On the Emerald Isle (Part 1 of 2)

Part 1:  In Dublin’s Fair City

A few weeks ago I made a brief visit to Ireland with my friend Michèle.  We were at school together in Argentina from the age of 13 and I have mentioned her on this blog several times, particularly recently because she is looking after her younger 25-year old daughter Selina who was in a terrible car accident last October.  After being unconscious for several months Selina has now woken up and is making a slow recovery at the rehabilitation centre near Buenos Aires where Michèle cares for her 24 hours a day for most days of the week.  She has to be up every two to three hours at night to turn Selina over to avoid pessure sores, so she rarely gets a complete night's sleep.  I post updates on this blog from time to time, the most recent on the post before this one.

She does it gladly and greets every small progress Selina makes with joy and relief, but there is still quite a way to go, and recently it became clear that my friend urgently needed a period of respite.  She was able to find a nurse to live with and look after her precious daughter, and thanks to her air hostess sister’s organisation she came to Britain in May to stay first of all with her youngest son, who is making his career in the world of polo here.  After a week she made her way on her own over to Bristol, and we were up at the crack of dawn the following morning to catch a plane from Bristol to Dublin.

We are in touch by phone, e-mail and Facebook, but it had been three years since I had last seen her.  Although her life had taken a ninety degree turn in the past months, it was clear that she was coping remarkably well.  She is strong in her will to provide her daughter with every care and stimulus necessary to give her the best chance of a complete recovery; confident in the route this must take, no matter what the obstacles; determined to meet red tape, difficult people and circumstances head on; steadfast in her faith that one day Selina will lead a normal life again.

She has been loyally and lovingly supported by her husband and family, and has discovered that the circle of friends and acquaintances that care about the family and wish to be involved in providing practical help is many times larger than she ever realised.  It has now been nearly nine months since the accident; at the beginning the visitors to the hospital were so numerous that they took over the cafeteria area – one day Michèle counted 150 visitors who had passed through its doors throughout the day to ask how Selina was. 

When Selina was eventually moved to a rehabilitation centre it was far from the centre of town with little or no access except by car.  This however did not deter the army of well-wishers who were horrified by the personal ordeal this young, vibrant and intelligent woman was going through, and they contrived to come by taxi in groups to share the expense, or if they took buses they devoted the day to their visit.  Some would stay overnight so that Selina’s mother could go home and wash clothes or have a complete night’s sleep. 

Michèle can actually remember the number of days when there have been no visitors, and says frequently that she has been greatly sustained by this tremendous support.  Speaking as one of the army of friends, her Facebook page is our lifeline; thus we learn of the little advances and the affectionate and thrilled messages they generate.

Her tiredness has been accumulating for some time, but I knew that she would not want to sit around and sleep all day when she was staying with me.  While browsing idly on the internet earlier this year I had found the website of an Augustinian Retreat in Orlagh, near Dublin in Ireland, which had been the home of Michèle’s husband’s ancestors, the O’Dwyer family, during the 1800s. 

I learned that the lady of the manor in those days had been Lady Selina, and Michèle’s daughter had clearly been named after her. 

Lady Selina O'Dwyer

and four of her children -

all of them boys despite their apparel.

(From the Orlagh website.)

This now struck me as a very appropriate coincidence and I wrote to the organisation to explain the story of Selina’s illness and ask whether it might be possible to see the house and grounds for an hour or two to take pictures.  I thought our not being Catholic might have a bearing on their decision, so I explained that we were Anglicans.  I hardly expected a reply.

When it came, it was overwhelming.  Fr John Byrne is the Augustinian priest who runs the retreat, and he told me that there had been two previous occasions when members of the extended O’Dwyer family had made personal pilgrimages to Orlagh, and he was glad to have been able to fill them in on some of their family history.  They in turn had given him some O’Dwyer material for the Retreat’s website.  The O’Dwyer family had sold the property in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, and it was eventually purchased by the Augustinian Order.  It had originally been a place where novitiates were trained, but was now a retreat and meditation centre.  He invited us to stay as their guests.

