Only One Inch

It is protocol for the Queen’s throne to be higher than everyone else’s, by at least one inch. This includes the Duke of Edinburgh’s. But on the request of the Palace the thrones for the Queen and the Duke on the royal barge, for the Thames Diamond Jubilee Pageant, will be the same height. The royal family want the whole affair of the Jubilee to be relaxed and not as stiff as a state visit. It has also been decided that a pair of thrones would thus be inappropriate and so a more of a ‘love seat’ is being built in a little factory in London.

No one is clear on exactly what will happen on the barge, but we do know that the Queen is “slightly dreading ‘the ship thing’ ” according to her cousin Margaret Rhodes. How very sweet!

It’s all very exciting for the British public and also for the royal family I am sure.

A Year & A Day

Dawn outside of the stone walls of York

The famous walls in York are referred to the New City Walls and the Bar Walls of York. They are 3.4 kilometres long and thus the longest, finest and most complete of any town / city in England according to Visit York. The stone walls we see today were built between the 1240s and the 1340s using tax money from goods brought into the city (previously the Romans, Saxons, and Vikings all had their own versions of these walls).Soldiers were employed to guard the city and were based along the city walls, but they were severely punished if they fell asleep while on duty.

Their punishment was to be given a little food hamper, with a little water and a knife. They were dangled over the walls for as long as was seen fit, and were cut loose to drop into the dirty (filled with all the castle waste), cold waters of the moat below.

They then had to fend for themselves as they would be banned from entering the city for a year and a day. Tough times!

Dawn Denton ©

www.traveltrales.wordpress.com

My Darling Daisy Wife

Daisy Greville, Countess of Warwick 1899

At 48, Bertie, the oldest son of Queen Victoria and thus the Prince of Wales, fell in love, and possibly for the first time.

The socialite Daisy Greville was the original ‘It Girl’. She was beautiful, charming, sophisticated and very rich. Her interesting family tree put her mother, Blanche FitzRoy, as a descendent of Charles II through his most famous mistress, Nell Gwyn. Daisy’s extravagance led to her having a railway branch installed to bring her guest directly to her home. As the Countess of Warwick (and 20 years younger than the prince) she was famous for luxurious parties she held at Warwick Castle. She spent money frivolously and her racy parties became known as ‘organised adultery’.

In 1886 Bertie was introduced to Daisy at one of her lavishly entertaining house parties. Their affair was common knowledge, but interestingly there was very little documented evidence of their relationship, which has left historians puzzled. A researcher, while reading through Bertie’s diaries, noticed D’s written backwards, and they seemed to become more frequent after Bertie and Daisy’s first meeting.  It is now believed at this symbol was code used by Bertie to cover his tracks of his frequent liaisons with Daisy and the development of an intense relationship.

He did refer to Daisy in his diaries as ‘My darling Daisy wife’ and she slowly become the love of the prince’s life. He wrote letters to her twice a day, and saw her frequently for morning tea, long dinners and for regular social or private occasions.  Historians have referred this relationships as  Bertie’s second marriage.  He became more and more devoted to this remarkable woman.

Princess Alexandra with her second son, Prince George of York who became George V of England

Princess Alexandra had turned a blind eye to all of Bertie’s previous relations, but this one was different.  She felt threatened by Daisy and so became more distant.  She travelled abroad frequently and for long periods, visiting her family in Denmark. This was Alexandra’s way of punishing the prince as it caused him grave public humiliation.Bertie’s unhealthy lifestyle was catching up on him. He was obese, and smoked very strong cigars. At this point it is  documented that he sought electrical treatment.  This may have been for impotency, as it is believed that Daisy loved sex and was known to have said, “I mate naturally with beauty or strength”. Bertie was not able to satisfy her criteria on the beauty side, and now his strength was waning.Daisy’s insatiable appetite for sex led to a pregnancy by another man, (the millionaniare Joe Laycock, who had served in the Boer War) and she wrote a letter to Bertie to break off the 10 year affair. Her letter does not exist today, but Bertie’s reply does.  In his reply to Daisy he said he had shown the letter to Princess Alexandra, who was ‘moved to tears’ and commented that ‘Out of evil, good would come’.

