	C. Evers

1883

‘English’	‘Scandinavian’
C.G. Poole	Jensen
H.J. Dodd	D. Hummell
J.G. Evans	F. Löwenadler
E. Earle	H. Waern
W.R. Lyne	J.O. Nygren
G.S.K. Dewhirst	S. Silfversparre
J.T. Musgrave	H. Winther
F.W. Pike	W. Bergh
cox unknown	cox unknown

*Colin Cracknell (on the left) joined Anglian Boat Club just before it merged with Mortlake Rowing Club in 1961. Cracknell rowed at club level in the 1960s and 1970s, and was captain of Mortlake Anglian in the late 1970s. After a spell, rowing as a veteran for Bewl Bridge Rowing Club, he returned to Mortlake Anglian & Alpha and hopes to be competing again in the near future. Cracknell has always been interested in the history of rowing clubs and the people involved. In particular, he has researched the early days of Anglian, the history of which had been largely lost over the years. In 2010, Cracknell graduated with a history degree from Sussex University where the subject of his dissertation was “Social Changes in Rowing Since the Second World War”.

Team Gallagher Made It Across!

Bernard Hempseed of New Zealand gives an update about Team Gallagher Trans-Tasman Rowing Challenge, rowing from Sydney to Ackland, whom HTBS wrote about on 6 January. Bernard writes,

The Trans-Tasman rowers have made it across. They landed near the top of the east coast of the North Island, and are going to continue on to Auckland. One crew member has had to leave but the other three hope to be there soon. See this link for more details (with video clip). - Cheers, Bernard

Great news, Bernard! Thank you for sharing!

Team Gallagher Trans-Tasman Rowing Challenge

Bernard Hempseed writes from New Zealand:

Here is a link about four guys trying to row from Sydney to Auckland, Team Gallagher Trans-Tasman Rowing Challenge. This is one of the worst stretches of water with frequent storms etc. They have had some bad luck with being pushed back and not making progress. I think they thought they might be home by Christmas when they set out, but they are still out there. One of the chaps is James Blake, son of the late Sir Peter Blake of NZ sailing fame (he won us the America’s Cup!) Sir Peter got killed by pirates on the Amazon about ten years ago.

Thank you, Bernard for this report. Read more about these brave fellows here, and do watch the film clip above, nothing wrong with the holiday spirit among them. Keep it up, gentlemen!

Greg Denieffe: The Story Of Dublin Rowing Club 1906-1942, Part 2

Dublin Rowing Club existed between 1906 and 1942. Here follows part 2 of the story of the club, written by Greg Denieffe. Part 1 was posted yesterday.

The late W.J. (Wally) Stevens described the final months of Dublin Rowing Club as follows:

“The year was 1942, the time April/May and I was standing close to the river by the hedge separating Dublin Rowing Club from Neptune. Joe Boylan approached me and asked if I would cross to the main door of Neptune, knock, and ask if I would oblige Joe by selling him a bottle of Guinness. I believe the bottle cost 6½ old pence.

The occasion is important to me because it marked the first time I ever set foot in Neptune; the idea of having to ask for an obligement must appear strange to our members today. Then the hedges around the club houses marked the boundary of each.

By May that year Dublin Rowing Club was in trouble; the maiden four in which I was a crew member broke up. However their senior four finished the season before the club closed its doors. Eric Foster and I joined Neptune but too late to gain a place in their maiden crews. We were in time to see them win the Blue Riband of Irish rowing on our own doorstep at Islandbridge. Des O’Sullivan and Bill Frazer followed us into Neptune in 1943.” 3.

Wally Stevens went on to become president of the Irish Amateur Rowing Union and Dessie O’Sullivan president of the Olympic Council of Ireland.

The senior four did finish the season and whilst not winning any silverware they did have an eventful race at Boyne Regatta. In one of the heats the boat of their opponents, Belfast Commercial, filled with water on the way to the start. They vacated, emptied and reoccupied in shallow water before losing to Dublin. 4.