So that’s what we did.

When I’m ruler of the world, one of my first edicts shall be that mornings are to start later.  Educational establishments, businesses, shops... at least 10 a.m., if not 11.  And this business of flights departing at sparrows’ fart is going to be discontinued.  Definitely.  I might even impose mandatory siestas as well. 

So I was practically cross-eyed when we got on the plane to Dublin which took off at 8 a.m., and there was a busy schedule ahead.  The flight from Bristol is less than an hour – not even time to doze.  We hired a small car at Dublin airport and I drove into town while Michèle had the difficult job of navigating using three different maps, all of which were too small, as were the street names, not to mention having to remind herself constantly that road signs were on the lefthand side. 

Her head was buried in the map while I did as I was told and was able to look around me.  We observed straight away that even in rush hour the volume of traffic and number of people around was way below what we were used to.  No one tooted impatiently at me, I was allowed to change my mind on lanes and directions, performing u-turns with little warning; though there might have been the odd “tsk tsk” and a rolling of eyeballs behind the rolled up windows, I certainly didn’t hear or see them.  This patience and courtesy was to become a feature in the days we spent in Ireland.

Not being one for figures and statistics, I hope nevertheless you’ll find this as interesting as I did.  England (i.e., not including Scotland or Wales) covers 70,280 sq km or 32,599 sq miles, whereas the Republic of Ireland (excluding Northern Ireland) has 130,400 sq km or 50,346 sq miles.  So without being too pedantic about it, the Republic of Ireland is nearly twice the size of England.  Compare this with the population:  England has 51.5 million people, Rep of Ireland 4.6 million – less than a tenth of England’s population.  So you can appreciate why the conurbations we saw and the roads we travelled along seemed quiet – or as England might have been a very long time ago.

We left the hired car behind in a car park and embarked on a bus tour of Dublin on the top of a double-decker bus...

...in the blazing sunshine of that most unusual of circumstances – an Irish heat wave, and not a cloud to be seen.  Shauna our bus driver was also the tour guide.   Talented and funny, she told us endless anecdotes and saucy facts about the Irish politicians of the day, and I found myself joining in with her singing “Molly Malone” at the top of my voice and stamping my feet at the appropriate point in “Wild Rover”, like a ten year old on a school outing.  Each guide has their own style – we know hers was not typical because a couple of days later we did it again (when we had recovered our energy and got on and off several times) and the tours were pre-recorded with nothing like Shauna’s exuberance.

Dublin loves its statues, and rightly so, because there are many unusual ones -

Molly Malone, otherwise known as The Tart with the Cart...

The Needle, otherwise known as

The Stiletto in the Ghetto...

(Google pic)

   

 The Hags with the Bags...      (Google pic)

Anna Livia representing the River Liffey,

otherwise known as

The Floozy in the Jacuzzi...  (Google pic)

Jim Larkin, Irish Trade Union leader

and social activist

Heroic maybe, but he'd obviously

been on the Guinness...

And she was holding the scales

as though they smelt horrible...

I'll take you to Orlagh next time.

-oOo-

Photo Finish

A change to the usual - these are all pictures

taken by John in Fuerteventura, Canary Islands,

with an underwater camera.

-oOo-

The joke's on me...

For some reason there are a lot of internet comparison insurance ads on British TV at the moment (I can count five in my head straight away, without too much thought) which have a couple of things in common – they all claim to be the quickest, easiest, cheapest and friendliest, and they all have annoying jingles. 

One of them, called Go-Compare, tries to grab your attention by means of a well-built tenor in a tail suit and a heavily waxed ringlet moustache who suddenly pops us and sings to people sunbathing on beaches, or in other situations (including historic) where they’re minding their own business, to tell them how they must visit the website when they want insurance.  "Go Compare!" features frequently in the lyrics.  The singer is clearly a professional but the tune seems to have been composed by a child and is unbelievably annoying.  His shuddering moustache is even more so. 

