Originally posted on NOTHE FORT AND BEYOND…:
Throughout its history, Weymouth’s Red Barracks and Nothe Fort have seen various troops come and go. Some good, some bad, some just plain bored and a few high spirited. Their boots marched through the town on parades, they wooed and (sometimes) wed the local girls, or maybe snatched a sneaky bit…
Category: Military
What Were Your Weymouth Ancestors Up To December of 1888?
Christmas is nearly upon us, its that time of year when we think about absent family and friends and especially those no longer here to celebrate with us. Our long departed ancestors knew how to celebrate Christmas too, albeit sometimes in a very different way, though their life often mirrored ours of today, with the same…
Victorian Castletown, Portland…Matelots, Mariners and Mishaps.
Now, I’ll be the first to admit, as much as I love the Isle of Portland, in all honesty I don’t know a great deal about it’s history, for that I defer to local historian and accomplished author, Stuart Morris. (image © West Dorset District Council Channel Coast Observatory) What I do enjoy is reading…
Executions of Crabchurch Conspirators Upon The Nothe Headland.
Follow this link to Mark Vine’s excellent blog that covers Weymouth’s vital involvement in the English Civil War. The Executions of the Crabchurch Conspirators Upon The Nothe Headland.. I can highly recommend this book if you have a love of Weymouth’s history.
Weymouth’s Tommy Atkins and Jolly Jacks.
Something that many of the younger generation might not realise but Weymouth has a long and fascinating history with the army and navy. Even during my own lifetime I can recall a certain ‘liveliness’ when hundreds of sailors would take their shore leave, hoards of men streaming along the esplanade heading for town, all eager to make the most of their…
Who stole the Christmas dinner?…Weymouth 1862.
Well…that time of year is almost upon us again, when everyone scurries around filling their baskets and trollies with a seemingly bizarre amount of food and goodies. Perhaps it’ll be a good time to take a peek back into history, see what sort of Weymouth our ancestors were living in, the everyday lives of the townsfolk…
Weymouth’s Victorian bandstands.
The final bandstand stood out at the end of what was once an elegant, curving pier, which brings us neatly back to where we first started our story of the Weymouth bandstands.
1870; The Queens Own Regiment of Dorset Yeomanry Cavalry week at Weymouth.
Weymouth down through it’s past history has quite a link with the military. In the late 1700’s The famous Red Barracks that sits up on the Nothe, its Georgian built accommodation blocks towering above the quayside cottages below, were built, first to house the cavalry troops, but then later converted to house infantry troops. The Nothe…
1886; Guy Fawkes night on Portland leads to riots!
The forbidding Verne citadel stands atop of Portland, built originally as part of Lord Palmerston’s coastal defences. Nowadays it hold prisoners serving their sentence for crimes to the community, but in the Victorian era it contained the might of the military. The soldier’s billeted within those strong walls came and went, some companies had better…
VICTORIAN TALES FROM WEYMOUTH AND PORTLAND 