CORONATION FOR THOSE WHO LIKE THAT SORT OF THING... AND THE SCOTS WHO DO NOT

The Coronation was held today.  Time to hoist the flag in the garden.

Liz and I watched it on our TV in front of the fire (being a rather damp day).  Like so many North Americans I just love a parade! I am a pushover for all the colour, history, pageantry; the music in the Abbey or out on the Mall; the horses and horsemanship, the carriages and the helicopters and jets in the Fly Past at the end.

My enjoyment lies a lot in associations: watching military tattoos as a child, playing in the school band when we marched around town (can't remember the events), being in Rangers where we learned to hoist flags and I even had a trip to Government House in Victoria to get my Gold Cord in 1962.  Here's proof!

* * * * * * * *

And the Scots?....

..... a nod to most of the rest of Scotland (who are not interested in the Coronation).  Here are photos of a recent trip we took to Glengyle House in Stronaclacher, Loch Katrine.

Ishbela and Alastair came with us.  Ian and Sheila were our hosts and showed us around their home and grounds.

 

Glengyle House

Adjacent to the house is the MacGregor Burying Ground (clan MacGregor - very, very old!)  That's Iain with Alastair behind the headstone.

a window... very curious... function is unknown

This is the view from their house looking south west.  Loch Lomond is on the other side of these hills.  This was all MacGregor land and is the source of many 'cattle rustling' stories.  It's a very deep glen; I can see why stolen cattle could be easily hidden!

All 4 of us enjoyed our host Ian's stories of the history of the MacGregors particularly Rob Roy MacGregor which, says Ian, is very much a case of fact and myth.

20TH ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11 RECOLLECTIONS

It is 20 years since the terrible event of the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers in New York. We all have our stories of where we were on that day when we heard the news.

Tribute in Light in Manhattan on 11 September 2013, marking the 12th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.Photograph: Gary Hershorn/Reuters

I certainly remember where I was on Sept 11, 2001 and what I was doing: I had just come from a large 11 am funeral at Glasgow Cathedral. It was of a young man who froze to death on the Matterhorn. (His father had been one of Iain’s students and as well as a fellow mountaineer.)   

On the way home I needed to do some photocopying of music required for our fiddle orchestra rehearsal that same evening.  I was standing in the Copy Agency Byres Road  putting sheets into the photocopier when the lad in charge of the place referred me to the news coverage coming out of his radio up on a shelf above my head. "Have you not heard?"     What a shock!  

And further to this… at the end of the day I went to collect a Canadian friend, Glenna Urbshadt, who had been staying with us, from a local golf club (Clober Golf Club) after she had finished her game, about 5 pm.  We met in the clubhouse foyer.  Off to one side of the wide foyer was a fairly large room with a TV in the corner.  A scattering of people were gathered in front of the TV watching the news coverage.  We stood at the opening (which was made by the big sliding doors being pushed to each side) and asked if we could come in to watch the TV.  “No madame …it's men only!”

CORONAVIRUS WEEK 32: SECOND WAVE ACKNOWLEDGED

The news is full of statistics and graphs showing how the pandemic is worsening.  Hospital admissions are up and, in England, they are preparing the Nightingale  facilities (temporary hospitals which are empty in readiness for a surge).

Scotland has already closed bars and restaurants for a fortnight.  It is the school holidays just now so this is seen as a 'circuit breaker' attempt to stem to rise in cases (and deaths).  

People whose jobs have been put on hold (musicians, entertainment people, for example) are looking at a continued life of no income. 

On the other hand there are people like us who are not spending money ... at all.  No petrol for a car that is not going anywhere, no new clothes for events that have been cancelled, no special food or drink for visitors who are not allowed to visit. And so it goes.  

We are keeping busy however with house and garden activities.  Here is Iain preparing venison for dinner.  He likes to fry up a steak.

We saw the 2 youngest grandchildren at the weekend.  We comply with socially distancing by sitting in the park behind our house as seen below.

* * * * * * * * * A PUZZLE * * * * * * * * * 

A friend sent me this photo and asked me if I could take a guess at what it was.  

I tried: a rather nice room with military people on the edge of the group.  A  man wearing a fez in the background.  Easter European? I thought. But that's about as far as I could manage.

It is of the trial of Gavrilo Princip [centre front] and his fellow-prisoners on the charge of assassinating the Archduke Francis Ferdinand (and his wife). It is a well-known fact that the assassination was the catalyst that started the First World War.  

When talking about this event with some friends this week it appears that it was a bit of a fluke that it happened the way it did. The car the Archduke was in ... seen here minutes before the assassination...

drove the wrong way (from the rest of the motorcade) and had then stopped to buy a sandwich. [Really?!] The assassins saw them and took their chance;  the rest is history.

