Hooptedoodle #74 - La Duchesse Veuve Culdechat

This Christmas season at Chateau Foy we have been honoured, once again, by a visit from la Duchesse Veuve Culdechat, the cherished mother of my dear wife, the Contesse.

As ever, it has been a joy to have the company of the old lady and – as ever – it has been a welcome opportunity to receive some timely reminders of the areas in which our hospitality and the comfort of our humble abode fall short of what might be expected in more esteemed circles.

A bed-chamber in the Guest Wing at Chateau Foy - too chilly for comfort

La Veuve is very partial to unattainable levels of heat in the home, for example, and is deeply suspicious of any food which is unfamiliar, or which might possibly reflect some undesirably foreign influence. She has unusually extreme views on a wide range of topics, any of which she is prepared to share at any time, regardless of the context or occasion (somehow it is never too much trouble – a selfless habit acquired during a lifetime of endless giving and suffering in the interests of others, bless her). These views are remarkably uniform in being based mainly on articles in certain right-wing newspapers which she has failed to understand fully – possibly as a result of the time pressures inherent in caring for so many others, and also as a sad consequence of the short attention span with which Nature – sometimes so callous – has blighted her. In truth, one or two of these pearls may come from a friend of a woman she met at the bus stop, but we value them all.

This morning her carriage was summoned as early as possible, and she went on her regal way, with all our staff lined up in the drive and waving, dabbing their eyes. She left us sad that she could not have stayed longer, yet quietly grateful that we had her company for the limited time possible, and relieved that we got through the holiday period without inflicting serious injury upon her.

Once again we are left with the need to examine carefully our values and our priorities. We may be slow learners, but I believe we are now agreed that there is a need to distinguish between the seasonal traditions which might be appropriate to (for example) theoretical families in story books and those which are appropriate to us. Whilst I have to treasure these most recent, brief moments of insight and lofty disdain, I also have to accept that I am not worthy, and would prefer  not to repeat the experience very often.

Next year, I believe we may pack up our plate, our hampers and our bottles of cordial early, and travel with our household to spend the Festive Season in the mountains, or near the lakes, or anywhere, really – with no forwarding address.

Well said, young man

Christmas Prize Quiz – The Judgement

This is a day earlier than I meant to publish the results, but hits on the Quiz post have just about stopped now – I haven’t had any fresh entries for a while – and I won’t have any blogging time for a few days, since we have visitors staying over Christmas.

The Quiz...

Well now – interesting. Thanks very much to all who sent in an entry, and also to those who thought about it but didn’t send one.

I received a total of 18 submissions, of which 13 were correct. Google has to take a lot of the credit, naturally, but that is the way things work now, and some good thinking went into the searches. Very well done, everyone [thank you, Miss].

There is a faint clue in the fact that my Blogger profile lists Vacances de Monsieur Hulot first among my favourite films - I’ve always loved Tati’s earlier films.

The answers, then are:

(1) It’s a bronze statue of Jacques Tati, in character as the sacred Monsieur Hulot.

(2) It is on the beach at St-Marc-sur-Mer, near St Nazaire, in Brittany (France). St Marc is where most of the film was shot in 1951.

(3) With so many direct hits, the deciding section had to be the description of how you solved it, and some appropriate reaction. This was all very entertaining – thanks for entering into the spirit of my silly quiz. On first instinct I thought Gary should have got extra points for having actually been there, but on second thought that rather discriminated against non-Europeans. I awarded extra points to entrants who ventured some original observation over and above a cut-&-paste from Wikipedia. In the end it was a very close call, but overall I found Fabrizio’s story the most amusing, and he also had the good taste to send a link to a very fine picture of a statue of President Reagan, which had suffered a sad dommage at Newport Beach – this was one of the better finds on Google from “leaning statue beach”.

Result: Fabrizio wins by a very short head from Steve, Gary and Pjotr, but there were lots of great efforts. Thanks, again, very much. I’ll email Fabrizio to get his address so I can send the prize parcel. Pjotr, you get a special runner-up prize because it was so close and because yours was the only entry which included a complete untruth – I’ll be in touch.  

Here’s another couple of pictures I took on that same day in 2008 at St Marc, to give a context. I was surprised how many people found an answer on Google, but was also surprised that so few knew of Monsieur Hulot – I guess you are all too young!

The most intriguing wrong entry was from Hannibal(?), who was certain it was the promenade at Tenby (Wales), and thought the figure might be a mime artist. Well, he sort of was. To remind us (primarily myself) what this was all about, here’s a little clip from Vacances.

Which leaves me only to offer a Christmas wish to everyone. I re-read what I said last year, and I think it still sums up my sentiments on the subject, so the message is the same as before:

I wish everyone, whatever your religion or political standpoint, a peaceful and comforting Christmas, and - to anyone who reads this blog - all the very best to you and yours in the New Year, and thanks for your company.

