General

 

The St. Paul/Butler collection is one that tells a story of European politics, British aristocracy and human behaviour.  Neither families originated in Northumberland, yet both had an impact on its history.  The first member of the St. Paul family that is noted amongst the collection – held by Northumberland Archives – is Thomas Paul of Coventry, but more is known about the family starting with Thomas’ great grandson, Robert Paul.

Robert Paul, born c.1697, was married to Judith Collins.  Robert purchased Yeavering and Coupland estates in Northumberland from Henry Grey of Howick, and Judith’s brother, John Collins, bought Ewart Park estate, which passed to Robert on the event of John’s death.  Judith and Robert had eight children.  When Robert died in 1762, Judith had the Paul name canonised by an Act of Parliament (1768), ensuring future generations of the family were known as St. Paul.

The eldest son, Horace St. Paul, was born in 1729.  He entered Gray’s Inn in 1749, but his career in law was ruined in 1751.  Horace quarrelled with a Mr. Dalton, and a duel was fought between the two men in Dalton’s home.  A servant heard the sounds of fencing and upon entering the Parlour, he found his master dead. The coroner came to the verdict of wilful murder and Horace fled the country and was outlawed.  He lived for a time in France before moving to Brussels.  Here, Horace found himself in the company of the Archduke Prince Charles of Lorraine, Governor of the Austrian Netherlands, who, on outbreak of the Seven Years War, returned to the Austrian Empire, with Horace as his Aide-de-camp.  On 20 July 1759, Horace was created a Count of the Holy Roman Empire for “having devoted himself to arms, and having followed the Royal-Imperial Standards in the last two Campaigns at his own expense, and having therein displayed pre-eminent fortitude and proved beyond doubt his soldierly valour and his exalted zeal in the arts if war…”

After making the acquaintance of Lord Stormont in Vienna after the end of the war, the wheels were put in motion for Horace to receive a Royal Pardon, which occurred in July 1765.  Around 1770, Horace petitioned to retire from Austrian military service, and in 1772, he was appointed Secretary of Embassy to the Court of France.  He stayed in this position until 1776. Although he was appointed Envoy to Sweden in October 1776, he subsequently declined the post in 1777, and retired from diplomatic life, moving to Chertsey in Surrey.

 

 

By this time, Horace had married and started a family.  In 1774 his marriage to Miss Anne Weston took place in the Embassy Chapel, Paris, and their first child, Horace David Cholwell St. Paul, was born in Paris in 1775.  Horace purchased Ewart from his brother Robert in 1775 and completely redeveloped the Estate, also redesigning the house that stood on the site.  Horace found inspiration for this from many sources, including Twizell Castle, the project of his close friend Sir Francis Blake.  The Estate must finally have been fit to inhabit in 1787, when the family made Ewart Park their main abode.

Whilst at Ewart, Horace raised the Cheviot Legion in 1798, from volunteers in the neighbourhood of Wooler, as a home defence force to combat the threat of a French invasion due to the Napoleonic Wars.  He was its first commandant, becoming Lieutenant Colonel in 1799, whilst one of his sons, Henry Heneage, was appointed Major.  It was disbanded in 1808, and the men transferred to the Northern Regiment of the Northumberland Local Militia, which included recruits from the disbanded Berwick Volunteers.  Henry Heneage continued his involvement, acting as Lieutenant Colonel of the Northern Regiment until 1816.

Henry Heneage St. Paul, was born in London in 1777.  He joined the 60th Foot, rising to the rank of Captain.  His career, as the Private Secretary to Sylvester Douglas, Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, led to his involvement in local politics, and he was MP for Berwick-upon-Tweed from 1812-1820, and served as Deputy Lieutenant of Northumberland in 1817.  Although Henry was not married, documents within the collection suggest he had an illegitimate son, Henry Morris, born in 1813 in Edinburgh.  In 1820, Henry fell ill, died, and was buried in Doddington Churchyard.

Count Horace’s daughter, Anna Maria, was born in 1782 in Chertsey, but lived most of her life on the Ewart estate, with her bachelor brother, Charles Maximilian.  Although he never married, Charles was another St. Paul who had an illegitimate child.  He had an affair with a Mrs Martha Elizabeth Edington, who gave birth to twins at the beginning of 1825, but the children only lived for three weeks.  On 17 September 1829, Martha gave birth to Elizabeth (Bessy) Charlotte Moore.  Martha moved to Jedburgh with Elizabeth (known to her family as Charlotte), where she died in 1835.  A letter within the collection, addressed to Charles Maximilian from an Andrew Spiers, informs him of the death of his lover after her clothes caught fire in the east apartment of the flat she lived in.  Charlotte was not in the flat at the time, and she was eventually placed under the guardianship of her grandmother, Mrs Anne St. Paul, who sent her to boarding school.  She stayed in touch with her father and aunt, writing to them often from her place of work at Marshall Meadows, Berwick-upon-Tweed, where she cared for the children of a Mrs Swanston.

