This is the latest of my attempts to come up with a title for a journey around the coast of England,Scotland and Wales. The treasures are the books and the stories that they tell.
It has to be clear that it is not a collection of books where tangible treasures are discovered - however, this is one of themes that does occur - hidden countries are discovered under the water. There are also many examples of emotional hinterlands to be explored. Monica Edwards, Arthur Ransome,Lois Lamplugh,David Divine,Richard Armstrong,Kathleen Fidler are amongst the authors who must be mentioned.
Captain Frank Knight, Mabel Esther Allan,George Beardmore are less obvious authors who must be dealt with.
Friday 31 December 2010
Wednesday 29 December 2010
The Brydons Go Canoeing
The Brydons Go Canoeing. It appears from the evidence which I have been able to
collect that the Brydons actually live in a little village near to Preston. The
village is supposed to be somewhere near Pendle Hill. Preston is the town
referred to as being visited by the adults in the story of this and other
volumes in the series. Is this place actually Whalley and is the hospital based on Calderstones Hospital ?
The story starts with Dan Brydon and Sam Mitton deciding that they are going to
make their own canoe. Their attempts to do so are suitably hair-raising and
foolish. They are also totally ineffective. It is the arrival of a new young
doctor at the Saint Jonathan's Hospital for Children next to their home that
resolves what promises to be a totally frustrating and dangerous situation. As a
part of a bargain with the young doctor both Dan and Sam take part in a new
class that he has instituted for disabled children. They are delighted to take
part in the new swimming activities and succeed in getting the children to take
part in water-based games which helps both their confidence and general health.
Meanwhile Doctor Ritchie sets about the project of getting the boys to build a
canoe and to learn how to use it safely. The two tasks begin to complement each
other and the Brydons find that they are getting far more out of helping the
disabled children than they had ever imagined. The disabled children also begin
to discover all sorts of things that they would like to do connected with the
canoe building. Painting and naming the canoes becomes a major point in their
progress.
Doctor Ritchie then begins to develop them as a viable force for making
explorations by canoe. In the end the newly created canoe is named 'The Gay
Adventurer' by Janet who has begun to find some of her old confidence.The first
voyage is on the Ribble from Edisford Bridge, near Clitheroe to Ribchester
Bridge. It is nine miles with quite a few hazards to negotiate. There is place
called the Jumbles which is the rocky shelves where the Calder joins the Ribble.
There is also a place called Sale Wheel where the river runs through a rocky
little gorge and then widens out to created a kind of whirlpool. Another
description mentions the great curves below Siddows Hall where the Standen Brook
came in. They also pass Great Mitton Bridge - we are told that if you could
stand on the bridge "you'll have one foot in Lancashire and the other in
Yorkshire".
Simon also mentions "Do you see the top of that square tower ? It belongs to the
church which dates back to 1270 (in Great Mitton). They pass Mitton Wood and
reached the place where the river Hodder came tumbling down its wooded valley to
join the Ribble. "There's a bit of wild water below Dinckley Ferry." They go
pass the red-brick Salesbury Hall. The inn they end up in is called the De
Tabley Arms.
collect that the Brydons actually live in a little village near to Preston. The
village is supposed to be somewhere near Pendle Hill. Preston is the town
referred to as being visited by the adults in the story of this and other
volumes in the series. Is this place actually Whalley and is the hospital based on Calderstones Hospital ?
The story starts with Dan Brydon and Sam Mitton deciding that they are going to
make their own canoe. Their attempts to do so are suitably hair-raising and
foolish. They are also totally ineffective. It is the arrival of a new young
doctor at the Saint Jonathan's Hospital for Children next to their home that
resolves what promises to be a totally frustrating and dangerous situation. As a
part of a bargain with the young doctor both Dan and Sam take part in a new
class that he has instituted for disabled children. They are delighted to take
part in the new swimming activities and succeed in getting the children to take
part in water-based games which helps both their confidence and general health.
Meanwhile Doctor Ritchie sets about the project of getting the boys to build a
canoe and to learn how to use it safely. The two tasks begin to complement each
other and the Brydons find that they are getting far more out of helping the
disabled children than they had ever imagined. The disabled children also begin
to discover all sorts of things that they would like to do connected with the
canoe building. Painting and naming the canoes becomes a major point in their
progress.
Doctor Ritchie then begins to develop them as a viable force for making
explorations by canoe. In the end the newly created canoe is named 'The Gay
Adventurer' by Janet who has begun to find some of her old confidence.The first
voyage is on the Ribble from Edisford Bridge, near Clitheroe to Ribchester
Bridge. It is nine miles with quite a few hazards to negotiate. There is place
called the Jumbles which is the rocky shelves where the Calder joins the Ribble.
There is also a place called Sale Wheel where the river runs through a rocky
little gorge and then widens out to created a kind of whirlpool. Another
description mentions the great curves below Siddows Hall where the Standen Brook
came in. They also pass Great Mitton Bridge - we are told that if you could
stand on the bridge "you'll have one foot in Lancashire and the other in
Yorkshire".
Simon also mentions "Do you see the top of that square tower ? It belongs to the
church which dates back to 1270 (in Great Mitton). They pass Mitton Wood and
reached the place where the river Hodder came tumbling down its wooded valley to
join the Ribble. "There's a bit of wild water below Dinckley Ferry." They go
pass the red-brick Salesbury Hall. The inn they end up in is called the De
Tabley Arms.
Friday 24 December 2010
Scotland and Wales
Venturer Top Secret is an odd book where the journey is from Scotland to Wales via the Caledonian Canal. Most of the journey is by sail with a few episodes involving a small auxiliary engine. Secret plans are being taken to London by the most implausible method that can be devised. The crew are all schoolboys and they are under threat from some enemy, presumably Fifth Columnists or Nazi spies. Official police are never involved until the very last minute. Some of the sailing details are impressive - such as the comradeship aboard the Venturer as the boys face perilous conditions in a stormy sea. The journey also embraces Oban where the crew see the formation of an Atlantic convoy. A little later they are off the coast as a German raid pours bombs on to Barrow in Furness. The timetable of events seems impossibly long for any urgency in getting the secret device to London. The conclusion takes place off the coast of Aberdovey when the principal enemy is outwitted by the schoolboy members of the crew. They are in a sailing dinghy whilst he pursues them in a motorboat. They trick him into a collision with a mudbank - he is left stranded to be picked up later by the proper authorities.
Wednesday 22 December 2010
In the sea near Lancashire
The Brydons Go Canoeing actually takes us to an incident at sea off the coast of Lancashire. On a trip to Heysham the family expedition is suddenly curtailed when they find that recent storms have dislodged a WW2 floating mine. It lies there in the channel with its horns brooding just below the service. The obvious thing to do is to get well away from it and make their way to land immediately. Having made this sensible decision they are suddenly overtaken by events. Moving at high speed up the channel towards them is a small cargo boat. How can they make sure that it stops in time as there is no way of getting their message on board before the vessel runs into disaster ? Two of the Brydon family decide that they have to stage a deliberate capsize which makes them look like they are sinking and in great peril.
The older members of the family have got ashore to try to ensure that the Isle of Man ferry does not run any risks without the authorities being warned. The twins are left in charge of the youngest members who are suddenly faced with the uncoming cargo boat. Dan and Mat
The older members of the family have got ashore to try to ensure that the Isle of Man ferry does not run any risks without the authorities being warned. The twins are left in charge of the youngest members who are suddenly faced with the uncoming cargo boat. Dan and Mat
Saturday 18 December 2010
Family at the Tide
The story is set near Chichester and the world is one of mud.Frank Knight's book is not quite what might expect. It is about a particular stretch of water that somehow seems without dramatic potential. It is also very much a family story. The younger boys do have character facets that are appealing. However, it is quite clear that father,mother and daughter are the central personalities about whom the reader is most interested.
The father may be a retired naval officer who has thrown up his job with an insurance company because he has not adjusted to life after the war. He is responsible for the whole family and it seems as though his life is guided by his much wiser wife who treats him a it like a child who has to be indulged. She knows that he needs to follow his star or he will make all their lives miserable. In a section that appears to be autobiographical the father sets out to become an author who can bring financial responsibility to his growing family.
Yett he end of the book brings a totally different experience for the father proves to be a totally different sort of hero. He helps Maureen and young
The father may be a retired naval officer who has thrown up his job with an insurance company because he has not adjusted to life after the war. He is responsible for the whole family and it seems as though his life is guided by his much wiser wife who treats him a it like a child who has to be indulged. She knows that he needs to follow his star or he will make all their lives miserable. In a section that appears to be autobiographical the father sets out to become an author who can bring financial responsibility to his growing family.
Yett he end of the book brings a totally different experience for the father proves to be a totally different sort of hero. He helps Maureen and young
Thursday 16 December 2010
New Library Orders
Beach mystery - ELIAS, Frank - Lutterworth Press London 1946.
The Peace Seekers - Finkel, George - Angus and Robertson, London, UK, 1970.
Shadows on the Sand - Terry Roche - Dobson Books Ltd, 1979
The Brydons Stick at Nothing – Kathleen Fidler 1972 – Knight or Brockhampton
The Brydons Do Battle – Kathleen Fidler 1954 - Lutterworth
The Brydons Look for Trouble - Kathleen Fidler- Lutterworth, England, 1950
Challenge to the Brydons - Kathleen Fidler Lutterworth, 1956.
The Brydons Hunt for Treasure - Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1951
The Brydons in a Pickle - Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth, 1950.
The Brydons go canoeing - Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth P, 1963
The Brydons Catch Queer Fish - Kathleen Fidler- Lutterworth, London, 1952.
The Brydons Abroad- Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1953
The Deans Dive for Treasure – Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1956
The Deans Solve a Mystery- Kathleen Fidler- Lutterworth Press, London, 1954
The Deans' Dutch Adventure Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1962.
The Deans and Mr. Popple Fidler, Kathleen Lutterworth Press London 1960,
Mr Simister Appears Again Kathleen Fidler Lutterworth Press, 1948.
The Treasure on Weir Island - Griggs, Percy G. - 1948.
The Bard's Cloak - Griggs, Percy - London: Pitkin, 1949
The Pirates of Thorne Island – Phill Carradice - Pont Books 2001
The Bosun's Secret – Phil Carradice - Pont books 2000
September Island – Rosalie K. Fry - J. M. Dent, London, 1965
The Riddle Of The Figurehead - Fry Rosalie K - London J.M.Dent, 1963.
Green Grow the Rushes – Elinor Lyon LEICESTER: BROCKHAMPTON PRESS.,
The Peace Seekers - Finkel, George - Angus and Robertson, London, UK, 1970.
Shadows on the Sand - Terry Roche - Dobson Books Ltd, 1979
The Brydons Stick at Nothing – Kathleen Fidler 1972 – Knight or Brockhampton
The Brydons Do Battle – Kathleen Fidler 1954 - Lutterworth
The Brydons Look for Trouble - Kathleen Fidler- Lutterworth, England, 1950
Challenge to the Brydons - Kathleen Fidler Lutterworth, 1956.
The Brydons Hunt for Treasure - Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1951
The Brydons in a Pickle - Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth, 1950.
The Brydons go canoeing - Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth P, 1963
The Brydons Catch Queer Fish - Kathleen Fidler- Lutterworth, London, 1952.
The Brydons Abroad- Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1953
The Deans Dive for Treasure – Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1956
The Deans Solve a Mystery- Kathleen Fidler- Lutterworth Press, London, 1954
The Deans' Dutch Adventure Kathleen Fidler - Lutterworth Press, London, 1962.
The Deans and Mr. Popple Fidler, Kathleen Lutterworth Press London 1960,
Mr Simister Appears Again Kathleen Fidler Lutterworth Press, 1948.
The Treasure on Weir Island - Griggs, Percy G. - 1948.
The Bard's Cloak - Griggs, Percy - London: Pitkin, 1949
The Pirates of Thorne Island – Phill Carradice - Pont Books 2001
The Bosun's Secret – Phil Carradice - Pont books 2000
September Island – Rosalie K. Fry - J. M. Dent, London, 1965
The Riddle Of The Figurehead - Fry Rosalie K - London J.M.Dent, 1963.
Green Grow the Rushes – Elinor Lyon LEICESTER: BROCKHAMPTON PRESS.,
Various Wales Ones
Wales and Cheshire
The Rising Tide – Mabel Esther Allan
When she inherits three small islands, an eighteen year old persuades
her friend to go and live there for the winter, in islands off the
coast of Wales, with a mystery to solve, and danger from the tide.
The Pirates of Thorne Island – Phill Carradice
Nat Thomas and the other boys from the "Havannah" sail along the Severn
Estuary on a training cruise on board the "Polly". When the "Polly" is
damaged in a storm they put in to Pembroke Dock for repairs. Nat and
the boys stay in the army fort on Thorne Island, where they see lights
late one night.
The Bosun's Secret – Phil Carradice
Nat Thomas, a young orphan boy, is sent to the Industrial School
Ship "Havannah" in Cardiff in 1870. The conditions on the ship are
brutal, most of the brutality being carried out by Bosun Jayne, who
singles Nat out and subjects him to a reign of terror. (
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness.
The Riddle of the Figurehead - Rosalie K. Fry
Building a boat on the Gower peninsula, a French visitor and the fight
to save Sammy from being sent to a hostel away from his beloved
guillemot.
The Bevans children, with their exchange visitor from Brittany and
their newly made boat Evening Star, figure out the riddle of the
Sammy's figurehead, and save his simple beach home. Fine descriptions
of the shore of South Wales. Set in a particularly attractive part of
the Welsh coast the young heroine Stella Bevan, 11, is helping her
elder brothers build a boat 'The Evening Star'. Mystery develops. Set
on the Welsh coast. Stella Bevan, aged 11, is helping her elder
brothers build a boat. They are going to call it The Evening Star.
Stella is expecting a French girl to stay with her during the holidays,
but Phiippe, a brother of the French girl, arrives instead. He proves
(to everyone's surprise) exceptionally good value, not only in helping
to launch the boat but also in sailing it. All the Bevan family
subsequently become involved in a local injustice which they put right,
and in which Philippe plays an audacious and decisive part as a
detective
September Island – Rosalie K. Fry
Children are stranded on a sand bar off the Welsh coast.
Perilous Dawn – W.J. Goodyer
What was the strange secret of the blue suitcase? That was the question
which puzzled Jimmy Keene, his parents and his brother Roger, when they
returned to Wales from holiday on the Isle of man."
The problems that began as the family make their way home by car from
Liverpool to Radnorshire just seem to get worse and worse. They have stumbled
into a plot that may involve IRA saboteurs or even Russian spies. A new
installation in the mountains is under some sort of threat and the gang
that the boys tangle with is not afraid to use threats and kidnap in order
to get their way. Both Jimmy and Roger have to use all their resources
to unable the police to overcome a very cunning and ruthless bunch of
ne-er-do-wells.
Hazel in Uniform World Margaret W. Griffiths War II spy adventure
involving Hazel and her friends, set on the Welsh coast.
Detectives in Wales – Jean Henson
A children's story in a series The Holloway children, mystery solvers,
are by the sea in a large house in Wales. By the author of River
Detectives, Detectives in the Hills, Detectives by the sea and
Detectives Abroad
Holiday Adventure – William Glynne-Jones
An entertaining story telling of a group of children's adventures
during their summer holiday in the small Welsh village of Portavon
Green Grow the Rushes – Elinor Lyon
A girl from London, vacationing on the rugged Welsh coast with a
snippy, spoiled companion, finds three adventurous friends whom she
joins in a search for the cliffborne track of an old Roman road.
Curlew CampC. R. MANSELL
The Guides of the Curlew Patrol have been hoping for Adventure—and they
get it, when they find that the camp they are to join in the country
near the Welsh coast does not exist.
But that is only the beginning. Camping in the orchard of an old
house that has once been used for smuggling they soon discover that
their cheerful hostess is in trouble; and the disappearance of dogs
from her kennels, followed by visits of a man who wants to buy her
home, is to the Guides more than just a mere coincidence. A new kennel-
maid who obviously resents their presence, a midnight rendezvous that
almost ends in ends in disaster due to Rose's curiosity, and strange
tapping noises in the cellar, are mounting evidence of a mystery that
is to involve them in excitements and even dangers. How the Guides win
credit to themselves—and an adorable sheep-dog puppy as a mascot is a
story that all girls will enjoy.
A Wind from the Sea – Jennifer Morgan
It's 1833 Liverpool and a dead body is found in the Mersey - a black
woman slave. Thirteen year old Patience Penry hears this news as her
own life is turned into turmoil. Locked into poverty, her mother is
forced into domestic service and she must move to live with Uncle Huw
on his farm in Wales.
Spring Tide – Mary Ray
Set in Roman Britain in Caer Taff (Cardiff).
The House by the Shore – Ivy Russell
. .Children's story about Nickie and Jill setting off for a quiet
holiday in Wales. It ends with Nickie and Jill about to be photographed
for television newsreel. What can have happened between these two
times ?
Mona the Welsh Pony – Allen Seaby
Allen Seaby's stories of the ponies of the New Forest, Exmoor,
Dartmoor, and the Shetland Islands, are deservedly popular, not only
for the entertainment of the stories themselves, but also for their
accurage and affectionate studies of the wild life of the countryside
in which they live.
In this volume, Seaby turns to the mountain ponies of North Wales, and
tells the enthralling story of Mona against the background of her
native landscape, its people and their history.
Allan W Seaby's book "Mona the Welsh Pony" is set in a place near
Abermaw.
Abermaw is the Welsh for Barmouth, which does exist.
Battle for Destiny – Peter John Stephens
A young Welsh boy meets Harry Tudor, A Welshman with a claim to the
English throne historical fiction; a young Welsh lad exiled in a Breton
abbey is determined to go home to Wales, and aligns himself with
another Welshman who has a claim to the English throne;
Battle for Destiny - Peter John Stephens.
Ithel, the son of a Welsh minor lord escapes from drowning off the
coast of Brittany. Taken in by the church he fights for his destiny
until he falls into the path of Henry, Duke of Richmond. Later he joins
Richmond in France and, committed to his cause, is sent to Wales to
help prepare the Tudor invasion that eventually bring to the throne the
Lancastrian, Henry VII. He plays a vital part at the battle of Bosworth
where Richard III is defeated and killed. Most of the story in Wales is
in the fields and small dwellings around Milford Haven and then Carew
Castle.
Journey with a Secret – Showell Styles
Ann and John's hiking trip from their Welsh village to the sea turns
into a wild adventure, combining spies, a Hungarian girl, a misty moor
and all
Two English children on a Welsh walking tour pick up a runaway girl who is the
age of the older Davies, John; his sister is thirteen. Ilonka Kazinczy tells
John and Ann that the police are after her because she has run away from a cruel
uncle, but her story is suspicious: why should there be such an intensive hunt
for her? The truth soon comes out; Ilonka's uncle has been murdered and she is
carrying a secret document that will help organize a Hungarian freedom movement.
The incidents of chase and pursuit are full of action, the setting is
interesting (although there is a heavy dose of mountaineering detail for
non-climbers) and the style competent, but the plot is both contrived and
melodramatic.
A Shadow on the Sea – Tessa Theobald
A children's holiday overlooking a bay in Pembrokeshire. Four children
spend their March holiday alone in their family cottage overlooking a
bay in Pembrokeshire. The older children spend their time refurbishing
an old canoe, but Emma, the youngest, finds and rescues a guillemot
which has been coated by oil from ships and is unable to swim or fly.
