28 November 2024

Racial descriptions of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor : Hiawatha's Wedding Feast to...?

 This is a work in progress

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
from the Sunderland Daily Echo
immediately before the first public performance of
Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, 15 November 1898

The public rehearsal and public performance of Coleridge-Taylor's Ballade in A minor at the Gloucester Three Choirs Festival brought his name into prominence. The much-heralded private performance of Hiawatha's Wedding Feast followed by its public performance in Sunderland made him almost a household name. As with any young "celebrity", people wanted to more about him, particularly when they learned he had African ancestry. The usual "coloured" was used to describe his skin, though there is one intriguing description of him as "a very dark gentleman". A gentleman who was "very dark"? Apparently so.

His ancestry caused more problems, with some partially-informed journalists calling him "West African". When his engagement to Jessie Walmisley became known in September 1899, there is at least one hint that a mixed-race marriage may not have been acceptable to some people. Very few would have been aware of her own Anglo-Indian ancestry.


1898

"THE PHILHARMONIC SOCIETY. TO-MORROW'S CONCERT
At a time like the present, when new musical works are eagerly sought for by conductors of choral and societies, it is most difficult to come across a composition of a high order containing ideas that are striking and good and quite away from the beaten track. The Sunderland Philharmonic Society, always to the fore in promoting the best interests of the musical public, has not been slow to take up one of the freshest and most attractive cantatas lately written. 
HIAWATHA’S WEDDING FEAST.
for tenor solo, chorus, and orchestra (words by Longfellow), will be given on the 16th inst. in the Victoria Hall under circumstances the most favourable; the composer will himself conduct the performance. Mr S. Coleridge-Taylor has, within a short period, become both prominent and eminent. Born in London on August 15th, 1875, he is quite young, and has evidently a brilliant career before him. Endowed with great musical gifts, and having had the advantage of a first-class musical training at the Royal College of Music, under the guidance of Professor Villiers Stanford, and surrounded by the best musical influences, he has worked unflaggingly and to good account. 

His father, a medical man, was born in West Africa, and his mother was English. This
ADMIXTURE OF NATIONALTIES
has, no doubt, had something to do with the distinct and characteristic flavour which gives individuality to his music. The great success of his orchestral ballade at the recent Gloucester Festival has quickly been followed by another in the work under notice, which was performed for the first time only a few days ago in London. That Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast is destined to very considerably enhance the composer’s reputation leaves little room for doubt. Indeed, the pronounced opinions of those who were fortunate enough to hear the Royal College performance the other night is a proof of the fact. 

How much Mr Coleridge-Taylor has been influenced by this or that composer is not of so much importance as that he has ideas of his own, and is sufficiently resourceful to be able to make a remarkable use of them. His quaintness of rhythmical effect, vigour of thought, and colouring of a vivid kind, and his exceedingly clever management of both vocal and orchestral material, at once arrest the attention of an audience. " - Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette - Tuesday 15 November 1898

"On Friday night we were all invited to the Royal College of Music to hear a promising though rather crude cantata, Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, by the young West African composer, Mr. Coleridge Taylor. The place was vastly overcrowded, as is, indeed, usually the case with practically a free show. Personally, of course, I do not complain because being compelled to stand in a crush at the back of the so-called "hall," my shoulder was utilised as a convenient rest by an extremely pretty hospital nurse, who was endeavouring to balance herself on a chair. I was, at any rate, in pleasanter circumstances than my colleagues of the Daily Telegraph and the Athenaeum, who, as no chairs were reserved for them, were glad to seat themselves on the floor. Close by Mme. Liza Lehmann was in a similar predicament." - Truth - Thursday 17 November 1898

"Four valses were given for the first time as a concluding item. They were by Coleridge Taylor, who is undoubtedly coming man. His ballade, composed for the Leeds festival, gained him immediate notoriety. He is only 23 years of age, and is a West African. Me. Godfrey is endeavouring to arrange with him to conduct one of his own works later in the season, and we hope he will do so." - Bournemouth Guardian - Saturday 10 December 1898

"The cantata Hiawatha's Wedding Feast formed the concluding part of the programme. It is quite a new composition from the pen of Mr. Coleridge Taylor, a gentleman of colour, and this was but the third or fourth time that it has been performed in public. It is quaintly picturesque and decidedly original, the score being marked by much novelty of treatment. It was capitally rendered by both band and chorus, and the only solo, which partakes of the character of recitative, was sung by Mr. Branscombe. The music, as becomes the celebration of a wedding feast, is at times joyous and hilarious and throughout is quite original and withal very tuneful and entertaining." - Torquay Times, and South Devon Advertiser - Friday 16 December 1898

1899

"Two of Mr. Coleridge Taylor’s works were presented. The first-was the orchestral Ballade in A minor, which was brought out at the last Gloucester Festival, and by which the young coloured composer—who is of London birth—secured a reputation. It is strong, forceful music, fashioned economically, and endowed with an element of the barbaric that is far from unwelcome." - Batley Reporter and Guardian - Friday 17 March 1899

"There are those who ill-naturedly attribute Mr. Coleridge Taylor's success to his personal colour, but few unprejudiced persons can listen to such music  as this of Hiawatha's Wedding Feast without being struck by its absolute freshness of idiom, together with a charm of treatment that succeeds in making much out of apparently very little." - Leeds Mercury - Friday 12 May 1899

"Mr. Coleridge-Taylor, a very dark gentleman, the composer of Hiawatha Sketches, accompanied little Maudie on the piano as she gave them. These sketches were most spirited and original—a tale, a song, a dance, and delighted the audience, who would have liked to encore them all." - Wrexham Advertiser - Saturday 8 July 1899

"The second part of the concert opened with the cantata, Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, by S. Coleridge Taylor, a modern rising composer. His nationality invests him with additional interest. This work has been performed only once or twice previous to its performance at Tenbury, but we understand that it is in the programme for the next Leeds Festival." - Tenbury Wells Advertiser - Tuesday 11 July 1899

"MR. COLERIDGE TAYLOR BETROTHED. It was, by the way, mentioned in Queen's Hall during the Worcester rehearsals, in which Mr. Coleridge Taylor took part, that the young West African composer is engaged married to Miss Walmesley [sic], who, the Daily News understands, was a fellow pupil of his the Royal College of Music." - Gloucester Citizen - Friday 08 September 1899

"The opening programme to-day included four works, first and foremost being a novelty in the shape of a Solemn Prelude for orchestra, composed by the young Anglo-African, S. Coleridge Taylor, to whose pen we owe Hiawatha’s Wedding [sic] and other works which are in the enjoyment of popularity. Sympathy seems to be claimed in advance of effort, and especially in the blend of the unmusical Anglo-Saxon with the passionate musical impulses of the African. What may result from such a combination we know in part, and there may be stronger evidence to come, but, though Mr. Coleridge Taylor is an interesting personality, and brings a "new" strain into English blood, he cannot be held exempt from criticism. Indeed, he is one to look after sharply, lest there be manifestations not healthy

At no previous time in the history of art was the nomenclature of musical compositions so vague as now. When, in past days, a musician composed a work in overture form he called it an overture as a matter of course, and everybody knew what was meant. Forms are now largely out of fashion, above all among writers for the orchestra, who decline to be fettered, and claim the full liberty enjoyed by, as said a Fourth of July orator, "the soaring and screaming eagle of our boundless prairies." The result is that we have a crowd of works which are essentially nondescript. Terms of description do not arise out of them, but are arbitrarily applied to them. Just as Chopin called his effusions preludes, ballades, and what not of ambiguous meaning, so here is Mr. Coleridge Taylor with his Solemn Prelude.

I am not going to quarrel with the name, but an innocent curiosity prompts me to ask what in the consciousness of the composer does this prelude indicate as coming after it? Has Mr. Taylor something to follow "up his sleeve"? I remember that Sir Hubert Parry once produced an overture to an unwritten tragedy. Here is an example for writers of preludes that, as far as they go, precede nothing. 

The work which has suggested these remarks is slow throughout (lento), in the key of B minor, and scored for full orchestra. Though in no recognised form, its subjects, of which there are three so dealt with, come up for treatment from time to time, and the whole piece ends with references to the matter, of its opening. It is very carefully orchestrated, and shows the knowledge and skill which are now so common in that branch of a composer's work. Some of the themes, moreover, are distinctly melodious, but their beauty is often disfigured by scrappy treatment or veiled by restless and harmonic progressions. 

This simply means that the Prelude suffered from the spirit of modern orchestral writing, an evil spirit which wars against intelligibility and beauty, which obscures the light that radiates from all true art. I honestly doubt if the Prelude left any save the very vaguest impression upon those who heard it to-day. 1t seemed, in my own case, to lack definiteness of idea and clearness of utterance. I could not discover what it was trying to say. Had it simply claimed to be a study of the dissonant the pretension would have been willingly allowed, but the music must have a purpose other that. What is it? The piece itself does not answer Call it prelude to Dante’s ‘Purgatory' and many will accept the idea as appropriate, but then the composer may not approve, and he is the arbiter. 

