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History Of Portsmouth - England, Its Famous People And Events

Hi, my name is Paul Hussey and I was born in Portsmouth - England in 1961.

The history of Portsmouth is entwined with the history of Her Majesty's Naval Base Portsmouth which extends almost two thousand years. The time when the Romans first recognized its strategic significance and built the fort "Portus Adurni", and now the home to 80% of the Royal Navy's surface fleet.

As so many Famous events and People were Born, Lived and worked in Portsmouth over the centuries I thought it would be a good idea to tell its story and some of the famous people's history.

 

The last person to be tried as a witch was a Mrs Duncan, a Scotswoman who travelled the country holding seances, was one of Britain's best-known mediums, reputedly numbering Winston Churchill and George VI among her clients, when she was arrested in January 1944 by two naval officers at a seance in Portsmouth. The military authorities, secretly preparing for the D-day landings and then in a heightened state of paranoia, were alarmed by reports that she had disclosed - allegedly via contacts with the spirit world - the sinking of two British battleships long before they became public. The most serious disclosure came when she told the parents of a missing sailor that his ship, HMS Barham, had sunk. It was true, but news of the tragedy had been suppressed to preserve morale.

 

Desperate to silence the apparent leak of state secrets, the authorities charged Mrs Duncan with conspiracy, fraud, and with witchcraft under an act dating back to 1735 - the first such charge in over a century. At the trial, only the "black magic" allegations stuck, and she was jailed for nine months at Holloway women's prison in north London. Churchill, then prime minister, visited her in prison and denounced her conviction as "tomfoolery". In 1951, he repealed the 200-year-old act, but her conviction stood.

 

Buckingham, George Villiers, 1st duke of (vil'yurz, bŭk'ing-um) [key], 1592–1628, English courtier and royal favorite.

 

While organizing a second campaign he was stabbed and killed at Portsmouth on August 23, 1628 by John Felton, an army officer who had been wounded in the earlier military adventure. Felton was hanged in November and Buckingham was buried in Westminster Abbey. His tomb bears a Latin inscription translating: "The Enigma of the World" and was also one of the most rewarded royal courtiers in all history.

 

The romantic aspects of the duke's career figure largely in Alexander Dumas's historical novel, The Three Musketeers. The Duke of Buckingham died leaving his wife Katherine Manners, their daughter Mary and son George, 1628.

Admiral Lord George Anson ( April 23rd. 1697 - 1762 )
George Anson, 1st Baron Anson was a British admiral and a wealthy aristocrat, noted for his circumnavigation of the globe.
Sailed around the world between 1740-1744 on HMS Centurion and brought back 500,000 pounds sterling value of Gold ( Equivalent in todays money 250 Million Pounds!!) as Booty from the Spanish in South America.

Jonas Hanway (1712-1786)
Born in Portsmouth & Pioneer of Umbrella.
English traveler and philanthropist, was born at Portsmouth in 1712. While still a child, his father, a victualer, died, and the family moved to London. In 172 9 Jonas was apprenticed to a merchant in Lisbon. In 1 743, after he had been some time in business for himself in London, he became a partner with Mr Dingley, a merchant in St Petersburg, and in this way was led to travel in Russia and Persia. Leaving St Petersburg on the 10th of September 1743, and passing south by Moscow, Tsaritsyn and Astrakhan, he embarked on the Caspian on the 22nd of November, and arrived at Astrabad on the 18th of December. Here his goods were seized by Mohammad Hassan Beg, and it was only after great privations that he reached the camp of Nadir Shah, under whose protection he recovered most (85%) of his property. His return journey was embarrassed by sickness (at Resht), by attacks from pirates, and by six weeks' quarantine; and he only reappeared at St Petersburg on the 1st of January 1745.

Lord Admiral Nelson ( 1758-1805 )
( Nelson and his mistress Emma lived for a time in Portsmouth )
Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, KB (29 September 1758 – 21 October 1805) was a British admiral famous for his participation in the Napoleonic Wars, most notably in the Battle of Trafalgar, a decisive British victory in the war, during which he lost his life.[1] Nelson was noted for his considerable ability to inspire and bring out the best in his men, to the point that it gained a name: "The Nelson Touch".
His actions during these wars meant that before and after his death he was revered like few military figures have been throughout British history.

