Regent's Park Catastrophe 1867, by Janie Hampton

When I was a small child my grandmother told me of a terrible event that she had witnessed. ‘My father took me to Regent’s Park,’ she told me. ‘We walked across the frozen lake. As we stepped off onto the bank, the whole lake tipped up, and all the people skating slipped into the water. Then the ice tilted back, with the people underneath. There was nothing anyone could do. Father and I were so lucky. We got off just in time.’ Her words stuck with me but it was another 50 years before I found an eye-witness account of this disaster which occurred 150 years ago next month. It was by Francis Henry Skrine, the 19 year old son of the Rev. Clarmont Skrine of Wimbledon, and went as follows:
‘Regent’s Park is, indeed, the chief glory of north-western London, and it owes much of its beauty to an artificial lake of vast extent, studded with islets, and the chosen home of a variety of wild fowl. On the 15th January 1867, the Regent’s Park water, as this lake is termed, presented an animated scene. Three days of sharp frost had covered its ample bosom with a sheet of ice, apparently firm enough to support the crowd of skaters and sliders with which it was thronged. The spectators on shore numbered thousands, and a roaring trade was being done by lenders of skates; and vendors of hot chestnuts, “brandy balls” and oranges. The great interest, however, centred round the “hockey on ice” – a game of which I was then an enthusiastic votary. It is played as hockey on dry land, with the exception that the rubber ball is replaced by a disc of cork: and when the pace is hard and the players numerous, it is a highly exhilarating if somewhat risky form of sport. So exciting was the game that I entirely failed to notice the dangerous condition of the ice, and the fact that it was gradually being deserted by all but the most adventurous skaters. 

'It was not till 1.30 p.m. that I paused for an instant to rest. I glanced round me, and saw at once that I was lost. I was exactly in the centre of the lake, 200 yards distant from the islets, or the shore; on a spot too, where I knew the water to be at least 12 feet in depth. The treacherous ice was everywhere a perfect maze of cracks, through which the water was oozing, as the surface bent and undulated under the skaters. I looked for a means of escape and saw close by an employee of the Royal Humane Society with cork life-belt and ladder, making his way gingerly towards the shore; but my entreaties to be allowed a share of his life-belt in case of a break-up, were answered by imprecation [cursing], and the remark that “he would have enough to do to save himself”. To strike out for safety would have endured instant immersion; I therefore lay down on the ice, and awaited the inevitable catastrophe. It was not long in coming. A party of 15 strong men were engaged, a few yards off, in a fierce struggle for the hockey ball. Their weight proved too much for the rotten ice, which gave way, engulphing the entire group. A wave swept over the surface of the lake from the scene of this catastrophe; the ice broke up in all directions and I found myself struggling in the water. I managed to grasp a floe about four feet in diameter, and, clinging desperately to it, shouted “help” with the full force of my lungs: but my despairing appeal was drowned by those of scores of other victims around me. My hands grew number from contact with the slippery ice, and I was burdened with my saturated overcoat, and dragged down by my heavy skates. I felt my grasp slowly relaxing, and knew that I must soon lose hold, slip between the miniature icebergs around me, and sink to rise no more.
‘At this critical moment, I observed, floating a few feet from me, the ladder of my friend the ice man, abandoned in his hasty retreat, and without hesitation, I left my floe, and struck out for the surer support. It was a terrible and almost hopeless effort. Twice I was engulphed amid the floating ice, and twice I emerged breathless from the dark water. But at length utterly exhausted, I reached the ladder, and clung to it with all the strength of despair. I was now in a position of comparative safety and able to glance at my surroundings. The entire surface of the lake was covered in human heads, their owners clinging desperately to ice-floes and rending the air with their entreaties for help. The shores were fringed by a yelling mob of spectators, intensely excited, but utterly unable to assist their perishing fellow-creatures close by. A stalwart fellow who had been one of the most eager and profane of our hockey-players, was praying fervently for mercy. Seeing my ladder, he implored me to push it within his reach, and after great exertion, I managed to do so. The groaning wretch abandoned his temporary support and clutched at my ladder; but the effort was beyond his powers. He went under, and the last I saw of him was two clenched fists slowly sinking between two adjacent floes.
‘A stout individual was lying at full length on an island of ice barely large enough to support his weight and shouting “A thousand pounds to the man who’ll get me out.” This appeal to their cupidity was too much for the “roughs” of whom the most ashore was largely composed. A chain was speedily found, and a score or two, hand in hand, darted into the icy water. After several fruitless efforts, the capitalist was rescued from his perilous position. (I afterwards learnt that he decided not to “execute”, and offered his salvors the paltry sum of £10; that they sued him for the entire amount but they lost, the judges holding the non-existence of a contract!)
‘One after another, the heads around me slowly disappeared, the shouts of the mob grew fainter, I felt a delicious dreaminess invading my sense, and sunk into a profound slumber, the result, doubtless, of the flow of blood from the head.
‘On awaking, I found myself in a comfortable bed, surrounded by kind and solicitous attendants. Collecting with a great effort my scattered senses, I ascertained that it was past 11 p.m. and that I was the guest of a resident in one of the splendid terraces overlooking the park. I learned that, after a prolonged delay, boats had been launched, and the survivors picked up and taken, for the most part, to the infirmary of the Marylebone workhouse. I had been actually the last to be rescued, after an immersion which had lasted towards of four hours, and had been conveyed to my kind hosts, at the suggestion of a friendly park-keeper. I had clutched the ladder to which I owed my life too firmly to allow of its being taken from me, and I was carried to my temporary quarters still holding it in my grasp.
'Medical men were in prompt attendance, and after unremitting exertion on their part for upwards of five hours, I was restored to consciousness. Beyond the loss of my finger-nails, I suffered no ill-effects from my terrible experiences and two days later was able to assist in the mournful task of dragging the lake for victims.
‘Forty-two bodies, mostly youths in the heyday of life, were recovered from the oozy depths, their hands full of weeds and mud grasped in their death agonies. The catastrophe was undoubtedly due to the incompetence of park officials and the police, who should have cleared the lake as soon as the dangerous condition of the ice became manifest. Its repetition has been rendered impossible by a reduction in the depth of the lake to a maximum of four feet. But the 15th January is still a sad anniversary in many an English home. F.H.S. Calcutta, December 1884.’