Mr. Taylor conducted in person with gratifying success, the fine orchestra following his indications with zeal and discretion." - Daily Telegraph - Thursday 14 September 1899

"Mr. Coleridge-Taylor, who was a student at the Royal College of Music, is about to marry an English lady was also a student at the College" - Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer - Friday 15 September 1899 

"There not any means such crowded congregation as the case on the Elijah day, when Mr. Coleridge-Taylor, the African genius, ascended the dais, but nevertheless, there was a most satisfactory attendance. Mr. Coleridge-Taylor’s contribution was a Solemn Prelude for full orchestra (op. 40), which he had composed specially for the Festival, and of course conducted himself. Unfortunately, the wonderful and most talented musician had only been able to devote limited time to rehearsal, and had not had any opportunity of giving much instruction to the band. It cannot, however, be said that this new work is by any means so good as his Ballad in A Minor, given for the first time at Gloucester last year, the favourable reports which had reached Worcester of the work hardly being borne out" - Gloucestershire Chronicle - Saturday 16 September 1899

"Mr. Coleridge Taylor is also here, the guest of Mr. and Mrs. Lee Williams, who are likewise chaperoning the West-African complexioned composer's affianced bride." - Worcestershire Chronicle - Saturday 16 September 1899




1903

"Mr. Walter Crane is 58, Mr. Keir Hardie is 47, “T. Nesbit’ and Mr. Maarten Maartens are each 45; the Emperor of China is 32 and Mr. Samuel Coleridge Taylor, the Anglo-African musician, is 28." - Labour Leader - Saturday 22 August 1903

27 November 2024

Racial descriptions of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor : From childhood the Ballade in A minor

 

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, aged about ten, 
while studying violin with Joseph Beckwith

The composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was born at 15 Theobalds Road, Holborn, now part of the London Borough of Camden, in 1875. 

His father, Dr Peter Hughes Taylor was from Sierra Leone. In the terminology of the UK National Office of Statistics in 2021, he was "Black or African". His mother, Alice Hare Martin, was "White". 

Dr Taylor and Miss Martin were not married. There is no evidence that he knew of Alice's pregnancy when he returned to Africa before his son's birth.

Newspaper references begin in 1886 when Samuel was eleven, and are uniformly positively for the next ten years, praising his violin playing and, later, compositions. At this stage of his career very few items mention the colour of his skin. Those that do, use the word "coloured", a word which at the time was seen as both respectful and respectable.


1886

"a little coloured fellow of 11 years" - Willesden Chronicle - Friday 3 December 1886


1888

"a little coloured boy with a fine voice" - Christian World - Thursday 12 July 1888


1895

"A new clarionet [sic] quintet from the pen of Mr Coleridge Taylor, the clever coloured student in the Royal College of Music" - The Scotsman - Thursday 11 July 1895


1896

"Mr. S. Coleridge Taylor, a young composer of African extraction, who is still a student the institution over which Dr. Hubert Parry presides" - Globe - Thursday 23 January 1896

"The first three movements of and very clever symphony, by the African student, Mr Coleridge Taylor, again drew attention to the young composer" - Irish Times - Saturday 7 March 1896

"Another attractive item in the programme was a symphony in A minor by Mr. S. Coleridge Taylor, who is an African." - Leeds Mercury - Saturday 7 March 1896

"A work of considerable promise was forthcoming in a Symphony by a student, Mr. S. Coleridge Taylor, a young gentleman of colour, who is possessed of original gifts" - Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News - Saturday 14 March 1896

"A native West African musical composer has produced a symphony in London, which is described as original, effective and promising. His name is Coleridge Taylor. and he is only twenty years old. He is not a black man, however." - Lyttelton Times (New Zealand) - Thursday 11 June 1896

"Mr. S. Coleridge Taylor, scholar of the Royal College of Music, is perhaps one of the most interesting. He has hitherto been introduced to the public chiefly by Symphony, given a few months ago at St. James’s Hall, and by several recently published pieces for violin and piano, a list to which must now be added a Quartet for strings performed last night for the first time at a College concert. Probably there is no severer test to which a composer can put himself than this form composition, and it would be scarcely true to say more of Mr. Coleridge Taylor's Quartet than that, like his former works, it is inspired with a distinct individuality, uncouth, barbaric, it may be, but for that very reason refreshing in the present, and encouraging for the future. Of course Mr. Taylor’s powers have not as yet found anything like their full development; his uncouthness is occasionally rather tame, and his barbarism decidedly mechanical, depending often for its effect upon a tom-tom accompaniment in the bass to a banshee melody above." - Globe - Friday 26 June 1896


1898

"A new orchestral Ballade in A minor by the young Anglo-African, Mr. Coleridge-Taylor" - Leeds Mercury - Friday 5 August 1898

"Mr. S. Coleridge-Taylor, who has composed a Ballade in A Minor for the Festival, is an Anglo- African, born in London in 1875." - Gloucester Journal - Saturday 27 August 1898

"The Musical Times has also a portrait of Mr. S. Coleridge-Taylor. The writer says:

It is very seldom that a young composer under twenty-three years ago receives the distinction being asked to a work for one of the Festivals. Some people speak of Mr. Coleridge-Taylor, who has thus been favoured, as a "coming man", while there are those who make bold to say that has arrived already. Coleridge-Taylor was born in London on August 15, 1875. His father, a doctor of medicine, was a native of Sierra Leone, on the West Coast of Africa, while his mother was an Englishwoman. “None of my people were at all musical from serious point of view,” Mr. Taylor informs us. He began to study music when was six years old." - Gloucestershire Chronicle - Saturday 3 September 1898

"Mr. S. Coleridge-Taylor is a coloured gentleman. His father was a doctor, a native of Sierra Leone, West Coast of Africa, and his mother was an Englishwoman." - Gloucester Journal - Saturday 3 September 1898

"The programme also included Mr. Coleridge Taylor's Ballade in A minor—after which Sir Arthur Sullivan warmly congratulated the swarthy composer" - Gloucester Citizen - Friday 9 September 1898

"On resuming after the interval, Mr. Coleridge Taylor, the  African composer, and a musician of great promise, came forward to conduct his Ballade in A Minor. This proved to be a highly effective work, the themes being melodious, while the scoring exhibited skill and a feeling for the picturesque. The influence of Tschaikovsky is evidently strong with the coloured composer, who delights in showy taste. Mr. Coleridge Taylor was warmly congratulated by Sir Arthur Sullivan and several other well-known musicians, and applause was showered upon him by the select party of connoisseurs present." -Evening Irish Times - Friday 9 September 1898

"Another work that will bring additional fame to the composer is a Ballade in A minor, by S. Coleridge- Taylor, a work written especially for the Festival. It will unquestionably rank amongst the best of short orchestral compositions. In parts it is perfectly thrilling in its barbaric splendour, and will prove a great treat. At its conclusion to-day the composer was warmly applauded by the select few who were privileged to be present, including Sir Arthur Sullivan, Dr. Lloyd, and others." - Gloucestershire Chronicle - Saturday 10 September 1898

"Then Mr. S. Coleridge-Taylor ascended the platform to conduct his Ballade in A Minor. The dusky composer's advent had evidently been awaited with considerable interest, and he received quite an ovation from orchestra and auditorium; and the applause was redoubled at the conclusion of his striking and original composition, some portions of which were tried over a second time [at this rehearsal]." - Gloucester Citizen - Tuesday 13 September 1898

"A COLOURED COMPOSER. The big success of the Gloucester Festival so far lies with Mr. Coleridge Taylor, the first coloured subject of the Queen who has challenged the opinions of the supporters of a great British Musical Festival." - Yorkshire Evening Post - Tuesday 13 September 1898

"also the Ballade for Orchestra of Mr. Coleridge Taylor, a young mulatto composer." - Westminster Gazette - Tuesday 13 September 1898

"There is a decided novelty at the Gloucester Musical Festival this week. It is the production of a work by Mr. Coleridge Taylor, the first coloured subject of the Queen to whom that honour has been accorded. Mr Taylor's mother was English, and he was born in London, but his father was a doctor from Sierra Leone, and his bushy hair and swarthy skin unmistakably betray his origin. His orchestral piece in A Minor has been received at rehearsals with great favour." - Western Mail - Wednesday 14 September 1898

"The advent of Mr. S. Coleridge-Taylor to conduct his orchestral work was awaited with considerable interest and some curiosity; and when the dusky Anglo-African appeared on the platform he received a flattering greeting. Mr. Coleridge-Taylor is justly regarded as a budding genius. In his case musical talent is not supposed to be hereditary; at any rate he has not derived it either from his father, a doctor, who was a native of Sierra Leone, or his mother, who was of English birth." - Gloucester Citizen - Thursday 15 September 1898

"Very different was the greeting accorded to the young coloured composer, Mr. Coleridge Taylor, who on stepping on to the platform to conduct his new orchestral piece in A Minor had round upon round of ringing cheers. Mr. Taylor has erroneously been described as a West African by birth. His father, it is true,, was a medical man front Sierra Leone. but the young composer's mother was British, and he  himself was born in London. He was one of the best of Sir Charles Parry's pupils at the Royal College of Music, and he is now a professor of the violin. Several of Mr. Taylor's works have been heard at the Royal College concerts, and the young man, who is now only three-and-twenty, his swarthy hue and bushy hair indicating beyond question his African origin, has for some time past been watched with interest as a coming composer. That he has that spirit of diffidence, and an enthusiasm for the ideal, which have marked so many great composers from Mendelssohn downwards, may be judged by the fact that since his piece was rehearsed in London he has made several alterations in it. It is rather absurdly described as a Ballade, and it is quite possible that it has a programme, the secret of which, of course, it is wholly impossible to guess. The influence of Tschaikowsky and Berlioz, and even of Raff, is to a certain extent noticeable, but Mr. Taylor is beyond question a composer with an individuality of his own, and is full of the spirit and fire of a race warmer in blood than our own." - Daily News - Thursday 15 September 1898