During the 18th century, even though he had been married for some time, Nelson became famous for his love affair with Emma, Lady Hamilton, the wife of the British Ambassador to Naples and she became Nelson's mistress, returning to the United Kingdom to live openly with him, and eventually they had a daughter, Horatia. It was the public knowledge of this affair that induced the Navy to send Nelson back out to sea after he had been recalled. By his death in 1805 Nelson had become a national hero, and he was given a State Funeral. To this day his memory lives on in numerous monuments, the most notable of which is London's Nelson's Column, which stands in the centre of Trafalgar Square.

John Pounds (1766-1839)
John Pounds was born in Portsmouth on 17th June 1766. His father was a sawyer in the royal dockyard and when was twelve years old, his father arranged for him to be apprenticed as a shipwright. Three years later John fell into a dry dock and was crippled for life.

Unable to work as a shipwright, John became a shoemaker and by 1803 had his own shop in St. Mary Street, Portsmouth. While working in the shop, John began teaching local children how to read. His reputation as a teacher grew and he soon had over 40 pupils attending his lessons. Unlike other schools, John did not charge a fee for teaching the poor of Portsmouth. As well as reading and arithmetic, John gave lessons in cooking, carpentry and shoe making. John Pounds died in 1839.

Charles Dickens was born in Landport, Portsmouth in Hampshire, the second of eight children to John Dickens (1786–1851), a clerk in the Navy Pay Office at Portsmouth, and his wife Elizabeth Dickens (née Barrow, 1789–1863) on February 7, 1812. When he was five, the family moved to Chatham, Kent. In 1822, when he was ten, the family relocated to 16 Bayham Street, Camden Town in London.

Charles Dickens published over a dozen major novels, a large number of short stories (including a number of Christmas-themed stories), a handful of plays, and several nonfiction books. Dickens's novels were initially serialised in weekly and monthly magazines, then reprinted in standard book formats.
The travelling shows were extremely popular and, after three tours of British Isles, Dickens gave his first public reading in the United States at a New York City theatre on 2 December 1867.

On 9 June 1870, he died at home at Gad's Hill Place after suffering a stroke, after a full, interesting and varied life. He was mourned by all his readers.

Jeremiah Chubb (1793-1860) and Charles Chubb (1779-1846)
Both brothers lived and worked in Portsmouth & are Famous Chubb Locksmiths.

The name of Chubb is famous in the lock world for the invention of the detector lock and for the production of high quality lever locks of outstanding security during a period of 140 years. The detector lock was patented in 1818 by Jeremiah Chubb of Portsmouth, England, who gained the reward offered by the Government for a lock which could not be opened by any but its own key. It is recorded that, after the appearance of this detector lock, a convict on board one of the prison ships at Portsmouth Dockyard, who was by profession a lockmaker, ad had been employed in London in making and repairing locks, asserted that he had picked with ease some of the best locks, and that he could pick Chubb's lock with equal facility. Improvements in the lock were subsequently made under various patents by Jeremiah Chubb and his brother Charles.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel ( 1806-1859 )
Brunel, perhaps, was the most prodigious Engineer of his time and many of his works, which challenged and inspired his colleagues during this period, have survived to our own time and some are still in use.

He was born in 1806, the son of a distinguished French engineer, Sir Marc Brunel, who had come to England at the time of the French Revolution. Unlike most engineers of the time, Isambard Brunel received a sound education and practical training - partly in France - before entering his father's office and taking full charge of the Thames Tunnel at Rotherhithe when he was only 20.

At the age of 26, he was appointed Engineer to the newly-formed Great Western Railway and acted with characteristic boldness and energy. His great civil engineering works on the line between London and Bristol, are used by today's high-speed trains and bear witness to his genius He eventually engineered over 1,200 miles of railway, including lines in Ireland, Italy and Bengal. Each of his three ships represented a major step forward in naval architecture.

