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Tonight I sat between two place names. To my left was a lady who married a man who was a direct descendent of Captain Charles Freemantle, the man for whom Freemantle, Western Australia was named. To my right was a Welshman who was given his mother’s maiden name to go between his first and last. Her maiden name was Farnham.
He was delighted when I told him that’s where we lived. Though he’d never been, some of his ancestors were from the area. Mrs Freemantle was also delighted when I told her how, back in 1960, my sister and I rolled down a hill in Freemantle as our first taste of Oz.
In the meanwhilst, Mirinda was sitting next to two teachers who changed their occupations; one became a psychologist and the other an author. She was also sitting by a woman who puts together anti-piracy teams. As in pirates of the high seas. The nasty, kidnapping type. There was also, coincidentally, a woman that Mirinda knew from a board they both worked on.
The reason we were sitting down with these people was because, tonight we went to the Trafalgar Dinner in the HMS Nelson Wardroom to celebrate the great, victorious battle in true naval tradition and style. The famous battle, started off Cape Trafalgar yesterday, October 21, 217 years ago.
We went because of my membership of the Society for Nautical Research. This year the SNR is celebrating the 100th anniversary of saving HMS Victory and, in view of this, we were invited to celebrate with The 1805 Club. And what fun it was. According to Mirinda, it was one of those truly weird things we find to do.
It all started with a fife and drum welcome at the entrance, after clearing security of course; the wardroom is in a Naval Base after all. It reminded me of all those times I had to report to the security people when I went to the library down in the Dockyard. Well, except for the musical welcome. I think that would have been rather nice.
After we’d settled ourselves in the bar, the drum and fife chaps joined us all to give us a few tunes. From the call to dinner to the rather too jolly call to punishment, they were very entertaining. They were also dressed in 1830 Royal Marine uniforms and, the night being quite mild, looked a bit too toasty.
There was also a very difficult ‘fun’ quiz which we were hopeless at. I do think the members of the club had a distinct advantage, though. Still, it was fun not knowing which ships mast was used for Nelson’s coffin. Or the first name of one of his aides, both of whom had the surname of Scott.
While there was sherry or prosecco as we arrived, there was also a fully stocked bar from which I availed myself.
There was a raffle but, silly Gaz didn’t bring any cash. I was amazed at how many of them did bring cash. The schedule of events for the whole night was quite insistent about the bar being card only so, I assumed, cash was not necessary. How foolish I was. My new mantra should be ‘Always Take Cash’. I have to when I’m with Nicktor so it’s not like I don’t know how.
Anyway, it didn’t really matter, we just kept a low profile during the purchasing.
Then in to dinner. To the accompaniment of a rather delightful band.
They proved even more delightful when we all sang sea shanties. Interestingly, the singing of sea shanties requires an awful lot of banging on the table. This made a lot of noise and rattling of cutlery. In fact, the ladies were warned about toppling glasses full of wine onto their party frocks. Men, it seemed, were immune to such spillage.
The meal was lovely and, surprisingly, quite lo-carb. Well, apart from the individual bomb Alaska dessert. The red and white wines were also very palatable and, of course, the port that we used to toast was also lovely. And there were a lot of toasts.
Actually, the meal started with grace from the chaplain before we headed into a rousing rendition of the new national anthem. The new gender version. There was quite a lot of rousing all night, to be honest.
All in all, a brilliant night out, thoroughly enjoyed, I think, by all.
It was also brilliant that my not very often worn tux, fitted me just fine.
