From FA Cup to the opera
QUESTION
Did an American play in the first FA Cup final?
In the 1872 FA Cup final, when Wanderers beat Royal engineers 1-0 at Kennington Oval, London, all the players were english, Scottish or Irish, except Col edmund William Creswell of the Royal engineers, who was born in Gibraltar.
In the following year’s final, the American Julian Russell Sturgis played for Wanderers in their 2-0 victory against Oxford University.
he also took part in the 1876 FA Cup final replay, playing for the Old etonians against Wanderers, losing 0-3.
Sturgis was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the fourth son of a merchant and lawyer from whom he inherited a fortune. educated at eton and Balliol College,
Oxford, he became a barrister and acquired British nationality.
A man of letters, in 1885 he wrote the libretto for Arthur Goring thomas’s opera, nadeshda.
his best-known libretto is the opera Ivanhoe of 1891, written for Sir Arthur Sullivan after W.S. Gilbert declined to write grand opera. Gilbert recommended Sturgis for the work based on Sir Walter Scott’s novel.
It debuted at Richard D’Oyly Carte’s Royal english Opera house on January 31, 1891. It was a great success and ran for an unprecedented 155 performances.
Sturgis went on to pen librettos for Alexander Mackenzie and Charles Villiers Stanford and wrote several novels.
When he died in 1904, author henry James wrote to his widow praising his ‘beautiful, noble, stainless memory, without the shadow of a single grossness or meanness or ugliness...When I think of my friendship of so many years with him I see it all as fairness and felicity’.
Owen Powers, Sherborne, Dorset.
QUESTION How did the RAF’s Pip-squeak system work?
A Key requirement in modern warfare is the ability to identify friend or foe. Pipsqueak was a radio navigation system used by the RAF during the Battle of Britain to locate friendly forces.
the aircraft’s radio was set to send out a 1khz tone — or Pip-squeak — for 14 seconds every minute, which was picked up by ground-based high-frequency direction-finding (hFDF, ‘huff-duff’) receivers. It was named after Pip, Squeak And Wilfred, a cartoon strip of the era.
In the opening months of World War II, radar was in its infancy and Britain was frantically trying to establish a network of interlinked radio and radar air defences across the South and South-east.
During the early deployment of the Chain home radar network of steel transmission towers, the limited radar coverage and resources were directed at locating approaching enemy formations rather than tracking friendly aircraft over British soil. the RAF needed an interim friend or foe detection system.
Following development at Biggin hill, hFDF was installed in Fighter Command’s sector airfields. this enabled the sector controller to plot the position of the fighters under his control.
the Pip-squeak system enabled radio direction finding (RDF) to identify pilots as friend or foe and direct them towards the enemy.
It could also be used to help guide planes home. the controller would ask the pilot to ‘flash your weapon’ (manually transmit the signal for a three to fivesecond burst) and he would then be given a compass direction.
the codename for the system was Cockerel. If a pilot had manually turned off the Pip-squeak during combat, he would receive a call asking: ‘Is your cockerel crowing?’ A classic example of RAF jargon.
S. W. Winterson, York.
QUESTION Why was the 16th century Sir Walter Scott dubbed Wicked Wat?
SIR Walter Scott, 1st Lord of Branxholme, 3rd Lord of Buccleuch, was a nobleman of the Scottish Borders and a notorious Border reiver involved in plundering livestock and racketeering.
Described as an ‘inveterate english hater’, he was one of several noble gentlemen who made it his business to harry and steal from his neighbours, carrying off whatever came to hand, be it horses, cows, sheep or goods.
this earned him his nickname of Wicked Wat. Sir Walter Scott, the 19th-century author, was a direct descendant.
Scott’s seat at Branxholme was the stronghold of a chain of fortresses commanding the pass between the tweed and Cumberland, where the reivers made raids into england and returned homewards.
Known as a tempestuous character, he accompanied James IV to the Battle of Flodden in 1513 and was one of the few who escaped the carnage when the Scots were routed.
he is said to have been knighted on the field before James was killed — the last monarch in Britain to die in battle.
Scott is best remembered for the Battle of Melrose in 1526, a failed rescue attempt of the future James V, who was being held against his will by Archibald Douglas, 6th earl of Angus.
After the death of James V in 1542, Scott was among those who opposed the proposed marriage of the infant Mary, Queen of Scots, to henry VIII’s son Prince edward.
he became active in the wars with england, which were later known as the Rough Wooing.
In 1545, Scott joined an alliance against the english at the Battle of Ancrum Moor, leading a contingent of borderers in the ambush and rout of the invading forces.
he also fought at Pinkie Cleugh on September 10, 1547, the last pitched battle between Scotland and england before the Union of the Crowns, finally submitting to edward VI.
Unable to be defeated in battle, Scott was murdered by his enemies on edinburgh high Street in 1552.
Callum Bower, North Berwick, East Lothian.
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