June 4th, 2013 was the day chosen to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation on June 2, 1953. It was exciting to be just across the river from the events! After breakfast we went back to our room, with the Order of Service from The Times in hand, to watch the events on the telly.
How it exciting it was for the kids and The Sister to see the very crown, scepter and consecrating oil vessel that they had just seen days before! How exciting to see the clips of the original coronation -- the Queen such a pretty young mother. An gentleman spoke of his experience 60 years ago as a dashing young footmen who had to powder his hair by applying a thick soap and then dusting it to make it white. A lady spoke of being one of the maids of honor, holding on to the silk handles underneath the Queen's train. And then they showed footage of that young queen being trailed by beautiful young women in dresses to die for. Three men sat and joked about their experience as choir boys during the coronation -- they said that they were given a sandwich, an apple, and some sweets to hide in their robes to keep them through the many hours.
We had considered going down to Westminster to throw ourselves into the throng, but the decision to watch it all on the telly was brilliant, as that action, too -- while not as glamorous as the crown being returned to the Abbey -- was an integral part of the original coronation. The decision was made in 1953 to televise the coronation -- and apparently this was an enormous decision. It proved to be a bonding experience for the country even though it was pointed out that many watching probably didn't realize how much of the pageantry and traditions were established centuries ago. In fact, Westminster Abbey has been the place of coronations since William the Conqueror's coronation in 1066. Plus, had we not been watching on television, I wouldn't have been able to see how the ever-elegant Kate was handling pregnancy. She looked lovely as always -- I want her legs.
It was kind of funny to be seeing the footage of the pageantry, and all the opulent fashion steeped in tradition, and then fast forward sixty years to when the queen arrived in "regular" clothes with her trusty handbag. I don't begrudge her not wearing the ermine-lined cloak, or wanting to keep track of her handbag... I'm just saying it was funny.
When an external shot panned the outside of the Abbey we exclaimed: "We're sitting in a room right there watching us sitting in a room right there..." I took a picture of the screen to remind us.
As they were loading back into their cars it was time for us to vacate the room. But we knew that we wanted to stay in the neighborhood because at 2:30 the Westminster Abbey Company of Ringers was to ring a Coronation 60th Anniversary "celebratory peal of London Surprise Royal, made up of 5,060 changes."
Fortunately, there were some awesome things to do in the neighborhood.
When we stepped out we noticed the flag on top of the Abbey:
And we crossed the street to St. Thomas's hospital where Florence Nightingale set up her nursing school. Here's the old wing:
In a strange location in the newer, much uglier portion of the hospital is where the Florence Nightingale Museum is located. It is really well done, and considering that it's not large, it's impressive how much information is conveyed. Considering how much information is available, I love how they break it up by creating this "peeping into the hedge" display.
Yep. By peeping through the bushes you learn things not only about Ms. Nightingale, but also about the time period in which she lived. Context is so vital to really learning. She lived during the Victorian age, in fact, she was born the year after Queen Victoria was born. Considering all the propriety the Victorian age is known for, I rather like to consider that all this hedge-peeping was because many of the topics covered were things that would not have been fit for public discussion at the time.
Here's a quote from the museum: "She led the nurses caring for thousands of soldiers during the Crimean War and helped save the British army from medical disaster. This was just one of Florence's many achievements. She was also a visionary health reformer, a brilliant campaigner, the most influential woman in Victorian Britain and its Empire, second only to Queen Victoria herself." Considering that at the time the British Empire covered one-fourth of the entire world population, that is indeed impressive.
She and her sister were homeschooled. Just thought I should include that. Her father taught her math, something somewhat unusual for the time, and she attributed this part of her education for her appreciation of statistics (something that became a huge part of her political campaigning in later years). From the museum: "The Nightingales were well-off, well-connected and from the upper-middle class. Their money originally came from lead mining. They were interested in the arts and the sciences, and believed in religious toleration and helping the poor. There was also a family tradition of supporting political reform. Florence's maternal grandfather William Smith, had been a Member of Parliament for many years and campaigned to end the slave trade." I appreciated that she was from a comfortable life, as it stands as an example that anybody who has insight, compassion, and intelligence can help tackle a social problem. It's not just the kid who grew up on the streets who can "understand" and make a difference in an authentic way.
Florence never married. At least twice she was tempted and had long almost-kind-of engagements. In one case, after seven years of thinking about it, she finally turned down what would have been a very good match -- causing her mother to pop her wig. History proved that perhaps Florence made the right call though, as by not being the wife of poet/politician Richard Monckton Milnes she wasn't impacted by his interest in erotica, pornography, and the Marquis de Sade. As it was, they remained friends, and as a politician he was able to champion her causes. She often said that she was choosing to remain single, as she felt that she had received a specific calling from God. This did not please her parents, though they did continue to financially support her for as long as it was needed.