The children clean it, and look after the bird, then find adventures
while exploring the bay.
Buried Alive – Jacqueline Wilson
Tim and Biscuits are having a brilliant holiday in Wales. Life is full
of icecream, sandcastles and picnics - until they meet the horrid bully
Prickle-Head and his side-kick Pinch-Face. Just as they are about to
despair, reinforcements arrive in an unexpected form.
Welsh Adventure – Viola Bayley
Mystery and excitement for Serena Hamble. Lively holiday adventures end
in deep mysterious waters.
The Haunting at Cliff HouseWales - unspecific
When her father inherits an estate from his great-aunt, Alison reluctantly
agrees to spend her summer in Wales. The dreary mansion called Pen-Y-Craig
(Welsh for Cliff House) is far from her Ottawa home, and her summer is far from
ordinary. Alison discovers an ancient diary, a haunted cave, and the story of a
young girl called Bronwen who lived at Cliff House in 1810. Alison sees spirits
and hears voices that compel her to unravel Bronwen's tangled and tragic
history. But can she learn from Bronwen's disasterous mistakes, and undo the
wrongs of the past and the present?" and "The story is set in the heart of Wales
in a house which Mr. Evans (The father) and Alison (the daughter) inherited from
a Great-Aunt. This house has a spirit trapped in time haunting it. Alison sees
visions of the ghost's (Bronwen's) life and is directed to an old diary. This
diary holds the keys to why Bronwen is trapped. Throughout the story Alison
seems to be going through the exactly the same situations as Bronwen did in
1810. Alison soon realizes what has happened to Bronwen and helps her change the
past. Throughout this plot Alison is going through tough times herself. Her
mother has long since passed away and her father has found a new woman
(Meiriona) who he has taken a liking to. Alison feels her territory has been
invaded by Meiriona and will ruin her tight knit relationship with her father.
In helping Bronwen out with her problem, Alison discovers that she can make
room, she doesn't own her father, and that everyone including her father has the
right to be happy."
Operation Footprint - Patricia Brooks.
The story is set in Llandudno, North Wales. The family on holiday come there
regularly each year and stay at a cottage on the less-frequented West Beach.
Most of their adventure features the Great Orme and their investigations by boat
of a small beach which is otherwise inaccessible. There are some quite exciting
episodes, though, after half-way it lapses into a pretty standard smugglers
story. The mystery may have been uncovered by the children but it is followed to
a conclusion by their uncle (very tradtional) who follows the clue to the
ring-leader of the gang to London in his fast car. Some details of this journey
and the previous vacation trips they go on may be worth following up.
Seal Secret – Aidan Chambers
William was thoroughly bored and fed up with everything about this
Welsh Holiday - but that was before he found out about Gwyn's secret..
A young boy endangers his own life when he sets out to release a
captive seal. William is unhappy when he sees the Welsh cottage his
parents had rented for their week's holiday, and he doesn't much like
Gwyn, the boy from the nearby farm
Three's A Crowd- Michael Drin
The story of Peter and Jenny's summer holiday with their writer uncle
on the Welsh coast.
Esme and the Smugglers – Olive Duhy
The school moves to a castle in North Wales where Esme's aunt turns out
not to be all she should.
Beach Mystery – Frank Elias
"Death had been waiting for the Captain at Moelvre Bay on the night
that the Royal Sovereign foundered and sank; he cheated it then, but it
still lurked and lingered in wait.
Evan Hughes knew nothing of this when he went to spend the summer with
his aunt at Menai Bridge; yet he was soon to realize that over her
household hovered a shadow which in some unfathomable way was related
to the tragedy at Moelvre Bay. With a lad's sensitive feeling for crime
and disaster, Evan had to visit the spot where the ship had gone down.
A sense of premonition possessed him before he went; having been there
and talked to the man with the glass eye, the dreadful fascination of
the place turned to fear - fear not of human agency,but of a power
beyond him that was sinister and oppressive.
Gradually and inexplicably he experienced a compelling sense of being
drawn into the Captain's affairs. The bay had an ungovernable
influence over him. Death was not to be cheated a second time."
The Peace Seekers - George Finkel A tale set in North Wales in
1170
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness. The
author also wrote "Midnight Blue", winner of the 1990 Smarties Prize.
M.Frow -Four Stowaways and AnnaA wild chase to Wales in pursuit of War Office secrets.
The Intelligence Corps Saves the Island – M.Frow
Two sets of twins on holidays in a small island off the coast of South
Wales find themselves looking into the case of the disappearance of
title deeds to their uncle's island and a mysterious stranger claiming
possession of the island.
The Rising Tide – Mabel Esther Allan
When she inherits three small islands, an eighteen year old persuades
her friend to go and live there for the winter, in islands off the
coast of Wales, with a mystery to solve, and danger from the tide.
The Pirates of Thorne Island – Phill Carradice
Nat Thomas and the other boys from the "Havannah" sail along the Severn
Estuary on a training cruise on board the "Polly". When the "Polly" is
damaged in a storm they put in to Pembroke Dock for repairs. Nat and
the boys stay in the army fort on Thorne Island, where they see lights
late one night.
The Bosun's Secret – Phil Carradice
Nat Thomas, a young orphan boy, is sent to the Industrial School
Ship "Havannah" in Cardiff in 1870. The conditions on the ship are
brutal, most of the brutality being carried out by Bosun Jayne, who
singles Nat out and subjects him to a reign of terror. (
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness.
The Riddle of the Figurehead - Rosalie K. Fry
Building a boat on the Gower peninsula, a French visitor and the fight
to save Sammy from being sent to a hostel away from his beloved
guillemot.
The Bevans children, with their exchange visitor from Brittany and
their newly made boat Evening Star, figure out the riddle of the
Sammy's figurehead, and save his simple beach home. Fine descriptions
of the shore of South Wales. Set in a particularly attractive part of
the Welsh coast the young heroine Stella Bevan, 11, is helping her
elder brothers build a boat 'The Evening Star'. Mystery develops. Set
on the Welsh coast. Stella Bevan, aged 11, is helping her elder
brothers build a boat. They are going to call it The Evening Star.
Stella is expecting a French girl to stay with her during the holidays,
but Phiippe, a brother of the French girl, arrives instead. He proves
(to everyone's surprise) exceptionally good value, not only in helping
to launch the boat but also in sailing it. All the Bevan family
subsequently become involved in a local injustice which they put right,
and in which Philippe plays an audacious and decisive part as a
detective
September Island – Rosalie K. Fry
Children are stranded on a sand bar off the Welsh coast.
Perilous Dawn – W.J. Goodyer
What was the strange secret of the blue suitcase? That was the question
which puzzled Jimmy Keene, his parents and his brother Roger, when they
returned to Wales from holiday on the Isle of man."
The problems that began as the family make their way home by car from
Liverpool to Radnorshire just seem to get worse and worse. They have stumbled
into a plot that may involve IRA saboteurs or even Russian spies. A new
installation in the mountains is under some sort of threat and the gang
that the boys tangle with is not afraid to use threats and kidnap in order
to get their way. Both Jimmy and Roger have to use all their resources
to unable the police to overcome a very cunning and ruthless bunch of
ne-er-do-wells.
Hazel in Uniform World Margaret W. Griffiths War II spy adventure
involving Hazel and her friends, set on the Welsh coast.
Detectives in Wales – Jean Henson
A children's story in a series The Holloway children, mystery solvers,
are by the sea in a large house in Wales. By the author of River
Detectives, Detectives in the Hills, Detectives by the sea and
Detectives Abroad
Holiday Adventure – William Glynne-Jones
An entertaining story telling of a group of children's adventures
during their summer holiday in the small Welsh village of Portavon
Green Grow the Rushes – Elinor Lyon
A girl from London, vacationing on the rugged Welsh coast with a
snippy, spoiled companion, finds three adventurous friends whom she
joins in a search for the cliffborne track of an old Roman road.
Curlew CampC. R. MANSELL
The Guides of the Curlew Patrol have been hoping for Adventure—and they
get it, when they find that the camp they are to join in the country
near the Welsh coast does not exist.
But that is only the beginning. Camping in the orchard of an old
house that has once been used for smuggling they soon discover that
their cheerful hostess is in trouble; and the disappearance of dogs
from her kennels, followed by visits of a man who wants to buy her
home, is to the Guides more than just a mere coincidence. A new kennel-
maid who obviously resents their presence, a midnight rendezvous that
almost ends in ends in disaster due to Rose's curiosity, and strange
tapping noises in the cellar, are mounting evidence of a mystery that
is to involve them in excitements and even dangers. How the Guides win
credit to themselves—and an adorable sheep-dog puppy as a mascot is a
story that all girls will enjoy.
A Wind from the Sea – Jennifer Morgan
It's 1833 Liverpool and a dead body is found in the Mersey - a black
woman slave. Thirteen year old Patience Penry hears this news as her
own life is turned into turmoil. Locked into poverty, her mother is
forced into domestic service and she must move to live with Uncle Huw
on his farm in Wales.
Spring Tide – Mary Ray
Set in Roman Britain in Caer Taff (Cardiff).
The House by the Shore – Ivy Russell
. .Children's story about Nickie and Jill setting off for a quiet
holiday in Wales. It ends with Nickie and Jill about to be photographed
for television newsreel. What can have happened between these two
times ?
Mona the Welsh Pony – Allen Seaby
Allen Seaby's stories of the ponies of the New Forest, Exmoor,
Dartmoor, and the Shetland Islands, are deservedly popular, not only
for the entertainment of the stories themselves, but also for their
accurage and affectionate studies of the wild life of the countryside
in which they live.
In this volume, Seaby turns to the mountain ponies of North Wales, and
tells the enthralling story of Mona against the background of her
native landscape, its people and their history.
Allan W Seaby's book "Mona the Welsh Pony" is set in a place near
Abermaw.
Abermaw is the Welsh for Barmouth, which does exist.
Battle for Destiny – Peter John Stephens
A young Welsh boy meets Harry Tudor, A Welshman with a claim to the
English throne historical fiction; a young Welsh lad exiled in a Breton
abbey is determined to go home to Wales, and aligns himself with
another Welshman who has a claim to the English throne;
Battle for Destiny - Peter John Stephens.
Ithel, the son of a Welsh minor lord escapes from drowning off the
coast of Brittany. Taken in by the church he fights for his destiny
until he falls into the path of Henry, Duke of Richmond. Later he joins
Richmond in France and, committed to his cause, is sent to Wales to
help prepare the Tudor invasion that eventually bring to the throne the
Lancastrian, Henry VII. He plays a vital part at the battle of Bosworth
where Richard III is defeated and killed. Most of the story in Wales is
in the fields and small dwellings around Milford Haven and then Carew
Castle.
Journey with a Secret – Showell Styles
Ann and John's hiking trip from their Welsh village to the sea turns
into a wild adventure, combining spies, a Hungarian girl, a misty moor
and all
Two English children on a Welsh walking tour pick up a runaway girl who is the
age of the older Davies, John; his sister is thirteen. Ilonka Kazinczy tells
John and Ann that the police are after her because she has run away from a cruel
uncle, but her story is suspicious: why should there be such an intensive hunt
for her? The truth soon comes out; Ilonka's uncle has been murdered and she is
carrying a secret document that will help organize a Hungarian freedom movement.
The incidents of chase and pursuit are full of action, the setting is
interesting (although there is a heavy dose of mountaineering detail for
non-climbers) and the style competent, but the plot is both contrived and
melodramatic.
A Shadow on the Sea – Tessa Theobald
A children's holiday overlooking a bay in Pembrokeshire. Four children
spend their March holiday alone in their family cottage overlooking a
bay in Pembrokeshire. The older children spend their time refurbishing
an old canoe, but Emma, the youngest, finds and rescues a guillemot
which has been coated by oil from ships and is unable to swim or fly.
The children clean it, and look after the bird, then find adventures
while exploring the bay.
Buried Alive – Jacqueline Wilson
Tim and Biscuits are having a brilliant holiday in Wales. Life is full
of icecream, sandcastles and picnics - until they meet the horrid bully
Prickle-Head and his side-kick Pinch-Face. Just as they are about to
despair, reinforcements arrive in an unexpected form.
Welsh Adventure – Viola Bayley
Mystery and excitement for Serena Hamble. Lively holiday adventures end
in deep mysterious waters.
The Haunting at Cliff HouseWales - unspecific
When her father inherits an estate from his great-aunt, Alison reluctantly
agrees to spend her summer in Wales. The dreary mansion called Pen-Y-Craig
(Welsh for Cliff House) is far from her Ottawa home, and her summer is far from
ordinary. Alison discovers an ancient diary, a haunted cave, and the story of a
young girl called Bronwen who lived at Cliff House in 1810. Alison sees spirits
and hears voices that compel her to unravel Bronwen's tangled and tragic
history. But can she learn from Bronwen's disasterous mistakes, and undo the
wrongs of the past and the present?" and "The story is set in the heart of Wales
in a house which Mr. Evans (The father) and Alison (the daughter) inherited from
a Great-Aunt. This house has a spirit trapped in time haunting it. Alison sees
visions of the ghost's (Bronwen's) life and is directed to an old diary. This
diary holds the keys to why Bronwen is trapped. Throughout the story Alison
seems to be going through the exactly the same situations as Bronwen did in
1810. Alison soon realizes what has happened to Bronwen and helps her change the
past. Throughout this plot Alison is going through tough times herself. Her
mother has long since passed away and her father has found a new woman
(Meiriona) who he has taken a liking to. Alison feels her territory has been
invaded by Meiriona and will ruin her tight knit relationship with her father.
In helping Bronwen out with her problem, Alison discovers that she can make
room, she doesn't own her father, and that everyone including her father has the
right to be happy."
Operation Footprint - Patricia Brooks.
The story is set in Llandudno, North Wales. The family on holiday come there
regularly each year and stay at a cottage on the less-frequented West Beach.
Most of their adventure features the Great Orme and their investigations by boat
of a small beach which is otherwise inaccessible. There are some quite exciting
episodes, though, after half-way it lapses into a pretty standard smugglers
story. The mystery may have been uncovered by the children but it is followed to
a conclusion by their uncle (very tradtional) who follows the clue to the
ring-leader of the gang to London in his fast car. Some details of this journey
and the previous vacation trips they go on may be worth following up.
Seal Secret – Aidan Chambers
William was thoroughly bored and fed up with everything about this
Welsh Holiday - but that was before he found out about Gwyn's secret..
A young boy endangers his own life when he sets out to release a
captive seal. William is unhappy when he sees the Welsh cottage his
parents had rented for their week's holiday, and he doesn't much like
Gwyn, the boy from the nearby farm
Three's A Crowd- Michael Drin
The story of Peter and Jenny's summer holiday with their writer uncle
on the Welsh coast.
Esme and the Smugglers – Olive Duhy
The school moves to a castle in North Wales where Esme's aunt turns out
not to be all she should.
Beach Mystery – Frank Elias
"Death had been waiting for the Captain at Moelvre Bay on the night
that the Royal Sovereign foundered and sank; he cheated it then, but it
still lurked and lingered in wait.
Evan Hughes knew nothing of this when he went to spend the summer with
his aunt at Menai Bridge; yet he was soon to realize that over her
household hovered a shadow which in some unfathomable way was related
to the tragedy at Moelvre Bay. With a lad's sensitive feeling for crime
and disaster, Evan had to visit the spot where the ship had gone down.
A sense of premonition possessed him before he went; having been there
and talked to the man with the glass eye, the dreadful fascination of
the place turned to fear - fear not of human agency,but of a power
beyond him that was sinister and oppressive.
Gradually and inexplicably he experienced a compelling sense of being
drawn into the Captain's affairs. The bay had an ungovernable
influence over him. Death was not to be cheated a second time."
The Peace Seekers - George Finkel A tale set in North Wales in
1170
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness. The
author also wrote "Midnight Blue", winner of the 1990 Smarties Prize.
M.Frow -Four Stowaways and AnnaA wild chase to Wales in pursuit of War Office secrets.
The Intelligence Corps Saves the Island – M.Frow
Two sets of twins on holidays in a small island off the coast of South
Wales find themselves looking into the case of the disappearance of
title deeds to their uncle's island and a mysterious stranger claiming
possession of the island.
Wednesday 24 November 2010
Dauntless Sails Again
Dauntless Sails Again
The Dauntless and her crew were sailing up the west coast of Scotland
towards the Isle of Skye when their holiday plans were interrupted.
Another converted fishing boat, bent on less lawful business than the
Dauntless, crossed their path, and they found themselves unaccountably
involved in a hunt for smugglers. Captain Blake and the boys would have
left the smugglers unmolested but for a chance meeting with Captain
Blake's old friend, McDougall, late of the Customs, who persuaded the
Captain to take him aboard. In spite of all Captain Blake's efforts to
keep the boys out of trouble, the fact that they alone had seen and
could recognise the smugglers made then, key witnesses for the Crown ;
but what finally lined them up on the side of the Law was the
smugglers' wrecking tactics. When they beheld the ripped sails and
smashed engine of the Dauntless the boys were all out for retaliation,
and the chase occupied the rest of their holiday
Another version
The ex-fishing boat Dauntless and her crew of teenage boys
are sailing up the West Coast of Scotland, determined to
return with a bunch of heather on their masthead to prove
they have reached the Island of Skye. But their holiday plans
come to an abrupt and sinister halt. A small coaster mistakes
their boat for another converted fishing yawl, and Dauntless
and her crew are caught up unexpectedly in a hunt for
reckless and determined smugglers.
By chance the boys meet up with James McDougall, an
ex-Customs officer and a friend of their sailing companion,
Captain Blake. Because the crew of Dauntless are the only
people who have actually seen the smugglers, they are key
witnesses in the chase, so McDougal1 hitches a ride on
Dauntless to track down the smugglers and find out where
and when they trans-ship the contraband.
Even then the boys hope to finish their trip to Skye, but
the smugglers decide to stop their spying by teaching them a
lesson. And when they deliberately smash. Dauntless's
engine and slash her sails to ribbons, there is no holding her
crew back from a chase that ends in a kidnap and the
dreadful swirling waters of the Gulf of Corryvrechan.
This is an exciting sea story in the tradition of Arthur
Ransome, which will be enjoyed by every young reader who
has ever wanted to sail or own a boat.
The Dauntless and her crew were sailing up the west coast of Scotland
towards the Isle of Skye when their holiday plans were interrupted.
Another converted fishing boat, bent on less lawful business than the
Dauntless, crossed their path, and they found themselves unaccountably
involved in a hunt for smugglers. Captain Blake and the boys would have
left the smugglers unmolested but for a chance meeting with Captain
Blake's old friend, McDougall, late of the Customs, who persuaded the
Captain to take him aboard. In spite of all Captain Blake's efforts to
keep the boys out of trouble, the fact that they alone had seen and
could recognise the smugglers made then, key witnesses for the Crown ;
but what finally lined them up on the side of the Law was the
smugglers' wrecking tactics. When they beheld the ripped sails and
smashed engine of the Dauntless the boys were all out for retaliation,
and the chase occupied the rest of their holiday
Another version
The ex-fishing boat Dauntless and her crew of teenage boys
are sailing up the West Coast of Scotland, determined to
return with a bunch of heather on their masthead to prove
they have reached the Island of Skye. But their holiday plans
come to an abrupt and sinister halt. A small coaster mistakes
their boat for another converted fishing yawl, and Dauntless
and her crew are caught up unexpectedly in a hunt for
reckless and determined smugglers.