Some believe that Daisy was one of the inspirations for the popular music hall song, “Daisy, Daisy. (Give me your answer do. I’m half crazy, all for the love of you)”  which was composed in 1892.

After the death of Edward VII, Daisy tried, unsuccessfully, to blackmail his son, King George V by threatening to publish private letters of his father. After years of extravagant living, she had depleted her immense inheritance and was fighting poverty.

Although Bertie loved his Danish princess and adored his children, but there was always an emptiness in his life. This emptiness he filled with mistresses, who all played very important roles in his life as prince and as king of England.

Dawn Denton©

www.traveltrales.wordpress.com

 

 

Image Sources: www.literacyla.org & www.wikipedia.org & www.thefirstwaltz.tumblr.com

“United we Conquer”

One mile north-west of the Highland village of Spean Bridge, the bronze memorial commemorating commando soldiers is situated in a dramatic setting overlooking Ben Nevis.

In 1949, Scott Sutherland won a competition to design a memorial to remember war veterans, those who were injured and lost their lives in World War 2, as well as those soldiers who died during training in the area. Scott won £200 and in 1952 the Queen Mother unveiled this inspirational memorial.

The Commandos were set up due to a request from Winston Churchill. During the Boer War in South Africa (1899-1902) Churchill was taken prisoner and was exposed to the Boer Commandos. He was very impressed with these small units of Boers who successfully used an unconventional method of blitz attack in their warfare against the British. The word ‘commando’ came from an Afrikaans word from the late 1800s.

Post Dunkirk, Churchill needed the British Army to be “prepared with specially trained troops of the hunter class who can develop a reign of terror down the enemy coast”.  Initially these soldiers, Commandos, were drawn from the main British Army, and later from the volunteering special service.

The ashes of many Commandos were scattered in the area, and not only World War 2 soldiers, but those who were involved in the Falklands War, Afghanistan and Iraq are remembered at the Commando Memorial that was named after Churchill’s enemies.

Dawn Denton©

Image Source: www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk & www.dailymail.co.uk

Fisherman’s 23rd Psalm

The Lord in my pilot, I shall not drift,

He lighteth me across the darkest waters

In the deepeth channels he steereth me

Charles Napier Hemy - The Fisherman 1888

He keepeth my log

He guardeth me by the star of holiness

For his names sake

Yea though I sail, amidst the thunder and tempests of life

I will feel no danger, for thou art with me

Thy love and thy care they shelter me

Thou preparest a harbour ahead, in the heaven of eternity

Thou annointest the waves with oil

My boat rideth calmly

Surely sunlight and starlight

Favour me on all voyages I take

And I shall rest in the port of my God

Forever

Amen

Image source: www.wikipedia.org

Friends with chocolate

Charles Dickens

“There is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate.”

Charles Dickens

 

 

 

Image Source: www.reslater.blogspot.com

 

Cornish Blood

Richard Lower

Richard Lower was born on the family estate at Tremeer near Bodmin in Cornwall in 1631. His fascination for the natural world and the human body led him to study medicine at Christ Church, Oxford. He graduated with flying colours and set up a practice in London, gaining the title of Fellow of Royal Society. His fascination lay with experimental physiology and thus the workings of the human heart, lungs and the nervous system. He was the first to note the difference between arterial and venous blood and he supported his findings with research Christopher Wren had done in the field of human blood transfusions. He first experimented with the process of directing blood from the vein of one dog to another (he was the first Western physician to do so) after reading about the experimental process being tested on sheep.  The success was encouraging and in 1666 he transfered the operation to human subjects after a long search for someone willing to be tranfused.

Richard Lower transfusing blood from lamb to a man

Charles II was so impressed with his work that he was appointed to the royal court to care for the king in the last years of his life.  After Charles’ death, Lower was not invited to the court of James II, as his anti-Catholic views were unpopular with the king and country.

Lower retreated and retired to his home county, Cornwall, where he spent the remainder of his life. He bequeathed his wealth to where his heart and religious beliefs lay – St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London and to French Hugenots and Irish Protestant refugees.

Today over 2.5 million units of blood are transfused in the United Kingdom each year, saving thousands of lives, and all thanks to the work of one of Cornwall’s famous sons, Richard Lower.

Dawn Denton©

Image Source Pages : www.sciencephoto.com & www.cornwalls.co.uk