Saltashe_, they shrugged their shoulders, and hardly regarded it as
serious. And when the strong, muscular women appeared in their
white-frilled caps prinked out with blue ribbon, their short
petticoats, white dresses, with a blue neckerchief tied over the
shoulders and crossed behind the back, they looked puzzled.
Mr. Porter says: "The challenge of the English captain created a stir
not only in Havre, but for miles around the French coast, and for many
leagues inland too. In England great interest was felt in the
forthcoming match, and in a short time it assumed a kind of
international character. Thus when the regatta day came there was a
vast concourse of people to witness the contest. Every quay, hill-top,
and house-roof whence a view of the course could be obtained was
crowded. All were on the tiptoe of expectation for _les Anglaises_....
Before the start the Saltash crew had a pull round 'to show
themselves,' and when their steady stroke was seen, how they bent
their backs to the work, yet with what perfect ease and grace they
pulled, our French friends opened their eyes wider than usual. Ann and
her crew had not the fairest start possible, nor had they the
advantage at first. Six boats were ahead of them five minutes after
the start. But they soon tested their opponents. After a little
opening play to get into trim, Ann, who had the stroke oar, gave the
word, 'Bend your backs to it, maidens; and hoorah for old England!'
One by one the French boats were passed with a cheer from old Ann. At
length the Saltash boat, with the British colours flying gaily at the
fore, took the leading position. It was a long course and a hard pull,
but the Frenchmen were soundly thrashed. Ann and her 'maidens' beat
them by one hundred yards."
However gallant Frenchmen may be, they did not at all relish this
beating.
The names of the crew were Ann Glanville, Harriet Hosking, Jane House,
and Amelia Lee. A man acted as coxswain.
Mrs. House was so elated at the victory that on reaching the committee
boat she plunged into the water, dived under the vessel, and came up
with dripping and drooping nightcap on the opposite side.
When the Prince of Wales, our present King, and the Duke of Edinburgh
came into Plymouth Sound in connection with the building of the new
Eddystone Lighthouse, Ann was sent for. A steam launch was despatched
to convey her to the vessel, where were their Highnesses, and she
dined on board. Lord Charles Beresford always entertained a high
regard for her, and never came to Plymouth without visiting her.
During her last illness she had his likeness placed on one side of her
bed, and that of her deceased husband on the other.
She died in 1880 at the age of eighty-five. In person Ann Glanville was
tall, firmly and vigorously built, not stout, straight about the bust
and waist. When young she must have been good-looking, for when old her
face was handsome and always possessed great dignity. The mouth was
firm. There was a kindly light in her grey eyes. She was always fond of
a joke, and her character was summed up by a neighbour: "Her was honest
to a farthing, clean as a smelt, and kind-hearted as a queen."
FOOTNOTE:
[39] Her mother was married three times--first to Warring, second to
Vosper, third to Geo. Buckingham.
JONATHAN SIMPSON, HIGHWAYMAN
This great rascal was born at Launceston in 1654 of respectable
parents, and his father, who was well-off, apprenticed him to a linen
draper at Bristol when he was fourteen years of age. When he had
served out his time, which he did with the repute of being a steady,
industrious youth, his father gave him fifteen hundred pounds
wherewith to set up in Bristol. About a year after he unhappily
married a woman who was the cause of his downfall and finally of his
death. She had two thousand pounds of her own, and this added to what
he already possessed promised him a considerable extension of his
business with corresponding profits.
But the girl he had chosen for his wife had previously engaged herself
to a young man of small means, and her parents had forced her into
marriage with Simpson as being better off and with good prospects. She
resented her compulsory marriage, and did not disguise her indifference
to her husband. Although her former lover, in a fit of disgust at his
rejection, had also married, Simpson ascertained that they corresponded.
Determined to find out the truth, that she still loved the man, he
announced to his wife that he was going to Launceston for ten or
twelve days to see his relations. As soon as he was gone his wife sent
to invite her _galant_ to supper, and provided for his entertainment
a couple of fowls and a bottle of wine. Either the fowls must have
been very small, or their appetites voracious.