By chance the boys meet up with James McDougall, an
ex-Customs officer and a friend of their sailing companion,
Captain Blake. Because the crew of Dauntless are the only
people who have actually seen the smugglers, they are key
witnesses in the chase, so McDougal1 hitches a ride on
Dauntless to track down the smugglers and find out where
and when they trans-ship the contraband.
Even then the boys hope to finish their trip to Skye, but
the smugglers decide to stop their spying by teaching them a
lesson. And when they deliberately smash. Dauntless's
engine and slash her sails to ribbons, there is no holding her
crew back from a chase that ends in a kidnap and the
dreadful swirling waters of the Gulf of Corryvrechan.
This is an exciting sea story in the tradition of Arthur
Ransome, which will be enjoyed by every young reader who
has ever wanted to sail or own a boat.
Policeman's Holiday
Policeman's Holiday -Bernard J.Farmer
The Ward family goes on their annual holiday to the seaside resort of Bargate which appears merely to be a cunning disguise for Margate in Kent. The plot concerns the old fort at the entrance to the Thames which was used for air-raid protection during WW2.
The Ward family goes on their annual holiday to the seaside resort of Bargate which appears merely to be a cunning disguise for Margate in Kent. The plot concerns the old fort at the entrance to the Thames which was used for air-raid protection during WW2.
Dauntless
Here is 'Dauntless and the Poplar Pirates'
Dauntless and the Poplar Pirates"Look out, David!" Alex cried warningly. "They are throwing stones at
us." David ducked, then raised himself cautiously. There was a
ringing sound and a yell of triumph.
"Got it!" a voice shouted jubilantly.
"I will get it as well," another voice cried and a stone hit the
Dauntless's mainmast. David saw the attackers as a row of faces
showing over the edge of the bridge balustrade and arms upraised to
throw more stones.
The crew of the Dauntless, David, Bob, Alex and Tim , have sailed
their boat up the Thames and moored her in Bow Creek and they are not
at all pleased at this reception. But they discover the "Poplar
Pirates", as these local lads call themselves, are not really
vicious, just showing their resentment at being warned off the river
boats by the local bargees. The Pirates are all desperately keen on
boats, so David and his friends decide to offer them a trip in the
Dauntless. There is fog in the river and they rescue the
unfriendliest of the bargees when his Thames sailing barge gets
wrecked on a sandbank. The bargee, his wife and granddaughter Jenny
take refuge on the Dauntless, but the Pirates decide to salvage the
barge so they can have a boat of their own.
David is worried about the barge family whose home it is, and the
rest of the story tells of the exciting salvage of the barge and how
finally David extracts them all from a dramatic situation by his tact
and good seamanship.
Another in the series of exciting books about the Dauntless, with the
usual ingredients of a thrilling story and all the fun of sailing as
well as the interest of the details of life on a working sailing
barge in the late 1940-s.
Dauntless and the Poplar Pirates"Look out, David!" Alex cried warningly. "They are throwing stones at
us." David ducked, then raised himself cautiously. There was a
ringing sound and a yell of triumph.
"Got it!" a voice shouted jubilantly.
"I will get it as well," another voice cried and a stone hit the
Dauntless's mainmast. David saw the attackers as a row of faces
showing over the edge of the bridge balustrade and arms upraised to
throw more stones.
The crew of the Dauntless, David, Bob, Alex and Tim , have sailed
their boat up the Thames and moored her in Bow Creek and they are not
at all pleased at this reception. But they discover the "Poplar
Pirates", as these local lads call themselves, are not really
vicious, just showing their resentment at being warned off the river
boats by the local bargees. The Pirates are all desperately keen on
boats, so David and his friends decide to offer them a trip in the
Dauntless. There is fog in the river and they rescue the
unfriendliest of the bargees when his Thames sailing barge gets
wrecked on a sandbank. The bargee, his wife and granddaughter Jenny
take refuge on the Dauntless, but the Pirates decide to salvage the
barge so they can have a boat of their own.
David is worried about the barge family whose home it is, and the
rest of the story tells of the exciting salvage of the barge and how
finally David extracts them all from a dramatic situation by his tact
and good seamanship.
Another in the series of exciting books about the Dauntless, with the
usual ingredients of a thrilling story and all the fun of sailing as
well as the interest of the details of life on a working sailing
barge in the late 1940-s.
Four books by George Elvey Haley
Cormorant Ahoy,Cormorant Sails Again,Cormorant's Commandos and Cormorant on Patrol are the four books in the series. Both Cormorant's Commandos and Cormorant on Patrol involve voyages from Whitby in north Yorkshire to a small island near the Manacles in the Channel.
Cormorant's Commandos also involves a brief visit to a lightship in the North Sea and this appears to be stationed off the mouth of the Humber. (Check details). The young crew believe that they are possibly headed for the Isle of Wight and they stop for a while in Dover.
When on the island -a fictional one not far from Plymouth - (which they name Dead Man's Chest)they become engaged in a war with older teenagers who are busy slaughtering the birds in order to make a profit. ON one occasion the younger members of the crew are immobilized by a rope deliberately wrapped around the screw of their propeller. They are unable to get back to Dead Man's Chest before they encounter storm force winds which prevent them from landing and which drive them down Channel and out into the Atlantic. A period of tremendous anxiety ends with a safe return home. Further explorations and warlike encounters continue until an unexpected discovery in a partly submerged cave is made. Rewards them come along for them all,
Cormorant's Commandos also involves a brief visit to a lightship in the North Sea and this appears to be stationed off the mouth of the Humber. (Check details). The young crew believe that they are possibly headed for the Isle of Wight and they stop for a while in Dover.
When on the island -a fictional one not far from Plymouth - (which they name Dead Man's Chest)they become engaged in a war with older teenagers who are busy slaughtering the birds in order to make a profit. ON one occasion the younger members of the crew are immobilized by a rope deliberately wrapped around the screw of their propeller. They are unable to get back to Dead Man's Chest before they encounter storm force winds which prevent them from landing and which drive them down Channel and out into the Atlantic. A period of tremendous anxiety ends with a safe return home. Further explorations and warlike encounters continue until an unexpected discovery in a partly submerged cave is made. Rewards them come along for them all,
Monday 22 November 2010
The Three Spaniards
The story is based around the coast of north Kent where is meets the river Thames. The village is called Cley and the nearby town is called Braddenham. However, several real places are brought into the storyline including Whitstable,Seasalter and Canterbury.
Saturday 20 November 2010
Haunted in Lincolnshire
It is the locale that makes the atmosphere of this book so successful. The story is set on a R.A.F. airfield on the marshes near the North Lincolnshire coast. It was used as a Coastal Command base during the Second World War. Two boys are at the centre of the experience and a series character nicknamed 'The Blue Falcon' is the nominal hero.
Mists sweep in from the sea and, for a while, make it plausible that unknown airmen are able to come and go within the perimeter of the secure base without being apprehended. The series of events that set everybody's nerves on edge are so violent and unexpected that it is hard to make any sense of what is being attempted by the people behind the 'so-called' haunting. A small dog is killed and mutilated without any logical explanation. A man in R.A.F. uniform in the mess responds to a challenge by lashing out and escaping into the rapidly approaching mist.
Most of the action takes place at night and the personnel on the base are in the grip of rumours and gossip about how old burial mounds have been responsible for the outbreak of sudden and violent activity. The tension is screwed up a few more rachets to breaking point when the vicar's daughter disappears into the mist and then the Blue Falcon himself is reduced to a helpless victim by a ninety-nine percent effective attempt at strangulation.
No sooner does the legitimate clandestine activity of the secret base become clear to the reader than the sudden and devastating attack is launched. Only the quick-thinking of the young hero leads to the apprehension of the malefactors and an explanation of their subterfuge.
Mists sweep in from the sea and, for a while, make it plausible that unknown airmen are able to come and go within the perimeter of the secure base without being apprehended. The series of events that set everybody's nerves on edge are so violent and unexpected that it is hard to make any sense of what is being attempted by the people behind the 'so-called' haunting. A small dog is killed and mutilated without any logical explanation. A man in R.A.F. uniform in the mess responds to a challenge by lashing out and escaping into the rapidly approaching mist.
Most of the action takes place at night and the personnel on the base are in the grip of rumours and gossip about how old burial mounds have been responsible for the outbreak of sudden and violent activity. The tension is screwed up a few more rachets to breaking point when the vicar's daughter disappears into the mist and then the Blue Falcon himself is reduced to a helpless victim by a ninety-nine percent effective attempt at strangulation.
No sooner does the legitimate clandestine activity of the secret base become clear to the reader than the sudden and devastating attack is launched. Only the quick-thinking of the young hero leads to the apprehension of the malefactors and an explanation of their subterfuge.
Sunday 14 November 2010
Round the coast in major authors
Crossing the Shadow Line
Which authors can be said to have used their section of the coastal journey to explore the hinterland of the characters behind the adventure on the coast ?
Off the top of my head I can think of about 10 who may qualify.
Malcolm Saville and the locations at Whitby,Robin Hood's Bay,Norfolk-Suffolk,West Sussex,Plymouth.
Dorita Fairlie Bruce and locations in Kent and in Ayr (Largs)
Philip Turner and locations in North and East Yorkshire,Dover and Shetlands
Arthur Ransome and locations in Norfolk,Suffolk,Hebrides
Mabel Esther Allan and locations in Robin Hood's Bay,Hebrides.
Hester Burton and locations in Suffolk and Norfolk
Percy F. Westerman and locations in Yorkshire,Hampshire,Dorset and Devon
Monica Edwards and locations in Kent and West Sussex
Tyler Whittle and locations in Norfolk and Suffolk
Lorna Hill and locations in Northumberland and Skye
Captain W.E.Johns and locations in Norfolk
Winifred Finlay and locations in Northumberland
Winifred Cawley and locations in Northumberland
Elinor M. Brent Dyer and locations in Guernsey and Wales
K.M.Peyton and locations in Suffolk and Essex
Lois Lamplugh and locations in Devon
Elsie J. Oxenham and locations in North Yorkshire
Theresa Tomlinson and locations in North Yorkshire
Jane Gardam and locations in Durham
David Divine and locations in Dover and Chichester
James Lennox Kerr and Peter Dawlish and locations in Yorkshire and the Thames
Which authors can be said to have used their section of the coastal journey to explore the hinterland of the characters behind the adventure on the coast ?
Off the top of my head I can think of about 10 who may qualify.
Malcolm Saville and the locations at Whitby,Robin Hood's Bay,Norfolk-Suffolk,West Sussex,Plymouth.
Dorita Fairlie Bruce and locations in Kent and in Ayr (Largs)
Philip Turner and locations in North and East Yorkshire,Dover and Shetlands
Arthur Ransome and locations in Norfolk,Suffolk,Hebrides
Mabel Esther Allan and locations in Robin Hood's Bay,Hebrides.
Hester Burton and locations in Suffolk and Norfolk
Percy F. Westerman and locations in Yorkshire,Hampshire,Dorset and Devon
Monica Edwards and locations in Kent and West Sussex
Tyler Whittle and locations in Norfolk and Suffolk
Lorna Hill and locations in Northumberland and Skye
Captain W.E.Johns and locations in Norfolk
Winifred Finlay and locations in Northumberland
Winifred Cawley and locations in Northumberland
Elinor M. Brent Dyer and locations in Guernsey and Wales
K.M.Peyton and locations in Suffolk and Essex
Lois Lamplugh and locations in Devon
Elsie J. Oxenham and locations in North Yorkshire
Theresa Tomlinson and locations in North Yorkshire
Jane Gardam and locations in Durham
David Divine and locations in Dover and Chichester
James Lennox Kerr and Peter Dawlish and locations in Yorkshire and the Thames
Friday 12 November 2010
Yorkshire
Bill Takes The Helm – Betty Bowen
FIFTEEN year old Bill Walton of Long Island, U.S.A., lives a
carefree, adventurous life sailing his beautiful shining boat off the
Sound, happy among his many friends, proud of captaining his school
football team. Suddenly Bill's mother dies, and everything is changed.
Bill decides to take his young sister Merrie to live with "Gram," the
grand¬mother he has never met, in a tiny Yorkshire fishing village.
Bill's sister Merrie falls sick on the Atlantic crossing, but even
worse, Gram is not there to meet them at Southampton! Bewildered and
homesick Bill finds his own way up to Yorkshire.
Whilst suddenly happy in their new home with Gram, Bill finds he is
unwelcome in the village and is looked upon as a "foreigner." He has
a tough time living down an early fight with local boys, Rolf, Tim
and Pete over the possession of a drifting boat he salvages and which
he hopes to repair and sail again himself.
How Bill lives down this first disas¬trous accident and takes part in
an exciting fishing expedition; how he passes his first strange and
frightening day at an English school and how he heroically rescues
his former enemies in a terrifying storm at sea, is all vividly
relived in this enthralling story of courage and high adventure set
against the authentic background of the storm-ridden, sea-battered
Yorkshire coast.
Huntrodd's Eye – Victor C. Brown
Set in Yorkshire, this a story about fourteen year old Kit. He is of
the Huntrodd family, the only one with that peculiar telepathic power
known as 'Huntrodds eye'. His journey ends in the smugglers' tunnels of
the village of Robin Hood's Bay. The old legends of the Bay take on a
terrifying life of their own.
Breakers by Julia Clarke
Adapting to life by the sea in Yorkshire is difficult for London-born
Cat and her sister Ana. Cat feels responsible for Ana - particularly
when the bullying starts. But she has her own life to sort out too. The
boy down the road, Sebastian, seems interested in her - but Cat
suspects his motives.
Smugglers All – W.Bourne Cook
18th century story of Yorkshire village where people make money by
fishing and smuggling. Hero is thirteen year old boy.
The Tale of Robin Lyth – Christine A. Jones
A young child is found on the beach near some fishing boats at the
North Landing of Flamborough, Yorkshire. Who he is or where he came
from no-one knows. He is taken in and raised by a fishing family and
becomes a notorious but brave and generous smuggler. He falls in love
with a pretty farmer's daughter whose family is reluctant to encourage
the match because of Robin's trade and unknown origins. Robin promises
to reform and prove himself worthy of her -- but too late, he is framed
for the murder of a coast guard and has to flee for his life. How he is
exonerated, the mystery of his birth and his quest to live "happily
ever after" is Robin Lyth's tale
Dog Friday – Hilary McKay
A beautifully written and hilarious introduction to Robin Brogan and
his friends at Porridge Hall. Robin Brogan lives peacefully with his
mother in one half of Porridge Hall, a big, old house on the Yorkshire
coast. And then the Robinsons move in next door, and Robin's life
becomes more evenful than he could possibly have imagined. The
Robinsons prove just as unusual and funny as their names. The twins,
Ant and Perry, vegetable loving Beany, Sun Dance and their scruffy
mongrel, Old Blanket, specialise in creating mayhem. They attempt to
entice guests in to Mrs Brogan's Bed and Breakfast, teach Robin how to
be brave, and, most importantly, help him work out how he can keep the
abandoned dog he finds on the beach...
Bandaberry- Laurence Meynell
A juvenile adventure thriller set on an island off the Yorkshire coast. David
Walker arrives on the island of Bandaberry.
The Highwayman's Footsteps - Nicola Morgan
This is a 2006 book which I have just read. The action purports to
take place on the North Yorkshire Moors, on two visits to Scarborough
and a fleeting return to Hexham where the hero comes from. The most
important events take place in Scarborough market and in a desperate
encounter in a back alley. The Hexham incidents reveal nothing about
the town that could not have been applied to anywhere. There is mention
of a real historical incident about a young soldier who was executed
for stealing flour that was used for powdering wigs. Similarly there is
mention of Hexham riots.
Nightingales Song - Kate Pennington
The setting is Whitby in the mid 1700s.Maggie Nightingale spends her
evenings singing in her father's tavern, the Anchor Inn, on the rugged
east Yorkshire coastline. The inn is a haunt for local ruffians,
thieves and smugglers, and Maggie overhears many a dark plan hatched
over ale at night. She never imagined that such plans could threaten
her very existence, and see her wrongly accused of murder. Togther with
notorious smuggling villain, Thomas Hague, Maggie's only escape from
public hanging comes in the form of a ship bound for America. The New
World. but will the shadow of death follow Maggie Nightingale across
the ocean, and haunt her for the rest of her life?
Room 13 - Robert Swindells
This is mostly set in Whitby. It gives an
account of a week's holiday spent in the seaside town by a party of 31
pupila from a school in Bradford. The story is mostly told from the
point of view of Fliss or Felicity who has a bad dream the night before
she goes on the trip and a nightmare experience during the week that
she is there. During the week various Yorkshire locations are visited
includings Staithes, Robin Hood's Bay and many well-known Whitby
landmarks including the Abbey and the famous steps.
Tom Travis - Nigel Thomas
Whilst vacationing with their parents on the east coast of England, Tom
and Simon Travis discover a maze of underground tunnels under an old
World War II gun emplacement. The tunnels have been constructed by the
Bridlington colony of an alien race, from the planet Pyzon. The Pyzons
are involved in a war with the people of the planet Tynax. The children
enlist the help of their father, a retired Royal Navy officer, who uses
his influence with the Ministry of Defence. The Royal Navy and Air
Force become involved in several underwater battles with the Tynax.
After a top secret, Area 51-style government communications base is
used to contact a Pyzon base on the moon, the action transfers to space
for the deciding encounter.
Wolf Girl - Theresa Tomlinson
This story is set in Whitby Abbey in the year before the Synod of
Whitby. Cwen, the weaver, is accused of stealing a valuable necklace.
That in itself would merit a severe penalty but there is worse. It
could be a royal necklace and in that case stealing it would be
treason and the punishment would be slow death. But Cwen's daughter
Wulfrun is determined to prove her mother innocent. And she finds
some surprising allies in the Princess Elfled, the novice monk
Adfrith and the cowherd/poet Cadmon. Their quest takes them to a
small fishing village and then to a hermit in a forest. But there are
those who do not want the truth uncovered and Wulfrun and her friends
eventually find themselves on a wild desperate flight to Bamburgh.
Whitby Abbey and its community are brought vividly to life both by
the author's descriptions and also by the useful little plan at the
beginning of the book. Right away this makes it quite clear that this
is a Celtic Abbey and not one of the better known medieval Roman
ones. For a start Hild's community contains both monks and nuns. The
everyday work of the little community can be easily imagined by the
reader. There is Adfrith in the scriptorium, Fridgyth with her herb
garden, Cadmon with his calves – and we share his pain when the blood
month arrives and they are killed.
The book just abounds with strong, independent female characters. To
name but a few: there is the Princess Elfled, wilful and imperious
but also courageous and determined, Wulfrun, courageous and
responsible beyond her fourteen years, and the abbess Hild herself
who rules her little community wisely and who wields power among the
greatest kings and princes in the land.
This story brings to life a period of English history which, sadly,
is too often neglected –– Anglo-Saxon times. The book has been
thoroughly researched and there is a note on the sources used ––
including of course Bede's History of the English Church and People.
