Just Before Midnight, a Reservoir Above Sheffield Gave Way - and the Water Swept Through Homes Below

Just Before Midnight, a Reservoir Above Sheffield Gave Way - and the Water Swept Through Homes Below

On the night of the 11th of March 1864, families across Sheffield and the surrounding valleys were settling down for the night. Several miles away, however, something was badly wrong with the enormous new reservoir at Dale Dyke. A crack had already been noticed in the dam.

The reservoir had been built by the Sheffield Waterworks Company as the rapidly growing town needed an increasing supply of water. By March 1864 it was filling, holding an immense quantity of water above the Loxley Valley.

Shortly before midnight, part of the embankment gave way. Around 114 million cubic feet of water escaped and surged down the valley towards Sheffield.

The flood struck communities including Low Bradfield, Loxley and Malin Bridge before continuing towards Hillsborough and Sheffield itself. People were caught in their homes as houses, workshops and bridges were overwhelmed.

The official death toll recorded by Sheffield’s Chief Constable was 240. Around 4,000 houses were flooded, about 100 buildings were destroyed and 15 bridges were lost. Surviving records suggest that the true number of people who died may have been slightly higher.

What I find particularly haunting is what survives in the compensation records. People claimed for clothes, furniture, tools and household belongings - ordinary belongings that tell us something about the people whose lives were turned upside down that night.

Around 7,000 claims were eventually made for damaged property, lost livelihoods, injuries and deaths.

An inquiry followed, but exactly why the dam failed has remained the subject of debate. The official investigation criticised aspects of its design and construction, but engineers and historians have continued to debate exactly what triggered the collapse.

The Great Sheffield Flood became one of the worst civilian disasters of the Victorian period, yet I do not think it is remembered nearly as widely as many other disasters from the era.

Had you heard of the Great Sheffield Flood before, or is this one of those pieces of Victorian history that was completely new to you?

Image: Remains of the Dale Dyke reservoir embankment following the Great Sheffield Flood, 1864. Photographer unknown. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Two Weeks After Guernsey Was Occupied, British Commandos Came Back in the Dark.

Two Weeks After Guernsey Was Occupied, British Commandos Came Back in the Dark

I had not realised quite how quickly Britain tried to strike back after Guernsey was occupied.

German forces arrived on the island on the 30th of June 1940. Just two days later, Winston Churchill was already asking for plans to be made for a raid on the newly occupied Channel Islands.

The recently formed British Commandos seemed ideal for the job.

Before the main raid, however, intelligence had to be gathered.

In the early hours of the 8th of July, Hubert Nicolle, a Guernseyman serving as an officer in the Hampshire Regiment, was secretly landed on his home island from the submarine HMS H43.

Nicolle spent three days gathering information about the German garrison before being collected and taken back to Britain.

Then came Operation Ambassador.

During the night of the 14th-15th of July 1940, about 140 men from H Troop of No. 3 Commando and No. 11 Independent Company set out for Guernsey.

The plan included attacking the airfield, destroying aircraft and buildings and capturing members of the German garrison.

Almost immediately, things began going wrong.

Faulty compasses and problems with some of the boats disrupted the landings. One party missed Guernsey altogether and ended up on Little Sark.

Only around 40 men from No. 3 Commando successfully reached Guernsey, landing at Telegraph Bay, just west of the Jerbourg Peninsula.

Once ashore, they found something they had not expected.

The barracks and machine-gun position they searched were empty.

The Commandos created a small roadblock and cut communication lines, but the larger attack never developed.

Getting away caused another problem.

When the men returned to the coast, their boats could not get close to the rocky beach. Most of the Commandos eventually had to swim out through the darkness to reach them.

Three men who were not strong enough swimmers to make the difficult journey were left behind exhausted. They were later captured.

A fourth man, Gunner James McGoldrick, was initially reported missing and presumed drowned during the confused withdrawal. He had actually survived and reached the island, where he too was captured. Four British servicemen from the raid therefore became prisoners of war.

Operation Ambassador failed to achieve its main objectives, but it took place at a remarkably early stage in the development of Britain’s Commando forces.

The raid exposed problems with planning, navigation, equipment and training, and the experience became part of the lessons learned as British Commando operations developed.

What struck me most was the speed of it all.

Guernsey had been occupied for barely two weeks when British troops were already trying to return.

Had you heard of Operation Ambassador before?

Have a cuppa and let’s discover history together.

