Tuesday 5 June 2018

The Drake Letters have now been uploaded

After a very long wait, the DRAKE LETTERS have finally ALL been uploaded to the website!

Find them here: cwrs.russianwar.co.uk/cwrs-R-mstevens-drake-letters.html

Saturday 2 June 2018

Megan Steven's Blog about Drake and his family

Very interesting background information about William Henry Drake and his family

downrabbitholes.com.au/category/drake/

Crimean War Research Society website update

After a very long wait, the DRAKE LETTERS are finally being uploaded to the website!
The first 40 have been done so far

Find them here: cwrs.russianwar.co.uk/cwrs-R-mstevens-drake-letters.html

Friday 1 June 2018

William Henry Drake of the Commissariat in the Crimea

After a very long wait, the DRAKE LETTERS are finally being uploaded to the website!
The first four so far …

Find them here: cwrs.russianwar.co.uk/cwrs-R-mstevens-drake-letters.html

Sunday 27 May 2018

The War Correspondent, Volume 35 No.3 April 2018

CONTENTS

SOCIETY BUSINESS
From the Editor
Changing of the Guard
Chairman’s Report 2018 from Glenn Fisher
Treasurer’s Report 2018 from Lee Tough
Secretary’s Report 2018 from Ken Tough

ARTICLES
The Early History of the Huddersfield and District Army Veteran’s Association by John H. Rumsby
William Henry Cory, 11th Hussars again by Tony Margrave
Szathmari at Silistria by Michael Tinsley
What if . . . Submarines off Cronstadt and Sevastopol by Dr. Douglas J. Austin
Crimea’s Byron? Adam Mickiiewicz? by Jennifer Margrave
The Story of Birr’s Russian Trophy Cannon by Dr. Paul Huddie
A Crimean War Veteran Returns Home to his Medals and His Family by Keith Smith
John Pendered, Royal Sappers and Miners and the First Photographic Expedition to the Crimea by Glenn Fisher
Balaclava’s Greatest Hits — Trumpeter Lanfried sounds the Charge by Philip Boys

TRANSCRIPTIONS
The Running W and the 1936 Movie “The Charge of the Light Brigade from an email from Philip Boys

BOOK REVIEWS
The Crimean War then and now by Dr. David Jones reviewed by Glenn Fisher
Into the Valley of Death by A. L. Berridge reviewed by Lawrence W. Crider
Memories of Memorials by Michael Aidan reviewed by Lawrence W. Crider
Voices from the Past: the Siege of Sevastopol by Anthony Dawson reviewed by Major Colin Robins

MISCELLANEA
The Other Nightingale Museum
The Submarine — Backward and Forward in Time

Friday 1 July 2016

John Barham's Journey through the Crimean War

Chapter Ten, 'Balaklava' has now been uploaded to 'Resources'.

http://cwrs.russianwar.co.uk/cwrs-R-jbarham-chapter10.html

Thursday 17 March 2016

AGM Week-end at Winchester 15th - 17th April 2016

Crimean War Research Society (2014) AGM Weekend Winchester 15th to 17th April 2016

MEMBERS AND FRIENDS PROGRAMME

Assemble at Mercure Wessex Hotel (in central Winchester alongside the Cathedral) and walk to nearby Winchester College. Our Guide will concentrate on the military monuments including the Crimean War Memorial (by William Butterfield, 1858) and the War Memorial Cloister (by Sir Herbert Baker, 1922-4) which is not included on usual tours. Please note that we need at least 10 participants for this bespoke tour to go ahead. 15.00 Tea in Winchester Cathedral Refectory. 15.30 Tour of Winchester Cathedral by Chris Maxse, a Winchester Blue Badge Guide who himself has family connections with the Crimean campaign. The Cathedral is famed for its monuments, second only to Westminster Abbey. The finest Crimean monument is to the 97th Foot. (For details see The War Correspondent, October 2008, at pp. 40-44)

19.00 Informal dinner at Mercure Wessex Hotel. Members to book dinner independently with the hotel, when they check in.

Saturday 16th April There will two alternative tours this morning. than 11th March] 09.15 Leave Mercure Wessex for Peninsula Barracks for a guided tour of the barracks complex followed by visits to the museums of the Royal Green Jackets and of the 11th Hussars. Both feature important Crimean War collections. We shall also view the Great Hall of Winchester Castle, before taking Tea and Coffee in the Peninsular Café (the former guardhouse of the barracks). This tour involves an uphill walk from the hotel and taxis will be available if needed. It will be led by an accredited Blue Badge Guide, Tony Newing, an ex-Royal Marine, who has a particular interest in military history.