Barba del Puerco - a Little More

Following yesterday's post about the skirmish at the bridge of Barba del Puerco, Gary very kindly sent me some photos he took when he visited the place a few years ago. Most illuminating - I took a view of the bridge from Google Earth, and I reproduce three of Gary's pictures here.

The French side would be on the upper right of the satellite view, and on the far side of the river in the photos. It is very obvious, and Gary confirms - having walked it! - that the valley side the French came up after crossing the Agueda is very steep and rocky indeed. They would not be coming up there with any kind of momentum.

Which leads me to wonder what on earth Ferey thought he was doing. If the objective was to grab the bridge and take the main advance guard by surprise up in the village overlooking the valley, then that might just have been successful, but it was not a position that could be held by anything apart from a herd of goats. If - as happened in the event - the Rifles turned out in time to catch the French on the hillside, it would not take much to roll them back down.

Barba del Puerco - March 1810

This follows on from my reference to General Ferey a week or two ago.

John C was kind enough to send me some pics and a map for the action at Barba del Puerco, which was mentioned in the excerpt from George Simmons' memoirs.

I had a look at Simmons' A British Rifle Man, and checked out Oman Vol.III for details. The difficult pass between San Felices and Barba del Puerco crossed a narrow bridge some 90 metres long, over the Agueda. The pickets of Craufurd's Light Division and the French VI Corps maintained an informal truce along the Agueda into March, 1810. The following passage is from Oman:

The first test of the efficiency of Craufurd's outpost system was made on the night of March 19-20, when Ferey, commanding the brigade of Loison's division which lay at San Felices, assembled his six voltigeur companies before dawn, and made a dash at the pass of Barba del Puerco. He had the good luck to bayonet the sentries at the bridge before they could fire, and was half way up the ascent from the bridge to the village [of Barba del Puerco], when Beckwith's detachment of the 95th Rifles, roused and armed in ten minutes, were upon him. They drove him down the defile, and chased him back across the river with the loss of two officers and forty-five men killed and wounded. Beckwith's riflemen lost one officer and three men killed, and ten men wounded in the three companies engaged.

Craufurd now expected a full attack, but nothing further developed.

The first picture, at the top of this post, is a painting entitled Winter Cheer, by Christina Hook, and it shows a couple of riflemen of the 95th and a trooper of the KGL Hussars fraternising with a cantiniere and a couple of French soldiers on the bridge during the early months of 1810. I'm sure the other pictures here are copyright as well, so my thanks and humble appreciation to whoever owns the copyright. The pictures suggest that Craufurd had troops other than the 95th involved.

For the trainspotters, Ferey commanded the 2nd brigade of Loison's Division of (Ney's) VI Corps at this time, and the battalions from which his voltigeurs were borrowed were one of the 32eme Leger, three of the 66eme Ligne and two of the 82eme Ligne.

From a completely personal point of view, I was delighted to renew my acquaintance with Major Simmons. Of all the diarists and memoir-compilers of the 95th (of which there are a bewildering number), I have found him to be the most engaging. Harris's book is a collection of regimental anecdotes polished over many years of retelling; Kincaid is admirably cynical, but  almost to the point of detachment; Surtees comes across as a snivelling, self-righteous prude, and so on. Good old George Simmons was always in the thick of things, was wounded or caught fever on a regular basis, and spent the rest of his time sending money home to pay for his brothers' education. I like him. He has a surfeit of neither imagination nor self-esteem - he just tells it like it was.

Fraternisation is interesting, too. Wellesley would hang anyone found dealing with the French, yet the practice was general and inevitable. Again, we gain insight into an age and a military system which relied on the fact that the soldiers of both sides were more frightened of their own officers than they were of the enemy.

Hooptedoodle #73 - Vintage Tommy Emmanuel

Something which cheered up my cold Winter morning. Here's an ancient clip of Tommy Emmanuel - entertainer, supreme musician and general hero. Tommy has been a marvellous ambassador for "proper" guitar playing and - I guess - for Australia over the years.

I'd forgotten about this track, but came across it again yesterday. His electric work is largely overlooked now - this is Who Dares Wins from 1991. If you can bring yourself to avoid being distracted by the red suit and the contemporary styling, this is still pretty damn good. Please enjoy a master at work.

Christmas Prize Quiz

While sorting out my bookshelves, I find that I have two good copies of HT Siborne's "Waterloo Letters", so I thought it would be amusing to offer one as a prize in an appropriately off-beat quiz, just for Christmas. Well - actually it's just to get rid of the extra copy, but it might still be amusing.

The book is a collection of 200 of the letters which were sent to William Siborne in the 1830s when he was gathering data to build his ill-fated model of the Battle of Waterloo. The collection was originally published by his son in 1891 - this is the 1993 edition published by Greenhill books. It is in nice, clean condition. The dustjacket is a bit faded, and is what one of my sons used to term "scrunkled" slightly at the ends of the spine, and there is a little general shelf-wear, but the book is tight and firm and doesn't smell.