Brunel's other works included docks, viaducts, tunnels and buildings and the remarkable prefabricated hospital, with its air-conditioning and drainage systems for use in the Crimean War. Inevitably, in such a prolific career, there were setbacks and disappointments such as the atmospheric railway but he readily admitted his mistakes. Indeed he himself suffered financially by supporting his ventures with his own money.

Brunel suffered several years of ill health, with kidney problems, before succumbing to a stroke at the age of 53. Brunel was said to smoke up to 40 cigars a day and to sleep as few as four hours each night.
Charles Dickens (1812-1870)

George Meredith (1828-1909)
Famous Novelist & Poet who was born in Portsmouth.
Contributed poems to various periodicals; an associate of the Pre-Raphaelite group around Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Algernon Swinburne; published
the poem Modern Love 1862; author of several novels including Diana of the Crossways 1885, which first brought him popular acclaim.

George Vicat Cole (1833-1893)
George Vicat Cole (usually known as Vicat Cole) was an important landscape painter working in the mid-19th century. In keeping with the realist mood of that period, he painted naturalistic English landscape scenes, without attempting deeper meanings or looking for rustic ideals. His speciality was the effect of atmosphere and light.

Cole was born in Portsmouth, and trained in the studio of his father George Cole (1810-1883), an eminent painter of landscapes, animals and portraits who rose as far as the Vice-Presidency of the Society of British Artists. As a young man, Cole copied prints of works of Turner, Constable and Cox, and the paintings of these men had a strong influence on him.

Lionel William Wylie (1851-1931)

Famous Marine Artist who Lived and died in Portsmouth. Wylie was born into a family of artists in 1851. The rather bohemian family spent their summers on the coast of northern France. Wylie recalled the journey by steamer down the crowded Thames from London on their way to Boulogne. When he was about 12 he went to art school in London, and in 1866 he started at the Royal Academy School. In 1869 he won the Turner Gold Medal for landscape. In 1870 one of the first pictures he exhibited at the Royal Academy was London from the Monument, a panoramic view of the city and the river and he began working as an illustrator of maritime subjects for The Graphic magazine. He had to reproduce detail accurately in black and white, and this discipline probably influenced him when he began making etchings in the early 1880s. Wyllie's first known etching, made in 1884, is Toil, glitter, grime and wealth on a flowing tide. It was commissioned by the print publisher Robert Dunthorne. Wyllie's Thames pictures led him to be elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1889. By 1907, when he became a Royal Academician, he had moved to a house at the entrance of Portsmouth Harbour. He had largely turned to painting naval and historical subjects. Nevertheless, he continued to make prints of London and the Thames to the end
of his life.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ( 1859-1930 )

Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born on May 22, 1859, in Edinburgh, Scotland. The Doyles were a prosperous Irish-Catholic family, who had a prominent position in the world of Art. Charles Altamont Doyle, Arthur's father, a chronic alcoholic, was the only member of his family, who apart from fathering a brilliant son, never accomplished anything of note. At the age of twenty-two, Charles had married Mary Foley, a vivacious and very well educated young woman of seventeen.
Mary Doyle had a passion for books and was a master storyteller. Her son Arthur wrote of his mother's gift of "sinking her voice to a horror-stricken whisper" when she reached the culminating point of a story. There was little money in the family and even less harmony on account of his father's excesses and erratic behavior. Arthur's touching description of his mother's beneficial influence is also poignantly described in his biography, "In my early childhood, as far as I can remember anything at all, the vivid stories she would tell me stand out so clearly that they obscure the real facts of my life."
After Arthur reached his ninth birthday, the wealthy members of the Doyle family offered to pay for his studies. He was in tears all the way to England, where for seven years he had to go to a Jesuit boarding school. Arthur loathed the bigotry surrounding his studies and rebelled at corporal punishment, which was prevalent and incredibly brutal in most English schools of that epoch.
During those grueling years, Arthur's only moments of happiness were when he wrote to his mother, a regular habit that lasted for the rest of her life, and also when he practiced sports, mainly cricket, at which he was very good.