So Florence follows her calling. During the day she acted the part of the high society, proper daughter. During the night she secretly studied her guts out and learned all that she could in the medical sphere. Eventually, she is allowed to pursue nursing. And then came the Crimean War (the Turkish government refused Russia's "demand to protect Orthodox Christians within it's declining Ottoman Empire... But there was a broader reason for the war. The British and the French were anxious that Russia.. not expand its empire, as this was a potential threat to their trade routes and territories."). Less than a year into the war the British soldiers, fighting with French and Ottoman Turks, were not just dying by Russian ammunition, but three to four times as many were dying because of rampant disease. The secretary of the state at war wrote to Florence and asked her to organize a group of nurses. She was incredibly selective, and in the end it was with 38 courageous women that she set sail for what is now Istanbul.
One of the women not selected to be among Florence's group was Mary Seacole. Like her African-Carribean mother, she was an "herbalist" and a hotel keeper. Further, her father was a Scottish solider. With that background, and a strong desire to help, she sailed towards the Crimean War on her own. She set up a general store and unofficial surgery. Many soldiers were very loyal to her, and referred to her as Mother Seacole. The end of the war found her bankrupt, but many soldiers rallied and organized benefit concerts and helped her publicize her memoirs.
While Florence was making her way to Turkey her pet owl, Athena, died. When she learned of it she was very upset and wrote, "Poor little beastie, it was odd how much I loved you."
The Crimean War. Well, it was a disaster. The hospital where Florence and her nurses were was built over a cesspool. Regardless of the insightful practices and crazy hard work, the death rate would not drop. Finally, an engineer came and cleaned up the muck from below, and only then did they see an improvement. Florence was loved by the soldiers, as she would indeed make continuous rounds -- impervious to her fatigue -- with a lamp at all hours of the night.
When she got home she wanted to fully understand exactly what went wrong in the military hospitals, and she used the knowledge that she gained to fight for health care reform. She was ill. Several times it was assumed that she would die, but from her bed she wrote gazillions of letters and constantly researched. There was some desire to "whitewash" or cover up the fact that the British hospitals were so jacked up, but even though the very hospital that she was at was the worst, she refused to have anything covered up, as she felt that it would hinder progress. The woman was awesome. She was known to say, "I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took an excuse." Prince Albert designed and Queen Victoria awarded her a medal of honor for her work, and while "she was honored, she felt that Prince Albert believed too much in the power in medals to bring about reform." The woman was awesome. And though most of her middle-aged life was spent in bed, she did end up living to be 90.
The museum was quite interactive, for example, there were spices that Mary Seacole would have used to be touched and smelled, and there were sheets of paper (and a postbox) for people to write down what reform they think is currently necessary/what causes they would campaign for.
Also in the area is the Garden Museum. A sweet little spot that made me happy to support. From the museum's materials: "The Garden Museum was founded in 1977 in order to preserve the church in which John Tradescant, 'the Shakespeare of gardening' was buried in 1638. The first church built on this site was built before the Norman Conquest, by Goda, sister of King Edward the Confessor, in 1062... In 1972 the church was deconsecrated, the structure was crumbling, and the congregation found a new home. Four years later our founder, Rosemary Nicholson, read a biography of Tradescant and made a pilgrimage to his tomb. She was shocked to discover the church derelict. She was determined to save the building from demolition and raised the funds to repair the structure, and to set up the world's first museum of garden history. John Tradescant (c.1570-1638) was the first celebrated gardener in British history, he was gardener to King James I and Charles I..." A woman reads the biography of a gardener who lived 300 years before and decided to find his tomb. Finds a mess of a church and decides to raise the funds to save it. Opens the first museum dedicated to gardening. Like Ms. Nightingale, she sounds like somebody that I would have liked to know... to have as an aunt or something. The structure is fascinating -- an aged church sheltering modern stairs and shelves and a cafe...
The gift shop had "seed boms." The Girl thought that they sounded fun; The Boy thought that they sounded like the best solution to war -- just chuck a seed bom at the enemy and scream: "The flowers will be coming up soon."
We learned that garden gnomes originated in 19th century Germany, and came to England in 1847. They are banned from the posh Chelsea Flower Show. Oh. British snobbery.
The thumb-pot is absolutely brilliant. It has holes in the bottom, and after submerging the entire pot, and letting it fill, you put your thumb over the top hole to create suction. Then, as you go through the garden and want to just sprinkle water, you release your thumb and water can come from the holes on the bottom...
First lawn mower was invented in 1885 by a gardener. Back then, if you were a gardener working for somebody else, you were in charge of all your own tools. Necessity is the mother of invention.