"Mr. Coleridge Taylor came forward as a complete stranger, and his new ballad in A minor excited lively anticipations. Mr. Coleridge Taylor is not yet known to fame or the musical dictionaries, but he has, none the less, begun to make his mark, and his future career promises to be no empty one. The young musician’s father was an African doctor of medicine, and from him Mr. Coleridge Taylor inherits the facial and hirsutical attributes of the African. We have lately had the spectacle of an Indian Prince showing us how to bat; now, we have another of Eastern descent giving proof of remarkable artistic gifts. Though of unmistakable African type, Mr. Coleridge Taylor is a Londoner by birth, and a late pupil of Professor Stanford at the Royal College of Music. Among his compositions are a symphony, a clarinet quintet—which was brought out in Berlin by no less famous sponsors than Dr. Joachim and  Professor Stanford—a set of Fantasie Stucke [sic] for string quartet, and some African romances for which the negro poet, Paul Dunbar, wrote the text. The new ballade an its dusky composer had a remarkably cordial reception from the crowded audience. The novelty is of the rhapsodic order, and a rhapsody indeed, composer intended to entitle it. That is has a programme is frankly confessed, though what this is Mr. Coleridge Taylor does not care to divulge. One cannot call the music uncivilised, since it highly sophisticated, and even Wagnerian; but there is a welcome touch of the barbaric about it, and an alien echo of some Kaffir war dance, or the weird chant of the witch doctor, possibly, that makes itself felt through all the teaching of the schools employed in a manner that suggests a compromise between the methods of Wagner and those of Edward German. -  Leeds Mercury - Thursday 15 September 1898

"The chief item of the programme, however, was undoubtedly Mr. S. Coleridge-Taylor’s orchestral ballad, which the young composer conducted himself. This promising dark-skinned musician, with his thick curly hair, who is the son of a medical man who practised in Sierra Leone, was, however, born in the metropolis." - St James's Gazette - Thursday 15 September 1898

"A third feature of importance in last night's programme was a so-called Ballade—why Ballade I cannot conceive—written for orchestra by Mr. Coleridge Taylor, a young musician who represents, through his father, a Sierra Leone doctor, the race of Ham, and derives from his mother an Anglo-Saxon strain. In this gentleman's appearance the African predominates, as appears to be the case in his music also; and the novelty of Mr. Taylor's apparition as a composer trained in England accounts, perhaps, for the unusual enthusiasm of the Gloucester public in his favour. The Ballade, so called, is really a rhapsody of the most violent description, indicating, however, very great talent. together with a temperament and disposition which may eventually lead to interesting, possibly to valuable results. I am not going to discuss the work, but simply to observe that already, through the Russians, we possess enough of music tinctured by the barbaric. Our art is not, I hope, to be controlled by primitive instincts, but the hope is faint, seeing how the public applaud that which is bizarre, extravagant and startling. The best wish for the clever Anglo-African is that he may exercise restraint and attain to the chaste dignity of highly-cultured art. This he may do without injuring that which gives character to his music. Mr. Taylor, being only twenty-four, is necessarily at a formative stage. His development will be worth watching." - Daily Telegraph - Friday 16 September 1898

"I am inclined to think that the urchins who sell programmes and music in the streets of Gloucester possess fine sense of humour. If not, why should they have offered copies of Wesley’s motet, In Exitu Israel, which is by means of the emotional order, under the title, In Excite You? By way of compensation, however, they sold programmes for Wednesday’s concert in the Shire Hall as "books for this evening’s service." This was peculiarly malapropos, since the most striking piece in the programme was Mr. Coleridge-Taylor’s orchestral ballade. That might suit the service in which the Priests of Baal leap upon the altar, and cut themselves with knives and lancets, but would be singularly out of place in connection with any more civilised rites. As matter of fact, it is just the refreshing barbarism of this “ballade,” or fantasia, that is among its chief recommendations. No doubt its youthful composer has heard Tschaikowsky’s Pathetic Symphony more than once, but I am inclined to think he is something other than a mere imitator. When one learns of his semi-African parentage, or sees his strongly characteristic head and dusky complexion, it is easy to find in his music traces of the untrammelled and untutored savage, but one needs not to go behind the score to appreciate its wild and youthful vigour. His melody has a welcome ring of emotional feeling, and he handles the orchestra as if to the manner born. I believe he is only 23 years old, but at any rate he is so young one feels that here is a composer to be reckoned with. His career will be watched with intense interest." - Globe - Saturday 17 September 1898

"Another very interesting personality has been introduced to the general musical public in the composer of the orchestral Ballade in A minor, which was performed in the Shire Hall on Wednesday evening. Mr. S. Coleridge Taylor is an Anglo-African. Born in London twenty-three years ago he was a scholar at the Royal College of Music, and though he had already written many pieces for the violin, for which his name was favourably known to critics, his "arrival" as an artist of undoubted originality and creative power will date from the production of the Ballade. Admirably played by the Festival band under the composer's direction, it was received with an enthusiasm which will not readily be forgotten, and which was the more remarkable from the fact that the tropical temperature of the gas-lit Hall, made applause an exertion. Tropical, too, was the music, instinct with the racial feeling, yet displaying in a very high degree a scholar's command of the resources of tonal art." - Cheltenham Examiner - Wednesday 21 September 1898

"Of the numerous novelties produced, the most successful was a Rhapsody in A minor by a young African musician, Mr. Coleridge Taylor. Somebody, it seems, without consulting the composer, re-christened this piece a Ballade, which it is not. Composers, from Beethoven downwards, have suffered from this species of impudence, although it was hardly thought that any one would try it on in the present day. At any rate the composer himself never called his piece a Ballade, and he thinks the term Rhapsody more appropriate; an expression of opinion which most of us will cordially share." - Truth - Thursday 22 September 1898

"One of the features of the Festival was heard played therein by Mr. Coleridge Taylor, a young coloured gentleman, who has studied to excellent purpose at the Royal College of Music. The Gloucester authorities invited him to write something for the Festival, and Mr, Coleridge Taylor suggested that a short cantata of his, Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast, should should be taken up, but an orchestral work being preferred, he produced a Ballade in A minor, which was practically completed in the short space of two days. This Ballade was remarkably successful in performance under the composer's direction at the only secular concert of the Festival. Objection has been taken to its title, but if the very vaguely significant heading of Ballade may be regarded as suggesting a nearer approximation to musical form than Rhapsody, then we prefer the former, for, if rhapsodic in spirit, the new work is possessed of a first and second subject, with an episode of some pretence to development.

Mr. Coleridge Taylor is a capital conductor and thorough musician. His Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast,  speedily win favour with choral societies, to whose attention it may be recommended. It been published by Messrs. Novello." - Leeds Mercury - Friday 23 September 1898

"MR. COLERIDGE-TAYLOR’S BALLADE IN A MINOR.  Civilisation has done much for man in transforming his manners, his habits, and his morals (or want of them). It has weakened the brutality of his vices, and widened and strengthened the field and scope of hie innate and acquired virtues. It has been the mightiest factor in the redemption and purifying of mankind, and yet, even at its highest development, history teaches that civilisation is but as a cloak or garment, which man wraps about himself in order to dissemble the true nature which expediency prompts him conceal. 

So in our smooth, curtailed, over-civilised little lives we live heeding and knowing little or nothing of the volcano of passion of lawlessness of fierce and primitive nature that lies hid all the while beneath, the calm exteriors of our fellows. But a word a cry, throb of music, and the old deep chords are fired in moment into burning flame, and the things of expediency are put behind us and done with, and the whole man is aflame with the vital, mighty instincts of the underlying and explosive life of the senses. 

To these reflections were brought, or rather were they forced upon us during the performance of Mr. Coleridge-Taylor’s marvellous Ballade in A minor given at the Shire Hall Concert on Wednesday evening. Strong and vital as though freshly sprung from the fiery, hot chaotic heart of the mine of life, the wild, strange, rhythmic music echoed and throbbed, its barbaric opening passage powerfully impressing one with a sense of the fantastic, untamed and untameable emotional life from which it issued. Redolent of half-savage, primitive force and power, it seemed to be horn of the wild emotional sense-life of a people in intimate touch with the elemental life of nature. The passion of love seemed to burn in it fiercer than death, and blood-red in its violent beauty; the passion of war, of battle, and conflict; and the eager, unchecked delight in feats of daring, of bloodshed, and courage—perhaps even the passion of death, too, but (decked out, fantastic in gaudy-coloured trappings and vestments—mocking at life and its impuissance) all the great, changeless, primary, lawless instincts, and needs of life when lived with the blood hot in the veins, and youth and love bright in the eyes—palpitated, vibrating in the air—awakening by the power of the music. 

For once music seemed no longer the slave of a master, but a free, chainless, fetterless element above law, above limit, a free elemental agent, pregnant and alive with the essence and heart of original life and being, echoing the elemental force and vigour, the excitement and madness, the glee and the brutal ecstasy in living, that lies hidden deep, deep down in the heart of each living creature,— impinged upon, cheeked, hindered, hampered though it be by the bonds of usage and custom, by the weight of time and established rule, the whole balanced order, in a word, of the ordinary inexpressive, unemotional life of routine. 

Here in these northern latitudes, in their rigour and severity, moral well as physical, whore Stoicism plays presiding genius, and where emotion is curtailed, despised, and overborne, such music as that of this Ballade of Mr. Coleridge-Taylor comes as a revelation and as revealer of the "secrets of the mysteries." Its composer is man of the South, and therefore endowed by natural heritage, with the gift of warm, rich, extravagant and glowing imagination, heated with all the vigour, coloured with all the fervid splendours, burning with the excessive abundance and exuberance of a race only recently evolving towards manifestation of its art and its genius. It is, comparatively, so young in time that it leaves the older races of civilisation in astonishment at the development it already begins to express; and once its pitch of expression reached, its power and spirit fully awakened and aroused, what secrets may it not have to unfold, what strange, wonderful messages to send forth along the line of the older civilisations? 