A billboard near the hospital where I work has appeared.  It’s near the traffic lights...

...and I nearly collided with the car in front because it made me laugh so much.

A few days later I took my camera into work and stopped to take this picture of it on the way, thinking how much I would enjoy putting it on my blog.

However, it was reported in the news some days later that it was all a spoof by the Go Compare company, and they had produced a whole series...

 ... backed up by TV ads in the same self-mocking vein.

I confess to feeling crestfallen, but I thought international readers might enjoy them anyway!

-oOo-

Update on Selina: Daughter of my friend Michèle about whom I've told you before.  She suffered a terrible car accident last October and was in a coma for several months.  She is now making a slow recovery.   (Previous updates are here, here and here).

Selina is now fully awake, and there have been many positive advances since I last updated you.  The physios, with whom she is a favourite, are assisting her to stand, and it won’t be long before her leg muscles are strong enough to enable her to do it unaided for short periods.  She can move her right arm slowly, and her sense of humour is definitely back – when given the shower head to help bath herself recently she drenched both her mother and the helper.  Michèle says she can’t move her face to smile yet, but her eyes were dancing and they knew she was laughing at them. 

When asked to identify the missing letter in a word she can write it, and identify the correct answer in a multiple choice history question. When her parents were discussing something in front of her recently, they had been debating whether some medication should be taken for one, two or more weeks, and suddenly noticed that she had been following the conversation and was gently pointing two fingers at them – and then they remembered it was indeed two weeks. She also understands the difference when putting two fingers up in the other direction, because it’s the only gesture of defiance open to her at the moment. She makes all the right moves to help the staff get her in and out of bed, and moves the zips up and down on her coat, so it’s all positive.

The other good news is that the other patient and her very difficult mother the other side of the curtain – they’re obliged to share the room – have departed to some other clinical establishment, and the new lodgers – an older woman and her carer-daughter have moved in and are good and considerate people. Michèle’s stress levels have gone back down again.

-oOo-

Photo Finish -

from Lonicera's digital archive

Some flowers from my garden

White camellia

Abbot's Pool, a very large pond nearby

Dwarf rhododendron (yakushimanum),

the only one which will grow in neutral soil.

Red camellia

This is the name of my house, called after

my favourite song from John's Clifton Town opera,

"The River Avon"  (see last posts before this one)

-oOo-

Tales of War and Conflict - Clifton Town, opera by John Humphreys (Part IV of IV)

Want to catch up on the story?
Click on Part I, Part II and Part III

Part IV
October 1831

It seemed as though the whole of Bristol was on fire, with thousands of rioters and looters roaming the streets.  The contemporary painter William James Muller illustrated these dramatic events with a rich and powerful use of colour -

The burning of the Custom House

The burning of the Mansion House, Queens Square

The troops marching up Corn Street

The burning of the 'new gaol' with St Pauls church opposite

The rioting in Queens Square

Back, then, to our story: 

Little Acorn, otherwise Billy, Sarah’s son who was so excited by the soldiers and was determined to be one when he grew up, was never destined to further his ambition.  Lost in the melée, unable to hear his mother’s cries as she hunted for him, the boy was suddenly spotted by the Trooper framed in a window with flames behind him.  He started forward to try to save him, but was stopped by his commanding officer who had a job for him to do, and the child suddenly disappeared from view.  The Peeler later found him and sadly brought his little body back to Sarah, who was distraught with grief.

Sarah:

Closed be thine eyes, never more to be peeping;

Closed be this hand on a kiss to be keeping

Safe, till my heart ceases wearily beating;

Return it to me at our next merry meeting…

Sleep, little Acorn, sleep little Acorn mine and angels guard thy rest!

