14. ST MARY’S INSTITUTE OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH INCIDENT REPORT
Competition entry by Anna Scutt
Report filed by: Kerensa Tonkin, Junior Historian, B.A., M.A. History, Falmouth University (NOT the University of Exeter, even though we have to share a campus with them)
Mission: Observe and report on the sighting of the Spanish Armada, Plymouth Hoe, 19th July 1588.
Personnel present: K Tonkin, Junior Historian; N Gallear, Historian masquerading as husband for 16th century propriety’s sake.
Urban legends are the bane of the historian’s life. I don’t know how many times I’ve had to explain to friends that Lady Godiva didn’t ride naked through the streets of Coventry, Mozart wasn’t poisoned by a jealous rival, and that Sir Francis Drake wasn’t playing bowls on Plymouth Hoe when the when the Spanish Armada was sighted.
There have been various claims to the origin of that story, from a Spanish nobleman boasting that the Armada was so effective at sneaking up on the English that it might have caught them playing bowls, to a report of ‘people dancing, bowling and merrymaking’ on the Hoe.
So Thirsk University had asked us to observe what did happen.
I would like to state for the record that I would much rather be at the Lizard in Cornwall watching out for the true first sighting of the Armada, but Junior Historians can’t be choosers.
I suppose I was still brooding on being sent to Devon instead of Cornwall as we entered the pod, because I raised the ultimate question. ‘So’, I said ‘Scones. Jam first or cream first?’
Gallear was busy laying in the coordinates. He shrugged distractedly. ‘Does it matter?’
You can go off people.
Before I could inform him that the correct answer is jam first, that science has proved that jam first tastes best, and that even Queen Elizabeth II used to put her jam on first, the world went white.
*
Obviously, we couldn’t land on the Hoe. The point of pods is to be inconspicuous and unobtrusive, and this cannot be achieved by materialising in the middle of an open space and possibly squashing several merry-making Elizabethan Plymothians in the process.
Instead, we landed in an alley in the Barbican and walked up to the Hoe in the sunshine.
We were not prepared for what we saw there.
Sir Francis Drake was playing bowls.
How he got away with it, I do not know. Bowls was made illegal by Henry VIII in 1541 because it distracted people from archery practice. Yes, the law didn’t apply to the wealthy (nothing changes), but even they were only allowed to play on private greens.
I couldn’t believe it. ‘What do we do now?’ I said. ‘We’ve got the chance to prove the legend is true and we can’t be here, or you’ll be arrested for non-practice of archery.’
Gallear pulled me to a stone structure that looked like a pod with a rounded roof.
‘Behind here.’
I shook my head. ‘This is a beacon. Sooner or later, someone will come to light it. And we’ll be seen.’
‘Then I’m just here for a bit of privacy with my lovely wife’
I glared at him. ‘Just try it. And we can’t see anything from behind here.’
Grinning, he drew a small box out of his pocket and pulled out the contents with a flourish. It looked like a cross between a telescope and a Meccano set that had mated with one of those articulated wooden snakes you can get for children.
‘What on earth is that?’
‘Little present from R&D. Retractable pericope that doubles as a recorder.’
‘Oh, God. Put it away before we get arrested for spying as well as archery avoidance and public lewdness.’
‘Do you want to see, or not?’
He pressed a button on the side of the box and the Meccano-snake thing slithered its way to just below the top of the beacon. A ridiculously complicated arrangement of mirrors allowed us to see the game in progress.
I don’t know much about bowls, but the players were obviously good, and seemed evenly matched.
We studied Drake’s opponent and the spectators, but neither of us recognised them; I will try to identify them before I report to Thirsk.
The sun beat down, and I could feel sweat trickling down my neck. Elizabethan clothing is not cool. I was just beginning to tire of watching the game when a man came racing across the Hoe looking even hotter and tireder than I was.
Captain Fleming. Bringing the news that the Armada had been spotted off the Isles of Scilly.
And Drake delivered his famous response, ‘Time enough to play the game and thrash the Spaniards afterwards.’
I won’t bore you with a description of the hours (days? weeks?) we spent watching the game. Even the thought that Sir Francis really did have very good legs couldn’t distract me for long. (I’ve since realised that ogling the Vice-Admiral of the Fleet while on assignment probably comes under the heading of unprofessional behaviour. Sorry about that.)
Eventually, the game drew to a close, and Drake lined up the deciding shot of the match.
What happened next was our fault.
Actually, no. I’m not taking responsibility for this. This was not my fault.
It was Gallear’s.
The only excuse I can think of is he must have been as bored as I was.
‘I reckon if I angle this out to sea, I’ll be able to spot the Spanish when they do turn up,’ he said. He twiddled a knob on the box and a mirror at the top of the contraption swivelled.
Drake screwed his eyes up suddenly as if something had momentarily blinded him.
And missed his shot.
The story of the match is well known, but nowhere does it say who won, and now we know why.
Sir Francis Drake hadn’t wanted his defeat recorded.
History is written by the victors – but just occasionally it’s suppressed by the loser, and an urban legend is born.
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