In this light, Mr. Taylor’s work is like a hand beckoning from another world, like a rift opening on the mysteries of the unknown things, for his art bids fair to be the exponent of new and hitherto neglected phases of life and emotion, and to be the herald of later manifestations of the inner life, the tears and joys and all the primitive unspoilt sensational development of a people who have not yet spoken their word in the manifestation of the spirit and "talents" of the nations. - Gloucester Journal - Saturday 24 September 1898

"Of a widely different order was the other chief novelty— the sensational ballad of Mr. Coleridge Taylor. The composer is only twenty-three, and is the son of an African doctor. At the age of eighteen he won the Composition Scholarship at the Royal College of Music, where he has since worked under Villiers Stanford. His work is daringly weird and original, full of outbursts of wild melody, and with a sort of barbaric splendour which fascinated band and audience alike. We shall hear more of this young genius in the near future." - Gentlewoman - Saturday 24 September 1898

"The "Colour Line" and The Daily News. It is generally known by those who have looked into the question, that although the coloured man in America has been "freed," he is by no means as free in that country as the term implies. To us, however, and we believe to every true Socialist, the colour of a man's skin is a mere detail of absolutely no moment, and we do not hesitate to say that we accept man on his merit, without regard to his nation, race, creed, or colour. 

This is as it should be, and we, therefore, always regret to see any indication that in this country the narrow view of the average American on the colour question is accepted in the slightest degree. We noticed what we consider the wrong note struck in connection with The Daily News report of the musical festival held recently in Gloucester. Says the writer, when referring to the success attending the production of an orchestral piece by a coloured composer (Mr. Coleridge Taylor): "Mr. Taylor has been erroneously described as a West African by birth. His father, it is true, was a medical man from Sierra Leone, but the young composer's mother was British, and he himself was born in London," and then the writer proceeds to describe him as "only three and twenty years of age, his swarthy hue and bushy hair indicating beyond question his African origin." 

Why this attempt to belittle his African blood? An African is the equal of an Englishman, and not being responsible for his colour he should not be made to feel that it in any way disqualifies him as a man. The fact that Mr. Taylor's mother was "British" does not make his music any the sweeter, why then emphasise the nationality of the mother at the expense the father. It is not creditable for The Daily News to, in the least degree, lend itself to the upholding of race prejudice." - Labour Leader - Saturday 5 November 1898

Continues...

07 September 2024

Tavistock Library - a short history

This is a history of the public library run by Devon County Council. Not to be confused with the independent Tavistock Subscription Library or the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust Library and Information Service.

In the beginning

The history of libraries in Tavistock goes back over one thousand years to the abbey founded by Ordwulf, son of Ordgar, Ealdorman of Devon, in the year 974. The abbey had a scriptorium for copying manuscripts, and the works being copied would have formed part of the abbey's library.

By 1525 Tavistock Abbey had a printing press, and it was there that The boke of comfort called in latyn Boecius de consolatione philosophie was printed by "me Dan Thomas Rychard monke of the sayd Monastery, To the instant desyre of the ryght worshypful esquyer Mayster Robert Langdon." What happened to the press and collection of books and manuscripts after the dissolution of the abbey in 1539 is a matter for speculation.

Tavistock Subscription Library

The concept of a free public library, open to all and managed by a local authority, did not develop fully until the mid-nineteenth century. But in 1799 Tavistock's first library, available to all on payment of a subscription, was opened. This was at a time before compulsory education existed so literacy was limited. If you could read, it was likely that you could also afford the subscription. The idea behind the library was simple - one person could only afford a limited number of books in their own personal collection. By clubbing together with other like-minded individuals a much larger collection could be established by pooling resources.

As the Subscription Library still exists and its history is well-documented, we will move on to the first true "public library" in Tavistock.

Public Libraries Act, 1850

The Public Libraries Act 1850 enabled towns and districts to establish free public libraries. It allowed local authorities with a population over 10,000 to spend one halfpenny in the pound on the service, subject to a vote approved by two thirds of the local ratepayers. Tavistock's population in 1851 was 8,036. The Public Libraries and Museums Act 1855 reduced the population requirement to 5,000 and increased the expenditure to one penny in the pound - the so-called "penny rate". Further legislation in 1866 removed the population requirement entirely.

Devon's free public libraries

It's one thing for legislation to exist which allows free public libraries to be opened, but a very different thing for them to open. Devon's first was in Exeter which opened the first true free public library in the county in 1870, the same year as Leeds. The Borough of Plymouth opened its first library in the former Guildhall in 1876, the Borough of Bideford followed in 1877, and the Borough of Devonport in 1882. Devonport was unusual in that the corporation took over the library and collections of the former Mechanics' Institute which had been transferred from the Civil and Military Library in 1865. South Molton followed in 1889, Moretonhampstead in 1902, Newton Abbot in 1904, and Torquay in 1907.

But what of Barnstaple, Paignton, Tiverton, Exmouth - and Tavistock?

Enter the County Council

Council councils were created in 1888, largely taking over the administrative functions of the unelected county courts of quarter sessions. They consisted of councillors, directly elected by the electorate; and county aldermen, chosen by the council itself. In the wake of the Great War, the Public Libraries Act 1919 allowed county councils to open and run free public libraries. It also allowed small library authorities, such as South Molton and Moretonhampstead, to hand over their services to the county council.

All this needed money, as opening public libraries had done in larger towns. And, as in larger towns, Andrew Carnegie, Dunfermline-born American steel magnate came to the rescue. The Western Times of 4 January 1924:
An explanation of the Rural Library Scheme was made to the Devon Education Committee at the Castle of Exeter yesterday by the Secretary of the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust (Colonel Mitchell). Members were previously handed a brief memorandum of the scheme, together with a short summary of the chief provisions of the Public Libraries Act, 1919. The information in the memorandum was based chiefly on recent reports by the Carnegie Trust.
It was pointed out that a grant made by the Trustees is calculated at the rate of £1 for five books, one book being allowed for each five of the school population. In one case of Devon this would mean a grant between £1,700 and £1,800. The Trustees consider that such a supply would probably be adequate for about five years, after which the Council would have to make substantial purchases of books each year...
With the help of the Trustees a Central Library Scheme in London has been inaugurated for the loan of expensive books of an advanced character, which may be obtained through the Rural Library Scheme by students in rural areas...
The scheme would be under the management of a County Librarian, and the Trustees as condition of their grant require that a salary of not less than £300 a year [£23,000 in 2024] should be offered in an area such as Devon. The cost of maintenance has not reached a halfpenny rate in any county, and is generally considerably less than that.
Colonel Mitchell explained that it was the late Mr. Carnegie's belief that one of the ways he could help in the spread of knowledge was to give a large sum of money for the erection of borough libraries. These buildings were now in various parts of the country, and were maintained out of the rates, the average rates levied for their upkeep being equivalent to one penny three-farthings the pound.
What was desirable for the boroughs was even more desirable for the villages, and nowhere more so than in Devon, where the population was scattered in as high a degree as anywhere in England or Scotland.

In practical terms, a central store was required together with locations in towns and villages across the county, probably in schools, where the deposit collections were available. Books, packed in boxes, were to be sent to each location and, after an appropriate amount of time, returned to the store for reallocation to the next location. Experience had shown that central monitoring of the collections was essential, and one location simply sending a box to another did not work.

Colonel Mitchell added that this offer was time-limited and had to be accepted by the end of 1925.

Devon County Library

It was hard for the county councillors to turn down the offer of free money to set up a much-needed service which would reduce the inequality between those living in rural areas and those in the county's boroughs. No time was lost.

The Western Morning News reported on Wednesday 18 June 1924:

[Tomorrow] the Education Committee will report, with reference to the county library scheme under the Public Libraries Act, that the sub-committee have appointed as librarian Mr. S. T. Williams, senior assistant librarian of the Cambridge Borough Free Library, who will take his duties on July 1.

A central depot for books will be established in Exeter, from which boxes of books will be sent out three times a year to local centres.

By September 1924 things had moved on apace. The service would be known as the Devon County Library, with its premises in Colleton Crescent until more suitable ones could be found. A list of 52 or 53 centres had been drawn up to receive the books.

Tavistock's County Library Centre

The Western Morning News of Monday 2 March 1925 provides an update, and for the first time Tavistock features. The population of Devon to be served is about 310,000 with a grant of £2,900 from the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust of which at least £2,200 [about £168,000 in 2024] must be spent on books. The balance to be spent on boxes and furniture.

📌 Personal aside: Those boxes were still in use when I started work in Exeter Central Library in 1981. Strongly made of wood, they were about three feet wide, two feet from front to back and eight inches in depth. They had metal fastenings which could be secured with a padlock. They had to be strong, being taken to railway station in Exeter and sent by rail. When they reached their destination they were loads on to carts or lorries and taken to their destination. They ended their lives carrying books to residential homes in Exeter.

Tavistock's population was reckoned at 5,238 and the centre would initially receive 400 books, increasing to 500 by the end of the first year. Torquay, the largest centre, would receive 3,000 increasing to 4,000.

A better class of book is generally required in the larger places than in the villages. Although there are exceptions, most of the latter require only the simplest non-fiction, but in larger places the percentage of non-fiction required is higher and more advanced. It is probable that a large number of modern works of travel, biography, essays, and up-to-date works on a variety of subjects will required. These books are published at a high price, and it is not possible to purchase many of them new, unless the average cost of the book is to be much higher than at present. Many of the books, however, can be obtained at about a third of the published price, and bought in large numbers at one time can frequently be purchased very cheaply.