Millions of soldiers lost their lives .... all because of a sandwich?

WHERE WERE YOU WHEN...?

Today is the anniversary of the death of John F Kennedy on this day in 1963.

I was in my first year of the B.Sc. in Nursing course at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and was living in Lower Mall residences for women. Having finished classes for the day I returned to my room in Hamber House to get my cafeteria card and head out to join the others for dinner.  

I dumped my books on my bed and switched on my dark brown Bakelite plug-in radio which sat on the window ledge. It was then that I heard the announcement.  I recall dropping down on to the bed utterly stunned!  It was because he was such a highly respected figure, so charismatic, so much part of American... and indeed, Canadian, culture!

 That's me in the middle (aged 19 years).

 The residents of Hamber House at the end of the university year in 1964.

When asking a friend today where he was when Kennedy was shot... he couldn't remember "probably working in the lab [doing chemical experiments]". However  he told me the following story:

He said that as a school boy he went to a school next to Edinburgh Castle.  He recalled that on the day in 1952 when they announced the death of King George VI it was decided to have a 58 gun salute*.

Why 58?... because the King, born in 1895 and died February 6, 1952, was 58 years old.  So once a minute for 58 minutes there was an almighty boom from the nearby cannon (presumably like the one above). He said that after about about 30 seconds you began to recover ... only to have to go through it again!

* Just as an open hand salute was used historically to demonstrate that no weapon was being held, a gun salute indicated the friendly intent of an empty ammunition chamber.

'TILIKUM' CANOE-SAILING VESSEL BRITISH COLUMBIA CANADA

A funny thing happened when I was at the Edinburgh Book Festival last week with Ishbel.  While she was browsing in the book tent I sat down at a vacant cafe table in the centre of the tent.  A few minutes later I was joined by a lady about my own age; we got talking (as I am apt to do).

She was Australian and was on holiday. However it turned out she and I both came to the UK when 'doing Europe' in the mid 1960s.  She eventually returned to Australia; I stayed.

When she heard I was from British Columbia she said "Oh I've been to Victoria to visit the B.C. Provincial Museum.  We wanted to see the boat Tilikum but it was not on display.  Her great uncle sailed on her in the early part of the 20th century.

Tilikum?  I'd never heard of her.  Certainly it was a word I hadn't heard in 70 years.  However. I recall that it was the name of a children's 'reading club' which featured in The Vancouver Province newspaper and I had the little silver-coloured totem pole broach to prove it.*

So while Ishbel chose some stories to read I sat and listened to her story of this boat and her uncle's role in her history. 

Once home I found lots about this vessel on the internet.  Excepts are here:

The boat:

"Tilikum was a 38-foot (12 m) dugout canoe that was used in an effort to circumnavigate the globe starting in 1901. The boat was a "Nootkan" (Nuu-chah-nulth) canoe which was already old when she was obtained by captain John Voss in April 1901. 

The boat was built in the early 19th century as a dugout canoe made from a large red cedar log. Tilikum was purchased for $80 in silver from a native woman (Voss describes her as a "siwash") in a transference ceremony allegedly sealed by a bottle of rye whiskey - the name Tilikum means "friend" in Chinook jargon. 

Apparently, John Voss and his companion in this venture, Norman Luxton, were inspired by the voyage of Joshua Slocum, who sailed the 37-foot (11 m) sloop Spray around the world a few years earlier and wrote a best selling book about his adventures."

Source:  [www.revolvy.com/page/Tilikum] 

 * * * * * * 

Luxton was a newspaper man and not an experienced sailor.  They set off from Oak Bay in Victoria in 1901:

"The boat was refitted - reinforced, covered and rigged with sail, 230 square feet (21 m2) in total, and readied for her voyage. Tilikum was sailed out of Oak Bay harbour [Victoria, Canada] on May 20, 1901, captained by Voss and mated by Norman Luxton.  After 10,000 miles (about 16000 km) and five months on the Pacific Ocean, Tilikum struck a reef and Luxton was thrown from the boat. ... The boat limped into harbour at Penrhyn Island in the Cook Islands on 2 September 1901, and Luxton was forced to abandon the trip in Siva, Fiji on 17 October 1901."

At this point it appears that Luxton had fallen out with Voss and gone on ahead to Australia.

The story of her great-uncle:
Source: [www.begent.org/voss.htm] 

His name was Walter Begent and he was taken on as crew in Suva.

