Wellington’s Victory Dinner Service

The Duke of Wellington is one of Britain’s greatest military heroes, but he was also seen as a saviour in Spain and Portugal. In the V&A is this huge dinner set commissioned by these grateful nations, produced 1813-16  

Forth Bridge and Britain’s Decline

This is from a piece by Ian Jack who remembered the opening of its predecessor 53 years ago. What has been lost? Odd little things: a quiet pice of shoreline a view, a further erosion of Fife’s separateness – which could be argued is for the good. The argument against the car is a bigger … Continue reading →

The Heroism of A Stranger

In the park adjoining the Museum of Childhood is a drinking fountain with an unusual and tragic history. Most marble fountains were erected by local worthies to provide refreshment for visitors, a few are memorials, but I doubt if any has such sadness associated with it. Water is essential to life. It is central to … Continue reading →

11 Million have Somme Ancestor

This is a headline from yesterday’s i paper: The Battle of the Somme, one of the bloodiest battles of he First World War, resulted in more than a million casualties over 141 days. On the first day alone, 19,240 British soldiers lost their lives – the worst day in the history of the British Army. … Continue reading →

More Blue Plaques to Women

Blue plaques are placed on buildings historically associated with famous people. This is from Monday’s i paper: It is “wrong” that so few blue heritage plaques are dedicated to women and there should be increased recognition of the female contribution to history, the chairman of English Heritage has said. Only 13% of London’s blue plaques – … Continue reading →

Scattering Grass In Wingrave Church

This is a strange ritual, but one recent enough to be traceable and so makes sense, well sort of. This is from Highways & Byways in Buckinghamshire: [Wingrave] church is the principal attraction. There is, for example, a rhyming record of a charity in one of the aisles: As day doth pass from houre to … Continue reading →

Unseen City

I stumbled upon this exhibition at London’s Guildhall, expecting it to be about -oh, I don’t know – underground tunnels or something, but it’s about The City, ie the rituals about London and its guilds that few of us ever hear about, but there are a lot of them – I knew of the Swan … Continue reading →

Remembering Prince

Someone on the radio said this has become a really bad year to be a celebrity – Victoria Wood and Prince within a few days of each other. Prince was so many things – songwriter, singer, performer, producer, but his virtuoso skills on the guitar have been often overshadowed, though comparisons with Hendrix have been … Continue reading →

Roger Casement and Africa

The i paper and the Independent have a lot of award winning journalists, but sometimes they publish personal stories by them which are often more interesting than the regular news. Patrick Cockburn is a brilliant writer on the Middle East, but here’s his take on a matter closer to home, that of Roger Casement, executed … Continue reading →

Quietly Ignored Are The Peace Monitors

North Korea is getting a lot of coverage at the moment for sabre-rattling, but here’s a rather sad-sweet article from yesterday’s i paper: In a tiny mess hall set amid pine trees and rose bushes on the heavily fortified Korean border, a lunch of steak and asparagus is served. Outside, birdsong competes with the drone … Continue reading →