Image credit: British Army Commandos in a landing craft during training in Scotland, 28th of February 1942. War Office official photograph, Imperial War Museums H 17472. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

Mary, Queen of Scots Had Been a Queen Since She Was Six Days Old. On the 8th of February 1587, She Walked to the Scaffold.

Mary, Queen of Scots Had Been a Queen Since She Was Six Days Old. On the 8th of February 1587, She Walked to the Scaffold.

Over my last few Tudor posts I have been following the events that eventually led to the death of Mary, Queen of Scots. I have looked at the plots surrounding Elizabeth I, Mary’s trial at Fotheringhay and the warrant Elizabeth finally signed.

On the morning of the 8th of February 1587, Mary was executed.

She was 44 years old. Mary had become Queen of Scots when she was only six days old, had also been Queen of France and had spent almost nineteen years in England under increasingly close confinement.

Her execution took place in the Great Hall at Fotheringhay Castle.

Even at the scaffold there was disagreement over religion. Richard Fletcher, the Dean of Peterborough, was there to conduct Protestant prayers, but Mary made it clear that she intended to die in the Catholic faith and continued with prayers of her own.

When Mary’s outer clothing was removed, red clothing was revealed underneath. Red was associated with Catholic martyrdom, and this part of her clothing has often been interpreted in that context, although we cannot know for certain what Mary herself intended by wearing it.

The execution was not completed with a single stroke. A contemporary account preserved among the papers of Henry Grey, Earl of Kent, records that it took two strokes of the axe.

Robert Wingfield, who witnessed the execution and later wrote an account of what he had seen, recorded another detail that I had not known before researching this.

After Mary’s death, a small dog was discovered hidden amongst her clothing. According to Wingfield’s account, the dog would not leave her body and and had to be taken away and washed.

Mary’s story did not quite end at Fotheringhay.

Elizabeth I died without children in 1603, and the man who inherited the English crown was James VI of Scotland - Mary, Queen of Scots’ son. He became James I of England.

Sixteen years after Mary’s execution, her son was sitting on Elizabeth’s throne.

Did you know that Mary’s son eventually succeeded Elizabeth I?

Image: The Execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, Alexandre-Denis Abel de Pujol, 19th century. Musée des Beaux-Arts de Valenciennes, via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.

The Day German Troops Arrived in the Channel Islands

The Day German Troops Arrived in the Channel Islands

I have been following what happened to the Channel Islands during those extraordinary days in the summer of 1940, and after the bombing of the 28th of June came something the people who remained could do almost nothing to prevent.

German occupation.

On the 30th of June 1940, a German Dornier aircraft became the first enemy aircraft to land at Guernsey Airport. The Germans had not initially known that the Channel Islands had been demilitarised. There was now no British military force waiting to oppose them.

German forces followed, and the occupation of Guernsey began.

The British Government had decided during June that the islands could not realistically be defended. British forces had been withdrawn and thousands of civilians had already left, but many thousands more had chosen to stay.

Now they were faced with German soldiers arriving on islands that had, only days earlier, been theirs.

Jersey followed on the 1st of July.

German aircraft dropped an ultimatum demanding clear signs that there would be no resistance. White flags were to be flown and large white crosses painted in prominent places. One of those crosses was painted in the Royal Square in St Helier.

German forces then arrived at Jersey Airport, where Bailiff Alexander Coutanche and Attorney-General Charles Duret Aubin met the arriving officers.

German soldiers were now appearing in the streets, orders and proclamations also began to be issued.

At first, around 1,750 German troops were stationed in Jersey. But by the end of the first year of occupation, that number had risen to around 11,500.

The Channel Islands were dependencies of the British Crown, but there was now no British military force there to defend them.

For the people who had remained, the question was what occupation was actually going to mean for their lives.

They would have almost five years to find out.

Next in my Channel Islands series: what happened during those first days of occupation, and how quickly did the new rules begin to change ordinary life?

Image: Orders of the German Commandant, Jersey, 2nd July 1940. Wikimedia Commons. Public Domain.

Harold Was Dead - But England Had Not Yet Accepted William as King

Harold Was Dead - But England Had Not Yet Accepted William as King

Harold Godwinson was dead, his army had been broken at Hastings, and William of Normandy had won an extraordinary victory. But England had not surrendered.

After the battle on the 14th of October 1066, there was still another possible king: Edgar Ætheling, a teenage descendant of the old royal house of Wessex.

