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The Postcard
A postcard that was published by Alexander D. Henderson of 90, High Street, Maybole, South Ayrshire, Scotland. The card was posted in Prestwick, Ayrshire using a 2d. stamp on Monday the 21st. August 1944. It was sent to:
Miss Heather Pope,
57, East Avenue,
Bournemouth,
Hants.
The message on the divided back of the card was as follows:
"21st. Aug. '44.
Lovely to be north again -
the air is so bracing.
Had my first battle for a
year y'day and played 12
holes of golf.
I'm feeling a lot better
than when I woke up.
With love,
David."
The Battle of the Falaise Pocket
So what else happened on the day that David posted the card?
Well, on the 21st. August 1944, the Battle of the Falaise Pocket ended in an Allied victory.
A Sinking in the English Channel
Also on that day, the Canadian corvette Alberni was torpedoed and sunk in the English Channel by German submarine U-480.
The Scuttling of a U-Boat
Also on the 21st. August 1944, German submarine U-230 ran aground at Toulon and was scuttled.
A Canterbury Tale
Also on that day, the British comedy-drama film A Canterbury Tale starring Eric Portman, Sheila Sim and Dennis Price premiered in the United Kingdom.
Eric Portman
Eric Harold Portman, who was born on the 13th. July 1901, was an English stage and film actor. He is probably best remembered for his roles in three films for Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger during the 1940's.
-- Eric Portman - The Early Years
Born in Halifax, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, Portman was the second son of Matthew Portman (1868–1939), a wool merchant, and his wife, Alice, née Harrison (1870–1918). His birth was registered with the middle name of Harold, but he later adopted his mother's maiden name as his middle name.
Eric was educated at Rishworth School in Yorkshire and, in 1922, started work as a salesman in the menswear department at the Marshall & Snelgrove department store in Leeds.
-- Eric Portman's Acting Career
While working in Leeds Eric performed with the amateur Halifax Light Opera Society.
He made his professional stage debut in 1924 with Henry Baynton's company. In 1924, when Robert Courtneidge's Shakespearian company arrived in Halifax, Portman joined the company as a 'passenger,' and appeared in their production of Richard II at the Victoria Hall, Sunderland. This led to Courtneidge giving him a contract.
Portman made his West End debut at the Savoy Theatre in September 1924, as Antipholous of Syracuse in The Comedy of Errors.
He was engaged by Lilian Baylis for the Old Vic Company. In 1928, Portman played Romeo at the rebuilt Old Vic. He became a successful theatre actor. In 1933, Portman was in Diplomacy at the Prince's Theatre with Gerald du Maurier and Basil Rathbone.
In the 1930's, Eric began appearing in films, starting with an uncredited bit in The Girl from Maxim's (1933) directed by Alexander Korda. In 1935, he appeared in four films, including Maria Marten, or The Murder in the Red Barn with Tod Slaughter.
He also made Hyde Park Corner with Gordon Harker and directed by Sinclair Hill; Old Roses and Abdul the Damned.
In 1936 Portman had a stage hit playing Lord Byron in Bitter Harvest. After Hearts of Humanity (1936), he played Giuliano de' Medici in Hill's The Cardinal (1936).
Portman made another film with Tod Slaughter, The Crimes of Stephen Hawke (1936), and was in Moonlight Sonata (1937).
Eric went to the US and played in Madame Bovary on Broadway for the Theatre Guild of America. He also had a small role in The Prince and the Pauper (1937), but disliked Hollywood, and did not stay long.
He was back on Broadway in I Have Been Here Before by J. B. Priestley. Portman's last London stage show was Jeannie.
In the semi-autobiographical play Dinner with Ribbentrop by screenwriter Norman Hudis, a former personal assistant to Portman, Hudis relates a claim made often by Portman that in 1937, before the start of the Second World War, he had had dinner in London with Joachim von Ribbentrop (then the German Ambassador to Britain).
Portman claimed that Ribbentrop had told him that:
"When Germany wins the war, you will
be installed as the greatest English star
in the New Europe at a purpose-built
film studio in Berlin."
In 1941 he had his first important film role playing Lieutenant Hirth, a Nazi on the run, in Powell and Pressburger's 49th. Parallel, which was a big hit in the US and Great Britain. Portman was established as a star, and signed a long-term contract with Gainsborough Pictures.
Portman was in Powell and Pressburger's follow up, One of Our Aircraft Is Missing (1942), which reworked the story of The 49th. Parallel to be about Allied pilots in occupied Holland.
Eric played a Belgian resistance leader in Uncensored (1942) from director Anthony Asquith, and a German pilot in Squadron Leader X (1943) with director Lance Comfort.
Portman was a sailor in Asquith's We Dive at Dawn (1943) and a factory supervisor in Millions Like Us (1943) from Launder and Gilliat.