In the evening Jonathan Simpson returned, entered his house, and
rushed to the dining-room. His wife had but just time to shut her
_galant_ into the oak chest; but not before Simpson had seen by the
movement of the lid that he was there. However, he gave no token of
having perceived anything, expressed his delight at so good a supper
having been prepared, and despatched his wife to the further end of
the town on an errand. No sooner was she gone than he sent for the
wife of "Pil-Garlic," and on her arrival disclosed the man in the box,
and enjoyed the scene of recrimination that ensued.
The vexation at the discovery he had made that he could expect no
domestic happiness created a great change in Jonathan Simpson's life.
He sold his business, refused to receive his wife back into his house
again, and with all the money he could scrape together that amounted
to five thousand pounds, quitted Bristol, and swore he would never
re-enter it.
He now led a riotous life, spending his money so freely that at the
end of eighteen months all his five thousand pounds was gone, and then
he took to the road to supply himself with more. After a while he was
arrested for highway robbery, and was sent to the Old Bailey, tried,
and condemned to be hanged.
His relatives at Launceston now exerted themselves to obtain a
reprieve, and by bribery and persuasion they got one, but only at the
last moment. Simpson was already under the gallows, with the rope
round his neck, when it arrived, and the execution was arrested.
As he was riding back to Newgate behind one of the sheriff's officers
that man asked him what he thought of a reprieve as he stood on the
scaffold. "No more," answered Simpson, "than I thought of my dying day."
On reaching the prison door the turnkey refused to admit him,
declaring that he could not take him in again without a fresh warrant;
and as this could not well be obtained, the sheriff's officer was
obliged to let him go free.
"Well," said Simpson, "what an unhappy dog am I! that both Tyburn and
Newgate should in one day refuse to entertain me. I'll mend my manners
for the future, and try whether I cannot merit a reception at them
both the next time I am brought thither."
He was as good as his word, and after his release is believed to have
committed above forty robberies in the county of Middlesex within the
ensuing six weeks.
He was a good skater, and made a practice of robbing people on the ice
between Fulham and Kingston Bridge, in the great frost of 1689, which
held for thirteen weeks. He would kick up their heels, and search
their pockets as they lay sprawling on the ice.
On one occasion a gentleman whom he stopped gave him a silk purse full
of counters, which Simpson took for gold, and so did not examine them
till he reached the inn where he put up. When he found that he had
been outwitted he quietly pocketed the brass booty, and abided his
time till he should meet the same gentleman again. This he did at the
end of four months, when he waylaid him on Bagshot Heath, where,
riding up to the coach, he said, as he presented a pistol at the
gentleman's head, "Sir, I believe you made a mistake the last time I
had the happiness to see you, in giving me these pieces. I have been
troubled ever since for fear you should have wanted these counters at
cards, and am glad of this opportunity to return them. But for my
care I require you this moment to descend from your coach and give me
your breeches, that I may search them at leisure, and not trust any
more to your generosity, lest you should mistake again."
The gentleman was obliged to comply, and Simpson carried off the
breeches with him to his inn, and on searching them found a gold
watch, a gold snuff-box, and a purse containing ninety-eight guineas
and five gold jacobuses.
On another occasion he robbed Lord Delamere in an ingenious fashion.
That nobleman was driving over Dumoor Heath in his coach well attended
by armed servants. Simpson rode up to the carriage and told his lordship
that he had been waylaid and robbed by some rogues, two in number, at a
little distance. Lord Delamere at once despatched his armed and mounted
escort in pursuit, and Simpson took the opportunity of their absence to
rob the nobleman of forty pounds. After that experience Lord Delamere
vowed he would never again show kindness to a stranger.
At last Simpson was taken near Acton by means of two captains of the
Foot Guards, where he attempted to rob both together. There ensued an
obstinate fight between them, and Simpson behaved with so much bravery
that in all probability he would have escaped, had not one of the
officers shot the horse on which he rode, which, falling, carried
Jonathan down with it. He had already been wounded in his arms and one
of his legs, but both his opponents were also wounded and bleeding.