"In October 1901 in a bar in Suva he met up with Captain John Voss who was looking for a mate to replace Norman Luxton.  [They] left Suva in the Tilikum bound for Sydney. During the yoyage, Voss claimed that Walter Begent was washed overboard in a storm taking with him the boat's only compass. Norman Luxton, later in a posthumously published biography, accused Voss of throwing Walter (Louis) Begent overboard in a drunken rage."

"In England, Captain Voss was feted for his adventures, and nominated for a Fellowship in the Royal Geographical Society although for unknown reasons he was never elected nor ever officially became a member. The vessel was exhibited at Earls Court, London in 1905 after which it was sold and passed through a number of hands before it was discovered lying derelict on the Thames in 1929. Tilikum was crated and returned to Victoria by freighter where restoration was carried out by the Thermopylae Club. Since 8th June, 1965, the Tilikum has been on display at the Maritime Museum in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada."

* * * * * * * 

And finally ... what became of Norman Luxton?   "After his arrival in Sydney, Luxton said Voss was in the hospital for weeks suffering from exposure and 'sickness he contracted through the women on the islands'. The two erstwhile adventurers made numerous appearances together in Australia, then parted company in Melbourne. Luxton never saw Voss again, and returning to Canada, married, and founded a tourist haberdashery, trading post, and taxidermist shop in Banff. He died in 1962.

Source:[website http://www.begent.org/voss.htm] 

* * * * * * * a UK reference  * * * * * * * 

British Museum Photograph from J M Booth Collection

[www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3164626&partId=1&searchText=british+columbia&page=5]

Sign describing a canoe, in front of a building; Beacon Hill Park, Canada. [Victoria]

Gelatin silver print

Source: Old Tillicum’ photographic print British Museum No. Oc,A65.359.  

Credit:  J M Booth**

Curator's comments: The sign in this image reads: " Old Tillicum This dugout canoe under command of Capt. J. C. Voss, F.R.G.S with only one seaman sailed 40,000 miles around the world. The Old Tillicum left Victoria, British Columbia, May 27 1901. Donated to the City of Victoria by Messrs. E.W.E and A. Byford Greenwich Yacht Club London England. Returned to Victoria July 1st 1930 through the efforts of The Victoria & Island Publicity Bureau.

__________________________________________

Footnotes: 

* The Club was sponsored by the Vancouver Province newspaper in the 1950s to promote children’s stories from all of the coast cultures. Shaped like a souvenir-shop totem pole, its motto reads, Klahowya Tillicum, which means “Greetings, friend” in Chinook. From "Klahowya Tillicum Coming Home to the Stories and Songs of the West Coast J. Edward Chamberlin, University of Toronto.

** No relation!

Books: 

Venturesome Voyages of Captain Voss by John Claus Voss, Charles E. Lauriat Company, Boston, 1913. First published in Yokohama in 1913 a second edition appeared in London in 1926.

Luxton's Pacific Crossing, by Norman Kenny Luxton, edited by Eleanor G. Luxton, Gray's Publishing Ltd., Sidney, B.C., 1971.

ARMISTICE DAY SCOTLAND 2018 - FAMILY CONNECTIONS

THE PRESENT - CENOTAPH IN MILNGAVIE

There was a Remembrance Service today to mark 100th anniversary of the signing of the World War One Armastice.

Having started primary school in Western Canada in 1950 I have memories of turning out every year at the Salmon Arm Cenotaph.  It was always a Big Thing.  Being an immigrant culture, it probably still is.

But turning to Scotland, it is a country with a long history providing regiments for war.

Laying of wreaths Milngavie

A local chap, namely I Taggart,  who is a sailing friend now in his 90s wearing both his uncle's medals (WWI) and his own (WW2).

The Milngavie Pipe Band outside my favourite coffee shop. (In the 1950s it was always the Vernon Girls Pipe Band that turned out for our small town.  I absolutely loved it ... still do!)

 * * * * * * *

THE PAST:  FAMILY CONNECTIONS (THESE MEN SURVIVED THE WAR)

The grandchildren ask questions …. 

[1] Why red poppies?

In the spring of 1915 a Canadian doctor, Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae was inspired by the sight of poppies growing in battle-scarred fields to write a now famous poem called 'In Flanders Fields'. After the First World War, the poppy was adopted as a symbol of Remembrance.

The exact battle he was involved in was during the Second Battle of Ypres in Belgium when the German army launched one of the first chemical attacks in the history of war. They attacked the Canadian position with chlorine gas on 22 April 1915.

I recall being told that my grandfather Rev. Victor H. Sansum [b. 1893 d. 1958] was gassed during the war.  Having found no other reference to the use of gas I deduce it was on this occasion. He was in the Canadian Expeditionary Force in France. His regimental number was 628122 and buried in Vancouver.