Agatha Christie on the rates

The objection to public libraries stocking "light" fiction is an old one which ignores what we would now call the benefits to mental health they bring. The Western Times of 19 March 1926 hints at a discomfort on the part of library staff: 
The opinion expressed by many librarians is, says the report, that in time works of an educational nature will be more widely read.
And in the Western Times of 13 April 1928 it surfaced again:
Mr Batting...wished the practical side could be developed at the expense of the fiction side. It sickened him somewhat to find young fellows and girls going to their schools and getting books of fiction and poring over them morning, noon and night. Could it do very much good? Mr. Goaman said was to the credit of the Devonshire people that they were actually reading a higher percentage than the average of practical books. Even small villages were showing well in this respect.

Into the Thirties

It's clear from reports from other towns in Devon, including Torrington, Plympton and Plymstock, that staffed branches were opened. In 1935 the post of Male Branch Librarian at Paignton was advertised with a salary of £150 a year [£13,500 in 2024]. Applicants had to be certificated members of the Library Association.

Tavistock was not in the fortunate position of Paignton or other larger towns. The service was run for two hours a week by volunteers "operating in cramped conditions in a room used during the day as an office of the Urban District Council and with minimum equipment necessary for library purposes". [Librarian's Annual Report for year ending 31 Jan 1949]

At County Library level, the service moved to 138 Cowick Street in Exeter, the former St Thomas Rural District Council premises opposite the parish church. From there Cyril Manchester and later E. J. Coombe ran their ever-expanding domains. Cowick Street was much more convenient for despatch of those wooden boxes from St Thomas railway station. By 1942 the headquarters had moved to Barley House, high above St Thomas, where it remained until the late 1990s.

Planning the new library

Under the system of local democracy then in use, each County Branch Library was overseen by a local Sub-Committee. In Tavistock, at its fullest in 1956, it comprised representatives from:

  • Tavistock Urban District Council
  • Tavistock Rural District Council
  • Co-opted Members
  • County Council representatives

The book of minutes starting from the initial meeting in 1947 has been preserved and its pages provide us with considerable, and not always interesting, information.

The first meeting took place in the Council Chambers on 28 July 1947, attended by Mr. Heyden, JP, (in the chair), Mrs M. E. Bazley, Mr A. H. Callaway, Mr E. H. Conybeare, Mr Frank G. Quant* and E. J. Coombe, the County Librarian.

It was agreed that the opening hours would be:

Monday: 2.30 - 4.30pm, 6 - 8pm
Wednesday: 6 - 8pm
Thursday: 2.30 - 4.30pm
Friday (market day): 11am - 1pm, 2.30 - 4.30pm, 6 - 8pm
Saturday: 2.30 - 4.30pm, 6 - 8pm

The County Librarian would advertise for the post of Librarian and the opening date would be agreed by the Chair and the County Librarian.

📌 Personal aside: Frank Quant, JP, (1900-1985) who had worked for the London and South Western and Southern Railways bequeathed his collection of railway books to the library.

The Library opens

By January 1948 the new library in the east corner of the main Pannier Market building had been fitted out. But sparsely, as future discussions would show. It was opened to the public on 28 January 1948 between 4pm and 8pm. The Branch Librarian, working 18 hours a week, was Mr. S. Brock.

The Western Morning News of 29 January 1948:

LET THEM READ ADVENTURES
ADVICE WHEN NEW LIBRARY OPENED
A warning against condemning the reading of adventure books children was given by Mr. John Day (vice-chairman Devon Education Committee and the County Library Committee's chairman) at a public meeting before officially opening Tavistock's new branch of Devon County Library.
The spirit of adventure of Tavistock's greatest man—Sir Francis Drake—would live as long as the English race endured, he declared. Mr. Day recalled that a library was first founded in Tavistock by John Tayler, of Holwell, in 1799. Tavistock had always been a seat of teaming, and in 1524 had a printing press, one of the earliest in the country. Many notable men and women, writers, and statesmen had lived there.

The main difference between libraries of the past and those of the present was that once books had been the privilege of the few, but now a social service for many was being established.

The true library rate for last year was 4d., and the 1949 rate would be 4½d.; not a great increase when the service of the libraries was borne in mind. 

The Western Times of 30 January 1948 gave a different account: 

A warning against condemning the reading of adventure books by children was given by Mr. John Day (vice-chairman of Devon Education Committee and the County Library Committee's chairman) at a public meeting before officially opening Tavistock's new branch of Devon County Library...

The new branch was the thirteenth to be established in the county's post-war programme, Mr. Day continued. It would be open for 18 hours a week instead of two hours a week as in olden days, and 4,500 books would be available, increasing to 6,000.

Mr. J. Heyden (chairman of Tavistock Urban Council) said the new centre, in the pannier market, was not an ideal one. nor was it in an ideal place, but it was central and spacious, and better than nothing.

📌 Personal aside: Arriving in Tavistock as Librarian-in-charge in 1983, the Area Librarian told me that a town centre location, though small, was better as it was more likely to be used by shoppers.

The minutes of the Sub-Committee meeting on 18 February 1948 tell us that in the first seventeen days of opening 941 new members had joined and 3,114 books had been borrowed.

Of the new members, 81 lived outside the town in places such as Brentor, Lamerton, Lydford, Mary and Peter Tavy, and Yelverton.

There were 386 women members, and 367 men; 102 boys and 86 girls.

Adult fiction, unsurprisingly, was the most popular with 1,554 loans. Adult non-fiction represented 792. Children's fiction (as discussed by Mr Day at the opening) was 451 and non-fiction 317.

📌 Personal aside: "Lt.-Comdr. S. Brock" as he is described in an article in the Tavistock Times of 30 July 1948 has proved to be an interesting and somewhat elusive character. Samuel Brock, born in the Coastguard Buildings at Grade, near Ruan Minor, Cornwall, on 6 June 1889. His father had joined the Royal Navy, claiming to be 14 at the age of 13; by 1879, when was married, he had transferred to the Coastguard at Weymouth. He had retired to Uffculme by 1911 but rejoined the Coastguard for the duration of the Great War. He was promoted to the honorary rank of Lieutenant Commander (retired) in November 1923 and died in Uffculme in 1942

His son Samuel, our first branch librarian, seems to have adopted his father's rank for his own purposes. He trained as a draughtsman and worked for a railway signalling company in Kilburn. Married at Hampstead Register Office in 1909, he joined the Royal Army Service Corps as a Motor Transport Driver in October 1916, specialising in driving lorries. He was discharged in November 1919 with an injury to his ankle. In 1939 Samuel and his family were living in St Albans where he had resumed working as a draughtsman.

It may never be clear what circumstances led Samuel to apply for the post of branch librarian when it was advertised, probably in the two Tavistock newspapers. His wife died in Kingston-upon-Thames in 1972. Samuel died in East Cornwall in July 1974 and was buried at St Ive.

Onwards and upwards

Such was the success of the new branch library that at the May 1948 meeting of the Sub-Committee it was unanimously resolved to extend the opening hours from 18 to 24. The Branch Librarian's salary was also increased to £150 [£6,800 in 2024] and an assistant appointed for 12 hours a week to help at busy periods.

Mr Quant suggested that a bench be provided and one was to be obtained from the Urban District Council store. And all agreed that an electric clock should be provided.

The West Devon Regional Library

With the branch library up and running - and the hours of Mrs N. Phillips, assistant librarian, increased from 12 to 18 - Mr Snook from Headquarters attended the Sub-Committee on 22 July 1948 to explain the concept of the Regional Library. Because of Tavistock's success and distance from Exeter, he proposed that collections of books for the rural centres should be assembled and despatched from Tavistock rather than the county town. An additional 3,000 books would be supplied together with a "qualified full-time Librarian" to run it from 1949. The branch would benefit from the additional books "floating through it", and (possibly) longer opening hours.

Mr Quant, who we can tell would have loved spreadsheets, had created graphs showing the number of loans and members for the previous quarter. They would be displayed in the library.

The Regional Librarian was confirmed as Mr K. G. Hunt who would start work in the autumn of 1948 in readiness for the Regional Library service to start in January 1949. The branch's opening hours would be increased to 30 per week.

📌 Personal aside: By the 1980s Ken Hunt had become Area Librarian in North Devon responsible for a vast rural area.

Minutiae

The minutes of the Sub-Committee meeting on 29 October 1948 give us an indication, if we needed one, of why the sub-committee system was eventually disbanded. But during its existence its members were valuable allies of the Branch Librarian.

E. J. Coombe travelled down from Exeter and announced that the heating for the Regional Library was being provided, that K. G. Hunt had moved to Exeter, that Mr J. G. Galt had been appointed in his place, and that a reconditioned vacuum cleaner had been bought.

The Sub-Committee recommended a glass screen to protect staff from the draught and a spring be fitted to the door for the same reason.

📌 Personal aside: Jack Galt (1923 - 2000) was the son of a solicitor's managing clerk from Exeter. On 29 September 1939 he was already working as a "librarian's clerk" in Exeter, though whether it was for the City or the County Library isn't clear. It's to Jack that we owe the compilation of a scrapbook of press cuttings about Tavistock Library as well as the continuation of the book of Sub-Committee minutes. He was nearing retirement when I joined Devon Library Services in 1981 and was working at the Barley House headquarters as Bibliographical Services Librarian. His memory stretched back many years and it was while I was working on the refurbishment of Tiverton Library in 1983 that he told me of the wooden book boxes being sent to Tiverton by train from Exeter, and taken up the hill to the library by horse and cart. As Tavistock's pioneer post-war librarian, I am dedicating this history to his memory. The initiatives which follow were put in place by Jack.

A full-time library

At the Sub-Committee meeting on 22 April 1949, the County Librarian announced a planned increase in opening hour to 40 per week, making Tavistock a "Full Time Branch Library", Alongside the increase was the appointment of a full-time Junior Assistant to be trained in the work of both the Branch Library and Regional Library. Unsurprisingly, the Sub-Committee was delighted. At the next meeting they were less delighted as the vacancy had only had three applications, and none had the School Certificate.

