Receiving his 50 year certificate at our recent AGM, Brian Coward HLM reflects that his father was also a member of the Guild for 50 years from the 1920s which, combined with his own 50 years, spans a complete century.
Living in Mere my father was a very active peal ringer in his earlier years when he became a College Youth. In memory of him I have presented to Anne at the Devizes Branch AGM a book recording his first 100 peals of which approximately 75 were in different towers. And 16 first peals on the bells.
Four Peals of note were his first peal being Grandsire at Zeals – the first peal on the bells; the one and only peal at Kingston Deveril, I believe, again Grandsire, the first peal of minor at Stourton on his 19th birthday and his first peal of Caters rung on the old ten at Trowbridge – my own tower for the last 50 years. The method was Grandsire conducted by Charles Andrews who became a member of the 12 bell committee to enhance a poor ten to the current twelve. His name is cast into the tenor together with names of all committee members. 50 years later in 1977 Charles was elected as Guild President.
Shortly after marrying and starting a family my father was called up to serve overseas in WW2. On returning back to Mere in the mid 1940s sadly he seemed a stranger to me and found it hard to settle. We moved to Leatherhead in 1948 to rented accommodation owned by the Royal School for the Blind where my father taught brush making a skill he learnt as a founder employee at the start of the Hill Brush Factory in Mere. He also learnt Braille. In the early 1950s he asked George Marriner, the Leatherhead tower captain of a very competent 10 bell band, to teach me to ring. I was in good hands.
In 1953 we moved to our own house in Dorking just in time for us to ring for the Coronation. I only rang one peal with him, it being my first covering to Grandsire at Betchworth in 1958. The reason why only one peal is another story.
He became Captain at Dorking taking over from George Coleman who I believe was the father of George Coleman who died recently in the Gloucester area. He continued being active for both the Guildford Guild and Surrey Association and as a stand in for service ringing at St.Pauls Cathedral until his sudden death in February 1965 at the age of 53. Unfortunately he did not see my return to ringing in the early 1970s when I too took over captaincy of Dorking and restarted peal ringing.
His funeral was led by Canon Kenneth Evans vicar of St. Martins and friend of the family who later became Bishop of Dorking at Guildford Cathedral The church was full made up of members from the blind school and ringing friends including Jack Paul who represented the Mere ringers and the Salisbury Guild. A course of Grandsire Triples was rung on handbells at the Cemetery. The band included Pat Cannon, the tenor, king who wrote his obituary which was published in the Ringing World (a copy of which I have attached to the book for future reference) and the Rev Wood who I recently discovered, while reminiscing with Giles at Trowbridge, was his father.
A small, and hopefully continuing, ringing world.
Brian Coward HLM
Trowbridge