He was in another war story in Comfort's Escape to Danger (1943), then was back with Powell and Pressburger for A Canterbury Tale (1944). Portman had the lead in Great Day (1945) with Flora Robson and in the expensive colonial epic Men of Two Worlds (1946).
In 1945, exhibitors voted him the 10th. most popular star at the British box office. He maintained that ranking the following year.
Eric made some thrillers – Wanted for Murder (1947), Dear Murderer (1947), and The Mark of Cain (1947). He was a hangman in Daybreak (1948), then made Corridor of Mirrors (1948) and The Blind Goddess (1948).
He made two films for the new producing team of Maxwell Setton and Aubrey Baring, The Spider and the Fly (1949) and Cairo Road (1950).
Portman was one of many names in The Magic Box (1951) before making an Ealing comedy, His Excellency (1952), playing a trade unionist who becomes Governor of a British colony.
For Baring and Setton, he made South of Algiers (1953) then had a big hit on stage in Terence Rattigan's Separate Tables and on film in The Colditz Story (1955).
Portman had a supporting part in The Deep Blue Sea (1955) and Child in the House (1956). He had the lead in The Good Companions (1957).
He played the bogus Major in Terence Rattigan's play Separate Tables in 1956–57 on Broadway. For this performance, he was nominated for a Tony Award (Best Actor (Dramatic)). In 1958 he appeared on Broadway in a short-lived production of Jane Eyre as Rochester.
Portman had better luck the following year in a production of Eugene O'Neill's A Touch of the Poet, which had a long run. In contrast, Flowering Cherry by Robert Bolt, with Portman in the title role, only lasted five performances on Broadway.
Later film roles included in The Naked Edge (1961), Freud: The Secret Passion (1962), West 11 (1963), The Man Who Finally Died (1963), The Bedford Incident (1965), and The Spy with a Cold Nose (1966).
In 1962 Portman was in a stage adaptation of A Passage to India that ran for 109 performances on Broadway.
Near the end of his life Eric played character roles, including Number Two in the TV series The Prisoner, appearing in the episode "Free For All" (1967), as well as films including The Whisperers (1967) and Deadfall (1968), both for director Bryan Forbes. His final film was Assignment to Kill (1968).
-- Eric Portman's Personal Life
In the early 1920's Portman was an amateur in Halifax Light Opera. While there he was romantically involved with Eliza Jane Thornton, his leading lady.
After appearing in The Silver Box together, they both went to London to work professionally, though eventually Thornton returned to Halifax.
Decades after Portman's death in 1969, it was suggested that he was homosexual, and that assistant director Knox Laing (1913 - 1974) was his partner.
Portman died at the age of 68 at his home in St. Veep, Cornwall on the 7th. December 1969 from heart disease. He was laid to rest in St. Veep parish church.
The Postcard
A postally unused carte postale that was published by Lévy et Neurdein Réunis of 44, Rue Letellier, Paris.
Although the card was not posted, someone has written on the divided back:
"From today's Daily
Telegraph.
With much love,
Auntie Florrie.
13. 1. 56."
On the left side of the divided back of the card, an 8 cm long news item had been glued to the card, but almost all of it has been scraped off.
Chartres
Chartres is a city and capital of the Eure-et-Loir department in France. At the 2019 census, there were 38,534 individuals living in the city.
Chartres is famous worldwide for its Gothic cathedral which is in an exceptional state of preservation. The majority of the original stained glass windows survive intact, while the architecture has seen only minor changes since the early 13th. century.
Part the old town, including most of the library associated with the School of Chartres, was destroyed by Allied bombs in 1944.
The Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Chartres, is one of the finest and best preserved Gothic cathedrals in France and in Europe. Its historical and cultural importance has been recognized by its inclusion on the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites.
Chartres is built on a hill on the left bank of the river Eure. The medieval cathedral is at the top of the hill, and its two spires are visible from miles away across the flat surrounding lands. To the southeast stretches the fertile plain of Beauce, the "Granary of France", of which the town is the commercial centre.
Chartres cathedral was built on the site of the former Chartres cathedral of Romanesque architecture, which was destroyed by fire (that former cathedral had been built on the ruins of an ancient Celtic temple, later replaced by a Roman temple).
Begun in 1205, the construction of Notre-Dame de Chartres was completed 66 years later.
The stained glass windows of the cathedral were financed by guilds of merchants and craftsmen, and by wealthy noblemen, whose names appear at the bottom. It is not known how the famous and unique blue, bleu de Chartres, of the glass was created, and it has been impossible to replicate it.
Chartres in WWII
In World War II, the city suffered heavy damage, both by bombing and during the battle of Chartres in August 1944, but the cathedral was spared by an American Army officer who challenged the order to destroy it.
On the 16th. August 1944, Colonel Welborn Barton Griffith Jr. questioned the necessity of destroying the cathedral, and volunteered to go behind enemy lines to find out whether the Germans were using it as an observation post.