Whilst on the ground he continued to resist with desperation whilst
extricating himself from his fallen horse; but the sound of the fray
had called up other passengers, and he was overmastered and sent to
Newgate, where he found the keeper so much of a friend that on this
occasion he was ready to receive him. Tyburn also was sufficiently
hospitable not to reject him, and he was hanged on Wednesday, 8th
September, 1686, in his thirty-third year.
DAVIES GILBERT
The simple and quiet life of a country gentleman who does not hunt,
but spends his days in the library among books, or at his desk making
calculations, presents little of interest to the general reader. But
Davies Gilbert is not a man to be passed over in a collection of minor
worthies of Cornwall.
Mr. Gilbert's original name was Giddy, and he was the grandson of a
Mr. John Giddy, of Truro, who had two sons, Edward and Thomas; the
former took Holy Orders, and became curate of S. Erth, and never
obtained any better preferment. Here he married Catherine, daughter of
John Davis, of Tredrea, the representative of several ancient
families, and inheriting what fragments were left of the property of
William Noye, Attorney-General in the reign of Charles I.
At S. Erth was born, 6 March, 1767, Davies Giddy, the subject of this
sketch. After having been
The whining schoolboy, with his satchel,
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school,
at Penzance, he passed to Oxford, and entered Pembroke College, his
father going up to Oxford to reside with him. Dr. Johnson, who was
also of Pembroke, once said, in allusion to the poetical characters
brought up there, that it was a veritable nest of singing-birds.
Davies Giddy was not a singer or a poet himself, but taught others to
sing, for he collected and published the traditional Cornish carols
with their melodies, now taken into every book of Christmas carols and
sung at the feast of Noël from John o' Groats House to the Land's End,
in America, India, and Australia. Probably this little gathering was
one of the works Davies Giddy, or Gilbert, least valued of his many
productions, but it has been the most enduring, and will be deathless
so long as English voices carol.
Contemporary with Davies Giddy, but of older standing in the college,
was that strange man Dr. Thomas Beddoes, lecturer on chemistry, whose
head was turned by fanatical republicanism, and who was an enthusiastic
admirer of the French Revolution, and prepared to condone the horrors of
the Reign of Terror. This was too much for most of Beddoes' friends, who
fell away from him, but Davies Giddy, though in politics standing at the
other pole, appreciated the great abilities of the doctor, shrugged his
shoulders at his political opinions, and refrained from absolutely
breaking off all intercourse with him, even when Beddoes was obliged to
resign the professorship he held at the University.
Beddoes, on leaving Oxford, set up a pneumatic institution at Clifton,
near Bristol, for the cure of consumption, by pumping air into the lungs
of those afflicted with phthisis. This was a great discovery, which was
to sweep this scourge out of England. The pneumatic bellows worked night
and day, and the patients gasped, inhaled and spurted the air back
through their nostrils, till the arms of the bellows-workers ached, but,
alas for suffering mankind, the pneumatic process proved a dead failure.
Davies Giddy after leaving Oxford went to a surgeon, Bingham Borlase,
at Penzance, to prepare for the medical profession, intending after
a stay with Borlase to complete his education at the Medical School of
Edinburgh. With Dr. Borlase was a lad, Humphry Davy, who had been
articled to him in 1793, when little more than fourteen years old. He
was a youth of active frame, and with a bright, intelligent face, with
wavy brown hair, and eyes "tremulous with light." Not only was Davy a
keen fisherman, but he was enthusiastic as a chemist; but he had no
particular desire to spend his life as a Sangrado in Penzance. Davies
Giddy speedily recognized the flashes of genius in the lad, and
recommended him to go to the pump-house of Dr. Beddoes as an assistant
at a modest salary. As Beddoes experimented with various gases on his
unfortunate patients there was at all events an element of novelty in
the venture. Mr. Giddy abandoned his intention of entering the medical
profession, and, having a sufficient income to support himself, he
devoted his whole time to scientific work, and became well known as a
geologist and botanist, and he associated with all the literary and
scientific men of his native duchy.
[Illustration: DAVIES GILBERT, M. A.