The young medical student met a number of future authors who were also attending the university, such as for instance James Barrie and Robert Louis Stevenson. But the man who most impressed and influenced him, was without a doubt, one of his teachers, Dr. Joseph Bell. The good doctor was a master at observation, logic, deduction, and diagnosis. All these qualities were later to be found in the persona of the celebrated detective Sherlock Holmes.
A couple of years into his studies, Arthur decided to try his pen at writing a short story. Although the result called The Mystery of Sasassa Valley was very evocative of the works of Edgar Alan Poe and Bret Harte, his favorite authors at the time, it was accepted in an Edinburgh magazine called Chamber's Journal, which had published Thomas Hardy's first work.
Dr. Arthur Conan Doyle's first gainful employment after his graduation was as a medical officer on the steamer Mayumba, a battered old vessel navigating between Liverpool and the west coast of Africa.
Unfortunately he found Africa as detestable as he had found the Arctic seductive, so he gave-up that position as soon as the boat landed back in England. Then came a short but quite dramatic stint with an unscrupulous doctor in Plymouth of which Conan Doyle gave a vivid account of forty years later in The Stark Munro Letters. After that debacle, and on the verge of bankruptcy, Conan Doyle left for Portsmouth, to open his first practice.
He rented a house but was only able to furnish the two rooms his patients would see. The rest of the house was almost bare and his practice was off to a rocky start. But he was compassionate and hard working, so that by the end of the third year, his practice started to earn him a comfortable income.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle also became one of the first goalkeepers of Portsmouth Football club in the 1880s.

Arthur Conan Doyle died on Monday, July 7, 1930, surrounded by his family. His last words before departing for "the greatest and most glorious adventure of all," were addressed to his wife. He whispered, "You are wonderful."

Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)

Famous Author who lived & Schooled in Portsmouth.
Kipling's days of "strong light and darkness" in Bombay were to end when he was six years old. As was the custom in British India, he and his three-year-old sister, Alice ("Trix"), were taken to England—in their case to Southsea (Portsmouth), to be cared for by a couple that took in children of British nationals living in India. The two children would live with the couple, Captain and Mrs. Holloway, at their house, Lorne Lodge, for the next six years. In his autobiography, written some 65 years later, Kipling would recall this time with horror, and wonder ironically if the combination of cruelty and neglect he experienced there at the hands of Mrs. Holloway might not have hastened the onset of his literary life.
Kipling kept writing until the early 1930s, but at a slower pace and with much less success than before. He died of a hemorrhage from a perforated duodenal ulcer on 18 January 1936, two days before George V, at the age of 70.

Herbert George Wells (1866 – 1946), known as H.G. Wells,

Was an English writer best known for such science fiction novels as The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man, The First Men in the Moon and The Island of Doctor Moreau. He was a prolific writer of both fiction and non-fiction, and produced works in many different genres, including contemporary novels, history, and social commentary. He was also an outspoken socialist. His later works become increasingly political and didactic, and only his early science fiction novels are widely read today. Both Wells and Jules Verne are sometimes referred to as "The Father of Science Fiction".

No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their boys as apprentices to various professions. From 1881 to 1883 Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at the Southsea Drapery Emporium. His experiences were later used as inspiration for his novels The Wheels of Chance and Kipps, which describe the life of a draper's apprentice as well as being a critique of the world's distribution of wealth.

In 1883, Wells's employer dismissed him, claiming to be dissatisfied with him. The young man was reportedly not displeased with this ending to his apprenticeship. Later that year, he became an assistant teacher at Midhurst Grammar School, in West Sussex (teaching students such as A.A. Milne, until he won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science, now part of Imperial College London), studying biology under T. H. Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909.