With his driver, Griffith proceeded to the cathedral and, after searching it all the way up its bell tower, confirmed to Headquarters that it was empty of Germans. The order to destroy the cathedral was withdrawn.
Colonel Griffith was killed in action later on that day in the town of Lèves, 3.5 kilometres (2.2 miles) north of Chartres. For his heroic action both at Chartres and Lèves, Colonel Griffith received, posthumously, decorations awarded by the President of the United States and the U.S. Military, and also from the French government.
Following deep reconnaissance missions and after heavy fighting in and around the city, Chartres was liberated on the 18th. August 1944, by the U.S. 5th. Infantry and 7th. Armored Divisions commanded by General George S. Patton.
Churches of Chartres
The Église Saint-Pierre de Chartres was the church of the Benedictine Abbaye Saint-Père-en-Vallée, founded in the 7th. century by Queen Balthild. At the time of its construction, the abbey was outside the walls of the city. It contains fine stained glass and, formerly, twelve representations of the apostles in enamel, created circa 1547 by Léonard Limosin, which now can be seen in the fine arts museum.
Other noteworthy churches of Chartres are Saint-Aignan (13th., 16th. and 17th. centuries), and Saint-Martin-au-Val (12th. century), inside the Saint-Brice hospital.
Museums of Chartres
Chartres' Museums include:
-- Le Musée des Beaux-Arts, a fine arts museum, housed in the former episcopal palace adjacent to the cathedral.
-- Le Centre International du Vitrail, a workshop-museum and cultural center devoted to stained glass art, located 50 metres (160 feet) from the cathedral.
-- Le Conservatoire du Machinisme et des Pratiques Agricoles, an agricultural museum.
-- Le Musée le Grenier de l'Histoire, a history museum specializing in military uniforms and accoutrements, in Lèves, a suburb of Chartres.
-- Le Musée des Sciences Naturelles et de la Préhistoire, a Natural science and Prehistory Museum (closed since 2015).
Other Features of Chartres
The river Eure, which at this point divides into three branches, is crossed by several bridges, some of them ancient, and is fringed in places by remains of the old fortifications, of which the Porte Guillaume (14th. century), a gateway flanked by towers, was the most complete specimen, until destroyed by the retreating German army on the night of the 15th./16th. August 1944.
The steep, narrow streets of the old town contrast with the wide, shady boulevards which encircle it and separate it from the suburbs. The Parc André-Gagnon lies to the north-west, and squares and open spaces are numerous.
Part of the Hôtel de Ville dates from the 17th. century, and is called l'Hôtel de Montescot. There is also La Maison Canoniale dating back to the 13th. century, and several medieval and Renaissance houses.
La Maison Picassiette, a house decorated inside and out with mosaics of shards of broken china and pottery, is also worth a visit.
There is also a statue of General Marceau (1769–1796), a native of Chartres and a general during the French Revolution.
The Economy of Chartres
Historically, game pies and other delicacies of Chartres are well known, and the city's industries have also included flour-milling, brewing, distilling, iron-founding, leather manufacture, perfumes, dyeing, stained glass, billiard requisites and hosiery.
More recently, businesses include the manufacture of electronic equipment and car accessories. Since 1976 the fashion and perfumes company Puig has had a production plant in the commune.
Pilgrimages
Chartres has been a site of Catholic pilgrimages since the Middle Ages. The poet Charles Péguy, who was born in 1873, revived the pilgrimage route between Paris and Chartres before the Great War.
At the outbreak of the war, Péguy became a lieutenant in the French 276th. Infantry Regiment. He died at the age of 41 in battle, shot in the forehead, near Villeroy, Seine-et-Marne on the 5th. September 1914, the day before the beginning of the Battle of the Marne. There is a memorial to Charles near the field where he was killed.
After the war, a number of students carried on the pilgrimage in his memory. Since 1982, the association Notre-Dame de Chrétienté, with offices in Versailles, organizes the annual 100 km (62 mi) pilgrimage on foot from Notre-Dame de Paris to Notre-Dame de Chartres. About 15,000 pilgrims, from France and countries outside France, participate every year.
The Bataclan Theatre Massacre
Chartres was the home of Omar Ismael Mostefaï aged 29, one of the three gunmen who attacked the audience at the Bataclan concert venue on the 13th. November 2015, starting at 21.40.
It was part of a carefully co-ordinated attack on Paris; over a 20 minute period, Islamist militants also killed and injured people at the Stade de France, and at six restaurants and cafes in the 10th. and 11th. arrondissements.
One of the restaurants was a popular Cambodian eatery in the trendy Canal Saint-Martin area, where at least 12 people died. Another 19 people were killed at a busy restaurant on nearby Rue de Charonne.
Shootings and bomb blasts on that night left a total of 130 people dead and hundreds wounded, with more than 100 in a critical condition.
The Start of the Bataclan Massacre
On the evening of the 13th. November 2015, the American rock band Eagles of Death Metal was playing to an audience of about 1,500 people at the Bataclan on the Boulevard Voltaire in the 11th. arrondissement of Paris.