[Photo: outside his house, 2843 MacDonald Ave, Vancouver probably late 1940s or early 1950s]

[2] What’s a ‘volunteer’?

Like so many of his generation Iain’s father [b. 1898 d. 1976] lied about his age in order to enlist. He joined the Seaforth Highlanders. 

This photo shows him on the left with 2 other 17 year olds and the bell shaped tents are in the background.

As a young man. He escaped the Battle of the Somme because his platoon sergeant pulled him out as there was a requirement from another regiment for a farrier i.e. someone who could shoe horses.

FOR THE RECORD:

This is Iain's mother's father: Sergeant John MacKenzie, Seaforth Highlanders. She was always known as Barbara 'Sergeant' [MacKenzie].

 

He was based in Gairloch, Wester Ross.

 

 Caption reads:   DEPOT AND ?7 TH (SERVICE) BATTALION SEAFORTH 

HIGHLANDERS FORT GEORGE 1914

John MacKenzie is 3rd right, 2nd row from bottom 

Postcard to J. MacKenzie, with regiment number.

OTHER POSTCARDS:

These give the idea of the dress.  Note bell tents in left hand image.  We think these are Iain's mother's [MacKenzie] cousins, Gairloch.  The uniform shown in the lower image appears similar to cenotaph photo at the beginning of this post.

Lastly, a photo taken by photographer in Perth of Duke of Windsor inspecting the line in, we think, Inverness.  Garage is McCrae and Dick.  Sculpture in centre appears to be soldier with bearskin hat.

POST SCRIPT ....

Here is a photo I took recently.  It is a gravestone that lies in the cemetery adjacent to St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall, Orkney.  I do not know the person, J MACKAY; it was the date that struck me.  He died 11th November, 1918.

LINDISFARNE 1: THE GRANDCHILDREN

It's Easter holiday time so we all headed off for a few days in the Borders. We had a wonderful day trip to Lindisfarne, off the Northumberland coast.  It was an important centre of Celtic Christianity.

Ishie, 9 years old

 

Alastair, 8 years old

 Harriet, nearly 3 years old with St Aidan in the background

  Harriet on Ishie's back at the portcullis entry door.

  "Ring the Bell"

Ellie, looking for water at the pump.

EASTER 2016 - RECOLLECTIONS

It's Easter. Having been away from my blog for 4 weeks - no excuses, just busy - it is time to catch up.

I  never think of Easter without thinking of my mother having a lot of folk in for Easter Sunday dinner.  By far the most memorable was about 30 years ago when Grandma and Tudor were here for a visit.  Everyone was seated round the table - always a big ham roast, scalloped potatoes and some of her baking for dessert - when I suggested we have a toast.  As the meal progressed we went round the table getting folk, if they were up for it, to raise their glass and think of some sort of toast.  (I was very impressed when 10 year old Alastair's turn came, "Here's to Grandma!" sez Alastair.) However, the last person to complete the round was Anne Bennet, sitting next to me on my right.  She is from Colraine in Northern Ireland.... and she raised her glass, paused and said quietly "Let's drink to Peace in Northern Ireland."   (It was the weekend that Tony Blair was completing the signing of the Good Friday Peace Agreement.) Very apt.

And so we move on ... to this Easter which marks the 100th Anniversary of the Easter Rising in Ireland.  April 1916 was when there was the rebelliion against British rule in Ireland; it became known as the Easter Rising. Ireland broke away from the United Kingdom and became Eire.

I have been reminded of all this bloodshed because I have been putting together an obituary of a remarkable woman particularly well known in the Irish/British yachting world.  She was Jennifer Guinness, Dublin, who died 2 months ago after a long and remarkable life.

She owned several yachts but Deerhound was the one that people around here remember.  What I had forgotten was the story of her getting caught up in one of the many manifestations of violence in Eire and Northern Ireland over the years.

From her home in Dublin, she was kidnapped for ransom on April 8, 1986 and held capative for 8 days. It's a long story; she said she had been "treated well" by what she believed to be "five or six" masked men, and did her best to establish a rapport with them. "I had an idea that if we could talk and communicate," she recalled, "then I had a better chance of survival. You don't shoot people you talk to." [The Independent, Eire].

She raced in a variety of boats, earning renown as a helm in the International Dragon Class, and cruised far and wide, from Spain to Scandinavia. In May 1986 - not long after the kidnapping - she was a crewmember on Robin Knox-Johnston's catamaran, which set a new round-Ireland record. Jennifer was also a member of the Irish Admiral's Cup team in 1975.   [The Independent, Eire].