Sport & Leisure

20 January, 1766: against Cockfighting

Cock-fighting in the churchyard after morning service on Easter Day had once been acceptable, because, according to folk-lore expert J. Linwood Pitts, in 1891, it had a religious origin, 'but became in time to be a scandal, and an Act of Court was passed, forbidding any but gentlemen paying tax on fifty quarters of wheat rent to indulge in the same.'

Christmas 1890

From the Star of December 25th, 1890: The Holiday.

The Great Water Gymkhana, 4th August 1938

Manning Dive Weekly Press 1938 Priaulx Library Collection

Here's what the Guernsey Water Polo Association got up to in what they termed their 'crazy' Water Gymkhana of August 1938, from the Star.

Experiment with Diving Dress, 1833

JOHN and JOSEPH ORCHARD having constructed a DIVING DRESS for the purpose of searching the Bottom of the sea in a moderate depth of water, beg leave to inform the public that they will, on TUESDAY MORNING at 10 o'clock, go down at the pier head and walk underwater towards Castle Cornet. This being the first thing of the kind ever made in this island, they invite the attention of the public to the above trial.

April 1809 and 1819

From local newspapers.

A Link with the Past: Ah! Mon beau laurier!

Guernsey Post Europa stamps showing a hurdy-gurdy or chifournie

Guernsey's favourite dance, the rather flirtatious 'Ah! mon beau laurier!.' The illustration is of a modern hurdy-gurdy, or 'chifournie,' used in the old days to accompany the dancing: with thanks to Guernsey Post Office, who also produced a superb video of the chifournie being played in Le Hurel barn in Guernsey. The chifournie has been replaced in Guernsey by the fiddle or accordion in modern times.

The first flower show, July 1833

The Gardener's Magazine, Vol. 9, 1833, and other extracts from local newspapers.

June 1811

From the Gazette de Guernesey, some translated from the original French. This was a very bad time for island banks, which had relied heavily on defaulting banks in London; the crash of the firm of Brock & Le Mesurier, operating out of London, took with it small local banks dependent on it.

Elizabeth College Cricket XI, 1913

Four of these boys died in the First War. Photograph from the Library Collection.

The Fancy Ball, 7 January 1836

'Oh happy night, enchanting sight, 'Neath garlands gay and floods of light, Brilliant eyes, balmy sighs, Shaming flow'r and lustre bright.' A report from the Star of 11 January, 1836. The photograph is a late 19th-century carte de visite, one of several in the Library Collection of subjects in fancy dress.

Search form