The haughty Bishop of Bristol appeared, seeing at a glance what was happening and could think of nothing better to say than -

“Repent and be comforted, for it is written ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay’ saith the Lord.”

Sarah cried – “In the name of Pity, how can you preach of Sin and Vengeance?”

The Bishop sneered – “This child, conceived in Sin and living in wickedness, this creature of curruption has paid!”

Sarah whispered, almost to herself -

.

Oh God who created me, sent me in my grieving

This sweet memento, conceived in love and tenderness;

Her voice started to gain strength -
.

Whispers, retrieving the solace that He sent me,

Words of compassion, gently reminding me:

Suffer the children to come unto me. 

She rounded on the Bishop with all the contempt she could muster -
.

Lordly Divine, prophet of vengeance,

Rejoice then, to see this God of mine forsaking His gentleness,

Taking an Acorn, breaking the heart,

The lonely heart of an oak tree…”

.

... then she broke down and wept.

.

-oOo-

Over the following three days central Bristol was beset by riots.  At first some 600 people roamed the streets but it grew to several thousand, its numbers swelled by prisoners who were sprung from gaol by the rioters.  Famous buildings and private homes were set on fire and destroyed, even by children, and looting was unrestrained. 

Thomas Leeson Rowbotham:  Bristol seen from Pyle Hill, 30/10/1831

(I have also seen this painting attributed to W J Muller)

.

The flames were visible for many miles around, and it has been documented that the glow of the fires could be seen from across the Bristol Channel, in Wales.  Many were  killed, some because their comrades were setting fire to buildings they were looting and the melting lead was flowing down the guttering and burning the people to death underneath, or because they jumped off the burning buildings and got impaled on the iron railings below.  Eventually the roofing of the buildings collapsed, killing still more.

W J Muller:  The Burning of the Bishop's Palace

One looter by the name of John Ives stole a priceless silver plate from the Mansion House.  It was from the civic collection and dated from 1595.  He later cut it up and offered 169 pieces of it to a local silversmith, who informed the authorities and Ives was caught and transported to Australia for 14 years.  The silversmith restored the basin to almost its former glory and the two missing pieces were remade and a plate made of silver fixed to the back to hold it together.  (See below)

Work on the Clifton Suspension Bridge had to be halted, and its designer Isambard, Kingdom Brunel was sworn in as a special constable.  It was to be five years before work was resumed on the famous bridge.

The riots were eventually quelled by the sheer numbers of armed reinforcements summoned from Keynsham and Gloucester.  It is thought that between five and ten thousand  people were involved, and some 500 killed.

-oOo-

The Aftermath – January 1832

Rolinda Sharples:  The Trial of Col Thomas Brereton, 1832. (Double click to enlarge)

There is no list of the people represented in this picture, but I believe

(but I'm by no means sure) that Col Brereton is the second to last person on the right

of those wearing a red uniform.  I also think the person seated to the left of the table

with the turban could be the famous Rajah Rammohun Roy (1772-1833),

Indian religious, social and educational reformer sometimes known as the

"Father of Modern India", who was visiting Bristol at the time,

and who in fact died here of meningitis.

Rajah Rammohun Roy, who was living in Bristol at the time of the riots.

At the court martial of Colonel Brereton, officials giving evidence were falling over themselves to claim they had nothing to do with the riots.

Alderman:

You can’t blame me, you can’t blame me!

I’m no rioter, no-one could be quieter…

With quiet tact I faced the crowd, the Riot Act I read out loud,

And then stayed at home drinking cups of tea

So it’s perfectly plain that you can’t blame me!

Town Clerk:

You can’t blame me, you can’t blame me!

I find rioting terribly disquieting…

I’m just a Town clerk, good as gold;
I’m only paid to do as I’m told;

And nobody told me a thing, you see

So how could anyone now blame me?

Mayor:

I am the Mayor, still hale and hearty;

I belong to the ruling party;

Give them a few more months, you’ll see:

They’ll soon find out that they can’t blame me!