 9.15 Leave Mercure Wessex for a one mile walk beside the River Itchen to The Hospital of St. Cross and Almshouse of Noble Poverty, comprising a Norman church and 15th century almshouses set in unspoilt water meadows. This walk inspired John Keats to write his ode ‘To Autumn’, Anthony Trollope based ‘The Warden’, first of his ‘Barsetshire Chronicles’, on St Cross, and it continues to inspire film and television producers (most recently for the BBC adaptation of ‘Wolf Hall’). Though this is intended to be a walking tour, taxis will be available if needed. Tea and Coffee will be served in The Hundred Men’s Dining Hall at St Cross and there will be a guided tour led by one of the 13.00

Both tours return to the Mercure Wessex for lunch in the Wykeham Suite, which has an uninterrupted view of Winchester Cathedral (at 556 feet, the longest Gothic cathedral in Europe).

14.00 Talks preceding the AGM ‘ Military Men of Feeling’ by Professor Holly Furneaux of Cardiff University ‘Some Sepulchrous Stories’ by Mike Hinton

15.00 Tea Break

15.15 AGM – (only paid up members can attend)

17.30 Evensong in Winchester Cathedral – an optional extra, to hear some of the finest choral singing in England.

 19.00 Meet in the Kings Bar at the Mercure Wessex.

19.30 AGM Dinner in the Wessex Restaurant at the Mercure Wessex.

Sunday 17th April 10.00 Leave the Mercure Wessex for a walking tour of Winchester, led by Chris Maxse.

11.30 (approximately) AGM Weekend finishes. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thursday 4 June 2015

The War Correspondent Archive Initiative

We are endebted to those who volunteered at the AGM in York to undertake scanning their old issues of the War Correspondent. All of these old issues up to the turn of the century and beyond are only held as original print run copies, or in some cases photocopies of same, by long-standing members of the CWRS. In an effort to digitally preserve the old output of the society a group of volunteers are scanning their old issues and sending them to the webmaster for processing, compiling and posting at Lulu.com in both print and PDF download versions. Eventually a DVD will be available of the complete run up to the present day. So far Volumes 1 and 2 have been posted as a compilation, and so have the four issues of Volume 3. Likewise Volume 6.

Tuesday 10 March 2015

CRIMEAN WAR RESEARCH SOCIETY (2014) – ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING WEEKEND IN YORK 24/25/26 APRIL 2015

CRIMEAN WAR RESEARCH SOCIETY (2014) – ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING WEEKEND IN YORK 24/25/26 APRIL 2015
 
1. The inaugural AGM Weekend of CWRS (2014) will be held in York, at the Novotel York Centre, on 24/25/26 April, 2015. The York Novotel, at Fishergate, York YO10 4FD, is a modern building with 124 bedrooms, situated just outside the historic walls of York, adjacent to the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss and a short walk from the city centre. It was the venue for the 2014 AGM of the old CWRS.
 
2. A new programme of visits to places of interest in and around York will be arranged for the afternoon of Friday 24, the morning of Saturday 25 and the morning of Sunday 26 April. We hope that this will include the Kohima Museum, and the Museums of the Queen’s Own Yorkshire Yeomanry, the Royal Dragoon Guards and the Prince of Wales’s Own Regiment of Yorkshire, some of which were closed at the time of our visit in 2014. Details will follow.
 
3. Members can arrange to dine together informally at the Novotel on Friday 24, if they so wish; there will be illustrated talks after lunch on Saturday 25, followed by the Annual General Meeting. The paperwork for the AGM, including draft Rules for CWRS (2014), will be circulated in due course. The Annual Dinner will be held at the Novotel on the evening of Friday 25 April.
 
USE OF EMAIL
90% of our Membership now have email and from now on, in the interest of speed and economy, we shall be issuing CWRS business notices in that form. In addition we shall of course post in hard copy form to those Members without email. If you receive this notice by post but you have email, please let us know your email address.
 
Please contact Ken and Lee for further details
 
Yours sincerely,
 
Ken & Lee Tough
Secretary & Treasurer, CWRS (2014)
 

Sunday 1 March 2015

Chapters 4 and 5 of John Barham's Journey through the Crimean War uploaded

Both Chapters 4 and 5 of John Barham's Journey through the Crimean War have been posted to the site.
Chapter 4, Stagnating at Varna - direct link
Chapter 5, On Other Fronts - direct link