Three dark-clad gunmen had been waiting in a black rental car near the venue for more than an hour, and were armed with Zastava M70 assault rifles. The M70 is a derivative of the Soviet AK-47, and can fire at a rate of 620 rounds per minute. Over 4 million of the ghastly things have unfortunately been manufactured.
The terrorists were three French natives of Algerian descent. As the band was playing their song "Kiss the Devil", the three men got out of the car and opened fire on people outside the venue, killing three.
They then burst into the concert hall and sprayed the crowd with automatic gunfire. Witnesses heard shouts of "Allahu Akbar" as the terrorists opened fire. Initially, the audience mistook the gunfire for pyrotechnics. The band ran offstage and escaped with many of the crew, although their tour manager was killed.
Rows of people were mown down by gunfire or were forced to drop to the ground to avoid being shot. Survivors described hundreds of people lying beside and on top of each other in pools of blood, screaming in terror and pain.
The gunmen also fired up into the balconies, and dead bodies fell down onto the stalls below. For a few minutes, the hall was plunged into darkness, with only the flashes from the assault rifles as the gunmen kept shooting.
The terrorists shouted that they were there because of French airstrikes against Islamic State. A witness who was inside the Bataclan heard a gunman say:
"This is because of all the harm
done by Hollande to Muslims all
over the world."
A radio reporter attending the concert reported that:
"The terrorists were calm and determined, and they
reloaded three or four times. Two gunmen attacked
the concert hall; one gunman covered fire while
another reloaded to ensure maximum efficiency."
Whenever a gunman stopped to reload, members of the crowd, some with bullets in them, ran for the emergency exits, scrambling over each other to escape. Some were shot from behind as they fled, and the terrorists laughed as they shot them. Those who reached an emergency exit were shot by the third gunman, who had positioned himself there.
Other groups of people barricaded themselves in backstage rooms. Some smashed open the ceiling in an upstairs toilet, and hid among the rafters under the roof. Those who could not run lay still on the floor or under bodies pretending to be dead. One women was seen hanging from a third floor window.
According to survivors, the terrorists walked among those who were lying down, kicked them, and shot them in the head if there were any sign of life.
An eyewitness reported hearing the gunmen ask amongst themselves where the members of the Eagles of Death Metal were once the gunfire stopped. Mostefaï and another of the gunmen then went upstairs to the balconies, while the third attacker stayed downstairs and fired at people who tried to flee.
Initial Armed Response to the Terrorists
The Brigade of Research and Intervention (BRI) arrived on the scene at 22:15, soon followed by the elite tactical unit, RAID. At 22:15, the first two responding officers entered the building armed with handguns and encountered one of the terrorists who was standing on the stage.
The Jihadist died after being shot by the officers and detonating his explosive vest. Mostefaï and the other remaining gunman (Mohamed-Aggad) then fired upon the officers, forcing them to withdraw and wait for backup.
The Stand-Off
From this point, Mostefaï and the other attacker took about twenty hostages and herded them into a room at the end of a corridor located further within the building. They also seized the hostages' mobile phones and attempted to use them to access the Internet, but they were unable to find a signal.
Some of the hostages were forced to look down into the hall and out the windows and report what they saw. During this time, the two terrorists fired on police and first responders as they arrived at the scene.
At 23:30, an elite police squad entered the building. One unit evacuated survivors from downstairs, while another unit went upstairs. They found Mohamed-Aggad and Mostefaï, who had begun using hostages as human shields. They shouted out to police the number of a hostage's phone.
Over the next 50 minutes, they had four phone exchanges with a police negotiator, during which time they threatened to execute hostages unless they received a signed paper promising France's departure from Muslim lands.
The Police Assault
The police assault began at 00:20 and lasted three minutes. Police launched the assault because of reports that Mohamed-Aggad and Mostefaï had started killing hostages. Police using shields burst open the door to the room and exchanged fire with Mohamed-Aggad and Mostefaï while managing to pull the hostages one-by-one behind their shields. One terrorist detonated his explosive vest, and the other tried to do the same but was shot.
Ninety people were killed at the Bataclan on that night, and hundreds of others were wounded. Almost all of the deceased victims were killed within the first 20 minutes of the attack. All of the hostages were rescued without injury.
Police dog teams from the Brigade Cynophile assisted with body removal because of concerns that there could still be live explosives in the theatre. Identification and removal of the bodies took 10 hours, a process made difficult because some audience members had left their identity papers in the theatre's cloakroom.
Omar Ismael Mostefaï
The homegrown suicide bomber Omar Ismael Mostefaï was identified after his finger was found among the Bataclan concert hall carnage.
Mostefaï was born in the Paris suburb of Courcouronnes and had eight past convictions for petty crimes. He is said to have been radicalised by a Belgian hate preacher at a mosque in France.