 

 

Horace David Cholwell St. Paul, Count Horace’s heir, married Anna Maria Ward, daughter of John Ward, 2nd Viscount Dudley and Ward, in 1803 at Doddington; it was through this marriage that the Staffordshire estates (including coal mines and farming land) came into the possession of the family.[1][10]  The couple had six children together, but Horace also had illegitimate children with his two mistresses, Ann Isaacson (alias Ann Jones) and Henrietta Campbell Cupples (alias Harriet Cooper).  In 1812, he was created a baronet, and obtained royal licence to accept and use the honour of Count of the Holy Roman Empire within England, and for it also to pass on to his descendants.

 

A few years ago I had to pick up a colleague up in North Broomhill, on our way to a Family History Fair in Berwick. It was on the way towards the A1 that we passed a memorial. Its importance was not known to me at the time. So, on our return journey I had to stop to see what it was about. This story is probably one which is not widely known, except to the locals who visit such a tranquil spot for a walk.

Who would have thought that when they left their billets on 17 January 1945 that 10 of them would not return from a training exercise that day. It had been raining heavily and the river at Guyzance was in flood. Orders were given as they began their river crossing, only for the strong current and fast flowing river to pull their boat across the weir and with their heavy equipment weighing them down ten soldiers all under the age of 19 were drowned.

Those lost were:-

+ L/Cpl. Mark Frederick Fredlieb of Sheffield

Pte. N. Ashton of Castleford

+ Pte. Percy Gibson Clements of West Hartlepool

Pte. E King of Todmorden

+ Pte. Kenneth Lee of Bradford

+ Pte. Alexander Leighton of Annfield Plain  

Pte M M Peddelty of Evenwood

+Pte John W. Wilson of Newcastle

+ Pte Ronald Herbert B. Winteringham of York

Pte. A Yates of Ferryhill

+ indicates that the body was found at the time of the inquest.

 

At the inquest which was held some weeks after the accident some of the bodies still had not been recovered. The inquiry was not to attach blame or bring criminal proceedings against anyone, but to try and make training exercises safer in the future.

Second Lieutenant George Leslie Renills, told the coroner that the exercise was to teach the men on how to handle the boat and not how to cross the river in a tactical manner, they were all inexperienced men in this respect. The boats they were using were made of canvas and wood with a flat wooden floor and considered safe for this type of exercise.

From 0930 to 1000 the men were given instructions in how to handle the boats, then six men and a Non-Commissioned Officer were loaded into the first boat and began crossing the swollen River Coquet.  Whilst Renills was inspecting one of the boats, he realised the first boat was drifting as the men were not paddling correctly! He went to the vicinity and told them how to paddle and climbed into the boat to help them. The river was fast, but had a very smooth surface and he had crossed much worse. When he reached the other side he noticed the second boat was going down stream. He shouted to them to get across and they seemed to be paddling correctly, but drifted sideways and got back to the original side. They drifted towards an over-hanging tree. Two of the men in the rear grabbed some of the overhanging branches. Renills shouted a warning to them about the weir. The branches some of the men were holding onto gave way and the boat began drifting towards the weir. They were all paddling, but not correctly and I shouted at them to jump. One of the soldiers began to take off his equipment. The boat then went over the weir nose first with all of the men out of the boat. I saw five of the men come to the surface and try to swim, but seemed to be pressed down by the force of the water and disappeared. Renills went downstream looking for them.

Sergeant Instructor Leslie Murray, told the Coroner Mr Hugh Percy, that he saw one of the bodies caught in the midstream and being a good swimmer dived in, but was nearly knocked out due to the force of the current. The Coroner returned a verdict – That the men were downed whilst carrying out a military exercise owning to the boat carrying them accidently going over the weir. The jury also added a rider that some lifeguard such as a safety line should be in operation for training purposes.

The MP for the area wrote an article which was published in the Morpeth Herald 18 May 1945, about the tragedy “Eighteen young men who had been in the Army just a month or two, began practicing crossing a river in a wooden structure covered with canvas and very light – and needing very special skill even under more or less normal conditions. But on the day this happened there was one of the biggest floods that there has been for many years. A short distance away from where the accident happened there was a weir. There is a bend in the river and the river in flood takes the weight of the water to the side. Underneath the weir there is an 11ft/12ft drop where there is a pool from which stones were quarried when building it. The weir is about 70 yards long and the pool 30ft to 40ft deep by 30/40ft wide and these lads having been instructed how to paddle over lost control and went over the weir and were drowned.

“There is as, I say no criminal charge and I am not asking for one. But to take young men and give them instructions on how to cross there without placing any qualified person in the boat with them to ensure that they would cross shows there has been a great dereliction of duty.”

A letter was also received from the Secretary of State for War – It is clear that the Officer responsible was guilty of an error of judgement in that he failed to appreciate what risk which was being taken in practising assault boating, with untrained men at this place with the river in flood, but it was held that neither he nor anyone else was guilty of negligence. In training an inexperienced crew it is inevitable that some risks must be taken before they can become proficient, but this risk would certainly have been lessened, as you suggested by stretching a rope across the river above the weir. This has now been done. The letter continues……

 

 

I hope that this article may encourage some more people to visit the site and enjoy its setting, but also to remember those young men.