The Librarian's Report records the loan of a book to the National Central Library of Italy, and 39 books lent to other libraries in the UK. Quite an achievement for a library hardly a year old.

The new opening hours would be:

Monday: 10.30am - 1pm, 2pm - 7.30pm
Tuesday: 10.30am - 1pm, 2pm - 7.30pm
Wednesday: 10.30am - 1pm, 2pm - 7.30pm
Thursday: 10.30am - 1pm
Friday: 10.30am - 1pm, 2pm - 7.30pm
Saturday: 10.30am - 1pm, 2pm - 7.30pm

A library cleaner, Mr G. H. Slatter, was appointed to work eight hours per week at 2/0¾ [two shillings three-farthings] an hour.

Financial crisis

A report to the County Library Sub-Committee on 28 March 1951 spelled out the grim reality of local authority cuts, the first since the Second World War. The budget for new books for the County would be reduced from £21,000 to £14,000, and £2,500 less would be spent on fiction for adults. The impact would be to reduce the number of novels available by 15,000. Measures to mitigate included ending services to the H.M Forces and hospitals, and buying more secondhand books - and recalling 7,000 books from urban branch libraries, including Tavistock. And no requests would be taken for new fiction unless the books were of "outstanding literary merit".

Into the Fifties

Mr S. Brock, who had served as Branch Librarian at the library's opening, and subsequently become Part-Time Assistant, left the service on 26 September 1953. Mr P. J. Bawden joined as Full-Time Assistant on 28 September.

📌 Personal aside: Peter James Bawden was born in Truro in 1941 and died on 7 November 2018, fondly remembered by many people. He lived in Plympton for many years which is when I met him and was regaled with stories of the Tavistock Mobile Library in the 1950s, one the less salacious ones I repeat below. He was presented with the Music Shield of the Gorsedh Kernow in 2014 for "outstanding services to music in Cornwall." A man of many parts and a great sense of humour.

On 17 December 1954 the temporary BBC television transmitter controversially located on North Hessary Tor began broadcasting to the Tavistock area just in time for Christmas. 

The Cornish Guardian on 23 December 1954 took a positive view:

Used selectively, television is perhaps better entertainment than even sound broadcasting, and at times even more educational. We have always regarded as nonsense the attitude of people who, with so little experience say of television. "I wouldn't have it if you gave it to me." Much nearer the truth are the people who say, "You are not living in your day and generation without it." 

Jack Galt, now the West Regional Librarian, reported in April 1955:

The past working year has been satisfactory in every respect. A careful check on the use of the Library was made from the opening of the North Hessary Tor Television transmitter and, although adult reading showed a very slight decline in January and February [1954], March reading returned to the high level of the first nine months of the year.

The Regional Library saw some changes over the same period. The centres at Tavistock Secondary Modern School and Postbridge were transferred to Headquarters, Sydenham Damerel lapsed and Maristow House, a "school for retarded children" started. Horrabridge received an extra bookcase.

Enter the Travelling Library

The Tavistock Times of 1 July 1953 had some exciting news:

Thanks to the progress - unequalled by any other County Branch Library in Devon - made by the Tavistock branch under the guidance and care of Mr. J. E. Galt and his staff, the Devon County Library Committee decided to make a big experiment in the county using their model branch of Tavistock for the experiment.

"The operation of this new method will mean the disappearance of the village library service as we have known it for the last 30 years except that certain large villages which can offer a good choice of books to readers will continue to function."

Following the meeting an inspection was made of the new mobile library, blue and cream van, it measures 22ft. by 7ft. 6ins. and inside bookshelves reached from floor to ceiling. Skylights and electric lighting enhance the brightly-painted interior and lockers provided storage space for reserve books.

The mobile library will be staffed by a qualified librarian and a driver will assist with the books.

Inevitably, not everyone was happy as Plymouth's Western Evening Herald demonstrated  on 11 August 1954:

It would be boorish to begrudge the amenity, but it looks a little queer side by side with reports of Westcountry parents complaining that their children have to walk nearly three miles to school.

Taken in conjunction with the plastic cover innovation introduced by Plymouth, this will look a little like having literature delivered on the doorstep with the milk.

After three months of operation the Sub-Committee received a report. It had 134 stopping points, 2,000 registered readers and had issued more than 13,000 books. A six-fold increase in loans and 300 per cent increase in membership compared with the deposit system.

The end of an era - and the start of a new one

On 19 October 1957, Jack Galt, who had created the full-time library in Tavistock, the Regional Library and Travelling Library, left Tavistock and headed with his family to Exeter. There he became Readers' Advisor at the County Library branch within the Library Headquarters at Barley House. Until 1974, Exeter had two main public libraries - the City Library in the centre and the County Library on top of the hill in St Thomas. 

Jack was replaced as Regional Library on a temporary basis by Mr T. Shannon. At their meeting on 15 November 1957 the Sub-Committee recorded their unanimous appreciation of Jack's services.

📌 Personal aside: By the time I arrived in Devon in 1981 Terry Shannon was Librarian-in-Charge at Okehampton. Born in 1933, he died in 1999. 

Terry Shannon was soon replaced on a permanent basis by Mr R. E. P. Wood. Born in Plymstock in 1934, Ray Wood first appears in the minutes of the Sub-Committee on 2 May 1958. Proposals for library improvements included fluorescent lighting and the shelves and walls to be painted. The Travelling Library had issued 105,378, an increase of 25%.

📌 Personal aside: I knew Ray Wood well - he worked for me in Plymouth from 1987 until his retirement. Stories abound, but I will only give two of the more repeatable. The first comes from Peter Bawden who discovered an orthodox way of providing staff facilities on the Travelling Library - by lifting up a flap in the floor.

The second involves Ray's underwear which he would leave soaking overnight in the library's washbasin. There was also a story involving his pyjamas, a cat and filing cabinet...

Those were unorthodox for the male staff of the library service. Johnny Bright, working at Torrington Library, slept on the table in the library. Later, when I knew him, he was working at St Thomas Library in Exeter and was seriously concerned about the curtains in the staff room there.

On 25 July 1961 Devon County Library opened its biggest and busiest branch costing £29,000 - at Paignton.

By 1964, society was changing and the Sub-Committee questioned the late opening of the library until 8pm on so many evenings, especially on Saturdays. Ray was instructed to count the number of visitors after 5pm in half-hourly bands and report back to the next meeting.

The stocks of the Branch Library and Travelling Library were combined, allowing much easier exchanges between the two.

In March 1965 the results of the survey were clear, and the Sub-Committee recommended that the library close at 6.30pm on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, and 6pm on Saturday.

The members of the Sub-Committee were also told that it would cease to exist. The Sub-Committee recommended to the new Public Libraries Committee of the County Council that there should continue to be local representation.

The last days of the Devon County Library

In February 1971 the Conservative Government published a White Paper on the structure of Local Government in England. This led to the Local Government Act 1972 which reduced the Cities of Exeter and Plymouth and County Borough of Torbay to secondary authorities, subordinate to a new Devon County Council. In library terms, services in Exeter, Plymouth and Torbay would become part of a much larger Devon Library Service.

The uncertainty that led up to this decision saw Devon County Council rapidly investing in library buildings in "vulnerable" areas. Plympton received a temporary structure which lasted over forty years, Plymstock a smart new-build. It is probably at this time that Tavistock Library, under pressure in its corner of the Pannier Market, expanded into the ground floor of Court Gate - the space currently occupied by the Museum of Policing in Devon & Cornwall.

Brave New World

It's not clear exactly when Ray Wood left Tavistock, but it seems likely that his move to Plymouth coincided with the creation of the new service on 1 April 1974. This, from the County Library's perspective, saw a takeover by the former senior staff in Plymouth. E. J. Coombe, County Librarian, retired, as did Bill Best Harris, City Librarian of Plymouth. Rex Charlesworth, former Deputy in Plymouth became the first County Librarian of the new authority.

Tavistock, along with Ivybridge, Okehampton and Princetown, became part of the new service's West Area. It was never a happy situation. Plymouth's service was the busiest and biggest in Devon. Grafting three rural branches, not to mention three very rural Mobile Libraries, on to the largest urban system on the south coast of England, was not going to work.

The County's decentralised structure meant that Barnstaple, Exeter, Plymouth and Torquay became local headquarters for their area. Book stock purchase, headed up by Jack Galt, remained at Barley House. But for Tavistock an extra layer had been created. No longer was Barley House just a phone call away - everything had to be run through Plymouth first. And Plymouth's priorities and viewpoints were not always Tavistock's.

The new service inherited a vast amount of books, with a plethora of catalogues in different formats. Previously Tavistock had a card catalogue which was matched by a "union catalogue" of all the county's stock at Barley House. Now Exeter's, Plymouth's and Torbay's catalogues had to be combined and something usable created.

Enter the COMCAT

Devon became the biggest customer of the British Library's new BLAISE service. The result was a catalogue on microfiche which was updated annually with monthly supplements. For Tavistock's customers this opened up the large and important collections of Exeter and Plymouth. Books could be requested and delivered by the internal van service.

Many readers will remember the orange plastic fiche reader used in the old library and the sheaves of plastic sheets. 

Moving to the Fire Station

With the new Devon Library Services in charge, library buildings were reviewed. These ranged from the good - Churston was almost new in 1974 - to the ancient - Barnstaple. Tavistock's was inadequate for a growing town with a developing service.

With Christine Kinsman as Divisional Librarian, ably assisted by Jean Greaves, the library moved from the now-cramped Pannier Market space into the former Fire Station opposite. For the first time the library had a large Children's Library, in accordance with Plymouth's longstanding priority to develop services for children and young people.

