How the Edwardians tried to stay cool
Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 5:17 am
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... w_20072006
How the Edwardians tried to stay cool
By Juliet Nicolson
(Filed: 20/07/2006)
The last time Britain lived through so much heat in July was in 1911, when 384 hours of sunshine were recorded in Eastbourne and Hastings.
Ninety-five years ago, dancing duchesses in the Savoy ballroom were cooled down by sprays of freezing ozone and the newly crowned Queen Mary found relief in the plentiful supplies of ice carried aboard the royal yacht.
Rupert Brooke took a break from writing his first book of poems that summer and swam naked in the river at Grantchester. The bathing machines that crowded Britain's beaches gave comforting shelter to those who feared public scrutiny as they clambered into their neck-to-shin swimming costumes (which weighed up to 20lb when wet).
But sunshine and warmth do not always bring happiness; excess heat has a way of stripping inhibitions and encouraging impulsive behaviour.
On July 17, 1911, a man walked six miles from his Essex village into the local town, stripping off his clothes and hurling them over the hedge as he went.
Finally, marching stark naked down Brentwood High Street, he was arrested and locked away in the local lunatic asylum. He had literally gone mad with the heat.
Newspapers began to run occasional columns that summer called Deaths from the Heat until they were discontinued as no longer newsworthy.
The dockers, exasperated by low pay and unemployment, went on strike that July, to be joined by the railwaymen, paralysing the transport system.
Winston Churchill, the 36-year-old home secretary, feared that as the food lay in the sun, untouched and rotting on the quays, there would be famine in the land.
Churchill also worried that the Kaiser's aggressive behaviour towards French-occupied North Africa might eventually lead to something truly dangerous. He discussed the situation in between swimming lengths of the new pool at the RAC Club in London's Piccadilly with his lodger, the foreign secretary, Edward Grey.
Even in the record-breaking heat of July 2006 it would be hard to imagine Margaret Beckett and John Reid so desperate for a swim that they would be caught mulling over departmental policy in the pool.
Juliet Nicolson is the author of The Perfect Summer: Dancing into Shadow in 1911, published by John Murray, £20
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2006.
How the Edwardians tried to stay cool
By Juliet Nicolson
(Filed: 20/07/2006)
The last time Britain lived through so much heat in July was in 1911, when 384 hours of sunshine were recorded in Eastbourne and Hastings.
Ninety-five years ago, dancing duchesses in the Savoy ballroom were cooled down by sprays of freezing ozone and the newly crowned Queen Mary found relief in the plentiful supplies of ice carried aboard the royal yacht.
Rupert Brooke took a break from writing his first book of poems that summer and swam naked in the river at Grantchester. The bathing machines that crowded Britain's beaches gave comforting shelter to those who feared public scrutiny as they clambered into their neck-to-shin swimming costumes (which weighed up to 20lb when wet).
But sunshine and warmth do not always bring happiness; excess heat has a way of stripping inhibitions and encouraging impulsive behaviour.
On July 17, 1911, a man walked six miles from his Essex village into the local town, stripping off his clothes and hurling them over the hedge as he went.
Finally, marching stark naked down Brentwood High Street, he was arrested and locked away in the local lunatic asylum. He had literally gone mad with the heat.
Newspapers began to run occasional columns that summer called Deaths from the Heat until they were discontinued as no longer newsworthy.
The dockers, exasperated by low pay and unemployment, went on strike that July, to be joined by the railwaymen, paralysing the transport system.
Winston Churchill, the 36-year-old home secretary, feared that as the food lay in the sun, untouched and rotting on the quays, there would be famine in the land.
Churchill also worried that the Kaiser's aggressive behaviour towards French-occupied North Africa might eventually lead to something truly dangerous. He discussed the situation in between swimming lengths of the new pool at the RAC Club in London's Piccadilly with his lodger, the foreign secretary, Edward Grey.
Even in the record-breaking heat of July 2006 it would be hard to imagine Margaret Beckett and John Reid so desperate for a swim that they would be caught mulling over departmental policy in the pool.
Juliet Nicolson is the author of The Perfect Summer: Dancing into Shadow in 1911, published by John Murray, £20
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2006.