_President of the Royal Society Member of Parliament--&c_
_1828_
_From the collection of Mrs. Lewis Lane_]
The introduction of Watt's improvement in the steam-engine into the
Cornish mines and the disputes between that great mechanical inventor
and Jonathan Hornblower, of Penryn, as to the economy and mode of
applying the principle of working steam expansively, early attracted
the attention of Davies Giddy, and Hornblower had frequent recourse to
him, as a mathematician, to work out his calculations for him, and to
advise as to his experiments, and approve or criticize his inventions.
Trevithick also had recourse constantly for the same purpose to Mr.
Giddy, and the latter was solicited by the county to take an active
part in determining the advantages of Watt's engines; and in
conjunction with Captain W. Jenkin, of Treworgie, he made a survey of
all the steam-engines then working in Cornwall.
One of the most laborious and practically useful works of Giddy was a
treatise on the properties of the Catenary Curve. This fine example of
mathematical investigation was published whilst Telford was preparing
materials for the Menai Straits Bridge; and Telford was so convinced
by Mr. Giddy's tract, that he altered the construction of the bridge
in accordance with what Giddy had laid down, causing the suspension
chains, which had already been completed, to be again taken in hand
and lengthened by about thirty-six feet.
In 1804 Giddy was elected into Parliament as representative of that
rotten borough Helston, but at the next election, in 1806, he was
returned for Bodmin, and continued its member till the Reform Bill
abolished these nests of corruption. In Parliament he was rarely heard
to speak, but his judgment was always valued there, and had great
influence on questions of a practical nature.
In 1811, when the high price of gold produced an ominous effect on the
currency of the realm, and when the public mind became greatly
agitated by the depreciation of bank notes, Davies Giddy published _A
Plain Statement of the Bullion Question_, with the object of allaying
the public ferment. Against great opposition he carried an extra
twelve feet in width to the design for rebuilding London Bridge.
In 1808 he married Mary Ann Gilbert, an heiress, of Eastbourne, in
Sussex, whose family name he afterwards assumed, on account of the
hereditary estates to which he became entitled through this marriage.
This lady was of a strong, determined character. On one occasion when
riding she was thrown, and dislocated her shoulder. Laying hold of
her hunting-crop with both hands, she threw herself back and so
brought the joint back into its place.
Once she had a dispute with some farmers, who would not continue their
farms without a great reduction of rent. "Very well," said she; "then I
will farm them myself." And she did so, and made them pay. She was the
first in England to introduce the allotment system on a farm of hers at
Eastbourne, Sussex. The marriage was due to Mr. Giddy meeting her when
she was staying with her mother on a visit to Mr. Fry at Penzance.
She was a handsome woman, with a determined face, and she suited her
husband admirably, for she was interested in many of the subjects that
he took up. She was an authoress, moreover--she wrote upon "Tanks,"
"On an Improved Mode of Forming Water Tanks," "On the Construction of
Tanks," in 1836, 1838, and 1840. Also "On the Self-supporting Reading,
Writing, and Agricultural School at Willingdon, in Sussex," 1842.
On the death of Sir Joseph Banks the unanimous voice of the Royal
Society called Sir Humphry Davy to the chair, and at the same time
Davies Gilbert--as he now was--was nominated Treasurer under the man
whom he had first helped to start in his career. Ill-health having
obliged Sir Humphry Davy to quit England in the early part of 1827,
Mr. Gilbert occupied the chair as Vice-President, and when finally Sir
Humphry retired in the same year he was chosen President.
At that time a President was elected for life, but Davies Gilbert
considered this to be unadvisable, and urged that the election should be
for a term only; and his recommendation was accepted after a few years,
when the presidency was required for the Duke of Sussex; thereupon it
was hinted to him that he should act upon his expressed opinion and
leave the chair for His Royal Highness. This he did without reluctance.
On his wife's estate in Sussex he introduced the Cornish stiles, of
gridiron fashion--strips of stone laid down with an interval between
each--and this prevents horses, donkeys, and cattle from adventuring to
cross them. But the Sussex people on the Eastbourne estate revolted, and
declared that they would not break their legs to please any Cornish
Giddy or Sussex Gilbert, and he was constrained to remove them all.