Neville Shute (1899-1960)
Famous Author/Aero-Engineer who worked in Portsmouth.
Born in Somerset Road, Ealing, London, he was educated at the Dragon School, Shrewsbury School and Balliol College, Oxford. Shute's father, Arthur Hamilton Norway, was the head of the post office in Dublin in 1916 and Shute was commended for his role as a stretcher bearer during the Easter Rising. Shute attended the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich but because of his stammer was unable to take up a commission in the Royal Flying Corps, instead serving in World War I as a soldier in the Suffolk Regiment. An aeronautical engineer as well as a pilot, he began his engineering career with de Havilland Aircraft Company but, dissatisfied with the lack of opportunities for advancement, took a position in 1924 with Vickers Ltd., where he was involved with the development of airships. Shute worked as Chief Calculator (stress engineer) on the R100 Airship project for the subsidiary Airship Guarantee Company. In 1929, he was promoted to Deputy Chief Engineer of the R100 project under Sir Barnes Wallis.

Sir Walter Besant 14/08/1836 to 9/06/1901 Famous Novelist/Scientist and historian from London. His sister-in-law was Annie Besant.
The son of a merchant, he was born at Portsmouth, Hampshire and attended school at St Paul's, Southsea, Stockwell Grammar, London and King's College London. In 1855, he was admitted as a pensioner to Christ's College, Cambridge, where he graduated in 1859 as 18th wrangler. After a year as Mathematical Master at Rossall School, Fleetwood, Lancashire and a year at Leamington College, he spent 6 years as professor of mathematics at the Royal College, Mauritius. A breakdown in health compelled him to resign, and he returned to England and settled in London in 1867. He took the duties of Secretary to the Palestine Exploration Fund, which he held 1868–85. In 1871, he was admitted to Lincoln's Inn.

Besant was a Freemason, serving as Master Mason in the Marquis of Dalhousie Lodge, London from 1873. He conceived the idea of a Masonic research lodge, the Quatuor Coronati Lodge of which he was first treasurer from 1886.

Sir Alec Rose (13 July 1908 - 11 January 1991)
Was a nursery owner and fruit merchant in Portsmouth England who had a passion for amateur single-handed sailing, for which he was ultimately knighted.

Alec Rose was born in Canterbury. During World War II he served in the British Navy as a diesel mechanic on a convoy escort, the HMS Leith. In 1964, Rose participated in the second single-handed transatlantic race, placing fourth across the line in his 36 foot cutter Lively Lady, originally built of paduak by Mr. Cambridge, the previous owner, in Calcutta.

Rose then modified the boat, including the addition of a mizzenmast, to sail single-handed around the world. He attempted to start this journey at2 approximately the same time as Francis Chichester sailing Gypsy Moth IV in 1966, but a series of misfortunes delayed Rose's departure until the following year. The journey was closely followed by the British and international press, and culminated in his successful return in Portsmouth on July 4, 1968, 354 days later, to cheering crowds of hundreds of thousands. The following day he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II, and nine days later he turned 60 years old. His voyages are detailed in his book "My Lively Lady."

On 17 December 1967, the then Australian Prime Minister, Harold Holt, drove with some family members to Port Phillip Heads, south of Melbourne, to view Rose complete this leg of his voyage. Holt then went for a swim at nearby Cheviot Beach, but the surf was rough, he disappeared from view, and was presumed to have drowned.

Callaghan of Cardiff,Leonard James Callaghan,Baron,(1912-2005)
Born and Schooled in Portsmouth.

British statesman. He was first elected to Parliament as a Labour member in 1945. As chancellor of the exchequer (1964–67), he introduced extremely controversial taxation policies, including employment taxes; he resigned when he was forced to accept devaluation of the pound. Prime Minister Harold Wilson Wilson, Harold (James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx), 1916–95, British statesman. A graduate of Oxford, he became an economics lecturer there (1937) and a fellow of University College (1938).

Callaghan served as foreign secretary (1974–76). He succeeded Wilson when the latter resigned as prime minister in 1976. Callaghan was by nature a moderate man, but his government was plagued by inflation, unemployment, and its inability to restrain trade unions' wage demands, and foundered after a series of paralyzing labor strikes in the winter of 1978–79. In the elections later in 1979, the Labour party lost to the Conservatives, led by Margaret Thatcher, Margaret Hilda Roberts Thatcher, Baroness, 1925–, British political leader.