LEST WE FORGET.

 

 

Andrew Buglass arrived at the Royal Naval Barracks, Portsmouth, in mid-February 1916.  From his first letter home, we learn that Andrew hates the Navy and wishes to return home and from there, join the army – as his brother George had done.  The weather does not help his mood.  Neither does the inconsiderate treatment he says he receives from his superiors and the doctor.  On Monday 7th February Andrew writes,

‘I was seeing the doctor this morning & had a lot of lip, said there was nothing the matter with me when I told him my state of mind, and said I was starting badly & said I had better look out or there would be trouble which made me worse than ever, but he gave me some more medicine for my stomach.’

Andrew wrote two letters on 15th February; one to his father and one to his mother.  The letter to his mother is cheerful, stating he is in the Soldiers and Sailors Rest drinking the cocoa which she had sent him.  The letter to his father is much darker, and continues the tone from his previous letters.  He states that ‘…today has been the worst day I have spent yet’, and that he is even thinking of deserting.  By the 17th February 1916, Andrew is in the Sick Bay.  He seems to be increasingly unwell, thinking he may have influenza.  The letter also illustrates Andrew’s fragile mental state.  He writes,

‘…I dread the coming of the night with its sweats and hideous dreams.  I sometimes wish I was dead anything is better than this…’

Ordinary Seaman Andrew Buglass died of pneumonia on 28th February 1916, little more than a month into his training.  He was 22 years old.  He was buried in Cambo Holy Trinity churchyard and is also commemorated on the Rutherford College War Memorial tablet, along with 151 men who were his Masters and fellow pupils.

 

Lance Corporal George Anderson Buglass enlisted on 16th October 1915 at Newcastle upon Tyne, and joined the Kings Royal Rifle Corps, 21st Battalion, designated the ‘Yeoman Rifles’.  This battalion was formed from farming communities in Yorkshire, Durham and Northumberland (hence Yeoman).

 

 

 

Training and equipping began after arrival at Aldershot in September 1915.  On 26th April 1916 the Division was inspected by H.M. The King, who was accompanied by Field Marshall Lord French and General Sir A. Hunter.  Entrainment began on May Day 1916 and by 8th May, the Division had completed its concentration between Hazebrouck and Bailleul, France.  Within the collection we have some of the letters George wrote home from the trenches to members of his family.  In one letter, written to his mother, Lizzie, he talks about watching gunfire over the trenches.

‘We sometimes see the flash of the guns after dark and last night at dusk we saw them bombarding an aeroplane but it must have been a long way off as we could only see the flashes but could not hear the sound of the explosion.’

In one of his final letters before going over the top, dated 13th September 1916, and addressed to his father, George makes quite a prophetic statement,

‘…We are going up to the trenches soon and as it is a rather hot corner some of us will be getting “blighties”.’

George and his comrades in the 21st Battalion were involved in the front line, in a support role, at Delville Wood in July 1916.  Their first involvement as an attack formation was in that part of the Somme battle known as the Battle of Flers-Coucelette, 15th-22nd September, which saw the very first use of tanks in battle.  George would have been one of the first to view these tanks, as the first one to advance started from the north end of Delville Wood, close to his position. At Zero Hour, George and his friends left Edge Trench and advanced across No Man’s Land, towards their first objective, which was secured by 07:00 hours.  The advance continued to the second objective, the western end of Flers Trench, immediately south of the village of Flers.  There was further fighting here, but the allotted section of trench was taken by the 21st Division after 30 minutes or so.  There was a delay which caused the advance to the third objective not to take place until mid-afternoon.  After this, there were no more advances this day.  As the troops were consolidating their gains, the German counter-barrage began.  In the evening, there were German attacks which were repulsed, but the shellfire continued. George would have been under machine gun fire as well as German counter attacks.

It seems likely that George was wounded sometime on the 15th, corresponding with his service records, which list that George was wounded, probably by shrapnel, in his neck, right arm, and buttock.  The wet, muddy conditions would have made his, and many others’, recovery very difficult.  George would probably have been taken first to the Regimental Aid Post which would be in, or very close to, the front line.  From there he would have gone to a Main Dressing Station.  He was taken to a Casualty Clearing Station on 16th September, and then on to No. 3 Stationary Hospital at Rouen on the 18th.  On the 19th September he arrived at Richmond Military Hospital, London.

George’s health seemed to improve whilst at Richmond, and he received some visitors, including his father.  George wrote some letters home whilst in hospital and the childish handwriting is evidence of the wounds he received in his right arm.  Yet, on 6th October, he died, somewhat unexpectedly.  His service records list that he died of ‘haemoptysis’ – the coughing up of blood/blood-stained sputum from the lungs, which is a sign of tuberculosis, respiratory infections, and pneumonia.