The loss of the Sainte Anne d'Auray, 21 December 1826
From The Star, Guernsey Weekly Advertiser, 26 December 1826.
February 18th, 1836: Louis Marin
From the Star of February 18th, 1836. Another way in which Jersey differed from Guernsey—the justice system; the Petite and Grande Enquêtes. The Star's readers must have been assumed to be unfamiliar with legal procedure in the sister isle, as the newpaper explains it at length. Marin was sentenced to transportation for life.
The end of the Submarine Diving Society, 24 October 1836
From the Star of Monday, 24th October, 1836. A report of the death of Peter Gallienne, a 'sober, steady, enterprising and well-informed young man,' which is thought to be the first ever death while diving of a helmeted diver.
Pierre Carey is under pressure at a States meeting, 1649
A report from The Guernsey and Jersey Magazine of 1837. Historical Notices of the Channel Islands, 8, taken from Pierre Carey's private papers. This Pierre [Peter] Carey is the Parliamentary Commissioner who later made a daring escape from imprisonment in Castle Cornet. A transcription of his letter book is in the Library.
14 February 1814: A Guernseyman's golden Valentine
Dug from Lima's golden mine, We hail it as our Valentine. HMS Menelaus recaptured a very valuable French prize, the Spanish treasure-ship the St Juan Baptista. The master was a Guernseyman, and Guernsey people are often very careful with money. This one certainly was. The account is from The Life of a Sailor by Frederick Chamier (1796-1870), some of whose tales are probably rather tall.
January 1793: Francois-Rene de Chateaubriand finds a Guernsey guardian angel
The Romantic author and politician François-René de Chateaubriand, wounded and weakened by dysentery, became extremely ill on a crossing to Jersey, on the way to his native Brittany to join royalist rebels. Chateaubriand managed to make it to Jersey, where he was delivered into the care of his uncle, the Comte de Bédée, but remained very ill for several weeks. He eventually went into exile in London. This is an extract from his memoirs, Les Mémoires d'outre-tombe, Book 10, Chapter III. The 1808 portrait by Girodet-Trioson is in the Museum of Saint-Malo.
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.'
Disorder in the Court, 1790
From the Gazette de l'Isle de Jersey, January 8, 1791. The autocratic Le Marchants—the Bailiff and his two sons—and their provocative behaviour. The original is in French. The illustration is from Augustin Grisier's Les Armes et le duel, 1865, from the Library collection.
Trade: 1827
Imports and Exports from Guernsey in 1827. From The Star, January 1, 1828. The Harbour records were destroyed in a German raid in 1940.
30 December 1672: Castle Cornet explodes
Reminiscences, from The Star, Tuesday December 9, 1890. The reaction of the population to the shocking event: a translation of an Ordinance of the Royal Court of 11 January, 1673; and an account from Roger North's Life of Dr John North, a 17th century Cambridge academic who was related to the Hattons. The illustration of the Castle before the explosion is a print published by Richard Godfrey in 1779, taken from a painting then in the possession of a [Mr] Carey.
Christmas 1607: what fun!
From the Acts of the Guernsey Colloquy, a document of exceptional local importance in the Library Collection. The Gathering of Ministers and Elders gives its judgment.
December 23, 1803: The loss of the Grappler and the sufferings of its captain and crew
Chaussey, or Choye, is a group of islets lying off the coast of Normandy, about twenty miles from Jersey, and nine from Granville. They stretch north, east, and west, and cover a space of nearly twelve miles. The principal of them is called the MaÎtre Isle, and is the resort of a few French fishermen during the summer, but being only a rock, and totally devoid of vegetation, its inhabitants are entirely dependent on the neighbouring shores for all the necessaries of life, excepting what their nets may produce. At the time of which we are writing, the winter of 1803, this group of islets was in the hands of the English, and was the scene of the wreck of the Grappler in that year.