Cobblets – Notelets for Cobbolds

COBBLET Feb 2010

Thanks to ‘The Oldie’ (February 2010 edition) we can enjoy another smile at the expense of the family historian:

COBBLET Nov 09

Publication of ‘To Suffolk with Love, The Life of Felix Thornley Cobbold’ has resulted in additional information coming to light.

Felix’s yacht, which he kept at The Royal Harwich Yacht Club was built by Fifes at Fairlie in 1867. At that time Fifes were considered to be the best yacht designers and builders in the UK. Felix’s Admiralty Warrant shows her to have been 45 tons, 61 ft. overall with a 13 ft beam and 8ft draft. She was rated for international racing and he renewed her sails in 1891, 1904 and 1905. She could be sailed single handed but was also large enough to entertain guests. The mahogany and polished brass can be easily imagined.

Just what one would have expected. Ship shape and Felix fashion!

COBBLET SEP / OCT 09

Lowe, Son & Cobbold Ltd was formed at about the end of the 19th century when Harry Vyvyan Cobbold (1865 – 1926) married Laura May Lowe. Harry (a grandson of Richard Cobbold) and Ralph P Cobbold (1869 – 1965) put money into the brewing business and became directors. The business thrived for a while but was taken over by James Hole & Co Ltd in 1935 and the brewery itself was knocked demolished in 1962.

Breweriana collectors apparently hold mementos in high esteem. The beer label shown below sold this month at auction for £190, but not to us!

NOT ON MY WATCH!

APHRODITE IN THE DAILY TELEGRAPH…50 SUMMER READS

Aphrodite’s Workshop for Reluctant Lovers by Marika Cobbold.

If you like that virtuous feeling of swatting up on a bit of local history when you’re on holiday, this is the perfect book to take to Greece. On Mount Olympus, Aphrodite, the Goddess of Love, is having a crisis of confidence: her most loyal earthling, the romantic novelist Rebecca Finch, has broken up with her boyfriend and become disillusioned with romance, which is very bad news for Aphrodite’s chances of promotion. With the assistance of her moody teenage son Eros, she gradually manages to lead Rebecca to her real Mr Right and to make a sugar-coated but convincing case for believing in lasting love.

Daily Telegraph 27th June 2009

A LONG FACE?

In days gone by ladies’ make-up was based on beeswax. If the wearer became too hot her whole ‘face’ would start to slide down. This is perhaps the origin of the term ‘a long face’ and maybe also ‘face-lift’.

POMPEI AD 79

A poem written by Richard Edgcumbe (1843 – 1937) (father of the 6th Earl of Mount Edgcumbe) in Naples on 6th April 1925 found amongst Edgcumbe family papers.

While excavating at Pompei a Roman Sentry was found at the Porta Marina

He stood at his post when the ashes fell,
When the sea at his feet was lashed to foam,
Undaunted by scenes of terrestrial Hell,
A dutiful son of Imperial Rome!

He leant on his spear in the gathering cloud
Awaiting a Summer that never came,
Till, wrapt in the folds of a scorching shroud,
He died where he stood, unnoticed by Fame.

They found him at last by the old sea-gate,
Entombed in the ashes of countless years.
Ages have passed and we honour his fate
By that tribute of love – a pilgrim’s tears!

NEIGHBOUR’S GARDEN

By R H Grenville

His garden is a lovesome thing.
In it the birds delight to sing,
The butterflies to dilly–dally,
The bees to buzz, the ants to rally.

The spider spins her web in it,
The breezes flow and ebb in it.
His mother likes to knit therein,
His wife will often sit therein.

His puppy buries things in it,
His little daughter swings in it,
And elves (she tells me) lurk in it,
But all he does is work in it!

SLEEP TIGHT?

In early times beds were made of a wooden frame on four legs across which rope or webbing was stretched to support the mattress. After they had sagged the need to tighten them is thought to have given rise to the expression “sleep tight”.

ALCOCK & BROWN

June 15th this year brings the 90th anniversary of the first non-stop Transatlantic flight.

Alcock and Brown took off in a modified WWI Vickers Vimy bomber from Lester’’s Field near St Johns, Newfoundland on June 14th 1919 and landed at Clifden, Ireland on June 15th. News of their success spread like wildfire and they were presented with the Daily Mail’s prize of £10,000 by Winston Churchill who was then Secretary of State, and knighted a few days later by King George V at Buckingham Palace.

William Nevill Cobbold (1863 – 1922) as well as being an early English International Footballer, was also something of an amateur poet. His enthusiasm and patriotism shine in the verse he wrote to mark the triumph.

At 1:45 p.m. we were airborne. (Photo courtesy of Cynthia Long)

CAPTAIN ALCOCK AND LIEUTENANT BROWN CROSS THE ATLANTIC

The vast Atlantic’s crossed to-day
Upon a British ‘plane;
Two Britishers have shewn the way,
Two men of nerve and brain.

These heroes reck not of their lives
Nor for the prize they care,
For England’s glory each one strives
For conquest of the air.

No praise too high we give to those
Who sped across the ocean,
Which twixt the Anglo-Saxons flows;
We laud their grand devotion.

In sixteen hours they crossed the main,
Those men of utmost daring,
Who feared not storm or winds or rain,
On wings when eastward faring.

Alcock and Brown, for aye your feat
Shall ring throughout the ages,
Tho’ myriads will this repeat
In history’s future pages.

Your mead is great; to our delight
We hear that you’ve been knighted,
Who first in one unbroken flight
On British soil alighted.

Footnote: Partition took place in 1921.

© Cobbold Family History Trust 2009.

Marika Cobbold - extract from her 4th book, ‘Frozen Music’

Elsewhere we report the publication of Marika Cobbold’s 6th novel. The following is an extract from her 4th book, ‘Frozen Music’

I scurried around asking my question “What is love?”

My father didn’t seem surprised by the question but didn’t seem overly interested in it either. “I suppose love is paying off your mother’s overdrafts”

Janet gave the brass and ebony candlestick one last flick with the duster and said, “In my view, it all comes down to socks in the end.”

“Socks?”

“If you can live with his dirty socks, not to mention the feet inside and still look at him tenderly, then you love him.”

THE ORIGIN OF THE TERM “SMALL BEER”

Writing about the decision of Thomas Cobbold (1680 – 1752) to move his brewery from Harwich to Ipswich in 1746, Bob Malster (A History of Ipswich, Phillimore, 2000) says “It might seem strange from a 20th-century perspective that several breweries could trade in a town with a population of no more than 10,000, but it has to be remembered that ale or beer was the normal drink for a very large part of that population. Even the children drank ‘small beer’ at a time when much of the water supply was grossly polluted.”

THOUGHT FOR THE NIGHT

As I grow older and older And totter towards my tomb, I find that I care less and less Who goes to bed with whom!

A WATERCOLOURIST IN OUR MIDST

Family History isn’t only about hatches, matches and despatches. We have an aesthetic side and one of the highlights of my year is my annual Christmas card from Constance Hiller née Cobbold. These are always reproductions of one of her watercolours of which I show four examples below:

Constance has original watercolours for sale. ‘phone 01404 850327’