And yet although so many scholarly works have been used the writing
is eminently readable.
In her note at the end the author has said that she decided to try
some mystery/adventure stories using Hild's abbey at Whitby for the
setting.
The Voyage of the Silver Bream – Theresa Tomlinson
A story of the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Waterway. Jack and Izzie's
father is the captain of a keelboat, the Dragonfly; that carries grain
from the River Humber, up the waterway to Sheffield Canal Basin, then
returns with a cargo of coal or iron goods. The new railway companies
threaten to put the keelboats out of business, so Jack and Izzie must
try to help their father save the Silver Bream.
The Summer People – John Rowe Townsend
Set during the summer holidays in a Yorkshire coastal resort just
before the outbreak of WWII.
A Sub of the R.N.R. – Percy F. Westerman
The first world war raid on Scarborough. A sub of the RNR.
The Voyage of the "Dauntless" - J.C.Western Holt
When his livelihood is threatened by the unscrupulous dealings of a
ship-owner the captain of a small cargo vessel decides to take action.
The owner pays him off in Hull and then replaces him with a captain who
is prepared to see one of his ships turned into a "coffin ship" for the
insurance money. A stowaway intervenes and saves the captain's life and
the two of them steer the ship back to Hull and rejoin the original
crew. At this point the good captain decides to take advantage of the
crook's plans and take over the ship himself. Believing it is lost, the
world does not realise that the honest crew have set out for Africa
under false colours.
FIFTEEN year old Bill Walton of Long Island, U.S.A., lives a
carefree, adventurous life sailing his beautiful shining boat off the
Sound, happy among his many friends, proud of captaining his school
football team. Suddenly Bill's mother dies, and everything is changed.
Bill decides to take his young sister Merrie to live with "Gram," the
grand¬mother he has never met, in a tiny Yorkshire fishing village.
Bill's sister Merrie falls sick on the Atlantic crossing, but even
worse, Gram is not there to meet them at Southampton! Bewildered and
homesick Bill finds his own way up to Yorkshire.
Whilst suddenly happy in their new home with Gram, Bill finds he is
unwelcome in the village and is looked upon as a "foreigner." He has
a tough time living down an early fight with local boys, Rolf, Tim
and Pete over the possession of a drifting boat he salvages and which
he hopes to repair and sail again himself.
How Bill lives down this first disas¬trous accident and takes part in
an exciting fishing expedition; how he passes his first strange and
frightening day at an English school and how he heroically rescues
his former enemies in a terrifying storm at sea, is all vividly
relived in this enthralling story of courage and high adventure set
against the authentic background of the storm-ridden, sea-battered
Yorkshire coast.
Huntrodd's Eye – Victor C. Brown
Set in Yorkshire, this a story about fourteen year old Kit. He is of
the Huntrodd family, the only one with that peculiar telepathic power
known as 'Huntrodds eye'. His journey ends in the smugglers' tunnels of
the village of Robin Hood's Bay. The old legends of the Bay take on a
terrifying life of their own.
Breakers by Julia Clarke
Adapting to life by the sea in Yorkshire is difficult for London-born
Cat and her sister Ana. Cat feels responsible for Ana - particularly
when the bullying starts. But she has her own life to sort out too. The
boy down the road, Sebastian, seems interested in her - but Cat
suspects his motives.
Smugglers All – W.Bourne Cook
18th century story of Yorkshire village where people make money by
fishing and smuggling. Hero is thirteen year old boy.
The Tale of Robin Lyth – Christine A. Jones
A young child is found on the beach near some fishing boats at the
North Landing of Flamborough, Yorkshire. Who he is or where he came
from no-one knows. He is taken in and raised by a fishing family and
becomes a notorious but brave and generous smuggler. He falls in love
with a pretty farmer's daughter whose family is reluctant to encourage
the match because of Robin's trade and unknown origins. Robin promises
to reform and prove himself worthy of her -- but too late, he is framed
for the murder of a coast guard and has to flee for his life. How he is
exonerated, the mystery of his birth and his quest to live "happily
ever after" is Robin Lyth's tale
Dog Friday – Hilary McKay
A beautifully written and hilarious introduction to Robin Brogan and
his friends at Porridge Hall. Robin Brogan lives peacefully with his
mother in one half of Porridge Hall, a big, old house on the Yorkshire
coast. And then the Robinsons move in next door, and Robin's life
becomes more evenful than he could possibly have imagined. The
Robinsons prove just as unusual and funny as their names. The twins,
Ant and Perry, vegetable loving Beany, Sun Dance and their scruffy
mongrel, Old Blanket, specialise in creating mayhem. They attempt to
entice guests in to Mrs Brogan's Bed and Breakfast, teach Robin how to
be brave, and, most importantly, help him work out how he can keep the
abandoned dog he finds on the beach...
Bandaberry- Laurence Meynell
A juvenile adventure thriller set on an island off the Yorkshire coast. David
Walker arrives on the island of Bandaberry.
The Highwayman's Footsteps - Nicola Morgan
This is a 2006 book which I have just read. The action purports to
take place on the North Yorkshire Moors, on two visits to Scarborough
and a fleeting return to Hexham where the hero comes from. The most
important events take place in Scarborough market and in a desperate
encounter in a back alley. The Hexham incidents reveal nothing about
the town that could not have been applied to anywhere. There is mention
of a real historical incident about a young soldier who was executed
for stealing flour that was used for powdering wigs. Similarly there is
mention of Hexham riots.
Nightingales Song - Kate Pennington
The setting is Whitby in the mid 1700s.Maggie Nightingale spends her
evenings singing in her father's tavern, the Anchor Inn, on the rugged
east Yorkshire coastline. The inn is a haunt for local ruffians,
thieves and smugglers, and Maggie overhears many a dark plan hatched
over ale at night. She never imagined that such plans could threaten
her very existence, and see her wrongly accused of murder. Togther with
notorious smuggling villain, Thomas Hague, Maggie's only escape from
public hanging comes in the form of a ship bound for America. The New
World. but will the shadow of death follow Maggie Nightingale across
the ocean, and haunt her for the rest of her life?
Room 13 - Robert Swindells
This is mostly set in Whitby. It gives an
account of a week's holiday spent in the seaside town by a party of 31
pupila from a school in Bradford. The story is mostly told from the
point of view of Fliss or Felicity who has a bad dream the night before
she goes on the trip and a nightmare experience during the week that
she is there. During the week various Yorkshire locations are visited
includings Staithes, Robin Hood's Bay and many well-known Whitby
landmarks including the Abbey and the famous steps.
Tom Travis - Nigel Thomas
Whilst vacationing with their parents on the east coast of England, Tom
and Simon Travis discover a maze of underground tunnels under an old
World War II gun emplacement. The tunnels have been constructed by the
Bridlington colony of an alien race, from the planet Pyzon. The Pyzons
are involved in a war with the people of the planet Tynax. The children
enlist the help of their father, a retired Royal Navy officer, who uses
his influence with the Ministry of Defence. The Royal Navy and Air
Force become involved in several underwater battles with the Tynax.
After a top secret, Area 51-style government communications base is
used to contact a Pyzon base on the moon, the action transfers to space
for the deciding encounter.
Wolf Girl - Theresa Tomlinson
This story is set in Whitby Abbey in the year before the Synod of
Whitby. Cwen, the weaver, is accused of stealing a valuable necklace.
That in itself would merit a severe penalty but there is worse. It
could be a royal necklace and in that case stealing it would be
treason and the punishment would be slow death. But Cwen's daughter
Wulfrun is determined to prove her mother innocent. And she finds
some surprising allies in the Princess Elfled, the novice monk
Adfrith and the cowherd/poet Cadmon. Their quest takes them to a
small fishing village and then to a hermit in a forest. But there are
those who do not want the truth uncovered and Wulfrun and her friends
eventually find themselves on a wild desperate flight to Bamburgh.
Whitby Abbey and its community are brought vividly to life both by
the author's descriptions and also by the useful little plan at the
beginning of the book. Right away this makes it quite clear that this
is a Celtic Abbey and not one of the better known medieval Roman
ones. For a start Hild's community contains both monks and nuns. The
everyday work of the little community can be easily imagined by the
reader. There is Adfrith in the scriptorium, Fridgyth with her herb
garden, Cadmon with his calves – and we share his pain when the blood
month arrives and they are killed.
The book just abounds with strong, independent female characters. To
name but a few: there is the Princess Elfled, wilful and imperious
but also courageous and determined, Wulfrun, courageous and
responsible beyond her fourteen years, and the abbess Hild herself
who rules her little community wisely and who wields power among the
greatest kings and princes in the land.
This story brings to life a period of English history which, sadly,
is too often neglected –– Anglo-Saxon times. The book has been
thoroughly researched and there is a note on the sources used ––
including of course Bede's History of the English Church and People.
And yet although so many scholarly works have been used the writing
is eminently readable.
In her note at the end the author has said that she decided to try
some mystery/adventure stories using Hild's abbey at Whitby for the
setting.
The Voyage of the Silver Bream – Theresa Tomlinson
A story of the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Waterway. Jack and Izzie's
father is the captain of a keelboat, the Dragonfly; that carries grain
from the River Humber, up the waterway to Sheffield Canal Basin, then
returns with a cargo of coal or iron goods. The new railway companies
threaten to put the keelboats out of business, so Jack and Izzie must
try to help their father save the Silver Bream.
The Summer People – John Rowe Townsend
Set during the summer holidays in a Yorkshire coastal resort just
before the outbreak of WWII.
A Sub of the R.N.R. – Percy F. Westerman
The first world war raid on Scarborough. A sub of the RNR.
The Voyage of the "Dauntless" - J.C.Western Holt
When his livelihood is threatened by the unscrupulous dealings of a
ship-owner the captain of a small cargo vessel decides to take action.
The owner pays him off in Hull and then replaces him with a captain who
is prepared to see one of his ships turned into a "coffin ship" for the
insurance money. A stowaway intervenes and saves the captain's life and
the two of them steer the ship back to Hull and rejoin the original
crew. At this point the good captain decides to take advantage of the
crook's plans and take over the ship himself. Believing it is lost, the
world does not realise that the honest crew have set out for Africa
under false colours.
Tuesday 9 November 2010
Wales
Wales and Cheshire
The Rising Tide – MEA –
When she inherits three small islands, an eighteen year old persuades
her friend to go and live there for the winter, in islands off the
coast of Wales, with a mystery to solve, and danger from the tide.
The Pirates of Thorne Island – Phill Carradice
Nat Thomas and the other boys from the "Havannah" sail along the Severn
Estuary on a training cruise on board the "Polly". When the "Polly" is
damaged in a storm they put in to Pembroke Dock for repairs. Nat and
the boys stay in the army fort on Thorne Island, where they see lights
late one night.
The Bosun's Secret – Phil Carradice
Nat Thomas, a young orphan boy, is sent to the Industrial School
Ship "Havannah" in Cardiff in 1870. The conditions on the ship are
brutal, most of the brutality being carried out by Bosun Jayne, who
singles Nat out and subjects him to a reign of terror. (
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness. The
author also wrote "Midnight Blue", winner of the 1990 Smarties Prize.
Rosalie K.Fry The Riddle of the Figurehead
Building a boat on the Gower peninsula, a French visitor and the fight
to save Sammy from being sent to a hostel away from his beloved
guillemot.
The Riddle of the Figurehead – Rosalie K. Fry
The Bevans children, with their exchange visitor from Brittany and
their newly made boat Evening Star, figure out the riddle of the
Sammy's figurehead, and save his simple beach home. Fine descriptions
of the shore of South Wales. Set in a particularly attractive part of
the Welsh coast the young heroine Stella Bevan, 11, is helping her
elder brothers build a boat 'The Even ing Star'. Mystery develops. Set
on the Welsh coast. Stella Bevan, aged 11, is helping her elder
brothers build a boat. They are going to call it The Evening Star.
Stella is expecting a French girl to stay with her during the holidays,
but Phiippe, a brother of the French girl, arrives instead. He proves
(to everyone's surprise) exceptionally good value, not only in helping
to launch the boat but also in sailing it. All the Bevan family
subsequently become involved in a local injustice which they put right,
and in which Philippe plays an audacious and decisive part as a
detective
September Island – Rosalie K. Fry
Children are stranded on a sand bar off the Welsh coast.
Perilous Dawn – W.J. Goodyer
What was the strange secret of the blue suitcase? That was the question
which puzzled Jimmy Keene, his parents and his brother Roger, when they
returned to Wales from holiday on the Isle of man."
The problems that began as the family make their way home by car from
Liverpool to Radnorshire just seem to get worse and worse. They have stumbled
into a plot that may involve IRA saboteurs or even Russian spies. A new
installation in the mountains is under some sort of threat and the gang
that the boys tangle with is not afraid to use threats and kidnap in order
to get their way. Both Jimmy and Roger have to use all their resources
to unable the police to overcome a very cunning and ruthless bunch of
ne-er-do-wells.
Margaret W. Griffiths Hazel in Uniform
World War II spy adventure involving Hazel and her friends, set on the Welsh coast.
Detectives in Wales – Jean Henson
A children's story in a series The Holloway children, mystery solvers,
are by the sea in a large house in Wales. By the author of River
Detectives, Detectives in the Hills, Detectives by the sea and
Detectives Abroad
Holiday Adventure – William Glynne-Jones
An entertaining story telling of a group of children's adventures
during their summer holiday in the small Welsh village of Portavon
Green Grow the Rushes – Elinor Lyon
A girl from London, vacationing on the rugged Welsh coast with a
snippy, spoiled companion, finds three adventurous friends whom she
joins in a search for the cliffborne track of an old Roman road.
Curlew Camp C. R. MANSELL
The Guides of the Curlew Patrol have been hoping for Adventure—and they
get it, when they find that the camp they are to join in the country
near the Welsh coast does not exist.
But that is only the beginning. Camping in the orchard of an old
house that has once been used for smuggling they soon discover that
their cheerful hostess is in trouble; and the disappearance of dogs
from her kennels, followed by visits of a man who wants to buy her
home, is to the Guides more than just a mere coincidence. A new kennel-
maid who obviously resents their presence, a midnight rendezvous that
almost ends in ends in disaster due to Rose's curiosity, and strange
tapping noises in the cellar, are mounting evidence of a mystery that
is to involve them in excitements and even dangers. How the Guides win
credit to themselves—and an adorable sheep-dog puppy as a mascot is a
story that all girls will enjoy.
A Wind from the Sea – Jennifer Morgan
It's 1833 Liverpool and a dead body is found in the Mersey - a black
woman slave. Thirteen year old Patience Penry hears this news as her
own life is turned into turmoil. Locked into poverty, her mother is
forced into domestic service and she must move to live with Uncle Huw
on his farm in Wales.
Spring Tide – Mary Ray
Set in Roman Britain in Caer Taff (Cardiff).
The House by the Shore – Ivy Russell
. .Children's story about Nickie and Jill setting off for a quiet
holiday in Wales. It ends with Nickie and Jill about to be photographed
for television newsreel. What can have happened between these two
times ?
Mona the Welsh Pony – Allen Seaby
Allen Seaby's stories of the ponies of the New Forest, Exmoor,
Dartmoor, and the Shetland Islands, are deservedly popular, not only
for the entertainment of the stories themselves, but also for their
accurage and affectionate studies of the wild life of the countryside
in which they live.
In this volume, Seaby turns to the mountain ponies of North Wales, and
tells the enthralling story of Mona against the background of her
native landscape, its people and their history.
Allan W Seaby's book "Mona the Welsh Pony" is set in a place near
Abermaw.
Abermaw is the Welsh for Barmouth, which does exist.
Battle for Destiny – Peter John Stephens
A young Welsh boy meets Harry Tudor, A Welshman with a claim to the
English throne historical fiction; a young Welsh lad exiled in a Breton
abbey is determined to go home to Wales, and aligns himself with
another Welshman who has a claim to the English throne;
Battle for Destiny - Peter John Stephens.
Ithel, the son of a Welsh minor lord escapes from drowning off the
coast of Brittany. Taken in by the church he fights for his destiny
until he falls into the path of Henry, Duke of Richmond. Later he joins
Richmond in France and, committed to his cause, is sent to Wales to
help prepare the Tudor invasion that eventually bring to the throne the
Lancastrian, Henry VII. He plays a vital part at the battle of Bosworth
where Richard III is defeated and killed. Most of the story in Wales is
in the fields and small dwellings around Milford Haven and then Carew
Castle.
Journey with a Secret – Showell Styles
Ann and John's hiking trip from their Welsh village to the sea turns
into a wild adventure, combining spies, a Hungarian girl, a misty moor
and all
Styles, Showell. Journey with a Secret. Meredith, 1969. 141p. $4.95.
Two English children on a Welsh walking tour pick up a runaway girl who is the
age of the older Davies, John; his sister is thirteen. Ilonka Kazinczy tells
John and Ann that the police are after her because she has run away from a cruel
uncle, but her story is suspicious: why should there be such an intensive hunt
for her? The truth soon comes out; Ilonka's uncle has been murdered and she is
carrying a secret document that will help organize a Hungarian freedom movement.
The incidents of chase and pursuit are full of action, the setting is
interesting (although there is a heavy dose of mountaineering detail for
non-climbers) and the style competent, but the plot is both contrived and
melodramatic.
A Shadow on the Sea – Tessa Theobald
A children's holiday overlooking a bay in Pembrokeshire. Four children
spend their March holiday alone in their family cottage overlooking a
bay in Pembrokeshire. The older children spend their time refurbishing
an old canoe, but Emma, the youngest, finds and rescues a guillemot
which has been coated by oil from ships and is unable to swim or fly.
The children clean it, and look after the bird, then find adventures
while exploring the bay.
Buried Alive – Jacqueline Wilson
Tim and Biscuits are having a brilliant holiday in Wales. Life is full
of icecream, sandcastles and picnics - until they meet the horrid bully
Prickle-Head and his side-kick Pinch-Face. Just as they are about to
despair, reinforcements arrive in an unexpected form.
Welsh Adventure – Viola Bayley
Mystery and excitement for Serena Hamble. Lively holiday adventures end
in deep mysterious waters.
The Haunting at Cliff House
Wales - unspecific
When her father inherits an estate from his great-aunt, Alison reluctantly
agrees to spend her summer in Wales. The dreary mansion called Pen-Y-Craig
(Welsh for Cliff House) is far from her Ottawa home, and her summer is far from
ordinary. Alison discovers an ancient diary, a haunted cave, and the story of a
young girl called Bronwen who lived at Cliff House in 1810. Alison sees spirits
and hears voices that compel her to unravel Bronwen's tangled and tragic
history. But can she learn from Bronwen's disasterous mistakes, and undo the
wrongs of the past and the present?" and "The story is set in the heart of Wales
in a house which Mr. Evans (The father) and Alison (the daughter) inherited from
a Great-Aunt. This house has a spirit trapped in time haunting it. Alison sees
visions of the ghost's (Bronwen's) life and is directed to an old diary. This
diary holds the keys to why Bronwen is trapped. Throughout the story Alison
seems to be going through the exactly the same situations as Bronwen did in
1810. Alison soon realizes what has happened to Bronwen and helps her change the
past. Throughout this plot Alison is going through tough times herself. Her
mother has long since passed away and her father has found a new woman
(Meiriona) who he has taken a liking to. Alison feels her territory has been
invaded by Meiriona and will ruin her tight knit relationship with her father.