In reality it was Dublin Rowing Club that was sinking. There were discussions with Commercial Rowing Club and even suggestions that they might merge. But Commercial Rowing Club would have nothing to do with a merger and when Dublin Rowing Club finally closed, Commercial Rowing Club like a hermit crab took over their premises at Islandbridge leaving Dolphin Rowing Club alone in Ringsend and sadly, they like Dublin Rowing Club went out of business that year.
University College Dublin Rowing Club was founded in 1917 and become lodgers of Commercial Rowing Club, Ringsend. In 1919 UCD Rowing Club moved in with Dolphin Rowing Club, Ringsend. In 1926 they changed their name to University College Dublin Boat Club and in 1928 moved upstream to Islandbridge and became lodgers of Dublin Rowing Club where they stayed until their own boat house was completed in 1932.

Commercial Rowing Club occupied the premises from 1942 until New Years Eve 1992 when vandals broke in and set fire to it, burning it to the ground. Dublin Rowing Club and their former boathouse were no more.

The original picture purchased on eBay. Not in great condition but well worth preserving. The Club colours were dark and light blue. Included in the picture are F.J. Kelly (back row 2nd left), Irish Champion sculler 1930, 1931 and 1932 and Joseph P. West (front row far right) who was vice-president in 1932 and 1932 and president in 1934, 1935 and 1936 of the Irish Amateur Rowing Union.

The following photograph appeared in the Irish Independent newspaper in 1924. It is described in the National Photographic Record of the National Library of Ireland as “Ireland Soccer Team v. U.S.A.” I believe it is of a group of rowing men outside the Dublin Rowing Club at the 1924 Tailteann Games Regatta.

The dark jackets with light trim appear to be those of Dublin Rowing Club. The person with the child on his lap is probably B. Harrington, coxswain of the 1921 junior eight. I think I have also identified two others from that crew: K.O’Reilly (3rd left, standing) and B.O’Reilly (10th left, standing) both wearing Dublin Rowing Club jackets. I am however open to correction.

References
1. T. F. Hall, History of Boat-Racing in Ireland (1939).
2. T. H. Nally, The Aonac Tailteann and the Tailteann games: their origin, history, and ancient associations (1922).
3. W. J. Stevens, ‘Neptune, as I remember it’, from Neptune Rowing Club 1908-1983 (1983).
4. W. F. Mitchell, Belfast Rowing Club, 1880-1982 (1994).

Greg Denieffe: The Story Of Dublin Rowing Club 1906-1942, Part 1

Greg Denieffe, who has a special interest in Irish rowing, has sent a nice piece about the Dublin R.C to HTBS. Greg's article is in two parts, the second part will be published tomorrow. Enjoy!

The Dublin Rowing Club was established at Chapelizod in 1906. The first appearance of the new club was at Boyne regatta where they competed for the Cairnes, Maiden and Kelly Cups. Their first boathouse was a primitive shelter on the bank of the river, but in 1907 a suitable site was secured and the present clubhouse erected. (It was opened the following year, 1908). In 1907 the Dublin R.C. won its first trophy, the Corporation Cup at Boyne. 1.

The site of the new clubhouse was a few miles downstream in Islandbridge on the opposite side to the Dublin University boathouse. Neptune Rowing Club which was established in 1908 built their clubhouse next door and for now rowing in Dublin was split between the clubs that remained in Ringsend (Commercial Rowing Club and Dolphin Rowing Club) and those at Islandbridge. They won the Corporation Cup for under-age fours again in 1909 and in 1910 they had a fine junior four that won the Boyne Cup and numerous other cups at smaller regattas. At the Boyne regatta of 1913 Dublin won both the maiden eights (Aspirants Cup) and maiden fours (Visitors’ Cup). The future must have looked promising for Dublin but it would be seven years before they would celebrate another victory.

The political situation in Ireland was worsening. In Dublin there was the general strike and lock out of 1913 and the onset of the First World War saw an end to almost all rowing from the end of the 1914 season until the spring of 1919. The Easter Rising of 1916 left the city devastated. The general election of 1918 was quickly followed by the War of Independence between January 1919 and July 1921. The Anglo Irish Treaty of December 1921 gave rise to Civil War which did not end until May 1923, and yet Dublin Rowing Club survived. The picture below is of the group of men who saved the club.