Maybe my granny saw this and believed it was her?

A year after this event, Francis Skrine joined the Bengal Civil Service and eventually rose to become British Commissioner of the Chittagong Division. The Regent’s Park catastrophe seems to have affected his entire outlook on life. During his 27 years in India, his colleagues were impressed by three water-related achievements: he designed a new system of embankments in the Nadiya District; excavated a great drainage canal at Rangpur; and constructed water-works at Arrah. He was noted for his efforts during three major famines and for his ‘energy and devoted efforts to save life during a very serious cholera epidemic’. Even though this was written 17 years after the catastrophe, the details were still vividly remembered. Maybe that is why my granny recalled being there – after reading this she was convinced she saw it all. I say this because, when I found Skrine’s account among her papers, I realized she was not born until 20 years after it had taken place. So much for oral history!

Leonard Mulley: a very civil hero, by Clare Mulley

Sorting through some family papers recently, my mother came across a handsome gentleman’s silver cigarette case. The initials ‘LM’, etched squarely onto the front, stand for Leonard Mulley. Len was my father’s favourite uncle, a working class lad brought up in a two-up, two-down cottage in east Finchley alongside his thirteen surviving brothers and sisters. Cheeky - in the way that only someone who knows they can get away with it - can be, he seems to have been forever putting frogs down his sister’s pinafores when they were young, and later coal dust in their powder compacts. Several of the brothers became local boxing champs, and nearly all were sailors with the Merchant Navy before and during the war. The presents they brought back included a macaw for their mother, who used to enjoy picking out her hairpins, and rope soaked in tobacco and molasses for their father to chew – apparently it smelt absolutely delicious. This elegant silver case is not the sort of object that I had imagined Len owning but it sits well in the hand, feels weighty, and would clearly have been pleasing to own. An inscription inside, dated November 1946, tells a rather lovely story…