In helping Bronwen out with her problem, Alison discovers that she can make
room, she doesn't own her father, and that everyone including her father has the
right to be happy."
Operation Footprint - Patricia Brooks.
The story is set in Llandudno, North Wales. The family on holiday come there
regularly each year and stay at a cottage on the less-frequented West Beach.
Most of their adventure features the Great Orme and their investigations by boat
of a small beach which is otherwise inaccessible. There are some quite exciting
episodes, though, after half-way it lapses into a pretty standard smugglers
story. The mystery may have been uncovered by the children but it is followed to
a conclusion by their uncle (very tradtional) who follows the clue to the
ring-leader of the gang to London in his fast car. Some details of this journey
and the previous vacation trips they go on may be worth following up.
Seal Secret – Aidan Chambers
William was thoroughly bored and fed up with everything about this
Welsh Holiday - but that was before he found out about Gwyn's secret..
A young boy endangers his own life when he sets out to release a
captive seal. William is unhappy when he sees the Welsh cottage his
parents had rented for their week's holiday, and he doesn't much like
Gwyn, the boy from the nearby farm
Three’s a Crowd - Michael Drin
The story of Peter and Jenny's summer holiday with their writer uncle
on the Welsh coast.
Esme and the Smugglers – Olive Duhy
The school moves to a castle in North Wales where Esme's aunt turns out
not to be all she should.
Beach Mystery – Frank Elias
"Death had been waiting for the Captain at Moelvre Bay on the night
that the Royal Sovereign foundered and sank; he cheated it then, but it
still lurked and lingered in wait.
Evan Hughes knew nothing of this when he went to spend the summer with
his aunt at Menai Bridge; yet he was soon to realize that over her
household hovered a shadow which in some unfathomable way was related
to the tragedy at Moelvre Bay. With a lad's sensitive feeling for crime
and disaster, Evan had to visit the spot where the ship had gone down.
A sense of premonition possessed him before he went; having been there
and talked to the man with the glass eye, the dreadful fascination of
the place turned to fear - fear not of human agency,but of a power
beyond him that was sinister and oppressive.
Gradually and inexplicably he experienced a compelling sense of being
drawn into the Captain's affairs. The bay had an ungovernable
influence over him. Death was not to be cheated a second time."
The Peace Seekers – George Finkel
A tale set in North Wales in 1170
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness. The
author also wrote "Midnight Blue", winner of the 1990 Smarties Prize.
M.Frow -Four Stowaways and Anna
A wild chase to Wales in pursuit of War Office secrets.
The Intelligence Corps Saves the Island – M.Frow
Two sets of twins on holidays in a small island off the coast of South
Wales find themselves looking into the case of the disappearance of
title deeds to their uncle's island and a mysterious stranger claiming
possession of the island.
The Rising Tide – MEA –
When she inherits three small islands, an eighteen year old persuades
her friend to go and live there for the winter, in islands off the
coast of Wales, with a mystery to solve, and danger from the tide.
The Pirates of Thorne Island – Phill Carradice
Nat Thomas and the other boys from the "Havannah" sail along the Severn
Estuary on a training cruise on board the "Polly". When the "Polly" is
damaged in a storm they put in to Pembroke Dock for repairs. Nat and
the boys stay in the army fort on Thorne Island, where they see lights
late one night.
The Bosun's Secret – Phil Carradice
Nat Thomas, a young orphan boy, is sent to the Industrial School
Ship "Havannah" in Cardiff in 1870. The conditions on the ship are
brutal, most of the brutality being carried out by Bosun Jayne, who
singles Nat out and subjects him to a reign of terror. (
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness. The
author also wrote "Midnight Blue", winner of the 1990 Smarties Prize.
Rosalie K.Fry The Riddle of the Figurehead
Building a boat on the Gower peninsula, a French visitor and the fight
to save Sammy from being sent to a hostel away from his beloved
guillemot.
The Riddle of the Figurehead – Rosalie K. Fry
The Bevans children, with their exchange visitor from Brittany and
their newly made boat Evening Star, figure out the riddle of the
Sammy's figurehead, and save his simple beach home. Fine descriptions
of the shore of South Wales. Set in a particularly attractive part of
the Welsh coast the young heroine Stella Bevan, 11, is helping her
elder brothers build a boat 'The Even ing Star'. Mystery develops. Set
on the Welsh coast. Stella Bevan, aged 11, is helping her elder
brothers build a boat. They are going to call it The Evening Star.
Stella is expecting a French girl to stay with her during the holidays,
but Phiippe, a brother of the French girl, arrives instead. He proves
(to everyone's surprise) exceptionally good value, not only in helping
to launch the boat but also in sailing it. All the Bevan family
subsequently become involved in a local injustice which they put right,
and in which Philippe plays an audacious and decisive part as a
detective
September Island – Rosalie K. Fry
Children are stranded on a sand bar off the Welsh coast.
Perilous Dawn – W.J. Goodyer
What was the strange secret of the blue suitcase? That was the question
which puzzled Jimmy Keene, his parents and his brother Roger, when they
returned to Wales from holiday on the Isle of man."
The problems that began as the family make their way home by car from
Liverpool to Radnorshire just seem to get worse and worse. They have stumbled
into a plot that may involve IRA saboteurs or even Russian spies. A new
installation in the mountains is under some sort of threat and the gang
that the boys tangle with is not afraid to use threats and kidnap in order
to get their way. Both Jimmy and Roger have to use all their resources
to unable the police to overcome a very cunning and ruthless bunch of
ne-er-do-wells.
Margaret W. Griffiths Hazel in Uniform
World War II spy adventure involving Hazel and her friends, set on the Welsh coast.
Detectives in Wales – Jean Henson
A children's story in a series The Holloway children, mystery solvers,
are by the sea in a large house in Wales. By the author of River
Detectives, Detectives in the Hills, Detectives by the sea and
Detectives Abroad
Holiday Adventure – William Glynne-Jones
An entertaining story telling of a group of children's adventures
during their summer holiday in the small Welsh village of Portavon
Green Grow the Rushes – Elinor Lyon
A girl from London, vacationing on the rugged Welsh coast with a
snippy, spoiled companion, finds three adventurous friends whom she
joins in a search for the cliffborne track of an old Roman road.
Curlew Camp C. R. MANSELL
The Guides of the Curlew Patrol have been hoping for Adventure—and they
get it, when they find that the camp they are to join in the country
near the Welsh coast does not exist.
But that is only the beginning. Camping in the orchard of an old
house that has once been used for smuggling they soon discover that
their cheerful hostess is in trouble; and the disappearance of dogs
from her kennels, followed by visits of a man who wants to buy her
home, is to the Guides more than just a mere coincidence. A new kennel-
maid who obviously resents their presence, a midnight rendezvous that
almost ends in ends in disaster due to Rose's curiosity, and strange
tapping noises in the cellar, are mounting evidence of a mystery that
is to involve them in excitements and even dangers. How the Guides win
credit to themselves—and an adorable sheep-dog puppy as a mascot is a
story that all girls will enjoy.
A Wind from the Sea – Jennifer Morgan
It's 1833 Liverpool and a dead body is found in the Mersey - a black
woman slave. Thirteen year old Patience Penry hears this news as her
own life is turned into turmoil. Locked into poverty, her mother is
forced into domestic service and she must move to live with Uncle Huw
on his farm in Wales.
Spring Tide – Mary Ray
Set in Roman Britain in Caer Taff (Cardiff).
The House by the Shore – Ivy Russell
. .Children's story about Nickie and Jill setting off for a quiet
holiday in Wales. It ends with Nickie and Jill about to be photographed
for television newsreel. What can have happened between these two
times ?
Mona the Welsh Pony – Allen Seaby
Allen Seaby's stories of the ponies of the New Forest, Exmoor,
Dartmoor, and the Shetland Islands, are deservedly popular, not only
for the entertainment of the stories themselves, but also for their
accurage and affectionate studies of the wild life of the countryside
in which they live.
In this volume, Seaby turns to the mountain ponies of North Wales, and
tells the enthralling story of Mona against the background of her
native landscape, its people and their history.
Allan W Seaby's book "Mona the Welsh Pony" is set in a place near
Abermaw.
Abermaw is the Welsh for Barmouth, which does exist.
Battle for Destiny – Peter John Stephens
A young Welsh boy meets Harry Tudor, A Welshman with a claim to the
English throne historical fiction; a young Welsh lad exiled in a Breton
abbey is determined to go home to Wales, and aligns himself with
another Welshman who has a claim to the English throne;
Battle for Destiny - Peter John Stephens.
Ithel, the son of a Welsh minor lord escapes from drowning off the
coast of Brittany. Taken in by the church he fights for his destiny
until he falls into the path of Henry, Duke of Richmond. Later he joins
Richmond in France and, committed to his cause, is sent to Wales to
help prepare the Tudor invasion that eventually bring to the throne the
Lancastrian, Henry VII. He plays a vital part at the battle of Bosworth
where Richard III is defeated and killed. Most of the story in Wales is
in the fields and small dwellings around Milford Haven and then Carew
Castle.
Journey with a Secret – Showell Styles
Ann and John's hiking trip from their Welsh village to the sea turns
into a wild adventure, combining spies, a Hungarian girl, a misty moor
and all
Styles, Showell. Journey with a Secret. Meredith, 1969. 141p. $4.95.
Two English children on a Welsh walking tour pick up a runaway girl who is the
age of the older Davies, John; his sister is thirteen. Ilonka Kazinczy tells
John and Ann that the police are after her because she has run away from a cruel
uncle, but her story is suspicious: why should there be such an intensive hunt
for her? The truth soon comes out; Ilonka's uncle has been murdered and she is
carrying a secret document that will help organize a Hungarian freedom movement.
The incidents of chase and pursuit are full of action, the setting is
interesting (although there is a heavy dose of mountaineering detail for
non-climbers) and the style competent, but the plot is both contrived and
melodramatic.
A Shadow on the Sea – Tessa Theobald
A children's holiday overlooking a bay in Pembrokeshire. Four children
spend their March holiday alone in their family cottage overlooking a
bay in Pembrokeshire. The older children spend their time refurbishing
an old canoe, but Emma, the youngest, finds and rescues a guillemot
which has been coated by oil from ships and is unable to swim or fly.
The children clean it, and look after the bird, then find adventures
while exploring the bay.
Buried Alive – Jacqueline Wilson
Tim and Biscuits are having a brilliant holiday in Wales. Life is full
of icecream, sandcastles and picnics - until they meet the horrid bully
Prickle-Head and his side-kick Pinch-Face. Just as they are about to
despair, reinforcements arrive in an unexpected form.
Welsh Adventure – Viola Bayley
Mystery and excitement for Serena Hamble. Lively holiday adventures end
in deep mysterious waters.
The Haunting at Cliff House
Wales - unspecific
When her father inherits an estate from his great-aunt, Alison reluctantly
agrees to spend her summer in Wales. The dreary mansion called Pen-Y-Craig
(Welsh for Cliff House) is far from her Ottawa home, and her summer is far from
ordinary. Alison discovers an ancient diary, a haunted cave, and the story of a
young girl called Bronwen who lived at Cliff House in 1810. Alison sees spirits
and hears voices that compel her to unravel Bronwen's tangled and tragic
history. But can she learn from Bronwen's disasterous mistakes, and undo the
wrongs of the past and the present?" and "The story is set in the heart of Wales
in a house which Mr. Evans (The father) and Alison (the daughter) inherited from
a Great-Aunt. This house has a spirit trapped in time haunting it. Alison sees
visions of the ghost's (Bronwen's) life and is directed to an old diary. This
diary holds the keys to why Bronwen is trapped. Throughout the story Alison
seems to be going through the exactly the same situations as Bronwen did in
1810. Alison soon realizes what has happened to Bronwen and helps her change the
past. Throughout this plot Alison is going through tough times herself. Her
mother has long since passed away and her father has found a new woman
(Meiriona) who he has taken a liking to. Alison feels her territory has been
invaded by Meiriona and will ruin her tight knit relationship with her father.
In helping Bronwen out with her problem, Alison discovers that she can make
room, she doesn't own her father, and that everyone including her father has the
right to be happy."
Operation Footprint - Patricia Brooks.
The story is set in Llandudno, North Wales. The family on holiday come there
regularly each year and stay at a cottage on the less-frequented West Beach.
Most of their adventure features the Great Orme and their investigations by boat
of a small beach which is otherwise inaccessible. There are some quite exciting
episodes, though, after half-way it lapses into a pretty standard smugglers
story. The mystery may have been uncovered by the children but it is followed to
a conclusion by their uncle (very tradtional) who follows the clue to the
ring-leader of the gang to London in his fast car. Some details of this journey
and the previous vacation trips they go on may be worth following up.
Seal Secret – Aidan Chambers
William was thoroughly bored and fed up with everything about this
Welsh Holiday - but that was before he found out about Gwyn's secret..
A young boy endangers his own life when he sets out to release a
captive seal. William is unhappy when he sees the Welsh cottage his
parents had rented for their week's holiday, and he doesn't much like
Gwyn, the boy from the nearby farm
Three’s a Crowd - Michael Drin
The story of Peter and Jenny's summer holiday with their writer uncle
on the Welsh coast.
Esme and the Smugglers – Olive Duhy
The school moves to a castle in North Wales where Esme's aunt turns out
not to be all she should.
Beach Mystery – Frank Elias
"Death had been waiting for the Captain at Moelvre Bay on the night
that the Royal Sovereign foundered and sank; he cheated it then, but it
still lurked and lingered in wait.
Evan Hughes knew nothing of this when he went to spend the summer with
his aunt at Menai Bridge; yet he was soon to realize that over her
household hovered a shadow which in some unfathomable way was related
to the tragedy at Moelvre Bay. With a lad's sensitive feeling for crime
and disaster, Evan had to visit the spot where the ship had gone down.
A sense of premonition possessed him before he went; having been there
and talked to the man with the glass eye, the dreadful fascination of
the place turned to fear - fear not of human agency,but of a power
beyond him that was sinister and oppressive.
Gradually and inexplicably he experienced a compelling sense of being
drawn into the Captain's affairs. The bay had an ungovernable
influence over him. Death was not to be cheated a second time."
The Peace Seekers – George Finkel
A tale set in North Wales in 1170
Telling the Sea – Pauline Fisk
Follows the fortunes of Nona, her mother and Nona's younger sister
Sharon. The family runs away together to the seaside village in Wales
which was the focus of Nona's mother's own childhood happiness. The
author also wrote "Midnight Blue", winner of the 1990 Smarties Prize.
M.Frow -Four Stowaways and Anna
A wild chase to Wales in pursuit of War Office secrets.
The Intelligence Corps Saves the Island – M.Frow
Two sets of twins on holidays in a small island off the coast of South
Wales find themselves looking into the case of the disappearance of
title deeds to their uncle's island and a mysterious stranger claiming
possession of the island.
Monday 1 November 2010
Round the coast
Start at the River Tyne and then head south. We pass the Wear and the Tees and get down to the Esk and then to the Humber. From the Humber we can move down round the coast of Lincolnshire and to the Wash. Round the Wash you can go round Norfolk and Suffolk and Essex until we reach the Thames. From the Thames we then set off for Kent and through to Dover. Progress along from Dover to East Sussex and West Sussex. Hampshire,Dorset and Devon to Cornwall and to Landsend. From Landsend and round to Lundy and from there up to Bristol. Round the South Wales coast and up until we get to North Wales and Llandudno. From Llandudno round to the Dee, Cheshire and the Mersey, From the Mersey up to Southport and to Blackpool and Morecambe. The coast of Cumbria then takes you up to Carlisle. The Solway firth takes you round to Stranraer and then from there up to Ayr and then Glasgow. Northwards we go until we reach Oban and later Ullapool. Round to Wick and John O'Groats. South we go to Inverness and then Aberdeen and Dundee and St. Andrews. From the mouth of the Forth down to Berwickshire and then from Berwick to the mouth of the Tyne again.
Inner Hebides and Outer Hebrides, Orkneys and Shetlands,Isle of Man, Scilly Islands, Channel Islands, Isle of Wight.Now let us try a list:-
1. From Tyne to Humber.
2. From Humber to the Wash.
3. From the Wash to the Thames. Broads as well
4, From the Thames to Dover.
5. Kent, East Sussex,West Sussex
6. Hampshire and Dorset. Isle of Wight as well. Channel Islands
7. Devon and Cornwall to Landsend. Scilly as well
8. From Landsend to Bristol.
9. From Bristol to Llandudno Anglesey as well
10.From Llandudno to Liverpool.
11. From Liverpool to Carlisle Isle of Man as well
12. From Carlisle to Glasgow.
13. From Glasgow to Ullapool. Western Isles
14. From Ullapool to the Forth. Orkneys and Shetlands
15. From the Forth to the Tweed.
16. From the Tweed to the Tyne.
Inner Hebides and Outer Hebrides, Orkneys and Shetlands,Isle of Man, Scilly Islands, Channel Islands, Isle of Wight.Now let us try a list:-
1. From Tyne to Humber.
2. From Humber to the Wash.
3. From the Wash to the Thames. Broads as well
4, From the Thames to Dover.
5. Kent, East Sussex,West Sussex
6. Hampshire and Dorset. Isle of Wight as well. Channel Islands
7. Devon and Cornwall to Landsend. Scilly as well
8. From Landsend to Bristol.
9. From Bristol to Llandudno Anglesey as well
10.From Llandudno to Liverpool.
11. From Liverpool to Carlisle Isle of Man as well
12. From Carlisle to Glasgow.
13. From Glasgow to Ullapool. Western Isles
14. From Ullapool to the Forth. Orkneys and Shetlands
15. From the Forth to the Tweed.
16. From the Tweed to the Tyne.
Thursday 28 October 2010
Mystery at Blackgang
Mystery at Blackgang arrived today and I have nearly read it. There is not much interesting about the setting. I have the feeling that there is more to find in the Westerman Sea Scout stories. I have made contact with Nigel Blasop at Westermanyarns to see if I can gain any coastal information.
Also Bell Rock lighthouse comes into the equation again as do seals on the Wash.
Also Bell Rock lighthouse comes into the equation again as do seals on the Wash.
Tuesday 26 October 2010
Blackball Annie
Shanghaied by Arthur Catherall
The story opens on the dockside at Hull. The story ends as the Blackball Annie prepares to head for her home port again. Between those two points an epic adventure has been unfolded that defies all of the predicted conclusions. It is another story about growing to man's estate and it produces one of the best descriptions of a seachange that has been set on paper by a juvenile writer. At first you are led to believe that the hero of the tale is young Harold Jackson who has been betrayed by his own grandfather into a life of filthy and dangerous drudgery when he is shanghaied aboard the little trawler as it sets sail for the fishing grounds of Iceland.
There is little detail of the coast that is revealed as the Annie leaves the Humber and heads to the north.
"The water in the river was yellow with mud and sand. There were twin lines of dancing buoys to mark the fairway, but in an hour or so they would be in the open sea."
Harold contemplates drastic action.
"Then he walked to the starboard bulwark and stared moodily at the flat landscape of Lincolnshire. They had just passed the entrance to Immingham docks, and he wondered for a moment whether he dare dive overboard and make a swim for it. The distance, he decided, would be less than a mile."