He was a man of a versatile mind. He published, with a translation by
J. Keigwin and W. Jordan, the early Cornish mystery plays of _Mount
Calvary_ and the _Creation of the World_.
He also undertook a Parochial History of Cornwall, giving first Hals'
account from his MS., now in the British Museum, with additions from
Tonkin, and a geological account of each parish by Dr. Boase, of no
great value, and his own additions. This was published in five volumes
in 1838.
He wrote also on steam-engines, on the employment of sea salt as a
manure, on the improvement of wheels and springs for carriages, on the
_Eikon Basilike_. He translated the Liturgy into Greek. Chambers in
his _Journal_, Vol. II, 1844, has an account of the improvements
effected on his wife's estate at Eastbourne.
When Lieutenant Goldsmith upset the Logan Rock he got the use of
timber and ropes granted for the work of replacing the stone, and had
the loan of the same also to replace the coverstone of Lanyon Quoit.
Lord Sidmouth offered him the position of Under-Secretary of State,
but he declined the offer.
About a year before his death Davies Gilbert entered in his notebook:
"Slept in a house for the first time on my own property." This was a
house in East Looe bequeathed to him by Thomas Bond, who had written the
_History of Looe_, and who died unmarried and without near relatives.
Davies Gilbert died at Eastbourne on Christmas Eve, 1839, as the
carollers, for whom he had done so much, were going round in the dark
under the stars singing--
Noël, Noël, the angel did say,
Unto these poor shepherds in the fields as they lay.
JAMES HOSKIN, FARMER
Castell-an-Dinas was the most complete and perfect relic of
prehistoric times existing in Cornwall, till a Mr. Rogers, of Penrose,
took it into his head to erect a tower on the summit, that was neither
useful nor beautiful, and to obtain material the walls of the fort
were pulled about and pillaged. It is still an interesting specimen of
a hill fortress, notwithstanding the mischief wrought by the builder
of the tower.
On the side of the swelling hill crowned by the old fortress is a small
walled enclosure, like a donkey-pound, and in this is the tomb of James
Hoskin, a farmer, who desired that he might not be laid in consecrated
ground. He was buried in 1823 at the age of 63. He was baptized at
Ludgvan on March 8th, 1760, and was the son of James Hoskin.
There are, in fact, three headstones within the enclosure: that which is
central is to James Hoskin; on the left is one to his eldest son, who
died in 1812, aged 20, and above it is the inscription, "Custom is the
idol of Fools"; on the right is one to a married daughter and her child,
also in 1812, the mother aged 22 and the daughter 7, probably months,
not years, in this latter case. Above this headstone is the inscription:
"Virtue only consecrates the ground." But although there be these three
memorial stones, only James Hoskin, the father, aged 63, lies here.
What caused James Hoskin to desire to be interred on the moor away
from consecrated ground? Tradition in Ludgvan says that he kissed the
parson's wife, and the rector, furious at the insult--his name was J.
Stephens--vowed that if he survived Hoskin he would bury him in the
most obscure corner of the graveyard on the north side of the church.
So in order to defeat the parson's intentions, he made provision for
his body to be buried at Castell-an-Dinas. Whether this be true or not
I cannot say, but certain it is that there was a lasting difference
between J. Hoskin and the Rev. J. Stephens.
The Hoskin family lived in a farm, Treassow, Castell-an-Dinas, the
original seat of the Rogers Family from before 1633. Sold by Captain
J. P. Rogers recently.
His was a small yeoman family in very fair circumstances. James Hoskin
had two sons who lived, besides John, the eldest, who died young.
These were John William and Richard Vinnicombe. This last went as a
clerk to Jamaica to Sir Rose Price. His grandsons are now living in
Ludgvan. According to some poor inflated verses, written by a Miss
Lean, of Ludgvan, in 1803, addressed to James Hoskin, he made the farm
on the slope of Castell-an-Dinas, from which height, she says--