The autumn of 1946 was pretty dismal in England. Eighteen months since the end of the war in Europe, the early mood of jubilation was long gone. The country was in recession, reconstruction had not yet started on any significant scale, demobbed former-servicemen were finding it hard to get work, and there was no prospect of the rationing for food and clothing ending anytime soon. Len had served in the navy during the war, delivering essential supplies to Russia on the arctic convoys, and tying up a substantial part of Germany’s Navy and Air Force. On one voyage to Murmansk, his convoy was waylaid by enemy aircraft and u-boats and several ships were sunk. Traumatised, Len was transferred to clearing up London bomb damage but found retrieving civilians' bodies so distressing that he rejoined the merchant marine.

Although he returned to civilian life with few formal qualifications after the war, Len’s strong work ethic and good manner with people secured him a job as a Steward at the rather theatrical Eyot House Club, which sits on its own island on the Thames at Weybridge, in Surrey.

Eyot House Hotel, circa 1955
Copyright The Francis Frith Collection - www.francisfrith.com

Eyot House had been built by D’Oyly Carte, the Victorian music impresario, theatrical producer and hotelier who had already built the Savoy theatre and hotel in the Strand, among many other famous venues. In its heyday the place would have been full of celebrity guests such as WS Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, and writers like JM Barrie, which might explain why D’Oyly Carte once reportedly kept a crocodile on the island. By 1946, when Len worked there, the club was reduced to trading on its former glory, but it still held a certain mystique. There was as yet no footbridge to the island, so guests arrived by boat, or had to pull themselves across on the chain ferry. Once installed however, the wrap-around, Colonial-style veranda provided a strong sense of occasion, along with commanding views down the river.

The sun had set just after four in the afternoon on 24^th November 1946. Although the weather had been unseasonably mild, there had been heavy rain for some days and most club members were inside, drinking tea or something stronger, and listening to the London Symphony Orchestra concert at the Royal Albert Hall being broadcast by the BBC Home Service. The setting could hardly have been more Agatha Christie, when suddenly shouts were heard coming from the river.

The Thames below the club house was at full tide and, further swollen by the recent heavy rains, the water was high and moving rapidly. Perhaps Len’s years in the navy meant the water held less fear for him. It is possible that he had helped saved others when his convoy had been torpedoed. However perhaps he had never had the chance, and the water held worse memories for him than for many. What we know for certain is that it would have taken great courage to plunge into the dark, fast-moving river that Sunday evening, but Len did not hesitate. Some time later he managed to swim to the bank, fighting hard to keep his head up, one arm clamped around a half-drowned woman. Who she was, and whether she was in the water through accident or intent, has been swept away by time and tide, but she survived that night because of Len.

The inscription inside Len's cigarette case

These dramatic events are recorded in three very brief accounts. A few lines were reported in the local paper that week. Shortly later Len was presented with his cigarette case by impressed members and staff of the Eyot Club House, ‘in recognition for his outstanding bravery in saving a life from drowning after dark, and with the river in full flood’. The following year the Royal Humane Society presented him with their ‘Honorary Testimonial on Vellum’, awarded when someone has risked their life to save another, and in this case specifically ‘for having gone to the rescue of a woman who was in imminent danger of drowning in the River Thames at Weybridge, and whose life he gallantly saved’.

Len's Royal Humane Society certificate

Sadly nothing more is known, except that the envelop enclosing the Royal Humane Society certificate was addressed to Len not at Weybridge, but at the Norfolk Hotel at Arundel in Sussex, where he was employed as Head Waiter, within a stone’s throw of the River Arun and not far from the coast. It seems that although changing jobs he wanted to stay close to the water. The Eyot House Club closed not long later, having been raided by police who stormed the island by boat late one Saturday night, and arrested a number of people for drinking after hours. 

Tragically, Len was later killed on his way to work when he was accidentally knocked off his bicycle by another vehicle. He may not have been highly decorated for his service during the war, no DSO or medals beyond those standard for active service, but Len's story reminds us that heroism is not confined to times of war. Len continued to live by the principles he had fought for during the war, risking his life for the security of others in the peace. He was a truly good man, and a hero.