Wednesday 28 January 2015

An accident at sea: Alfred John Farrant, 6 February 1915




The war memorial in All Saints Church, East Budleigh church

On 6 February, 1915, Petty Officer 1st Class Alfred John Farrant was recorded as having drowned.  He has no known grave, but is listed on East Budleigh’s village memorial and in the parish church of All Saints. He is also remembered on the Plymouth Naval Memorial. 

Petty Officer Farrant was 37 years old and left a widow, Gertrude, whose address was given as 16, Morice Square, Devonport. 

Known to his family as John, as is evident from the village memorial, he was the son of George and Emily Farrant, of East Budleigh;  his father is recorded as a bricklayer.  









HMS Thunderer at anchor at Spithead, in the Solent, off the coast of Hampshire, in 1912. This is photograph Q 21854 from the collections of the Imperial War Museums (collection no. 2107-01)

At the time of his death he was serving on HMS Thunderer, one of the Royal Navy’s most expensive battleships constructed in 1909 as a result of the Admiralty’s call to counter the German naval expansion.















The First Fleet assembles for the King's review on 18 July 1914.  A postcard image described as likely to be an artist's vision

The  vessel was part of the 2nd Battle Squadron consisting of battleships which made up the Royal Navy’s Grand Fleet. No other casualty on board Thunderer was reported on that day, suggesting that John’s death was accidental. Research has shown that he was a gun layer or ‘sight setter’ with the task of helping the ship’s guns to aim at a target. 

Many local men who served with the Royal Navy during the Great War came from a fishing background. This does not seem to have been the case with John Farrant.  

It is possible that he may have been encouraged to go to sea by George Farrant, who was serving with the Coast Guard. George Edward Farrant, born in Littleham in 1867, had been a coastguard officer in the Isle of Wight. He had local connections, being the son of an agricultural labourer, also named George, who was born in around 1844 at Knowle, in East Budleigh parish. Alfred John Farrant’s father was four years younger, being born in around 1848; it seems likely that the two were cousins.   

George Edward Farrant was transferred from the Isle of Wight after 1911, and by 1919 he is listed as the Chief Officer at Budleigh Salterton’s coastguard station on Coastguard Road. 

‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!! 


Tuesday 20 January 2015

The threat from the deep




 




















Image credit: © IWM


In common with residents of other British coastal towns, Budleigh Salterton people were only too aware of the threat from the Imperial German Navy.  



On the morning of 16 December 1914, the North Sea ports of Hartlepool, West Hartlepool, Whitby and Scarborough were bombarded by the German First High Seas Fleet Scouting Group. 137 people lost their lives and 592 people were wounded.  The above poster uses the incident to try and encourage people to enlist, but the British public and newspapers were also outraged at the Royal Navy for not protecting the towns.


Scarborough and Hartlepool were fortified towns and were considered legitimate targets by the Germans. While Budleigh Salterton did not fall into that category local people were aware of the threat to the many passing convoys from enemy submarines.   Although Germany’s surface fleet failed to achieve many of its objectives its submarine force posed a major threat to the British supply system.




 














German submarines at Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein, on 17 February 1914. U 21 is at the far right of the first row. The caption in German reads: "Our submarine boats in the harbour" (in German).

Image source: German Federal Archives and Wikipedia


As early as 5 September 1914, the underestimated U-boat had shocked the British public when SM U-21 hit the 3,000-ton British light cruiser HMS Pathfinder with a torpedo off the Firth of Forth on a calm, sunlit day.  Broken in two, Pathfinder instantly began sinking, dragging most of her crew down with her and leaving a massive pall of smoke to mark her grave. The vessel sank so quickly, in fact, there was insufficient time to launch lifeboats. Of a total of 270 personnel on board including two civilian canteen assistants there were just eighteen known survivors.


Convoys, particularly of merchant ships escorted by Navy warships, were indeed a regular sight off the Budleigh coast.  Local resident Jim Gooding, as recorded in the book Budleigh in bygone days, remembered them passing on most days, mainly in the evening,  and was struck by how close to the shore they sailed. “There were times when it was miraculous that they did not run aground.” 


As a member of the Coast Patrol, he recalled that it was his duty to see that no light was visible from the sea because of the danger from enemy submarines.  



The convoys were, as described by William Cowd, another Budleigh  resident, “a most impressive sight.” In his memoirs kept at Fairlynch Museum he recalled being first on the scene when a dozen crew members of a merchant ship arrived on the beach near the present Marine Court flats on Marine Parade. Their ship had been torpedoed and the crew, taking to the life boat had rowed about 12 miles to the shore. Their cries of “Shipwreck Crew” were heard, but William Cowd also heard a warning from his companion: “You be careful, you be careful, it may be enemy Germans who’ll shoot you.”



Such was the fear of enemy submarines, as intense as that of German spies, that one might guess it verged on the paranoid.



“One morning, looking from the windows of ‘Matford’ on Marine Parade I saw the periscope of a submarine in the Bay,” remembered Winifred Hart in another memoir kept at Fairlynch Museum. “The sea was quite calm. It was probably a German one as we had so many convoys of ships passing during the War.”  [Source: Mrs Hart’s Memories of 1914-18, a document in Fairlynch Museum Local History Room, 1980]. 


 























The caption shows a German Periscoper exclaining: "Ach, Himmel! Dot most be der peautiful Ben Nevis of vich ve 'ave 'eard so mooch!"

From the 1915 edition of Frightful War Pictures by W. Heath Robinson published by  Duckworth 

German periscopes were probably 'spotted' as frequently as suspected enemy spies. At least for cartoonists like Heath Robinson they could be a source of humour.  

‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!! 




Friday 9 January 2015

A Budleigh artist’s “utter disregard of danger”: George Ellis Carpenter and his painting ‘Rainy Day’





















There is a fine picture of rain
That I look at again and again.
For the artist, I’ve found,
Was a hero renowned
For a courage you could call insane.





'Rainy Day' is an attractive oil painting of Budleigh Salterton High Street by George Ellis Carpenter.  The painting, part of Fairlynch Museum’s art collection, is interesting as a historical record. A twin picture of Rolle Street in Exmouth was painted by the artist, but its whereabouts are currently unknown.



The antiques shop on the right, currently a barber’s shop, was run by David Thorn, who took it over from his father in the 1960s. The business had originated in the previous decade. A strongroom, one of the features in the antiques shop was a relic from the time when the building had belonged to the Westminster Bank. 

Opposite the antiques shop at No 1 High Street was Milne's, a chemist's shop.  I was told, however, that the painter was criticised for his artistic licence in adding a non-existent pedestrian crossing to this scene of Budleigh. 



Rain is a popular subject for artists. I like the way in which Carpenter has combined the distorting effect of water with the effects of light. He has transformed Budleigh High Street into a floating liquid world; the darker depiction of some of the distant figures - things as well as people -  makes them less important than their reflections in the flooded street, while the rain-soaked far distance envelops buildings in greyness. It’s almost as if the street is turning into a mad and misty torrent, heading westward. 

Yet this seems to be the end of a rainy day. The sun is breaking through from the south, giving colour to the nearer figures and buildings; even the orange globe of the Belisha beacon plays its part in the process.  One of the two girls in the foreground, without an umbrella, is holding out a hand as if to tell us that the rain is stopping. The lighter sky in the west is a hopeful sign.



George Carpenter was very much an amateur painter. Originally from Yarmouth, Suffolk, he served in World War One on the Western Front. He was commissioned as a Lieutenant in the Royal Engineers and gained an MC for exemplary gallantry in January 1918 at the age of 27.



The story of his bravery deserves telling even though he was not born in the Lower Otter Valley. Originally from Yarmouth, Suffolk, he had started out as a Private in the Civil Service Rifles, otherwise known as the 15th (County of London) Battalion, The London Regiment (Prince of Wales's Own Civil Service Rifles).



By January 1915, he  is recorded in the London Gazette of 15 January 1915 [p.495] as being seconded as a Second Lieutenant in The Post Office Rifles, or to give it its full title, the 8th (City of London) Battalion of The London Regiment.

  

Today, it has been said, the Post Office Rifles are best remembered for their involvement as infantry on the Western Front in the First World War, distinguished by their bravery, tenacity and character in the grim conditions of the trenches.



Two years later, on 26 September 1917, George Carpenter’s appointment as acting Captain with the Royal Engineers was announced in the London Gazette.



 
















Men of R. E. Signals, 1st Corps, burying cable along trench in wooden cases.  © IWM (Q 27152)



His role was in the specialist area of communications on the front line rather than in combat.  As trench warfare came to characterise much of the conflict on the Western Front, the opposing armies relied on traditional techniques of communication such as semaphore and lamps, but also on the widespread use of wires for messaging between the front lines and command HQs.


It’s been estimated that tens of thousands of miles of copper-core cables were laid for both Morse telegraphy and for voice telephony. In many cases, wires were laid on the ground or on low poles, or buried in the ground down to 30 cm deep. Even at that depth they could be destroyed by artillery fire or explosions; a depth of at least 130 cm was needed to afford suitable protection. 



 




















Three men of the Royal Engineers Cable Section carry drums of cable    Image credit: http://worldwar42.blogspot.co.uk



When attacks were planned, brave technicians like George Carpenter were expected to venture out into no-man’s land in order to lay communication lines, risking their lives while facing the threat of snipers and artillery shells.  Only towards the end of the war did wireless communication become more common, with sets being made small enough to be carried by troops.


On 8 January 1918, the London Gazette announced the award of a Military Cross to acting Captain George Ellis Carpenter.  

 The citation read as follows:    

For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty on numerous occasions. He has continually shown absolute fearlessness and the greatest ability in the execution of his work, on at least two occasions going forward under heavy shell fire and making a personal and successful reconnaissance for the laying out of lines which were urgently needed. His splendid personal example and utter disregard of danger have on all occasions set a very high standard to the linesmen in his company.”



Having moved to Budleigh as Manager of the town's Gas Works he took up art as a hobby and was a founder member of the Exmouth Art Group, acting as its part-time Secretary.





















George Carpenter, standing, third from the left, with members of Budleigh Salterton Drama Club. 
Image from Fairlynch Museum archives  

He also became involved in amateur dramatics, particularly with pantomime. He took the occasional acting role. In 1930, one of a cast of 14, he played the part of Horace, the Court Physician, in a production of The Sleeping Beauty in the Public Hall.  A document in Fairlynch Museum dated December 1937 lists him as one of the founder members of Budleigh Salterton Drama Club. He was also responsible for the lighting in many productions, and his scenery painting skills were much valued.



He obviously demanded high standards. Friend of Fairlynch Museum Anita Jennings recalled an incident involving fellow Drama Club member Ron Cox, who told her the story of how he was apprenticed to George Carpenter.



“For one play he was allowed to paint the scenery,” she said. “Less experienced than the master, but keen to make his mark Ron worked at it for hours.... only to discover that at some unearthly hour George Carpenter had been to the Club and painted over all of Ron's work.” 

‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!!