Portsmouth Football Club ( Pompey ).

 

Pompey was Established in 1898 and early participants in the Southern League, One of their first Goalkeepers pre- 1898 was Arthur Conan Doyle the author of Sherlock Holmes. Portsmouth have grown to become a club worthy of playing in the top flight of English Football.

Portsmouth's debut season in the English First Division during the 1920's turned out to be a difficult one. However, despite disappointing league form the club fought off stiff competition to reach the FA Cup final closely losing out to Bolton Wanderers.

Having solidified their position in the top flight, the 1938-1939 season saw Portsmouth again reach the FA Cup final. This time Portsmouth were successful beating Wolves in a convincing 4-1 win. The club had secured their first major trophy.

After the end of World War Two league football began again and Portsmouth quickly proved to the footballing masses that they were a team to be reckoned with, lifting the League title in 1949 season. The club then crowned this achievement by retaining the title the following year 1950 and becoming only one of five English teams to have won back to back championships since World War Two.

 

Portsmouth was the first club to hold a floodlit Football League match when they played Newcastle in 1956.

Finally under the management of Harry Redknapp Portsmouth were promoted into the Premier League and have held a solid place in the top flight since this date despite coming close to relegation a number of times.

Recently Portsmouth have gone from strength to strength under the careful management of Harry Redknapp and a much-needed injection of cash. In the 2007-2008 season Portsmouth won the English F.A. Cup and qualified for the UEFA Cup qualification. They had proven themselves as a consistent and strong team.

 

Alas, at present ( 2010 )they are in financial difficulties and at the root of the Premier League and have just been deducted 9 points due to going into Administration and are now relegated into the Championship league Division. They reached the F.A.Cup final in 2010.

 

The last person to be tried as a witch was a Mrs Duncan, a Scotswoman who travelled the country holding seances, was one of Britain's best-known mediums, reputedly numbering Winston Churchill and George VI among her clients, when she was arrested in January 1944 by two naval officers at a seance in Portsmouth. The military authorities, secretly preparing for the D-day landings and then in a heightened state of paranoia, were alarmed by reports that she had disclosed - allegedly via contacts with the spirit world - the sinking of two British battleships long before they became public. The most serious disclosure came when she told the parents of a missing sailor that his ship, HMS Barham, had sunk. It was true, but news of the tragedy had been suppressed to preserve morale.

 

Desperate to silence the apparent leak of state secrets, the authorities charged Mrs Duncan with conspiracy, fraud, and with witchcraft under an act dating back to 1735 - the first such charge in over a century. At the trial, only the "black magic" allegations stuck, and she was jailed for nine months at Holloway women's prison in north London. Churchill, then prime minister, visited her in prison and denounced her conviction as "tomfoolery". In 1951, he repealed the 200-year-old act, but her conviction stood.

 

I am a world authority on Louis Wain 1860-1939 who was an artist of funny Cats, Kittens, Dogs, Horses, Pigs and Birds. He visited Portsmouth a few times in his lifetime. To view some of his fab art please visit my other website where I have over 100 Art Prints on display. Please Click Here For Funny Louis Wain Art Prints.

Please visit my Funny Animal Art Prints Collection @ http://www.fabprints.com

My other website is called Directory of British Icons: http://fabprints.webs.com

To visit the list and links to my other Blogg articles: http://bloggs.resourcez.com

 

The Chinese call England "The Island of Hero's" which I think sums up what we English are all about.

 

1. 1. 1. 1. 1. 1. Copyright © 2010 Paul Hussey. All Rights Reserved.

About the Author

Please visit my Funny Animal Art Prints Collection @ http://www.fabprints.com

My other website is called Directory of British Icons: http://fabprints.webs.com

 

The Chinese call England "The Island of Hero's" which I think sums up what we English are all about.

 

Copyright © 2010 Paul Hussey. All Rights Reserved.

William Cooper & his Death 1