The seed displays were so aesthetically pleasing. Because we learned at the Beatrix Potter experience that some vegetables have gone in and out of favor in seed catalogues, we thought to check to see if there were any varieties that were no longer popular. We are curious as to what "Breakfast Radishes" are?
Aside from the seed packets, there were other examples of how design was/is a part of the gardening world. Here was a pamphlet put out during the war (1944):
"Many people are anxiously looking forward to the day when their leisure hours can be devoted to growing flowers again. But the needs of the nation come first and the production of food must be given pride of place for at least another year." Not to minimize the duration of a full decade, but it is interesting to consider whether or not it would have seemed incredulous to some if they had been told that in ten years, this would be the gardening publication:
An It's a Small World motif with the words: "Be a happy, carefree gardener" scrawled across the bottom. Carefree just seems a world away from growing necessary vegetables during wartime. Sometimes a decade is a world away. I've certainly learned during our scheme that just one short year can completely change perceptions, relationships, future trajectories...
We finished up, and after strolling through the little garden out back, began our preparations for the 2:30 bell ringing. Namely, getting sandwiches and positioning ourselves on a bench by parliament. According to the clock on Big Ben's tower 2:30 came and went. We began to worry that perhaps the bell ringing was something happening inside the Abbey? Were we perhaps too far away to hear them over the clamor of busy London? At one point I said that I "was crushed, but recovering..." The Sister agreed... The Girl said that she wasn't crushed, so there wasn't a need to recover... BUT, then... peals and notes and notes and peals came tumbling out, rolling over each other and filling the air with sound bubbles floating around us, bobbing and then eventually popping out of existence as new bubbles came into existence. It was awesome.
This is where we were and what we were looking at when the bells went off:
We happily munched our sandwiches, and then with the bells STILL going we walked towards their source. The camera crews were still camped everywhere, and the crowds were still being kept away from entering the Abbey.
Our main objective for the day -- hearing the bells -- reached, it was time to start heading toward the train station. The plan was for The Dad to head back to collect our laundry, stuff it into our bags waiting in the waiting closet at the hotel, and then load our two million bags into a taxi and meet us at St. Pancras.
The kids and I still had a couple of things to do before leaving London.
1. Ride at the top of a double-decker bus. Even though it was a completely inefficient way to get to St. Pancras, we obtained the necessary information and then waited for our first bus to come, to take us to the point of transfer where we then took a second bus on to the station. We were lucky-lucky. Both times we were able to get the very front seats at the top. Totally fun. Even though it smelled of urine in the corner when I bent down to retrieve my dropped Oyster card.
The busing took so long, that we became cramped for time. Nonetheless, we popped off at the British Library, as The Boy desperately wanted to see Robert Falcon Scott's journals, and made a desperate dash for it. Unfortunately, when we gained the information counter, panting, we were told by the most long-winded bloke that he thought the journals were out on loan, but he wasn't sure... So we ran up the steps and checked every case in the gallery. There was a lot of great stuff that deserved our attention (i.e. the Magna Charta -- which I'm ashamed to say I had to look up to be reminded what it was: done in 1215, it was the first document forced on a monarch by a group of subjects... it began the very long process toward constitutional law in the English-speaking world... eventually everything in it had been repealed, but during the English civil war it became a motivating symbol... and was actually a reference point for early settlers in American... and eventually the United States Constitution). Unfortunately, it was true that the journals were loaned out. The Boy was disappointed, but handled it well.
From there we dashed past St. Pancras and over to King's Cross... to check out platform 9 3/4. We had heard that a sign had been put up... and it has, but true to capitalistic nature, in front of the sign (and cart, complete with trunk and bird cage sticking half out of the wall) was a queue of people waiting to pay to have their picture taken. Now, if the picture set-up was of you holding on the cart it might have been cool, but it was with Gryffindor scarves and wands -- more like a dual happening... outside in the snow. Now come on. Anyway, we scoffed at the situation and waiting between groups to just take a snap of the sign, sans dorky tourists. (That should read dorkier tourists).
We met The Dad back at St. Pancras, got through security and the passport line, hunted/gathered some sandwiches, and waited for our train. As it turned out, our car was the furthest away from entry onto the platform. When I asked an employee she laughed and said, "Unfortunately, it's the very last one. Fortunately, you will be the first to enter Paris." I thought that was a fabulous response.
The train ride went quickly: what with the kids trying to catch up on their journals, and our UK candy bar taste-testing. The Girl's mouse (that she bought at the FN museum to try to scare me) traveled in style:
We are in Paris, planted for the next five days down the street (one of them) from the Arc de Triomphe. At night we can see the sparkle-show on the Eiffel Tower from our window.