The Jihadist was buried in the Cimetière Parisien de Thiais
located in Val-de-Marne.
A Prolonged Ice Storm
So what else happened on the day that the card was written?
Well, on Friday the 13th. January 1956, a six-day ice storm that had lashed Mount Washington in the United States since the 8th. January came to an end.
Arno Dübel
The day also marked the birth of Arno Dübel.
Arno Dübel was a German male who gained notoriety for his decades-long unemployment. Born in Bornumam Elm, Lower Saxony, West Germany, Dübel began an apprenticeship as a painter, but dropped out in 1976, and lived on unemployment benefits ever since.
Dübel actively advertised his unwillingness to find work, and went to great lengths to avoid sanctions for not working, taking part in talk shows promoting his lifestyle.
He even unsuccessfully tried to start a career as a schlager music singer with a song about his lack of employment.
Dübel's demonstrable abuse of the social security system in Germany made him a target for yellow journalism, with German tabloid Bild calling him "Germany's most insolent unemployed." Bild used him as an example of alleged widespread fraud of the welfare system.
Dübel died in Hamburg on the 23rd. May 2023, at the age of 67.
This photograph was published in the Illustrated Chronicle on the 12th of January, 1917.
During the Great War the Illustrated Chronicle published photographs of soldiers and sailors from Newcastle and the North East of England, which had been in the news. The photographs were sent in by relatives and give us a glimpse into the past.
The physical collection held by Newcastle Libraries comprises bound volumes of the newspaper from 1910 to 1925. We are keen to find out more about the people in the photographs. If you recognise anyone in the images and have any stories and information to add please comment below.
Not my first published photo, but it is the first time I had a photo published in a national magazine. One of my favorite models Laura, photo from out studio shoot 11-21-2009
Model Laura
Model Mayhem # 617397
THE WESTERN PRODUCER October 4, 2007
EARTH, WIND AND FIRE - The autumn sun casts a warm glow across the landscpe near Altamont, Man.
Framed and on display at the Notre Dame de Lourdes Foyer - October 2016
I've been lazy about posting this. A few months ago I was approached by Deathmobile - a Pittsburgh area based band about using two photos I took at one of their performances in the packaging of their CD release.
This is the result of that!
Deathmobile rocks, I highly recommend you to check out the CD!
You can find links to Deathmobile and the CD from the It's Alive Show web site - www.theitsaliveshow.com/ The It's Alive Show is a Pittsburgh area based show hosted by several members of Dealthmobile which shows old horror movies.
Pacific West Regional Director Jon Jarvis (now the Director of the National Park Service). (IMG_2168_edited)
Published online here:
www.coldsplinters.com/2009/07/obama-picks-a-national-park...
Also here: www.coldsplinters.com/2009/07/obama-picks-a-national-park...
Big Ant TV Media LLC ©
published freelance photographer
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This photograph was published in the Illustrated Chronicle on the
19th of February 1917.
During the Great War the Illustrated Chronicle published photographs of soldiers and sailors from Newcastle and the North East of England, which had been in the news. The photographs were sent in by relatives and give us a glimpse into the past.
The physical collection held by Newcastle Libraries comprises bound volumes of the newspaper from 1910 to 1925. We are keen to find out more about the people in the photographs. If you recognize anyone in the images and have any stories and information to add please comment below.
Catalogue published c.1937.
Document owned and scanned by rebollo_fr. It is in public domain, as are all anonymous works published more than fifty years ago in Japan.
See also the Camera-wiki page about Tougodo.
The Postcard
A postcard that was published by Judges Ltd. of Hastings. The card was posted in Sevenoaks using a 1d. stamp on Saturday the 10th. August 1929. It was sent to:
Mr. & Mrs. Baker,
41 Sheringham Road,
Anerley,
London SE 20.
The message on the divided back of the card was as follows:
"Thought you would like
to know we are having a
lovely time.
The weather is lovely now,
although we were nearly
flooded the other day.
We are surrounded by
gorgeous beech woods,
& can see for about twenty
miles.
Best wishes,
P. Dixon."
The Witch's Oak
The huge oak, known for centuries as "The Old Oak,' but popularly called "The Witch's Oak", is one of Knole Park's great "lost" trees. The legend tells of a young tousle-haired local lass who fell in love with Richard Sackville, Third Earl of Dorset. Sadly for her he married the far more noble Lady Anne Clifford in 1609.
However the scorned girl had supernatural powers, and she placed a curse on Knole. Never again, she swore, would Knole have an immediate heir to the title. In fact the three sons of her object of desire, Richard Sackville, died in infancy, and he himself left this world in 1624 aged only 34, after “a surfeit of potatoes” (amongst other excesses).
Further misfortunes followed, including the death in 1815 of George, Fourth Duke of Dorset, who had his spine crushed by a falling horse in a hunting accident. Since the witch's curse the issue of inheritance at Knole has been a constant source of contention, "moving crab-like from generation to generation".