Because the library was now so busy, issuing over 250,000 books a year - slightly behind Plympton and Plymstock - it was given a large, long counter to handle the manual system. Although Exeter was automated, and East Devon branches followed along with Plymouth, Plympton and Plymstock, it was to be ten years before Tavistock was connected.

Chris left and her place was taken by Tina Weekes. Tina moved to Paignton on a temporary basis in the early 1980s and took up the post permanently in 1983.

From 1983 to 1987

📌 Personal aside: I arrived at Exeter Central Library, fresh from Library School in London, in June 1981. Before Library School I had worked as a Library Assistant in Richmond-upon-Thames and Westminster and completed a degree in music. During my time at Exeter I worked on the refurbishment of Tiverton Library, and it was this that brought me into contact with Jack Galt. In June 1983 I arrived as the new Librarian-in-charge at Tavistock.

In June 1983 the staff of Tavistock Library comprised a full-time Librarian-in-charge (the writer of this history), a full-time First Assistant (Jean Greaves), a full-time Library Assistant (Judi Martin), and part-time Library Assistants Margaret Maker, Madeleine Green and Olive Ottley. There was also a Mobile Library Assistant who was independent but relied on the Branch for book exchanges and cover when she was on leave or off sick.

It's hard to imagine a time when music cassettes were the last innovation in libraries, but so it was at Tavistock in July 1983. The collection was launched by Tavistock Gazette music critic Ben Morland and County Councillor Lysbeth Gallup. There was a catch - unlike books which by law had to be free of charge, there was a 20p per week hire charge for cassettes.

Hard on the heels of the cassettes, the following month saw Tavistock hosting a Writer-in-Residence, Alexis Lykiard, for six months. As well as giving advice and encouragement to local writers, Alexis arranged visits and talks by well-known poets. These included Charles Causley and Alan Brownjohn. Quite a coup for a small market town in West Devon.

Friday mornings were the busiest day of the week as it was market day. And wet Friday mornings were something to be anticipated with something akin to horror. Three or four members of staff working around each other on "the issue", finding the tickets of queues of borrowers which regularly stretched out of the door. Unforgettable.

Memorable borrowers in those days included Angela Rippon, then living at Grenofen and looking very different from her glamorous self. And Mrs Lakeman, with her little boys Seth and Sam, now well-known musicians. Mrs Kelly of Kelly House, and her mother-in-law, were always welcome for the smile they brought.

Always under pressure to raise money, the Library Service decided to start selling bus tickets on which they would receive a commission. These were time-consuming and cumbersome and lasted only a few years, but appreciated by those who bought them.

Something else that was cumbersome was the income from fees and charges. All in cash in those days, of course. Rolls of "fines tickets" were used as receipts and woe betide if, the next morning, the number of receipts issued didn't match the money in the box. If there was too much in the box the solution was simple - tear off the requisite number of receipts. But if more receipts had been issued than money taken, there was a problem. The official line, followed in Tavistock, was simply to note the discrepancy.

📌 Personal aside: When I started work in Plymouth in 1987 I discovered a different approach: the "ups tin". Any excess of money over receipts was put in a jar and used to balance any discrepancies. I was horrified.

Eventually, around 1985, came the news that Tavistock would be the next library for automation. This was before the Internet enabled easy connections between computers. A dedicated BT line using the X.25 protocol was used and at some considerable expense. Almost overnight the service was transformed. The old tickets and cards were binned and the queues - especially those wet Friday queues - became a thing of the past.

Using a terminal (in those days known as a VDU), staff could access the county's catalogue and see, for the first time, exactly what books were where. It revolutionised the requests service, speeding up delivery by weeks.

Through all this change, the fundamental work of shelving return books and tidying the shelves continued. There was little space available to promote books or have displays. Such things were still a pipedream and Tavistock Library was fast becoming the modern equivalent of the old pre-1948 library in the room in the Council Chamber.

More change

In June 1987 there was a new Librarian-in-charge. This was Jean Boase, a very experienced member of Plymouth staff who had previously jointly-run the Central Lending Library. It was a good move for her in her final years before retirement. In a strange quirk of fate she found herself buying the house in Buddle Close which Tina Weekes had sold in 1983. Jean had a happy retirement in Tavistock and died in 2009.

Jean's place was taken by another experienced member of Plymouth staff, Moira Cave. Moira took the library service into the new millennium and the new building in Plymouth Road. But before that...

And even more change

Changes were afoot in local government again in the 1990s. New counties such as Avon and Humberside had not found favour with their communities, and cities which had been subsumed by their surrounding counties, wanted greater control. Leicester, Nottingham, Brighton and, of course, Plymouth.

It was Devon's turn in 1998. In 1997 everyone was planning for the dismantling of a service which had been assembled in 1974. Plymouth was becoming a unitary authority, and getting control of its library service, and so - surprisingly to some - was Torbay. The rest of Devon was unaffected - except that they were losing access to Plymouth's books and specialist resources.

Since Tavistock was being run from Plymouth, there would be major changes again. Plymouth Reference Library was no longer the default for answering information enquiries, and the Music and Drama Library and Bookbindery were being lost as well. But so was the level of management introduced in 1974 where everything was channelled through Plymouth.

As if to mark the new service Tavistock finally heard the news it had been waiting for - a new library would be built at The Wharf as part of a County Council development. Gone would be the cramped, but town centre, location. Replaced with a spacious new building opposite the bus station and next to a large car park.

Libraries Unlimited

Any history, however short, of Tavistock Library must record the creation of the charity Libraries Unlimited in 2016. This model of library service provision, where the local authority legally responsible commissions a new charity to deliver the service, wasn't new. But it was new to Devon. Advantages include independence from the local authority's constraints and freedom to make new partnerships for the benefit of communities, and funding for a set period. Disadvantages include a new bureaucracy taking over from the old, and a possible loss of professional library expertise.

In November 2023, the County Council agreed to decommission its fleet of mobile libraries, including that which had been based at Tavistock since 1954. In place of the mobile libraries, the Council wanted to create a network of "community libraries" run by volunteers.

Now where have we heard that idea before?

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank all those former colleagues of mine who worked for both Devon County Council and Plymouth City Council. Without their knowledge, experience, advice and anecdotes this short history would not have been possible because so many records no longer exist. Many of these colleagues are now longer with us, and I would like to dedicate this to the memory of their hard work, patience, skill and good humour. I would also like to thank my successor at Tavistock, Jan Horrell, and her team for preserving what records do exist and making them available to me.




22 June 2024

A recovered lunatic

The West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum opened to patients on 23rd November 1818 with the aim of providing mental health care assistance to people from poorer backgrounds.

In 1831, Dr Charles Caesar Corsellis was appointed Director and Resident Physician; he remained there until 1853.

Corsellis was one of the many children of Nicholas Caesar Corsellis and his long-term mistress, Sarah Plampin. He was born in Caister-on-Sea, Norfolk, on 1 February 1800 and baptised at St Mary the Virgin, Wivenhoe, Essex on 8 July 1813. On 31 August 1827 he married Caroline Coolidge Turkington in London. After his time at Wakefield, he moved to Llandysul, Cardiganshire, and then to Oxford where he died on 1 January 1876.

Mary Hutton, nÊe Taylor, the writer of these lines appreciative of the care given to her by Dr. and Mrs. Corsellis, was born in Wakefield on 10 July 1794. She moved to Sheffield when young and spent most of her life there.

On 4 March 1844, the Sheffield social campaigner, Samuel Roberts, and the poet, James Montgomery, published an open letter in a Sheffield newspaper entitled The case of Mrs Mary Hutton. This letter detailed the plight of Mary Hutton and her husband, who had been "thrown into great difficulties...his wife, who detested and publicly denounced, in verse, the dreadful New Poor Law, was of too independent a spirit to apply to it for relief. They struggled on but the struggle was too much for them both; their strength, their health, and, at length, HER reason gave way. Her husband was then compelled to apply for her to the Workhouse, while he himself was admitted as an in-patient of the Infirmary". 

In 1843 Mary was sent to Attercliffe Asylum, which had recently been the subject of an enquiry into the forced restraint of inmates. The letter continues "There she remained during two weeks of such dreadful sufferings, that had they been longer continued, they must, she says, have precluded all hope of recovery". 

Mary was then sent to the West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum, and the care of Dr. and Mrs. Corsellis, "a change as she states, almost resembling a removal from hell to heaven".

Leeds Intelligencer - Saturday 23 March 1844

The following lines, which we have great pleasure in publishing, have been written by Mrs. Mary Hutton, the poetess, of Sheffield. The writer, who has long had to struggle with poverty and privations, was a few months ago deprived of her reason and she became an inmate of the Lunatic Asylum at Wakefield, where she continued for four months, when she happily recovered. 

In some letters to her friends, written whilst she was in the Asylum, she speaks in the highest terms of thankfulness to Dr. Corsellis and his lady, and on her release she wrote the following lines.


To Dr. and Mrs. Corsellis

To you, ye worthy, noble minded pair.
Devoted love and gratitude I owe;
For your exalted skill and timely care,
Uprais'd me from the lowest depths of woe.

When in a storm of wild convulsions toss'd
My health and strength and blessed reason lost;
And when I scarce could know my depth of pain,
Through the wild whirlings fever'd brain;

Angelic tones fell softly my ear,
And sweetly soothed and bade banish fear,
And cheer'd poor desponding soul with love,
And bade me hope and trust heaven above.

MARY HUTTON.

We may just add that Samuel Roberts and James Montgomery, Esqrs., of Sheffield, have made an appeal to the public on behalf of this poor woman which we hope will be successful.

17 March 2024

In defence of the "Savages of North Devon"

The first of several letters to the Editor of the North Devon Journal from Rev. T. J. Leslie, Appledore, published Thursday, 23 November 1871. The "Special Commissioner" was James Greenwood who later published an expanded account.


