Category: Locations

The Dutch are coming…

The Medway folks are celebrating the Battle of the Medway with various events climaxing in fireworks at Upnor Castle on the 17th June.

It looks great if you can do it on foot, though my plan to sail there to watch the fireworks has been shot away, as it seems great flotillas of Dutch yachties have booked all the nearby berths that can be found! Duh!

Over that weekend and the one before there’s quite a lot going on besides the fireworks, including living history events at Upnor Castle, Dutch and British warships, a a fun fair, food and drink stalls and a river pageant sail past the Dockyard and Upnor Castle. There’s also live music, walkabout entertainments and clog dancing performances will run throughout the evening. Check the leaflet for details!

Suffolk – the uneatable cheese of the Royal Navy

I’d like to introduce you lot to the excellent Foods of England project.

I particularly liked its entry for Suffolk Cheese, a product that is no longer made for reasons that will become obvious. Until the mid-18th Century it was used by the Royal Navy to feed its sailors, but by all accounts it was dry, salty and so hard there were many stories and jokes about the difficulty of eating it.

Naval administrator Samuel Pepys wrote that he was upset when his domestic staff complained about having to eat it. On the 19th December 1825, The Hampshire Chronicle carried a notice that read: ‘As characteristic of Suffolk cheese, it said that a vessel once laden, one half with grindstones and the other half with the above commodity, on arriving at its destination it was found that the rats had consumed all the grindstones, but left the cheeses untouched.’

Historian NAM Rodger reports that the Navy gave up provisioning ships with the stuff in 1758, no doubt to loud cheering from the foc’sl. My crews, of course, are always provided with the finest cheese I can afford…

Other sea related entries are hardtack or ships biscuits (a nuclear bomb test was named after them), grog, bumpo, and  Cheshire cheese (another Naval staple).

My thanks to Sarah Coxson for the tip!

Cornish folks to try to rescue the Ocean Pride

Facebook has news, if you’re a Facebook user: a few weeks ago Penlee Lifeboat Coxswain Patch Harvey found the Newlyn-built counter-stern lugger, PZ 134 Ocean Pride, at Rye Harbour in Sussex. Naturally, she is desperately in need of care and restoration.

See the Facebook page for more photos and information.

The Ocean Pride was once owned by Patch’s grandfather, Ted ‘Chuggy’ Downing, and he hopes to bring her back to Newlyn in the near future.

This project is in it’s early stages but we hope to involve the whole community. Watch this space for more news!

My thanks to Kipperman Mike Smylie for pointing out this piece of good news.