The witch vowed never to leave the park, so where is she now?
Gnarled and sinister-looking, its huge hollow frame supported by wooden staves and bound in an iron girdle, The Old Oak was fancifully described in early postcards as "The oldest oak in England". Ancient it certainly was: even 360 years ago it was known as "The Old Oak".
It stood not far from the house, to the north of Echo Mount, together with King John's Oak and King Beech. They were important enough to show on the Ordnance Survey map of 1869.
Nan Horns and All: "The Old Woman Who Lived in the Tree." Nan Horns and All (so called because she was never seen without her hair in stiff curl papers) lived for many years in The Old Oak's hollow bole (trunk) in the early 19th. century. She worked as a "potman", serving at the old Wheatsheaf Inn which stood in London Road.
Woe betide any passing kids who called her by her nick-name. They were soon seen off with a barrage of stones.
The tree was vandalised in 1954.
Knole
Henry VIII acquired Knole from Archbishop Thomas Cranmer in 1538 for hunting purposes, and he then set about enlarging and improving the house and grounds. Earlier, the estate had been bought and the first house built by Archbishop Thomas Bourchier between 1456 and his death in 1486.
Though Elizabeth I subsequently presented it to her cousin Thomas Sackville, later 1st. Earl of Dorset, in 1566 he was not able to occupy it until he bought back the lease in 1603. Over the next two years the house underwent a transformation into a great Renaissance palace, and it largely remains unaltered from that time.
Throughout part of the seventeenth century, occupation by the Sackville family was intermittent, possibly due to lack of money, and it was sometimes leased.
It was not until the beginning of the eighteenth century that the 6th. Earl and later his son, the 7th. Earl, used the house as their principal residence, renovating, improving and embellishing what the 1st. Earl had initiated.
The family have lived at Knole ever since, but owing to the burden of upkeep and protecting the valuable collections within the house, they presented it (with the walled garden) to the National Trust in 1946, in exchange for a generous lease of 200 years.
-- More on Knole House
The excellent shelleyshouse.blogspot.com provides some fascinating information about Knole. Here are some of the highlights:
Virginia Woolf, describing Knole in her novel Orlando, 1928 wrote:
"The great house lay more like a town
than a house...with all its chimneys
smoking busily as if inspired with a life
of their own."
Underneath the Knole rooftops lies a labyrinth of apartments, each containing several rooms. These apartments once housed hundreds of people including high status staff, visitors and family members. The Sackville-West family still live in apartments here, over 400 years since the first family member lived in Knole.
Knole house stands on five acres of ground, around the size of three and a half football pitches.
There are over 300 rooms.
Knole has 51 chimneys.
The problem for me about Knole was that at the beginning of the tour most things were covered with dust sheets, in glass cases. I found it hilarious that there were signs on a lot of pieces (like enormous vases, or ornate chairs) printed with the word 'salvage'. I had to ask what this was about as I wondered if these items had been picked up from a salvage yard, though it seemed unlikely.
Turns out there is a very particular protocol in the event of a fire or other disaster about what will be saved first, and these labels referred to the priority of the items in that protocol.
Knole Park is the home of a wild deer herd. They are the descendants of those first introduced here over 500 years ago. It is Kent's last remaining medieval deer park.
Henry VIII stated in 1532:
"And as for Knole it standeth on a sound perfect,
wholesome ground. And if I should make mine
abode here, as I do surely mind to do now and
then, I myself will lie at Knole."
Archbishop Thomas Cranmer surrendered Knole to Henry VIII. The king purchased more land, and by 1556 Knole Park covered 446 acres. Today Knole Park covers 1,000 acres. It is 7.5 times bigger than St James' Park in London.
There are over 350 wild deer in Knole Park.
I remember an old bed (you know, the kind with curtains) still in pieces, being cleaned by a young man. He was using just water, and just rubbing the black pieces of wood; I think he said it was walnut, but I'm not sure. He told us that the Knole attics were so vast they still hadn't been fully explored and all the findings catalogued, even though the National Trust acquired the place in 1946 (over 70 years ago!).
In another room there was a bed covered and curtained with some sort of holey green fabric. The guide there explained that some inexperienced restorers from some workers' cooperative had used modern glue to stick the fabric back onto the wood, rather than the old fashioned fish glue.
This modern glue had eaten the fabric, and they were painstakingly trying to restore the old cloth. I had two thoughts at the time. One was how quickly they were ready to name and blame outsiders; the other was the enormous expense of restoring such a large amount of fabric. I would just frame a square or two and put up modern fabric, a copy of the original. Probably best that I don't work in restoration, eh?
Knole House is called a Calendar House, that is a house that has architectural features in quantities that mirror the numbers in a year. Knole reportedly has 365 rooms, 52 stair cases, 12 entrances and 7 courtyards (give or take).
One more thing that has come back to me is one of the guides telling me about a Knole couch. If you ever watched/drooled over Downton Abbey you know exactly what one looks like (the big red one to the left of the fireplace in the library).