If you fancy it, all you have to do is have a look at the photo below and answer some questions. If you don't know the answers, have a guess.

(1) What is this? (up to 5 points available for this)

(2) Where is it, exactly? (give an actual location - up to 10 points available, depending how far your answer is in a straight line from the real place)

(3) How do you know, or how did you work it out? Also, do you have any thoughts about this? (up to 10 points for this section, with originality, ingenuity and humour scoring high)

You can comment here (tell me if you don't want it published!) or (probably better) email me through my Blogger profile. I'll keep this open until Christmas Eve (24th December), and publish the exciting results shortly afterwards. When I have a winner, I'll arrange to get a postal address to send the prize.

All you detectives will want to know that I took the photo at around 11 in the morning, on 21st July 2008, in the northern hemisphere.

My Bluff Is Called? – Feasibility Study

Monument at Eggmuhl

I believe I’ve mentioned here before that I have long nurtured a fantasy that one day I might take a little time to make a tour of Napoleon’s 1809 adventures along the Danube. Like all unlikely dreams, it has a built-in safety factor in that if I never get to do it, I’ll never find out that it was a really stupid idea.

The whole point of a trip like this (in theory) is that you do a lot of enjoyable reading, plan it all out and then spend fulfilling days in the sunshine, walking around clearly-signposted, well maintained battlefields, looking forward to the next bottle of halbtrocken and the odd hot chocolate. Oh – and cakes. Lots of cakes. The campaign is very compact – the early stages involved actions just about on consecutive days, so the distances to be covered are relatively small, and – exactly because it was such a fertile area – Napoleon had his army march right along the tourist magnet of the Danube itself. They would have had cakes every day, you bet.

Stadtplatz, Abensberg

When I mentioned it in the blog before, I got a very gratifying degree of supportive jostling – hey! just do it – all that. Excellent. This is what you need to keep your fantasies tickly and fresh. I can’t even claim to get any opposition at home – Mme La Comtesse thinks it’s a really good idea. Now that I have the time, and provided I don’t have to cash in the kids’ future to finance the deal, there’s no reason why not.

Well....

Landburg Trausnitz, Landshut

Well, that’s true. The only argument against getting on with it is that I would then have to organise it and make a job of it. I might mess it up. It might be, as discussed, a stupid idea. There is a risk that my lovely fantasy might turn into a boring mud bath (like some parts of my recent Hadrian’s Wall pilgrimage), or that the battlefields are now underneath local authority housing estates, or a sewage works. I don’t know the area – the Tyrol and Rothenburg ob der Tauber are as near as I have been. Würzburg, maybe.

Next tightening of the screw is that a friend has expressed great enthusiasm for the project, and reckons we should go next September. Should we do Vienna as well? – maybe that would require a second week? – hmmm. At this point, the kids’ future is looking a bit more shaky.

So I promised I would have a look to see what would be involved, and how it would be, and what the costs might look like, and I would get back to him. I dug out Loraine Petre and the John Gill trilogy, and the trusty Elting & Esposito atlas – now you’re talking – and the AvD road maps, and I started taking serious notes. A return flight to Vienna from Edinburgh is a bit over £200 if you book it far enough ahead. Hire a car at the far end, and from Vienna it is around 250 miles to Abensberg, then short hops back towards Vienna will get you to Landshut, Eckmühl, Ratisbon (that’s Regensburg to you and me and the road signs), then a bit further to Aspern-Essling and Wagram. Small, family-run hotels – possibly a couple of centres would cover the whole area. Or maybe that’s too much for a week. The more I got into this, the more it seemed like an actual military campaign. Needs a lot more work. Where the blazes is Berthier when you need him?

I had a root around on the internet to see if anyone publishes battlefield guides for this campaign, or this area. So far I came up with very little. Maybe the local tourist organisations can provide more information. Now I come to think about it, I don’t even know how many of the battlefields would make a worthwhile visit. I’m quite happy to work away on this – my only misgiving is that at the moment it looks as though it might be a fair amount of work just to decide if it’s at all feasible.

Oh well, all right then

I could, of course, look for a commercially available organised tour – if there is one – these things tend to cluster around bicentenaries these days. The really big downside of such a tour (apart from the cost – I’m sure these are excellently done, but they are not cheap) is that I do not relish spending much time on a bus with a bunch of people who are like me. No, thank you. Also, I was once told a scary story about a trip someone did to the WW1 battlefields of Northern France, which was spoiled only by the fact that the organiser/owner/guide was a total pain in the neck, which caused problems after 5 days of continuous, unrelenting monologue. High risk, I think.

So I would definitely prefer the do-it-yourself approach, if I only had a few more clues to get me started. Please – anyone done this, been to this area, know of any books or sources, have any tips on how to go about it? Even insider info about the best cakes in town would be most welcome.