Dublin Rowing Club, 1921, Junior Eight, Winners at Bray Regatta: B. O’Reilly (4), F. Kelly (7), L. Richardson (Cox), L. Mooney (6), (inset) R. D. Moore, Sec. K. O’Reilly (3), P. Murphy (5), P. O’Reilly (2), B. Harrington (Cox), A. Brady (Bow), J. West (Stk).
Also winners of: Boyne Challenge Cup, Drogheda - Junior Four, Roche Challenge Cup, Dundalk - Junior Four, Bray Regatta – 2nd Senior Four, Junior Four & Junior Pairs (coxed).

This group began rowing in 1920 and repeated the club’s wins of 1913 at Boyne regatta winning the maiden eights and fours. These wins upgraded the crew to junior for the following season and the photograph shows that they were successful at that grade and very proud of their win in the junior eights at Bray. I believe that their victory in the junior fours at Boyne would top that. It is interesting to see that they also won at Dundalk. Although there was rowing in Ireland in 1921 & 1922 many regattas were not held owing to the continuing troubles. In fact Dundalk Rowing Club’s boathouse was maliciously burnt down in 1922.

Dublin Rowing Club now had a group of senior rowers for the 1922 season. Dublin Metropolitan Regatta was a victim of the Civil War but the Dublin clubs were determined to hold a regatta that year and held a “Metropolitan River Carnival” at Islandbridge late in the season. Dublin Rowing Club won both the senior eights and fours on their home water. Their journey from maidens to seniors was complete and they also helped save the Irish Senior Eights Championship that year. It was raced at Trinity Regatta on the 17 June, the first since 1914 and there were only two entries, Dublin University Boat Club winning by three lengths.











A medal inscribed on the reverse “Dublin Rowing Club, ‘At Home’ 1924”. 45cm in diameter.

A blazer Button showing the crest of Dublin Rowing Club. 20cm in diameter.

Over the next twenty years Dublin Rowing Club had successful years followed by several barren ones. In 1923 their new maiden eight won at both Boyne and Trinity regattas. In 1928 they won junior and senior sculls at Galway. The period 1930 to 1933 was rather more successful. In 1930 F.J. Kelly won the Eblana Challenge Cup for senior sculls at Dublin Metropolitan Regatta which was long regarded as the Irish Sculling Championship. He repeated this feat in each of the following two years adding the senior sculls at Galway in 1931 and the senior sculls at Galway and Trinity regattas in 1932, making him undoubtedly the best sculler in Ireland at that time.

The 1932 season was the most successful in the club’s short history. In addition to Kelly’s wins their under-age four won at Boyne and Dublin Metropolitan before winning the same event at The Tailteann Games, beating Queen’s University Belfast by ½ a length. Their junior sculler J.P. Finn won at Trinity, Galway and also at The Tailteann Games where he beat Lady Elizabeth B.C. by four lengths in the semi final and beat Newry by three lengths in the final. This was the third and final Tailteann Games since their revival and the regatta was held on the Boyne in Drogheda. The 1924 and 1928 Tailteann Games regattas were held in Dublin and Cork respectively.

The ‘Aonac Tailteann’ [literally translated as ‘Tailteann Fair’] were an ancient games held in Ireland, instituted in 1829 BC to commemorate the death of Queen Tailte. It is not generally known, and will, no doubt, surprise many of our otherwise enlightened readers to learn that the far-famed Olympic Games of Ancient Greece drew their inspiration from the still much more ancient games in Ireland. The Hellenic games may, indeed, be traced almost directly to the great national celebrations of Tailteann.2. The games ran until 1171 AD when they died out after the Norman invasion.

Following Independence in 1921 there was a great interest in reviving the games and they were held again in 1924, 1928 and 1932. In the rowing section there was international competition in 1924 and 1928.

A short article on the Tailteann Games 1924-1932 can be found here; and here is a link to a British Pathe newsreel with a rowing interest from the 1924 Games.












Gold [silver gilt] and Silver medals for rowing from the 1932 Tailteann Games Regatta – the reverse inscribed Anonach Tailteann, Baile Atha Cliath, First/Second Prize, Rowing, with provincial crests surrounding the border, the obverse depicting a young Queen and inscribed An Bainrioghan Tailte.