Visitors from the local area and further afield have enjoyed access to Knole Park since the 17th. century. A dispute over public right of way led to Mortimer, 1st Lord Sackville, closing the park in June 1884. Local people were furious, and on the night of the 18th. June 1884, over a thousand people stormed the park. They broke down barricades before marching to the front of the house. The town's people smashed windows and hurled abuse.
President H. Hoover
So what else happened on the day that the card was posted?
Well, on the 10th. August 1929, U.S. President Herbert Hoover celebrated his 55th. birthday at the presidential camp in Madison County, Virginia; Charles and Anne Lindbergh were among the guests.
Patrick Collinson
The 10th. August 1929 also marked the birth of Patrick "Pat" Collinson, CBE, FBA.
Patrick was an English historian, known as a writer on the Elizabethan era, particularly Elizabethan Puritanism.
He was emeritus Regius Professor of Modern History, University of Cambridge, having occupied the chair from 1988 to 1996. He once described himself as:
"An early modernist with a prime interest
in the history of England in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries."
-- Patrick Collinson - The Early Years
Collinson was born in Ipswich, the son of Cecil Collinson and Belle Hay Patrick. His father came from a Yorkshire Quaker family, and both Patrick's parents were Christian missionaries. He later wrote that:
"My childhood home was an evangelical
hothouse where the Second Coming
was expected daily."
Before Patrick was 20, he was baptised at Bethesda Chapel in Ipswich.
After a short spell at Bethany School in Goudhurst, Kent, and Huntingdon Grammar School, Collinson was educated at King's Ely, and Pembroke College, Cambridge from 1949 to 1952.
He also trained as a radar mechanic during his national service in the Royal Air Force.
Patrick became a postgraduate student at the University of London in 1952 under the supervision of the Tudor historian J. E. Neale, who handed him some notes on East Anglian Puritanism.
In 1957 Collinson completed his doctorate on Elizabethan Puritanism, its 1,200-page size causing the administration to impose a word limit on future dissertations.
The work was published in 1967 as The Elizabethan Puritan Movement, which showed Puritanism to be a significant force within the Elizabethan Anglican Church instead of merely a radical group of individuals. It became a standard work on the subject.
-- Patrick Collinson - The Later Years
Collinson became a lecturer at the University of Khartoum, and from 1961 assistant lecturer in ecclesiastical history at King's College London (where he taught Desmond Tutu).
In 1960 he married Elizabeth Albinia Susan Selwyn, a nurse. He thought about becoming an Anglican minister, but in the end chose not to.
In 1969 Collinson emigrated to Australia to become chair of the history department of Sydney University.
Although he appreciated a more open-minded approach favouring interdisciplinary studies, he opposed what he termed the "fungus" of postmodernism, and so returned to England in 1976 as professor of history at the University of Kent.
Patrick was President of the Ecclesiastical History Society (1985-86).
He was chair of modern history at the University of Sheffield from 1984 to 1988 before he succeeded Sir Geoffrey Elton as Cambridge Regius Professor of History, where his attempt to reform the tripos failed due to opposition from within.
His inaugural lecture was entitled:
"De Republica Anglorum:
Or, History with the Politics
Put Back."
By the time of his retirement in 1996, Collinson was one of the doyens of English Reformation history. His short summation of the period, The Reformation, was published in 2003.
Collinson's work laid the foundations, in many ways, for what historians of the English Reformation currently term the 'Calvinist Consensus' in the latter decades of the 16th. century.
As such, the belief that Puritanism was anything but religiously radical in relation to English, and indeed British, culture stands as one of his great achievements as an historian.
In July 2000 Collinson was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Essex.
In 2011 Boydell Press published Collinson's memoir The History of a History Man Or, the Twentieth Century Viewed from a Safe Distance: The Memoirs of Patrick Collinson as part of its Church of England Record Society Series.
Collinson was the founding president of the society in 1991.
Collinson's political views were left-wing; he was a republican and a supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
-- The Death of Patrick Collinson
Patrick died on the 28th. September 2011. He lived for 30,000 days, or, to put it another way, 82 years, 1 month, and 19 days, including the day on which he died.
Patrick was laid to rest at Crossways Woodland Burial Ground,
Cheriton Bishop, in Devon.