His action in kicking off his shoes warns his captors and he turns his mind in another direction.
"The white buildings on Spurn Point suddenly reminded him that the trawler carried a wireless set."
He tries to send a message, little knowing that Mike Grogan, the skipper, has no intention of letting him go.
The story opens on the dockside at Hull. The story ends as the Blackball Annie prepares to head for her home port again. Between those two points an epic adventure has been unfolded that defies all of the predicted conclusions. It is another story about growing to man's estate and it produces one of the best descriptions of a seachange that has been set on paper by a juvenile writer. At first you are led to believe that the hero of the tale is young Harold Jackson who has been betrayed by his own grandfather into a life of filthy and dangerous drudgery when he is shanghaied aboard the little trawler as it sets sail for the fishing grounds of Iceland.
There is little detail of the coast that is revealed as the Annie leaves the Humber and heads to the north.
"The water in the river was yellow with mud and sand. There were twin lines of dancing buoys to mark the fairway, but in an hour or so they would be in the open sea."
Harold contemplates drastic action.
"Then he walked to the starboard bulwark and stared moodily at the flat landscape of Lincolnshire. They had just passed the entrance to Immingham docks, and he wondered for a moment whether he dare dive overboard and make a swim for it. The distance, he decided, would be less than a mile."
His action in kicking off his shoes warns his captors and he turns his mind in another direction.
"The white buildings on Spurn Point suddenly reminded him that the trawler carried a wireless set."
He tries to send a message, little knowing that Mike Grogan, the skipper, has no intention of letting him go.
New Possible Title
"On all sides mystery,romance and adventure."
A Guide to the Children's Books of the British Coast"
or possibly
"On all sides mystery,romance and adventure."
A Voyage Round the Children's Books of the British Coast.
A Guide to the Children's Books of the British Coast"
or possibly
"On all sides mystery,romance and adventure."
A Voyage Round the Children's Books of the British Coast.
Where to start ?
The quotation says "Entirely surrounded by mystery and romance." A journey around the coasts of Britain using children's books. Let us cut that back -
Surrounded by mystery and romance. A Journey around the coasts of Britain by tracking the settings of children's books.
I thought of all the places I could start this journey. My wife suggested Dover and I remembered 'The Key of England' by David Divine and thought that was going to be appropriate. But it is round Britain that I am going. Dover will not do.
The basic premise was to cover every stetch of the coast and also the adjacent islands. But what about those pieces of coastline where I simply did not know of any story that used that setting. Were these destined to remain as "undiscovered" on the literary maps which I proposed constructing ? I have to think of a way of resolving this problem. At this stage I will have to confess that I do not know what will be missing. Am I ready to invite the reader to tell me how to fill in the gaps ?
Another problem then crossed my mind ? Which direction should I take - clockwise or anticlockwise ? Some of the coastal journeys recounted go in one way and some the other. My instinct is for clockwise.
Which books and which authors ? I am not so naive that I propose to tackle a subject which does not refer to authors who are well-known.
That poses yet another problem - some of the settings - those of Monica Edwards and Malcolm Saville are already well known and well written about by Girls Gone By authors of non-fiction. I must produce my own words but not duplicate what is already there. Abbreviated versions with reference to the extant books provides part of the solution.
Next I must consider just how far from the coast the stories may reach. Major rivers sometimes provide long hinterlands of description.
The problem of London and its gargantuan size provides another formidable challenge.
Another thing to be considered is the use of definite places and probable places that have been traced by other sleuths e.g. anything about Guernsey and coastal Wales by EBD.
Counting against all this is the excitement of the project itself and my knowledge of Mabel Esther Allan and Percy F. Westerman.
Seaside, riverside, smugglers' caves and cliff accidents.
Mabel Esther Allan, Percy F. Westerman, Arthur Ransome, Richard Armstrong, John Rowe Townsend, Elsie J. Oxenham, Lois Lamplugh, Malcolm Saville, Monica Edwards.
Surrounded by mystery and romance. A Journey around the coasts of Britain by tracking the settings of children's books.
I thought of all the places I could start this journey. My wife suggested Dover and I remembered 'The Key of England' by David Divine and thought that was going to be appropriate. But it is round Britain that I am going. Dover will not do.
The basic premise was to cover every stetch of the coast and also the adjacent islands. But what about those pieces of coastline where I simply did not know of any story that used that setting. Were these destined to remain as "undiscovered" on the literary maps which I proposed constructing ? I have to think of a way of resolving this problem. At this stage I will have to confess that I do not know what will be missing. Am I ready to invite the reader to tell me how to fill in the gaps ?
Another problem then crossed my mind ? Which direction should I take - clockwise or anticlockwise ? Some of the coastal journeys recounted go in one way and some the other. My instinct is for clockwise.
Which books and which authors ? I am not so naive that I propose to tackle a subject which does not refer to authors who are well-known.
That poses yet another problem - some of the settings - those of Monica Edwards and Malcolm Saville are already well known and well written about by Girls Gone By authors of non-fiction. I must produce my own words but not duplicate what is already there. Abbreviated versions with reference to the extant books provides part of the solution.
Next I must consider just how far from the coast the stories may reach. Major rivers sometimes provide long hinterlands of description.
The problem of London and its gargantuan size provides another formidable challenge.
Another thing to be considered is the use of definite places and probable places that have been traced by other sleuths e.g. anything about Guernsey and coastal Wales by EBD.
Counting against all this is the excitement of the project itself and my knowledge of Mabel Esther Allan and Percy F. Westerman.
Seaside, riverside, smugglers' caves and cliff accidents.
Mabel Esther Allan, Percy F. Westerman, Arthur Ransome, Richard Armstrong, John Rowe Townsend, Elsie J. Oxenham, Lois Lamplugh, Malcolm Saville, Monica Edwards.
Monday 25 October 2010
Lincolnshire
Don't Expect Any Mercy - Henry Treece
Don't Expect any Mercy by Henry Treece
From Lincolnshire to Shropshire and across to Sark Gordon Stewart
pursues his enemies.
"Don't expect any mercy" by Henry Treece starts by the side of the
River Humber
"and there below me kay the broad Humber, just as I had laast seen
it, two years before - silver blue and majestic, still lightly
clothed in the pearl-grey mists of early morning."
"As I gazed before me from the hilltop across the Humber, I picked
out once again the green and golden wolds of Yorkshire, and to my
right hand the distant towers and chimnies, the domes and gantries of
Hull, mysterious in the morning haze."
He visits one of the local beauty spots called Banyon's Manor.
"as we walked around the manor, its many scars came into close and
pathetic view. PIllars had been dragged down by the front door,
bringing with them a mass of crumbled masonry; leading had been torn
brutally frrom what had been noble windows; along the golden walls,
semi-literate hads had scrawled such messages as:
'Beware; Ye gost walks hear at midnight !'"
Don't Expect any Mercy by Henry Treece
From Lincolnshire to Shropshire and across to Sark Gordon Stewart
pursues his enemies.
"Don't expect any mercy" by Henry Treece starts by the side of the
River Humber
"and there below me kay the broad Humber, just as I had laast seen
it, two years before - silver blue and majestic, still lightly
clothed in the pearl-grey mists of early morning."
"As I gazed before me from the hilltop across the Humber, I picked
out once again the green and golden wolds of Yorkshire, and to my
right hand the distant towers and chimnies, the domes and gantries of
Hull, mysterious in the morning haze."
He visits one of the local beauty spots called Banyon's Manor.
"as we walked around the manor, its many scars came into close and
pathetic view. PIllars had been dragged down by the front door,
bringing with them a mass of crumbled masonry; leading had been torn
brutally frrom what had been noble windows; along the golden walls,
semi-literate hads had scrawled such messages as:
'Beware; Ye gost walks hear at midnight !'"
Scottish Islands
One of the first books that I have re-read on the quest around Britain is one which is based on the remote islands of the Outer Hebrides. Two boys on a school camp are suddenly adrift as a result of an unexpected trip on their inflatable raft.
Ian and Dougal are peacefully fishing on their raft when the turburlence in the water around the shoal of fish is suddenly increased by the arrival of a bottle-nosed shark. The two boys are experienced enough to realise that they are in no danger of being deliberately attacked by the large creature. However, what they are not expecting is that the sudden surge in the water is going to cause a tremendous and near catastrophic capsize of their safe and dry perches. They are both thrown overboard and Ian is unfortunate to lose consciousness when his head hits a part of the outboard motor which hangs below the rubber skin. Dougal is left with an unconscious friend and a tremendous struggle just to get back on board the flimsy craft. Danger increases when he has to abandon his life-jacket in order to plunge beneath the dinghy and try for his friend's rescue. Dragging Ian to the surface and then forcing him on board takes all his strength and both boys are subject to the bitingly cold wind and drifting further from their camp-site on their lonely island.
Dougal tries to cope with his unconscious friend and then has to abandon him again when he realises that his only hope of getting aid is to swim ashore on to a tiny islet where he has spotted a red-haired man.
A rescue is quickly followed by a whole series of further difficulties when the man and his companions have every reason for secrecy and no wish to complete their rescue and go for aid. The exact location of the island is in sight of the lighthouse at the foot of Barra. Cave of the Cormorant by Arthur Catherall contains some very effective descriptions of fights in a cave and on board the Cormorant.
Ian and Dougal are peacefully fishing on their raft when the turburlence in the water around the shoal of fish is suddenly increased by the arrival of a bottle-nosed shark. The two boys are experienced enough to realise that they are in no danger of being deliberately attacked by the large creature. However, what they are not expecting is that the sudden surge in the water is going to cause a tremendous and near catastrophic capsize of their safe and dry perches. They are both thrown overboard and Ian is unfortunate to lose consciousness when his head hits a part of the outboard motor which hangs below the rubber skin. Dougal is left with an unconscious friend and a tremendous struggle just to get back on board the flimsy craft. Danger increases when he has to abandon his life-jacket in order to plunge beneath the dinghy and try for his friend's rescue. Dragging Ian to the surface and then forcing him on board takes all his strength and both boys are subject to the bitingly cold wind and drifting further from their camp-site on their lonely island.
Dougal tries to cope with his unconscious friend and then has to abandon him again when he realises that his only hope of getting aid is to swim ashore on to a tiny islet where he has spotted a red-haired man.
A rescue is quickly followed by a whole series of further difficulties when the man and his companions have every reason for secrecy and no wish to complete their rescue and go for aid. The exact location of the island is in sight of the lighthouse at the foot of Barra. Cave of the Cormorant by Arthur Catherall contains some very effective descriptions of fights in a cave and on board the Cormorant.
Sunday 24 October 2010
Yorkshire Coast Stories
Children’s stories which are set in an areas of moorland, sometimes adjacent to the coast, are not that difficult to find. Quite often all the places in the tales remain resolutely anonymous so that it is possible to think that they happened in one part of the British Isles without ever coming up conclusive proof. Such a story is The Secret of Curbchain Hall by John Maurice. It could have happened in Yorkshire but, after a few moment’s reflection, you realise it could just as easily have happened in Devon. Amongst the oddities of the storyline is the inclusion of a short section which describes the two boys later to be caught up in the adventure as pursuing an otter hunt. It’s an idea not often raised in children’s books. However, there is no blinking the fact that such things used to happen in Yorkshire and other parts of the country. Apart from this the rest of the book is mostly the cliches of the older boys’ adventure story. The exploration up river on the hunting trail leads them to a large and desolate house, the Curbchain Hall of the title, which the boys decide to revisit on a later occasion.
John and Peter are on a camping trip travelling round the countryside on their motorbikes, eating enormous meals and relaxing in the sun. Then Peter’s Uncle George, who is mysteriously connected with the Admiralty, turns up and begins to enlist their aid in tracking a stolen lorry. Their enquiries lead them to Curbchain Hall. It must lie somewhere on the route between Scotland and the south coast. The hall contains the inevitable secret passage and the boys are soon on the trail of an international band of agents who are determined to smuggle a new style of explosive mine out of the country.
The chase takes place on the moors on the way to a small harbour called Coldburn. There is a low road and a high road. The high road is a quicker route but naturally gets shrouded in mist. A car crash and an episode where the heroes pretend to be Irish labourers enliven the progression of the narrative from inland to the coast. With Uncle George immobilised through injury and concussion John and Peter are left to make their own desperate arrangements to thwart the enemy. As you will have deduced, there is plenty of rapidly moving action but the reader is required to supply the locations either from their imagination or from their memory. You are forced to the conclusion that a story which could happen anywhere really happens nowhere and is not a satisfactory read for the older age group for which it was intended.
The Blackspit Smugglers by Lennox Kerr suffers less from this reluctance to name Yorkshire as the locale. It also has the bonus of some extremely strong characterisation and two very vividly described pieces of action. The story begins with sixteen-year-old Tom Rennie home on leave from his apprenticeship in the city. He considers his surroundings on page 2 of the book.
“On his left the moor rose steadily to the sky line. There, Tom knew, were the steep, sheer cliffs falling to the sea, for this moor was a large bulge of land thrusting itself into the North Sea, a promontory known to every seafarer as Blackspit Head, and a favourite landfall for all vessels making a passage up or down the east coast.”
There’s no chance of Devon this time !
Again, however, fictional names are employed. Tom’s father is a coast watcher from the fishing village of “Fairhaven” in the north to a point twenty miles south. The nearest fishing village is called “Blackhaven” which is located on “Blackhaven Bay”. Nevertheless this time the author tries to give his readers a readily appreciable sense of place.
“Standing still, his nostrils sucked in the scent of the heather, and the clear breeze coming from the sea. Round him the moor rustled like a breathing being; gorse bushes were exploding outbursts of gleaming yellow, and, above, one solitary puff of white cloud drifted lazily across a sun-bleached sky. To Tom it was all beautiful, even the grim black telegraph poles strutting like a widely spaced army of giants alongside the roadway.”
When he needs to, Lennox Kerr, who also wrote many children’s books under the pseudonym Peter Dawlish, can bring a place to life. It’s a pity that his plot doesn’t live up to his characterisation and his scene setting. The articles being smuggled are drugs and the villain who is smuggling them is called Devlin, a smarmy, supremely confident type, who has no moral scruples but who inspires loyalty in his gang by his undoubted intelligence and courage. Matched against him is Commander Rankin, the fiery ex-Naval officer who has a roving commission from Her Majesty’s Government.
In smuggling stories there is always a secret cave and an underground passage to the sea. The Blackspit Smugglers is no exception. Tom Rennie’s part in the adventure is, for most of the book, rather unspectacular and ignominious. The smuggling gang see him off very easily when he pries into their secret cave and he is left to drown in the face of an advancing tide. This provides one of the highlights of the book as the reader shares in his desperate struggle for survival. Later Tom tamely walks back into the hands of the enemy when he calls at the hut of old Harry, a half-mad recluse who lives on the moors a full mile from the coast. And in old Harry we meet another quite extraordinary character who, brutalised and sent to the brink of insanity by his early life at sea, has built his hut over the entrance to the secret cave. Thrown into captivity with the old man, young Tom finds it difficult to retain his courage when listening to the old man’s ramblings about the “bucko” mate who had tormented him so many years ago.
A second scene of quite impressive intensity occurs not long before the end of the book when Tom is trapped in the cave with the residue of the gang who are waiting half-hoping and half-fearing that Devlin will appear again. The tide rises and they retreat higher and higher up the walls in darkness watching for the signs that it is on the turn and that they will be safe. In a surprising manner Lennox Kerr then begins to reveal the different character traits of the criminals who up to this point had appeared little more than stereotypical cyphers. There is the panic-stricken Cockney and the belligerent but cheerful Blackie who tyrannises over him. Even the law-abiding Tom is forced to admire the spirit shown by Blackie when the odds of survival seem very low indeed. Eventually, of course, Tom’s opportunity to show his mettle arrives and there is a splendid shipwreck to bring the book to its climax and conclusion.
Whilst Lennox Kerr and John Maurice may have been quite enigmatic about the setting of their stories in Yorkshire (or not) John Mowbray’s The Radio Mystery wants to trumpet the fact from the very beginning. The inside flap of the dust-wrapper has the following blurb,
“Espionage on the fair Yorkshire Moors ! Poor Toby, sent to England on a vitally important mission, that of testing his uncle’s ingenious new Radio gadget, finds himself in the midst of an unscrupulous gang of enemy agents who will stop at nothing to steal the invention for their own devilish uses. There is plenty of breath-taking suspense and the unmasking of the arch-fiend – whose name we must not mention – is most cleverly done by this master of espionage tales, John Mowbray.”
Of course, it is hardly fair to blame the author for the enthusiastic exuberance of the person who wrote this hard-sell but it is fair to say that The Radio Mystery does indeed live up to the worst of our expectations. Yet it has its moments.
The first page goes in for a little bit of patriotic and indeed Yorkshire chest swelling. Born in Africa and brought up in Kenya, Toby Yorke makes a fervent declaration of his allegiances.
“Oh, yes,” as he was telling his friend Brian Merritt, “you can call me a Colonial as hard as you like, and I’m jolly well proud of it…”
“Of course you are,” interposed Brian.
“But I’m English as well. And this Yorkshire of yours is my county, Brian.”
The two boys are resting on the cliffs which overlooked the North Sea. Inland they can see the sixteenth century farmhouse that has been in the Merritt family for generations. Just in case we haven’t got the message, Toby continues with his declaration of commitment.
“For ages you Merritts have farmed in that same Valley House. You are Yorkshire. And Yorkshire is you, Brian. And I am Yorkshire as well in my blood and my bones, Brian, for all my ancestors are English and come out of Yorkshire. And I tell you again: it’s good to be in England.”
By now the alert young reader will have recognised that we are in wartime situation – World War 2 to be precise and that a great deal is going to be demanded of the young heroes. The absence of any sort of parental control or protection is an essential feature in this sort of story. Toby’s parents are dead and Brian’s father has suddenly (and inexplicably) decided to go to Egypt. There’s only Brian’s twin sister, Meg, who is going to offer them any sort of company or solace. Fortunately, as Brian says, “she’s quite a good sort.” On the other hand it gets quite irritating when her parts of the dialogue are rendered by the author’s incessant use of the expression “Meg trilled” as she makes her contributions to the ebb and flow of conversation.
The invention mentioned in the dustwrapper blurb is an early form of “scrambler” device that will enable safe communication between the allies when the British Government decides to adopt it for the military’s use. Toby offers an explanation to Meg,
“Or would you prefer me to give you a lecture on pentodes and double diodes and . er, other –odes, together with Mutual Conductance, Impendance, Modulation, et cetera ?”
What matters from the point of view of the plot is that the invention is of vital importance and when threatened they feel it safer to turn over what they know to Sir Pascal Lanch, the local big-wig.
“He’s awfully popular. He’s got pots and pots of money which he spends like a king.”
Need I say more.
There is some attempt to suggest Yorkshire to us as a real place by the journeys taken by the three youngsters in the surrounding countryside. To get to “Epton” Toby has to catch the train from “Allerton Bridge”. On its way the train passes through “Uskdale” where it is delayed some minutes by “moorland cattle wandering across the rails”.
Another lonely mansion plays its full part in the story and there is a description which creates genuine tension when Toby climbs the side of the house for six storeys in pitch darkness and is just managing to cling on to the vertical ladder. Some time later in the story Toby is able to see the exact position of the old house and realises that it is on the coast and the beach below would be the perfect place for the arrival of the landing craft of a German invasion. However, let us leave some mystery for you to unravel yourself.