The "So-Called Savages of North Devon"

Upcott, photographed about 1860 by William Hector
Dear Sir,

Will you kindly publish the following facts in reference to the above subject?

On the 23rd October the Daily Telegraph published a report of a visit made by their "Special Commissioner" to the house of Mr. C. Cheriton, of Nymet Rowland. The report being greatly exaggerated and highly sensational, and having been reprinted by many of the daily and weekly newspapers throughout the country, I wrote to the Editor of the Daily Telegraph, not as an apologist for Cheriton or for his ill-deeds, but simply to place a few facts, which had come under my own notice, before the readers of the said report, so that they might have more correct account of poor Cheriton and his family. But to my astonishment the editor has not published my letter. Such conduct, to say the least about it, is mean in the extreme. It unjust to the poor man and his family; and it unjust to North Devon.

Many my friends, knowing that I knew the neighbourhood of Nymet Rowland, have asked me for my opinion about the report of the "Special Commissioner;" and my reply has been—It is greatly exaggerated. It contains some of the most unjust charges and abominable insinuations that it is possible for a corrupt mind to think of; and if the "Special Commissioner" be the author of them, I fervently pray that he may never again visit the North of Devon. I will not repeat the abominable and vile insinuations which the report contains, but will point out to you a few things connected with the family, which may be of interest to readers of your paper, and secure for the Cheritons that justice which is their due.

It is not a difficult matter for a few rich farmers to invite a reporter to come down to "interview" a poor family, who may be disagreeable neighbours—give him good fare for the day, and frank his expenses. Many of their prosecutions of the Cheritons have savoured much of the spirit of persecution. The "Special Commissioner" in his report says, "Thus saith rumour." Allow me to tell him that rumour also saith, "The rich farmers would like to rid the parish of the Cheritons." I would suggest to him, and through him to them, that would be more Christlike, if, instead of persecuting them, they would try a little kindness and respectful forbearance. 

The "Special Commissioner" speaks of "a mud floor, walls as black as soot, and full of chinks." He says "There was no fire place; but a ruddy glow smouldered from a hole in the floor of earth, and over it, by an "iron chain, a cooking pot was suspended." If he had examined other houses in the neighbourhood, he would have found that nearly the whole of them are built of "cob," the floors made of what he calls "mud," (lime and sand, or paved with small stones,) and very few would have fire-grates, the fire being on the hearth, with an open chimney place, and the pot or kettle hung over it by a chain fastened to a cross-bar in the chimney. Wood and not coal is mostly burned in the neighbourhood. 

A person coming down from London would conclude at once that such houses were not fit for human beings live in: but the natives like to live in houses built of cob, and to have good fire of wood upon the hearth. I admit that poor Cheriton's house is in a very dilapidated condition; it needs much repairs; but I very much question whether any of his detractors in Nymet Rowland would let him have a few bundles of reed to repair the roof with. 

Much of the cottage property of North Devon is far below what it ought to be; but such reports as the one written by the "Special Commissioner of the Daily Telegraph" will not tend to improve it. The landlords themselves are aware of the fact, and many of them are improving the cottages of their workmen. The "Special Commissioner" makes much of the fact that there was a little mud between the gate and the house through which he had to pass. I could take him to respectable farm houses where he would experience some difficulty in getting from the gate to the house in wet weather without dirting his boots.

This "Special Commissioner" tells us that he came down to interview this poor family because "a clergyman had this time spread the amazing intelligence." I am sorry to hear it. It is a great pity that a clergyman, who is paid by the State to instruct the poor, should have nothing better to employ his time than write to the Times against one of his own parishioners, who could not reply to his letter. I would suggest to the "Special Commissioner" that the next time he makes a visit to North Devon he should enquire into the conduct of some of the clergymen who have lived in the neighbourhood of Nymet Rowland; and I am sure he will be able to write a report far more sensational than the one he wrote about the so-called savages of North Devon. 

There are several state-paid clergymen living within the radius of a few miles of Cheriton's house. What, I ask, have they done to save this poor family from a life of sin and misery? They cannot plead a lack of time, for some of them have time enough to go fox-hunting. They need not fear being molested, for I have passed the house both by day and night without fear or harm. Let the clergy of the county do their duty, as before the Lord, (which I am thankful to say many of them are endeavouring to do,) and there will soon be no (so-called) savages of North Devon to write the newspapers about.

I admit they are in bad repute in the neighbourhood, but, speaking from what I used to see of them, I am bold to say that they do not deserve the treatment which they have received. When I was pastor of the Independent Church in Lapford I frequently saw them at the chapel. At other times I have seen them going to the church. I conducted religious services in a cottage at Nymet Rowland, and I have seen some members of the family there. I have also seen them at the meeting at Chenson, and they always behaved themselves in proper manner. 

Having spoken of them as I knew them a few years ago, let me now speak of them as they are at present. My wife went with a lady to see them last Thursday. They drove up to the gate, and one of them alighted and went into the house. A young woman came out, and took charge of the horse and trap, and then gave the horse some hay. When they entered the house they found a young woman sitting near the fire, who was evidently very ill, with the baby on her knee (of whom the "Special Commissioner" gives such a graphic description). They spoke kindly to her (she was very weak and faint), and looked at the baby, which they found to be sickly, but not in the state as described by the "Special Commissioner." 

The other young woman then entered the house, and said that her mother had gone to the shop at Lapford to buy some things, but added—"She will back soon." Three little boys came and looked in two or three times: at length one of the little fellows ventured in, and sat down beside his mother. The old man was out working on the farm, but a message having been sent to him, he came to the house, and seemed to very pleased to see his visitors. He rubbed his hands, smiled, and said—"I am glad to see ye, I be; but I be afeard ye will not be comfortable here. Will ye mind going to the Public, and I will pay for a glass each for ye." 

They thanked him for his kindness, and said they had brought some provisions with them and they were going to take tea with him. He thanked them much, and appeared to be somewhat confused. Tea was provided, and they were all enjoying the social cup when the old woman returned. She looked as if she was taken aback, but, recovering herself, soon made herself at home, and began to tell them how they were persecuted and annoyed. 

She complained very bitterly of the infamous report of the "Special Commissioner." She says that he called and them if they would give him a drink of water, and, thinking that he was an honest man, she told her daughter to give him a drink of milk; at the same time saying, she knew gentlemen liked cider, but that they were quite out of it. She declares he is a bad man, or he would never have drank the milk, which she gave to him, and afterwards and write lot of lies about them. 

Before leaving my wife said they had brought two New Testaments with them, and they intended to read a chapter and pray together before they left. Cheriton said he should be pleased if they would do so. But as she was beginning to read Matthew, xxv. chapter, a voice was heard outside, "Is your father at home?" Cheriton went to the place where the door once stood, and the voice was heard again, "I have come to speak to you as the head of the house about your family insulting my servants." 

The daughter went to the door, and the voice was heard again, "You women are the worst." They replied, "Your servants, and a brother of one of them, were here last night stoning us for an hour and half: they won't let us alone." The voice was heard again, "I am going now, and if you do not behave yourselves I will get a summons for you." The old woman called out, "It is you who put the letters in the papers." The voice was again heard, "I know nothing about that, I have come now to talk to you about your conduct." That voice was the Parson's

The above facts will speak for themselves. During the last few weeks they have received several letters, some of which are full of silly questions, such as—"Can you read?" "Can you say the Lord's prayer? If you cannot, then go to the clergyman and he will teach you." Several persons have called, but they have no confidence in these "special" visitors, and they have refused to have any conversation with them. 

My wife did not see the eldest son. She enquired where he was, and they said, "He had gone to help the daughter's husband with little work he had to do. 

Cannot something be done to help this poor family? It would not cost much money to repair the house, and provide a little clothing for them. Things have gone from bad to worse, and members of the family have been fined at various times by the magistrates, so that they are not able to repair the house, although they may desire to do so. 

A christian lady has kindly promised to give me ten shillings if a subscription list is opened on their behalf. I shall be willing to receive other sums toward the relief of the so-called savages of North Devon. Subscriptions will be acknowledged through your paper.

I am, Dear Sir, yours truly, 

T. J. LESLIE, Independent Minister. 

Appledore, North Devon, November 18th, 1871.


[We readily make use of our correspondent's letter. All will admire the audi alteram partem ["listen to the other side"] spirit which prompted him to say what he knew that was favourable to, or extenuating of, the Cheritons. All will do justice to the kindness of the ladies who visited them. Still, there can be no denying that, under how much provocation soever, they have been guilty of many indefensible breaches of the law, and that their mode of living is an outrage on the proprieties of civilization, the more inexcusable because it is idle to say that a family occupying their own freehold of forty acres have not the means of living in decency. 

One can't much wonder if the rich farmers in the neighbourhood do wish to be rid of such neighbours. We hope they will bethink themselves that there is a better thing to be aimed at than even to be rid of them. If they would but try what the "law of kindness" can do, it might astonish them by its results. It has wrought greater wonders than it would be even to convert these "savages" into a family and household restored to the pale of civilization, "clothed and in their right mind." Doing full justice to the kindness which only can have suggested our reverend correspondent's appeal for pecuniary help, does he think the case a man living in his own freehold is one for which eleemosynary assistance can be fairly asked, or that, if rendered, it could be expected to do real and lasting good? 

Injustice is always to be condemned; but is there not danger in leading persons who are unquestionably wrong doers to conceive themselves martyrs He knows the case better than we do, and he has, no doubt, weighed the matter. If, indeed, they have been wronged and soured by persecution, possibly that might be means by which society might make a sweetening and purifying compensation.—Ed.]