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Knowth - July 25, 2012: Bru na Boinne, Ireland. (c) 2012 - photography by Leaf McGowan, technogypsie.com. More about Knowth: www.technogypsie.com/reviews/?p=988 (published):One of Irelands most famous Neolithic passage graves, Knowth is in the valley of the Boyne River, at the ancient monument of Brú na Bóinne nearby famous Newgrange. This monument was built after Newgrange, roughly 5,000 B.C.E. (Before the Common Era). It is believed to have been built before Dowth. It is similiar in size to Newgrange, but is surrounded by 18 satellite mounds. The 'Great Mound' has two passages with entrances in the opposite sides - passage on the west is 34 meters long, passage on the east is 40 meters long, both ending at a cruciform chamber with a corbelled roof. Mythologically believed to be a Faerie mound - A Sidhe - Archaeologists catalogue the site as a passage grave based on three recesses and basin stones found within the chambers into which the cremated remains of the dead were placed. More about the Bru na Boinne: www.technogypsie.com/reviews/?p=987. * aka "Palace of the Boyne" or "Bend of the Boyne" * Knowth/Newgrange, Donore, Co. Meath, Ireland * UNESCO World Heritage Site *"Bru na Boinne" is the name of a Boyne River Valley section that is home to the World Heritage sites consisting of the Tumulus Sidhe known as "Knowth", "Dowth", and "Newgrange". These monuments are the largest and one of the most important prehistoric megalithic sites in Europe that consist of a complex of neolithic chamber tombs, standing stones, henges, and other prehistoric enclosures dating as early as 35th century B.C.E. (predating the Egyptian pyramids)
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The Postcard
A postally unused postcard that was extracted from a book of 30 Goya postcards that was published by Magna Books.
Francisco Goya: Self-portrait at 69 Years
Two original versions of this work have been preserved. One of the paintings, painted on canvas, is housed in the collections of the Prado Museum.
The other, created on wood panel, is located in the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid (see below).
Both paintings were created in 1815, in the post-war period, and depict a very similar image of the artist. This is one of the most sincere and direct self-portraits of the painter.
-- Goya's Self-Portraits
Throughout his long life, Goya created many self-portraits – at least fifteen are recognized as authentic, with a total of over thirty.
He used various techniques: painting, engraving, and drawing. He also portrayed himself in various ways, for example, classically before easels with attributes of the painter: Self-portrait at an Easel modeled after Velázquez and his Las Meninas.
Goya also depicted himself with important clients: Charles IV of Spain and Family, The Family of the Infante Don Luis, and José Moñino, 1st. Count of Floridablanca and Francisco de Goya.
He also appears in religious scenes like The Sermon of Saint Bernardino of Siena, genre scenes like La novillada (The Young Bulls' Fight), in a drawing with his muse, the Duchess of Alba, or in Self-portrait with Dr. Arrieta painted as a votive offering.
There are also several portraits of Goya executed by other artists, such as by Vicente López (Portrait of Goya at 80 years.
Francisco Goya
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered to be the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th. and early 19th. centuries.
His paintings, drawings, and engravings reflected contemporary historical upheavals, and influenced important 19th.- and 20th.-century painters.
Goya is often referred to as the last of the Old Masters and the first of the Moderns.
Goya was born to a middle-class family on the 30th. March 1746 in Fuendetodos in Aragon. He studied painting from the age of 14 under José Luzán y Martinez, and moved to Madrid to study with Anton Raphael Mengs.
He married Josefa Bayeu in 1773. Goya became a court painter to the Spanish Crown in 1786, and this early portion of his career is marked by portraits of Spanish aristocracy and royalty, and Rococo-style tapestry cartoons designed for the royal palace.
Although Goya's letters and writings survive, little is known about his thoughts. He had a severe and undiagnosed illness in 1793 that left him deaf, after which his work became progressively darker and more pessimistic.
His later easel and mural paintings, prints and drawings appear to reflect a bleak outlook on personal, social and political levels, and contrast with his social climbing.
He was appointed Director of the Royal Academy in 1795, the year Manuel Godoy made an unfavorable treaty with France.
In 1799, Goya became Primer Pintor de Cámara, the highest rank for a Spanish court painter.
In the late 1790's he completed his La Maja Desnuda, a remarkably daring nude for the time, and clearly indebted to Diego Velázquez. In 1800–01, he painted Charles IV of Spain and his family, also influenced by Velázquez.
In 1807, Napoleon led the French army into the Peninsular War against Spain. Goya remained in Madrid during the war, which seems to have affected him deeply. Although he did not speak his thoughts in public, they can be inferred from his Disasters of War series of prints (although published 35 years after his death) and his 1814 paintings The Second of May 1808 and The Third of May 1808.
Other works from his mid-period include the Caprichos and Los Disparates etching series, and a wide variety of paintings concerned with insanity, mental asylums, witches, fantastical creatures and religious and political corruption, all of which suggest that he feared for both his country's fate and his own mental and physical health.
His late period culminates with the Black Paintings of 1819–1823, applied to the plaster walls of his house the Quinta del Sordo (House of the Deaf Man) where, disillusioned by political and social developments in Spain, he lived in near isolation.
Goya eventually abandoned Spain in 1824 to retire to the French city of Bordeaux, accompanied by his much younger maid and companion, Leocadia Weiss, who may have been his lover.
There he completed his La Tauromaquia series and a number of other works. Following a stroke that left him paralyzed on his right side, Goya died on the 16th. April 1828 aged 82.