It is somewhat alarming to find that the locality of the North Yorkshire Moors has previously been a hot-bed of dramatic inventions and underhand dealing by the Germans. It is obviously something about its rugged remoteness and yet its apparent accessibility from the North Sea that makes it a desirable setting for boys’ adventure stories. The Secret of the Baltic by T.C. Bridges is set during the First World War and the main protagonists are somewhat older than those in The Radio Mystery. The hero, Guy Hallam, is longing for a chance to “do his bit”.
“Although at eighteen he was taller, stronger, deeper in the chest and broader in the shoulders than most grown men, yet that damaged leg and the slight limp resulting from it had cut him off from the chance of wearing His Majesty’s uniform.”
Instead of joining up he is helping Mr. Ingram, the scientist, in developing a new invention – an explosive that causes a complete vacuum over the whole area of the explosion. This means that “every cell in every living thing within that area must burst open”. The explosive is called “neonite” and (what else ?) could bring the war to an end in a matter of months.
The secret workshop is located on the coast at Galleon Gap – somewhere on the North Yorkshire Coast. One of the drawbacks is that living nearby is a man called Cratch.
“Who is Cratch ?” asked Anson.
“A fellow who lives in an old farmhouse near here. Pretends to be on a fishing holiday,” Guy answered. “But Wallace and I are pretty certain he’s a spy.”
They are right. Indeed he proves to be a pretty resourceful one, adopting at least three disguises and succeeding in capturing both the inventor’s son and then the inventor himself. Some of the other Germans in the book run more true to the jingoistic Hun-bashing tendencies of the authors of this sort of story.
“The Hun, scowling balefully up at them, was satanically ugly. He was quite short, but had the chest and shoulders of a giant, whilst his arms were as long as those of the original Black Dwarf. His head was bald as a coot’s, and the smooth skull was shaped like a dome. He had a great hooked nose, a gash of a mouth, and small, deep-set, pale blue eyes.”
Just in case we hadn’t got the message the author adds,
“Haughtiness, intolerance, and downright cruelty were written large all over him.”
The name of this charming specimen is Baron von Fromach and his voice and manner match the description given. He had arrived on the North Yorkshire Coast in a German bi-plane (scandalously disguised of course by British roundels on its side and wings) in pursuit of Lieutenant Dick Anson who has discovered a big German secret in the Baltic and then made his escape by drifting across the North Sea in a balloon. The German invention that Anson has found is even more dramatic than Ingram’s neonite. It is the ability to freeze anything that moves.
Naturally it is vital that Anson gets to London and the Admiralty to pass on this information. Fourteen miles away is “Brocklesby Junction” where the 8.30 train goes straight through. By now you will have anticipated that as soon as they get out the car a mist will start to fall over those grim northern moors and that desperate men will be lying in wait.
Later in the book more examples of the perfidy of the Germans are laid before us and T.C. Bridges introduces a few more features of the coast nearby. Thus when Guy and Wallace see two people on the Snout, a rocky point on the north side of the bay, who are bound to be cut off by the tide, they lose no time in coming to the rescue. Guy lowers Wallace down to the beach so that he can help. To his horror things don’t quite work out as he had planned.
“Close under the cliff Wallace lay helpless. His hands and feet were tied, and a gag was in his mouth. A few yards away were the two men. They were powerfully built, ugly-looking fellows, and having discarded their overcoats and flung aside their rod and net, now appeared in their true colours – as German sailors.”
Later Guy has to watch in impotent fury as his friend is rowed out to a waiting U-boat. The Germans (by a very dirty trick) have got the inventor’s son. By blackmail they also manage to get hold of the inventor himself and the secrets of his “neonite”. This time the U-boat comes near shore at a place called “Cleft Bay”, an even more remote spot than Galleon Gap. To get there they have had to pass through the “Singing Reef” a place of rocks where the water is “always talking and the swift tides humming among them”.
Guy contemplates with horror what has happened.
“It was all over. Neonite would at once be manufactured on a large scale, and within a few weeks it and the Cold Ray would come into effect on the Western Front.”
Fortunately Guy hasn’t just got a stiff leg, he has also got the stiff upper lip of a true Briton. Even more fortunately Mr. Vassall of Intelligence and the Royal Navy are waiting in the wings.
The Secret of the Baltic was written in 1919 and in its attitude and its contents was very much a product of its time. To be fair to T.C. Bridges it is worth saying that he was not alone in producing this jingoisitic sort of story about the Great War and his later adventure stories such as Wings of Adventure are less preposterous and genuinely exciting. Unfortunately they are not set in North Yorkshire.
It would be nice to think that both the bigotry and the plain “daftness” of this sort of story disappeared with the passage of time. However, when we turn to the work of Percy F. Westerman and his stories about the North Yorkshire Moors we discover this not to be the case. Standish Pulls it Off was published in 1940 and was just the latest offering in the long-running Standish series which includes such titles as Standish Holds On and Standish Gets His Man. The hero Colin Standish is a pilot and in the early stories such as The Amir’s Ruby and The Westow Talisman works for a commercial airline. By the time of Standish Pulls it Off our hero is a senior officer in the North Eastern Division of the Royal Air Constabulary. Already he has done his bit by dealing with an American tommy-gun gangster who flew over to England to embark upon a spree of bank-robberies amongst the limeys. It should be noted that Percy F. Westerman was just one of a clutch of writers serving up aeroplane stories to the very air-minded youth of the late 1920s and 1930s. Also churning them out were George E. Rochester, Rowland Walker, T.C. Bridges, John F.C. Westerman (Percy’s son), Major Charles Gilson and Captain W.E. Johns. Even the concept of the air constabulary and the air police had been done before and, with “Biggles’” retirement from the R.A.F. after WW2, was going to be done far better in the future.
To anyone who has read a large proportion of his more than 176 books it often seems that Percy F. Westerman had a dual identity. When he writes about life in the Merchant Navy or small boat sailing his stories drip with reality but when he steps on land or goes up in the air he is no more than a relentless hack with no feeling for people or place. Standish is the least satisfactory of his series heroes and Standish Pulls it Off must be amongst the worst of his books. It is gloriously awful.
Like T.C. Bridges Percy F. Westerman believes in doing things in a big way. In preparation for WW2 the British Government has decided to excavate a gigantic defence establishment under the North York Moors. Huge numbers of miners have been drafted in from all over the North and they are working day and night to complete some gigantic project. Naturally all this work is “off-limits” to the public. Even Standish and his fellow pilots only know that people have to be kept away from the potential danger area which you will find on the map marked as Westerdale Moors. However, the story starts off in a real place for Standish, based at Hawkscar (Ravenscar perhaps) is told that a suspicious aeroplane has been intercepted and forced down close to Hayburn Wyke.
“There was no need for Standish to consult his map. He knew this part of Yorkshire like the palm of his hand – perhaps better.”
The author then begins to tell us what he knows,
“Hayburn Wyke is a narrow, thickly wooded gorge bounded by the North Sea on the east and by a steep hill on the landward side. This slope is rendered even more difficult by a railway, with its attendant telegraph wires, running between Scarboro’ and Whitby.”
This is all very promising and begins to fill you with nostalgia for the lost railway that is now a coastal path. However, we are soon off into Ruritanian fantasy for the suspicious aircraft has come from Verdonia, one of this country’s implacable enemies. It was brought down by the use of the Z ray which had the effect of polarising the magneto of any fugitive machine. The ZZ ray is even more effective but I won’t trouble you with that..
Back to the reality part of the storyline - the Verdonian pilot had apparently been taking photographs and had abandoned his camera somewhere near Ralph’s Cross (nowadays the symbol of the North York Moors National Park). Colin Standish and his friend Don Grey are selected to be the ones that should recover it. They set off in Colin’s car for Castleton, expecting to complete the rest of the journey on foot. Almost immediately they run into a “red herring” and get on the track of an innocent citizen who actually has sent a loudly ticking watch through the post. Satisfied that it was not an “infernal machine” the two officers of the RAC (Royal Air Constabulary – remember !) return to their mission. As they drive along through Pickering and then take the turning at Kirkbymoorside Colin begins to put Don in the picture.
“You’ve flown over this district scores of times ?”
“Rather !”
“Seen anything unusual ?”
“Can’t say I have.”
“Then that points to the excellence of the system of camouflage. We are now over an immense subterranean hangar, proof against the heaviest bomb. Within it is accommodation for a thousand machines with several exits so arranged that they can take off at the rate of ten a minute.”
No wonder Don Grey is surprised !
Eventually they arrive at Ralph Cross and, unobserved themselves, watch a solitary motorist actually climbing up the cross so that he can put something in the hollow on the top. Not long afterward they watch another individual come along and remove the article. In the middle of the night in his room at the Robin Hood hotel in Castleton Standish watches a huge military convoy heading up on to the moors. The next day Colin and Don pay a visit to Colonel Bonnington, the local commander of the vast underground establishment. He gives them a conducted tour of the works and they discover that conventional aircraft are not the main weapon being prepared against a possible enemy. In fact the North Yorkshire Moors have become a vast launching pad for V2 style rockets that can rain down upon the cities of any potential aggressor. This is a nice ironic twist when we consider today’s reality of Fylingdales and the “Son of Star Wars” project.
However, we have almost forgotten about the Verdonian pilot. His name is Jean Lensco and he has a big part yet to play in the visits to many well-known parts of the moors. The police have decided to move their prisoner to York en route to London for further questioning. As the car presses onward through Malton there is a sudden puncture that causes a crash from which only Lensco recovers quickly. Off he goes into the woods and then to a railway line where he manages to climb on to a freight train. He eventually ends up in a siding in Pickering. Unshaven and hungry, Lensco pretends to be deaf and dumb and buys himself a pie and a bottle of cider. Lest he look conspicuous he walks on until he comes “to a ruined castle with a bank in front upon which there were two or three seats”. This is still a fair description of Pickering Castle today. His next trick is to steal a bicycle and set off along the road towards Kirbymoorside.
It seems fairly obvious that Percy Westerman who lived and worked on the south coast of England did some genuine research for this particular story. The geographical details are based on reality and it’s only the preposterous plot that lets it down. No new territory is taken in from this point onwards, though it is worth mentioning yet another suddenly descending mist and its effect on a frantic car chase, and so, abandoning the action half way through, we move to another Westerman story which sees this prolific author trying out another format.
The Mystery of Stockmere School is Percy F. Westerman’s one attempt at writing a public school story. However, it is only by a process of deduction that one can work out that it must be set in Yorkshire.
The basic plot is quite interesting - somewhere in the north is the town of Colbury Monkton, a grimy industrial sort of place where soot hangs in the air and where Stockmere School is like an oasis in a desert. The school has a good reputation for academic success but in terms of sporting achievement they are a spent force. The boys spend their days either with their heads down over their books or coughing out their lungs. Even the
master who ran the Scout troop has given it up as a bad job. Then, for the Headmaster, an even bigger tragedy occurs for the school is going to be forced to close seven weeks early because an inspection of the drains has found conditions to be wholly insanitary. In other Westerman stories the boys would have set off on some sailing adventure using the time profitably in becoming "men" and frustrating the activities of some of the many cardboard villains that infest this sort of tale. This time, however, the Headmaster's brother persuades him to move the school lock, stock and matron up in to the hills some 12 miles to the north but with a distant sight of the North Sea. The site of an old aerodrome is available for rent and the school can take it over.
The sixth form boys (who are the heroes of the tale) are allocated a hut that has a mysterious visitor on the first night. Someone has been scraping away at the floor and left his knife behind. The next night the boys make their plans to catch the intruder but only succeed in snagging an obnoxious (and ineffective) teacher in their trap. Yes, there is even an illustration with a bucket of water on his head. The boys are chucked out of their hut
for their cheek. This mystery then lies in abeyance for most of the rest of the book. Meanwhile, you see, the younger boys are required to have a few adventures and, free at last of the poisonous atmosphere, to get themselves fit for the County Sports.
To cut a long story short here are just some of the more amazing things that happen:
A younger boy (about fourteen) is picked up by a golden eagle and he shoots the eagle with his Derringer pistol which a senior boy had decided not to confiscate because it wasn't his business to do so. Some of the boys find an underground cave filled with stalactites and stalagmites and the Headmaster's brother decides the best way to provide better access to this fragile underground marvel is to use blasting powder. To return to the mystery element two plain-clothes detectives spend 10 nights in the room where the intruder was seen attacking the floor and fail to find the trap-door that opens in the centre of it - it leads to a secret tunnel to the cave mentioned above. A boy ordered by his teachers to take a silver teaspoon to be identified by a local jeweller is arrested as a country-house thief. This same boy makes his escape from the police and runs two miles back to the school in order to take part in the school sports. He arrives at the starting line puffed out but still manages to win the hurdle race. Ten minutes later the same boy sets a blistering pace in the mile so that his team-mate who runs a steady pace can come through and pick off their rivals who have all run too fast. By the way the team-mate's only distinguishing feature is his enormous head - usually just used for passing examinations before the move away from the grimy town.
The school, of course, gets a higher pass-rate than usual and wins the County Sports by just onepoint.
You are cordially invited to follow the "wonderful adventures" of the two heroes of this book into their next volume Sinclair's Luck where they head off for East Africa. The blurb promises you : "it is full of exciting incident such as boys revel in".
Children’s stories which are set in an areas of moorland, sometimes adjacent to the coast, are not that difficult to find. Quite often all the places in the tales remain resolutely anonymous so that it is possible to think that they happened in one part of the British Isles without ever coming up conclusive proof. Such a story is The Secret of Curbchain Hall by John Maurice. It could have happened in Yorkshire but, after a few moment’s reflection, you realise it could just as easily have happened in Devon. Amongst the oddities of the storyline is the inclusion of a short section which describes the two boys later to be caught up in the adventure as pursuing an otter hunt. It’s an idea not often raised in children’s books. However, there is no blinking the fact that such things used to happen in Yorkshire and other parts of the country. Apart from this the rest of the book is mostly the cliches of the older boys’ adventure story. The exploration up river on the hunting trail leads them to a large and desolate house, the Curbchain Hall of the title, which the boys decide to revisit on a later occasion.
John and Peter are on a camping trip travelling round the countryside on their motorbikes, eating enormous meals and relaxing in the sun. Then Peter’s Uncle George, who is mysteriously connected with the Admiralty, turns up and begins to enlist their aid in tracking a stolen lorry. Their enquiries lead them to Curbchain Hall. It must lie somewhere on the route between Scotland and the south coast. The hall contains the inevitable secret passage and the boys are soon on the trail of an international band of agents who are determined to smuggle a new style of explosive mine out of the country.
The chase takes place on the moors on the way to a small harbour called Coldburn. There is a low road and a high road. The high road is a quicker route but naturally gets shrouded in mist. A car crash and an episode where the heroes pretend to be Irish labourers enliven the progression of the narrative from inland to the coast. With Uncle George immobilised through injury and concussion John and Peter are left to make their own desperate arrangements to thwart the enemy. As you will have deduced, there is plenty of rapidly moving action but the reader is required to supply the locations either from their imagination or from their memory. You are forced to the conclusion that a story which could happen anywhere really happens nowhere and is not a satisfactory read for the older age group for which it was intended.
The Blackspit Smugglers by Lennox Kerr suffers less from this reluctance to name Yorkshire as the locale. It also has the bonus of some extremely strong characterisation and two very vividly described pieces of action. The story begins with sixteen-year-old Tom Rennie home on leave from his apprenticeship in the city. He considers his surroundings on page 2 of the book.
“On his left the moor rose steadily to the sky line. There, Tom knew, were the steep, sheer cliffs falling to the sea, for this moor was a large bulge of land thrusting itself into the North Sea, a promontory known to every seafarer as Blackspit Head, and a favourite landfall for all vessels making a passage up or down the east coast.”
There’s no chance of Devon this time !
Again, however, fictional names are employed. Tom’s father is a coast watcher from the fishing village of “Fairhaven” in the north to a point twenty miles south. The nearest fishing village is called “Blackhaven” which is located on “Blackhaven Bay”. Nevertheless this time the author tries to give his readers a readily appreciable sense of place.
“Standing still, his nostrils sucked in the scent of the heather, and the clear breeze coming from the sea. Round him the moor rustled like a breathing being; gorse bushes were exploding outbursts of gleaming yellow, and, above, one solitary puff of white cloud drifted lazily across a sun-bleached sky. To Tom it was all beautiful, even the grim black telegraph poles strutting like a widely spaced army of giants alongside the roadway.”
When he needs to, Lennox Kerr, who also wrote many children’s books under the pseudonym Peter Dawlish, can bring a place to life. It’s a pity that his plot doesn’t live up to his characterisation and his scene setting. The articles being smuggled are drugs and the villain who is smuggling them is called Devlin, a smarmy, supremely confident type, who has no moral scruples but who inspires loyalty in his gang by his undoubted intelligence and courage. Matched against him is Commander Rankin, the fiery ex-Naval officer who has a roving commission from Her Majesty’s Government.
In smuggling stories there is always a secret cave and an underground passage to the sea. The Blackspit Smugglers is no exception. Tom Rennie’s part in the adventure is, for most of the book, rather unspectacular and ignominious. The smuggling gang see him off very easily when he pries into their secret cave and he is left to drown in the face of an advancing tide. This provides one of the highlights of the book as the reader shares in his desperate struggle for survival. Later Tom tamely walks back into the hands of the enemy when he calls at the hut of old Harry, a half-mad recluse who lives on the moors a full mile from the coast. And in old Harry we meet another quite extraordinary character who, brutalised and sent to the brink of insanity by his early life at sea, has built his hut over the entrance to the secret cave. Thrown into captivity with the old man, young Tom finds it difficult to retain his courage when listening to the old man’s ramblings about the “bucko” mate who had tormented him so many years ago.
A second scene of quite impressive intensity occurs not long before the end of the book when Tom is trapped in the cave with the residue of the gang who are waiting half-hoping and half-fearing that Devlin will appear again. The tide rises and they retreat higher and higher up the walls in darkness watching for the signs that it is on the turn and that they will be safe. In a surprising manner Lennox Kerr then begins to reveal the different character traits of the criminals who up to this point had appeared little more than stereotypical cyphers. There is the panic-stricken Cockney and the belligerent but cheerful Blackie who tyrannises over him. Even the law-abiding Tom is forced to admire the spirit shown by Blackie when the odds of survival seem very low indeed. Eventually, of course, Tom’s opportunity to show his mettle arrives and there is a splendid shipwreck to bring the book to its climax and conclusion.
Whilst Lennox Kerr and John Maurice may have been quite enigmatic about the setting of their stories in Yorkshire (or not) John Mowbray’s The Radio Mystery wants to trumpet the fact from the very beginning. The inside flap of the dust-wrapper has the following blurb,
“Espionage on the fair Yorkshire Moors ! Poor Toby, sent to England on a vitally important mission, that of testing his uncle’s ingenious new Radio gadget, finds himself in the midst of an unscrupulous gang of enemy agents who will stop at nothing to steal the invention for their own devilish uses. There is plenty of breath-taking suspense and the unmasking of the arch-fiend – whose name we must not mention – is most cleverly done by this master of espionage tales, John Mowbray.”