Edgar was probably only around fourteen years old and had little political experience, but his bloodline mattered. He was the grandson of Edmund Ironside and the last surviving male member of the old royal house of Wessex. In London, support quickly gathered around him.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that Archbishop Ealdred and the people of London wanted Edgar as king, while the powerful earls Edwin and Morcar promised to support him. Hastings had therefore not settled the question of who would rule England.

William now had to turn military victory into control. His forces secured Dover and Canterbury, while London remained resistant. William continued his campaign through south-east England, his forces ravaging territory as they advanced.

But the support behind Edgar did not develop into an effective military response. With Harold dead and the English leadership divided, Edgar's position weakened.

By December, Edgar, Archbishop Ealdred, Edwin, Morcar and other leading figures had submitted to William at Berkhamsted. Edgar was never crowned.

On the 25th of December 1066, William was crowned king at Westminster Abbey.

Harold's death at Hastings had removed the king who had led the English army against William, but England was still not securely under Norman control. The submission at Berkhamsted brought William much closer to the crown, although resistance to Norman rule would continue for years. Even after the coronation, the conquest was far from complete.

What do you think might have happened if England's leaders had managed to unite behind Edgar Ætheling?

The coronation of William I by Ealdred, Archbishop of York. Later medieval depiction by Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Guernsey Had Already Been Left Undefended - But 33 Civilians Were About to Die

Guernsey Had Already Been Left Undefended - But 33 Civilians Were About to Die

On the 28th of June 1940, tomato lorries stood around St Peter Port harbour, connected with the island’s important export trade. Then German aircraft appeared overhead.

By the 19th of June, Guernsey had been left without British military defence. The British Government had decided several days earlier that the Channel Islands would not be defended, and the withdrawal of military personnel followed. Thousands of islanders then left, including many of Guernsey’s schoolchildren.

German forces, however, were not yet aware that the islands had been demilitarised.

From the air, the vehicles gathered around St Peter Port harbour were mistaken for military transport. They were actually connected with Guernsey’s important tomato trade, with produce being prepared for export.

Bombs struck the harbour area and fruit export sheds, while vehicles around the White Rock were hit and set ablaze. Thirty-three civilians were killed and another 67 were injured.

It is the timing that stays with me. The occupation had not even begun when those 33 civilians lost their lives. There were no British troops waiting to defend St Peter Port and no battle taking place around the harbour. The people caught in the attack were civilians living through the uncertain days between evacuation and occupation.

Only two days later, on the 30th of June, German officers arrived in Guernsey to accept the island’s surrender. Once it was clear that Guernsey was undefended, the occupation began without a battle for the island.

Guernsey was about to endure almost five years of occupation. But before the first occupying troops had even arrived, 33 islanders had already lost their lives.

Had you heard about the bombing of St Peter Port before?

 

St Peter Port from White Rock Pier, Guernsey – Rijksmuseum / Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain (CC0).

Inside the Old Nichol: One of Victorian London’s Most Notorious Slums

Inside the Old Nichol: One of Victorian London’s Most Notorious Slums

In the Old Nichol, some families lived, ate, slept and worked in the same room.

The district lay around the boundary of Bethnal Green and Shoreditch in London’s East End. Its streets and courts were densely packed, and by the late 19th century it had become known for severe overcrowding and poor housing.

Work was often carried out inside the home. Social reformer Clementina Black investigated home workers in the area and recorded matchbox making among the trades she found. Women and children could spend long hours making boxes for very little money.

Victorian accounts also gave the Old Nichol a reputation for crime and disorder. Some of those descriptions were exaggerated, but the poor condition of much of the housing and the level of poverty in the area were well recorded.

Charles Booth’s investigations into London poverty during the 1880s included this part of the East End. His work showed just how concentrated poverty had become in some London neighbourhoods.

The London County Council was created in 1889. The following year it proposed the Boundary Street improvement scheme, covering about six hectares and involving the displacement of 5,719 people.

A revised scheme was approved in 1893 and demolition began. Hundreds of houses were eventually cleared.

The Boundary Estate was built on the site. Red-brick blocks surrounded the raised garden at Arnold Circus, with wider streets running out from the centre. The redevelopment was completed by the end of 1900.

Former Old Nichol residents were not necessarily moved into the new buildings. The rents were too high for many of them, so they were forced to find cheaper rooms elsewhere in the East End. Some moved into areas where overcrowding was already common.

By 1900, the streets of the Old Nichol had largely disappeared under a completely different development. For the people who had lived there, however, demolition did not necessarily mean better housing.

Had you heard of the Old Nichol before?

Image: Boundary Street, Old Nichol, c.1890. Photographer unknown. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.