Townsfolk:

I quite agree, you can’t blame me!

No fear of the government making a fuss.

They won’t blame you and they can’t blame us!

There must be someone we can blame;

(Hist’ry needs a name)

For the loss of property, life and limb,

Must blame someone; let’s all blame HIM

…and so Colonel Brereton took the blame for everything, although his sin was, in fact, to have done nothing.  He was sickened by the evidence he had heard of viciousness, death and violence, and on the fourth day he made the offer to plead guilty to bring the proceedings to a halt.  When the court adjourned for the day, a very distressed Brereton returned to his lodgings in Redland and his two young daughters.  A letter was delivered to him later.  He read parts out loud...

Brereton

"Colonel Brereton:  The Court has considered your offer to plead guilty... no more witnesses...our bounden duty...justice to be served... your plea must be rejected... trial to proceed several days...further evidence."
O memory!  Do you then deceive me?  Are my senses failing?  Were they not my friends?  And justice?  "Justice to be served"... and does Justice never serve Humanity?

He finally realised that those he had once called his friends were now all against him. Feeling that he had nowhere else to turn, he shot himself.

-oOo-

Thus we find ourselves back at the beginning of this tale, in gaol with Bert, (Bess’s husband, Sarah’s father), as Isambard Kingdom Brunel listened to his story and noted it down.  It was now dawn and the gaoler rattled his keys as he came to fetch Bert.  He was one of the rioters who had been sentenced to death by hanging.

Brunel promised to stay with him till the end, as Bert quipped bravely “Just as well, I’d say, Sir.  That scaffold don’t look any too safe to me!” 

As he was being blindfolded before a silent crowd, he said his last words -

Bert:

By and by, this daft ol’ rope untie and take me down.

And let my body lie somewhere, down there, in Clifton Town!

.

The trapdoor fell away, and as Bert's inert body swung from the noose, the Peeler had the last word ...
.

Peeler:  (Partly to the crowd beside the gaol, partly to the audience)

Move along!  Move along!

-oOo-

Postscript: 

Charles Pinney, mayor of Bristol, was acquitted at his trial for neglect of duty.  Of the five rioters sentenced to be hanged, one was reprieved on the grounds that he was mentally deficient.  Some ninety others were imprisoned or transported.

Many history papers have been written since speculating on whether the riots had some shadowy figure in the background whipping up the masses for their own ends, but no evidence has to date been found.  There were thousands of rioters, but for the most part they were illiterate and would have been in fear of hanging or transportation.  It is unlikely that they would have left any sort of proof or memoir.  

As far as the immediate impact of the riot was concerned, there is significant evidence that the violent unrest around the country and particularly in Bristol had a major effect upon the eventual success of the Reform Bill.  It became law that same year of 1832 and the rotten boroughs were abolished, with new towns being properly represented in Parliament.  From 1835 onwards the Municipal Corporation Act changed the constitution of the City Councils and they ceased to be the unofficial gentleman’s clubs that they once had been.

-oOo-

NOTICE
1988 Copyright John Humphreys.
Copying any part of John Humphreys' work is
expressly forbidden by copyright laws.
.

Maestro John Humphreys!

-oOo-

Acknowledgments:

John Humphreys’ notes taken from John Latimer’s Annals of Bristol in the Nineteenth Century

http://brisray.com/bristol/briot1.htm

www.brh.org.uk/articles/1831.html

Images of paintings are from the internet - if further acknowledgments are required, please let me know and I will gladly mention them.

-oOo-

Photo Finish -

from Lonicera's non-digital archives

A few more pictures of Bristol Temple Meads Railway Station

on a quiet Sunday afternoon

 

Royal Mail loading our post...

  

Someone's in-tray waiting for Monday... 

The exit/entrance to the station

  

There are fewer passenger trains on Sundays

due to maintenance work carried out on the lines...

  

Detail of a supporting column 

-oOo-