Of course, it is hardly fair to blame the author for the enthusiastic exuberance of the person who wrote this hard-sell but it is fair to say that The Radio Mystery does indeed live up to the worst of our expectations. Yet it has its moments.
The first page goes in for a little bit of patriotic and indeed Yorkshire chest swelling. Born in Africa and brought up in Kenya, Toby Yorke makes a fervent declaration of his allegiances.
“Oh, yes,” as he was telling his friend Brian Merritt, “you can call me a Colonial as hard as you like, and I’m jolly well proud of it…”
“Of course you are,” interposed Brian.
“But I’m English as well. And this Yorkshire of yours is my county, Brian.”
The two boys are resting on the cliffs which overlooked the North Sea. Inland they can see the sixteenth century farmhouse that has been in the Merritt family for generations. Just in case we haven’t got the message, Toby continues with his declaration of commitment.
“For ages you Merritts have farmed in that same Valley House. You are Yorkshire. And Yorkshire is you, Brian. And I am Yorkshire as well in my blood and my bones, Brian, for all my ancestors are English and come out of Yorkshire. And I tell you again: it’s good to be in England.”
By now the alert young reader will have recognised that we are in wartime situation – World War 2 to be precise and that a great deal is going to be demanded of the young heroes. The absence of any sort of parental control or protection is an essential feature in this sort of story. Toby’s parents are dead and Brian’s father has suddenly (and inexplicably) decided to go to Egypt. There’s only Brian’s twin sister, Meg, who is going to offer them any sort of company or solace. Fortunately, as Brian says, “she’s quite a good sort.” On the other hand it gets quite irritating when her parts of the dialogue are rendered by the author’s incessant use of the expression “Meg trilled” as she makes her contributions to the ebb and flow of conversation.
The invention mentioned in the dustwrapper blurb is an early form of “scrambler” device that will enable safe communication between the allies when the British Government decides to adopt it for the military’s use. Toby offers an explanation to Meg,
“Or would you prefer me to give you a lecture on pentodes and double diodes and . er, other –odes, together with Mutual Conductance, Impendance, Modulation, et cetera ?”
What matters from the point of view of the plot is that the invention is of vital importance and when threatened they feel it safer to turn over what they know to Sir Pascal Lanch, the local big-wig.
“He’s awfully popular. He’s got pots and pots of money which he spends like a king.”
Need I say more.
There is some attempt to suggest Yorkshire to us as a real place by the journeys taken by the three youngsters in the surrounding countryside. To get to “Epton” Toby has to catch the train from “Allerton Bridge”. On its way the train passes through “Uskdale” where it is delayed some minutes by “moorland cattle wandering across the rails”.
Another lonely mansion plays its full part in the story and there is a description which creates genuine tension when Toby climbs the side of the house for six storeys in pitch darkness and is just managing to cling on to the vertical ladder. Some time later in the story Toby is able to see the exact position of the old house and realises that it is on the coast and the beach below would be the perfect place for the arrival of the landing craft of a German invasion. However, let us leave some mystery for you to unravel yourself.
It is somewhat alarming to find that the locality of the North Yorkshire Moors has previously been a hot-bed of dramatic inventions and underhand dealing by the Germans. It is obviously something about its rugged remoteness and yet its apparent accessibility from the North Sea that makes it a desirable setting for boys’ adventure stories. The Secret of the Baltic by T.C. Bridges is set during the First World War and the main protagonists are somewhat older than those in The Radio Mystery. The hero, Guy Hallam, is longing for a chance to “do his bit”.
“Although at eighteen he was taller, stronger, deeper in the chest and broader in the shoulders than most grown men, yet that damaged leg and the slight limp resulting from it had cut him off from the chance of wearing His Majesty’s uniform.”
Instead of joining up he is helping Mr. Ingram, the scientist, in developing a new invention – an explosive that causes a complete vacuum over the whole area of the explosion. This means that “every cell in every living thing within that area must burst open”. The explosive is called “neonite” and (what else ?) could bring the war to an end in a matter of months.
The secret workshop is located on the coast at Galleon Gap – somewhere on the North Yorkshire Coast. One of the drawbacks is that living nearby is a man called Cratch.
“Who is Cratch ?” asked Anson.
“A fellow who lives in an old farmhouse near here. Pretends to be on a fishing holiday,” Guy answered. “But Wallace and I are pretty certain he’s a spy.”
They are right. Indeed he proves to be a pretty resourceful one, adopting at least three disguises and succeeding in capturing both the inventor’s son and then the inventor himself. Some of the other Germans in the book run more true to the jingoistic Hun-bashing tendencies of the authors of this sort of story.
“The Hun, scowling balefully up at them, was satanically ugly. He was quite short, but had the chest and shoulders of a giant, whilst his arms were as long as those of the original Black Dwarf. His head was bald as a coot’s, and the smooth skull was shaped like a dome. He had a great hooked nose, a gash of a mouth, and small, deep-set, pale blue eyes.”
Just in case we hadn’t got the message the author adds,
“Haughtiness, intolerance, and downright cruelty were written large all over him.”
The name of this charming specimen is Baron von Fromach and his voice and manner match the description given. He had arrived on the North Yorkshire Coast in a German bi-plane (scandalously disguised of course by British roundels on its side and wings) in pursuit of Lieutenant Dick Anson who has discovered a big German secret in the Baltic and then made his escape by drifting across the North Sea in a balloon. The German invention that Anson has found is even more dramatic than Ingram’s neonite. It is the ability to freeze anything that moves.
Naturally it is vital that Anson gets to London and the Admiralty to pass on this information. Fourteen miles away is “Brocklesby Junction” where the 8.30 train goes straight through. By now you will have anticipated that as soon as they get out the car a mist will start to fall over those grim northern moors and that desperate men will be lying in wait.
Later in the book more examples of the perfidy of the Germans are laid before us and T.C. Bridges introduces a few more features of the coast nearby. Thus when Guy and Wallace see two people on the Snout, a rocky point on the north side of the bay, who are bound to be cut off by the tide, they lose no time in coming to the rescue. Guy lowers Wallace down to the beach so that he can help. To his horror things don’t quite work out as he had planned.
“Close under the cliff Wallace lay helpless. His hands and feet were tied, and a gag was in his mouth. A few yards away were the two men. They were powerfully built, ugly-looking fellows, and having discarded their overcoats and flung aside their rod and net, now appeared in their true colours – as German sailors.”
Later Guy has to watch in impotent fury as his friend is rowed out to a waiting U-boat. The Germans (by a very dirty trick) have got the inventor’s son. By blackmail they also manage to get hold of the inventor himself and the secrets of his “neonite”. This time the U-boat comes near shore at a place called “Cleft Bay”, an even more remote spot than Galleon Gap. To get there they have had to pass through the “Singing Reef” a place of rocks where the water is “always talking and the swift tides humming among them”.
Guy contemplates with horror what has happened.
“It was all over. Neonite would at once be manufactured on a large scale, and within a few weeks it and the Cold Ray would come into effect on the Western Front.”
Fortunately Guy hasn’t just got a stiff leg, he has also got the stiff upper lip of a true Briton. Even more fortunately Mr. Vassall of Intelligence and the Royal Navy are waiting in the wings.
The Secret of the Baltic was written in 1919 and in its attitude and its contents was very much a product of its time. To be fair to T.C. Bridges it is worth saying that he was not alone in producing this jingoisitic sort of story about the Great War and his later adventure stories such as Wings of Adventure are less preposterous and genuinely exciting. Unfortunately they are not set in North Yorkshire.
It would be nice to think that both the bigotry and the plain “daftness” of this sort of story disappeared with the passage of time. However, when we turn to the work of Percy F. Westerman and his stories about the North Yorkshire Moors we discover this not to be the case. Standish Pulls it Off was published in 1940 and was just the latest offering in the long-running Standish series which includes such titles as Standish Holds On and Standish Gets His Man. The hero Colin Standish is a pilot and in the early stories such as The Amir’s Ruby and The Westow Talisman works for a commercial airline. By the time of Standish Pulls it Off our hero is a senior officer in the North Eastern Division of the Royal Air Constabulary. Already he has done his bit by dealing with an American tommy-gun gangster who flew over to England to embark upon a spree of bank-robberies amongst the limeys. It should be noted that Percy F. Westerman was just one of a clutch of writers serving up aeroplane stories to the very air-minded youth of the late 1920s and 1930s. Also churning them out were George E. Rochester, Rowland Walker, T.C. Bridges, John F.C. Westerman (Percy’s son), Major Charles Gilson and Captain W.E. Johns. Even the concept of the air constabulary and the air police had been done before and, with “Biggles’” retirement from the R.A.F. after WW2, was going to be done far better in the future.
To anyone who has read a large proportion of his more than 176 books it often seems that Percy F. Westerman had a dual identity. When he writes about life in the Merchant Navy or small boat sailing his stories drip with reality but when he steps on land or goes up in the air he is no more than a relentless hack with no feeling for people or place. Standish is the least satisfactory of his series heroes and Standish Pulls it Off must be amongst the worst of his books. It is gloriously awful.
Like T.C. Bridges Percy F. Westerman believes in doing things in a big way. In preparation for WW2 the British Government has decided to excavate a gigantic defence establishment under the North York Moors. Huge numbers of miners have been drafted in from all over the North and they are working day and night to complete some gigantic project. Naturally all this work is “off-limits” to the public. Even Standish and his fellow pilots only know that people have to be kept away from the potential danger area which you will find on the map marked as Westerdale Moors. However, the story starts off in a real place for Standish, based at Hawkscar (Ravenscar perhaps) is told that a suspicious aeroplane has been intercepted and forced down close to Hayburn Wyke.
“There was no need for Standish to consult his map. He knew this part of Yorkshire like the palm of his hand – perhaps better.”
The author then begins to tell us what he knows,
“Hayburn Wyke is a narrow, thickly wooded gorge bounded by the North Sea on the east and by a steep hill on the landward side. This slope is rendered even more difficult by a railway, with its attendant telegraph wires, running between Scarboro’ and Whitby.”
This is all very promising and begins to fill you with nostalgia for the lost railway that is now a coastal path. However, we are soon off into Ruritanian fantasy for the suspicious aircraft has come from Verdonia, one of this country’s implacable enemies. It was brought down by the use of the Z ray which had the effect of polarising the magneto of any fugitive machine. The ZZ ray is even more effective but I won’t trouble you with that..
Back to the reality part of the storyline - the Verdonian pilot had apparently been taking photographs and had abandoned his camera somewhere near Ralph’s Cross (nowadays the symbol of the North York Moors National Park). Colin Standish and his friend Don Grey are selected to be the ones that should recover it. They set off in Colin’s car for Castleton, expecting to complete the rest of the journey on foot. Almost immediately they run into a “red herring” and get on the track of an innocent citizen who actually has sent a loudly ticking watch through the post. Satisfied that it was not an “infernal machine” the two officers of the RAC (Royal Air Constabulary – remember !) return to their mission. As they drive along through Pickering and then take the turning at Kirkbymoorside Colin begins to put Don in the picture.
“You’ve flown over this district scores of times ?”
“Rather !”
“Seen anything unusual ?”
“Can’t say I have.”
“Then that points to the excellence of the system of camouflage. We are now over an immense subterranean hangar, proof against the heaviest bomb. Within it is accommodation for a thousand machines with several exits so arranged that they can take off at the rate of ten a minute.”
No wonder Don Grey is surprised !
Eventually they arrive at Ralph Cross and, unobserved themselves, watch a solitary motorist actually climbing up the cross so that he can put something in the hollow on the top. Not long afterward they watch another individual come along and remove the article. In the middle of the night in his room at the Robin Hood hotel in Castleton Standish watches a huge military convoy heading up on to the moors. The next day Colin and Don pay a visit to Colonel Bonnington, the local commander of the vast underground establishment. He gives them a conducted tour of the works and they discover that conventional aircraft are not the main weapon being prepared against a possible enemy. In fact the North Yorkshire Moors have become a vast launching pad for V2 style rockets that can rain down upon the cities of any potential aggressor. This is a nice ironic twist when we consider today’s reality of Fylingdales and the “Son of Star Wars” project.
However, we have almost forgotten about the Verdonian pilot. His name is Jean Lensco and he has a big part yet to play in the visits to many well-known parts of the moors. The police have decided to move their prisoner to York en route to London for further questioning. As the car presses onward through Malton there is a sudden puncture that causes a crash from which only Lensco recovers quickly. Off he goes into the woods and then to a railway line where he manages to climb on to a freight train. He eventually ends up in a siding in Pickering. Unshaven and hungry, Lensco pretends to be deaf and dumb and buys himself a pie and a bottle of cider. Lest he look conspicuous he walks on until he comes “to a ruined castle with a bank in front upon which there were two or three seats”. This is still a fair description of Pickering Castle today. His next trick is to steal a bicycle and set off along the road towards Kirbymoorside.
It seems fairly obvious that Percy Westerman who lived and worked on the south coast of England did some genuine research for this particular story. The geographical details are based on reality and it’s only the preposterous plot that lets it down. No new territory is taken in from this point onwards, though it is worth mentioning yet another suddenly descending mist and its effect on a frantic car chase, and so, abandoning the action half way through, we move to another Westerman story which sees this prolific author trying out another format.
The Mystery of Stockmere School is Percy F. Westerman’s one attempt at writing a public school story. However, it is only by a process of deduction that one can work out that it must be set in Yorkshire.
The basic plot is quite interesting - somewhere in the north is the town of Colbury Monkton, a grimy industrial sort of place where soot hangs in the air and where Stockmere School is like an oasis in a desert. The school has a good reputation for academic success but in terms of sporting achievement they are a spent force. The boys spend their days either with their heads down over their books or coughing out their lungs. Even the
master who ran the Scout troop has given it up as a bad job. Then, for the Headmaster, an even bigger tragedy occurs for the school is going to be forced to close seven weeks early because an inspection of the drains has found conditions to be wholly insanitary. In other Westerman stories the boys would have set off on some sailing adventure using the time profitably in becoming "men" and frustrating the activities of some of the many cardboard villains that infest this sort of tale. This time, however, the Headmaster's brother persuades him to move the school lock, stock and matron up in to the hills some 12 miles to the north but with a distant sight of the North Sea. The site of an old aerodrome is available for rent and the school can take it over.
The sixth form boys (who are the heroes of the tale) are allocated a hut that has a mysterious visitor on the first night. Someone has been scraping away at the floor and left his knife behind. The next night the boys make their plans to catch the intruder but only succeed in snagging an obnoxious (and ineffective) teacher in their trap. Yes, there is even an illustration with a bucket of water on his head. The boys are chucked out of their hut
for their cheek. This mystery then lies in abeyance for most of the rest of the book. Meanwhile, you see, the younger boys are required to have a few adventures and, free at last of the poisonous atmosphere, to get themselves fit for the County Sports.
To cut a long story short here are just some of the more amazing things that happen:
A younger boy (about fourteen) is picked up by a golden eagle and he shoots the eagle with his Derringer pistol which a senior boy had decided not to confiscate because it wasn't his business to do so. Some of the boys find an underground cave filled with stalactites and stalagmites and the Headmaster's brother decides the best way to provide better access to this fragile underground marvel is to use blasting powder. To return to the mystery element two plain-clothes detectives spend 10 nights in the room where the intruder was seen attacking the floor and fail to find the trap-door that opens in the centre of it - it leads to a secret tunnel to the cave mentioned above. A boy ordered by his teachers to take a silver teaspoon to be identified by a local jeweller is arrested as a country-house thief. This same boy makes his escape from the police and runs two miles back to the school in order to take part in the school sports. He arrives at the starting line puffed out but still manages to win the hurdle race. Ten minutes later the same boy sets a blistering pace in the mile so that his team-mate who runs a steady pace can come through and pick off their rivals who have all run too fast. By the way the team-mate's only distinguishing feature is his enormous head - usually just used for passing examinations before the move away from the grimy town.
The school, of course, gets a higher pass-rate than usual and wins the County Sports by just onepoint.
You are cordially invited to follow the "wonderful adventures" of the two heroes of this book into their next volume Sinclair's Luck where they head off for East Africa. The blurb promises you : "it is full of exciting incident such as boys revel in".
Friday 22 October 2010
22nd October,2010 James is 33 today.
I will start collecting material for this blog which,hopefully, will start to accumulate the information I need. I am still not satisfied with this title but it will do as a working hypothesis. The accumulation of books and the re-reading of some of them will help me get around the coast. I am not sure where to start but let us consider some of the big names. 'Holiday at Arnriggs' by Mabel Esther Allan is probably the best jumping off place that I can think of. This pitches me straight into Robin Hood's Bay in North East Yorkshire. That leads us into Whitby and Malcolm Saville. 'Mystery Mine' and 'The Buckinghams at Ravenswyke' are the obvious ones. Percy F. Westerman and Standish take us on to the cliffs at Ravenscar. There is also the interesting Theresa Tomlinson to start me thinking again. 'The Blackspit Smigglers' by Lennox Kerr starts us on a journey that takes us back to Peter Dawlish and the 'Dauntless' stories. Dawlish is in Devon/Cornwall,
I have ordered 'Mystery at Blackgang' and hope that it turns up so that I can tackle the Isle of Wight which takes me back to Percy Westerman and John Westerman again. 'The Key of England' and David Divine also takes me on to 'Three Red Flares' and Chicester. Lois Lamplugh takes me round to the coast of North Devon and I should not forget the story about Lundy. What about that Pigeongramme Puzzle? There is also that story about Llandudno and the Great Orme. JUst where is 'Last Horse on the Sands'set by Catherall. Rooskie and the Solway also cross my mind. Of great ports there is Liverpool,Carlisle,Chester and those islands in the Dee. What about those stories on Anglesey and Percy emerges again. Didn't Percy also take Alan Carr to Dundee and the Tay.
I will start collecting material for this blog which,hopefully, will start to accumulate the information I need. I am still not satisfied with this title but it will do as a working hypothesis. The accumulation of books and the re-reading of some of them will help me get around the coast. I am not sure where to start but let us consider some of the big names. 'Holiday at Arnriggs' by Mabel Esther Allan is probably the best jumping off place that I can think of. This pitches me straight into Robin Hood's Bay in North East Yorkshire. That leads us into Whitby and Malcolm Saville. 'Mystery Mine' and 'The Buckinghams at Ravenswyke' are the obvious ones. Percy F. Westerman and Standish take us on to the cliffs at Ravenscar. There is also the interesting Theresa Tomlinson to start me thinking again. 'The Blackspit Smigglers' by Lennox Kerr starts us on a journey that takes us back to Peter Dawlish and the 'Dauntless' stories. Dawlish is in Devon/Cornwall,
I have ordered 'Mystery at Blackgang' and hope that it turns up so that I can tackle the Isle of Wight which takes me back to Percy Westerman and John Westerman again. 'The Key of England' and David Divine also takes me on to 'Three Red Flares' and Chicester. Lois Lamplugh takes me round to the coast of North Devon and I should not forget the story about Lundy. What about that Pigeongramme Puzzle? There is also that story about Llandudno and the Great Orme. JUst where is 'Last Horse on the Sands'set by Catherall. Rooskie and the Solway also cross my mind. Of great ports there is Liverpool,Carlisle,Chester and those islands in the Dee. What about those stories on Anglesey and Percy emerges again. Didn't Percy also take Alan Carr to Dundee and the Tay.
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