Literature

The Genius of Richard Webb, and his new potential best seller, ‘My Devonshire Year’

David Fursdon DL, Her Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant for Devon:

“This is a book to read slowly; to dip in and out of and to savour and to read with the seasons. It is a book for the Devon connoisseur and the Devon beginner and celebrates an endangered way of life. It is full of colour and of wisdom. It is, quite simply, a delight.”

These words greet the newly published ‘My Devonshire Year’, I cannot improve on them.  This book is being published by my very good friend, Richard Webb, who lives in a beautiful house in Warfleet Creek, at the entrance to Dartmouth harbour where he can sit at his desk and watch all manner of boats and ships arrive and depart.

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June-5th-The-Beauty-of-Devon-Hedgerows

A day in the life of Lt. John Chard, Royal Engineers – 22 January 1879 by Charles Aikenhead

The Zulu War of 1879 is quite well known and the two battlefields that witnessed a disastrous massacre at Isandlwana and a heroic defence at Rorke’s Drift marked the beginning of the British Campaign.  They both occurred on 22 January and involved 25,000 warriors in mortal combat, in which some 5,000 died. Their detail continues to generate a book a year and a regular stream of visitors to the battlefields.

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Portrait of Lt. John Chard Royal Engineers

The Preparations for Captain Cook’s Voyage

This article was commissioned by Robert Jarman for Debrett’s Bicentennial Australia which he compiled and edited 1987.  Robert Jarman took great delight in inviting Stewart Aberdour and his wife Amanda to visit Australia during its bicentennial year and to participate in the celebrations of its discovery in 1787 in which his ancestor James Douglas, 14th Earl of Morton, played a major part in funding and organizing.

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Captain Cook by Nathaneal Dance