Exhibitions

Guernsey Photography festival: 3rd-29th May 2010

Invasion, Occupation, Liberation, Celebration

Red Cross child Photographs from the Library's collection illustrating this theme have been enlarged and laminated and were on display in the Library garden, part of the historic Candie Gardens in St Peter Port. Mounted onto eye-catching display units, hand-built here at the Library, the exhibition of 15 photographs proved very popular with the public. It complemented other cultural sites in the island that are taking part in the Photography Festival, all of whose displays are based around the theme of the 65th anniversary of the Liberation of the Island from the German occupying forces.

Guernsey Heroes of the Royal Society

A comprehensive display of biographical information, works, and objects associated with members or would-be members of the Royal Society with links to Guernsey is currently on show at the Library, complementing the series of lectures taking place in the Island to celebrate the Society's 350th anniversary. From 1st April to 25th June the Library will be hosting a free exhibition, featuring the lives and works of ten Guernsey Fellows of the Society, and information about other Fellows who have some connection with the island.

The earliest Fellow featured is the Stuart courtier Sir Henry de Vic, an "Original Fellow", having been elected in 1662 prior to the granting of the Royal Charter to the Society. Case displays are dedicated to the 19th-century astronomer Warren de la Rue and to S. Elliott Hoskins, some of whose geological specimens are included in the exhibition.

In 2010 the Royal Society is celebrating its 350th anniversary and is supporting a series of commemorative lectures, of which three focus on Guernsey's own contribution to the Society. The island was honoured in November 2009 by being the site of the first anniversary lecture under the Society's auspices.

The lecture was One shilling weekly: 350 years of the Royal Society, and was given by Keith Moore, Chief Librarian and Archivist, Royal Society, at the Frossard Centre in Candie Gardens, who informed the slightly bemused local audience that a former Guernsey Fellow had submitted a recipe for cooking cormorant to the Society. They were relieved to discover that this was not a recent event.

On 13 May 2010, Les Cotils Centre, 8.00 p.m. Amanda Bennett, Chief Librarian, Priaulx Library, and David Le Conte, Chairman, WEA Guernsey, gave The Raymond Falla Memorial Lecture, Guernsey Heroes of the Royal Society, to a large and enthusiastic audience.

Still to come:

20 October 2010. Frossard Centre, 8.00 p.m.: What’s the point of the Royal Society? A modern perspective, by Professor Nicholas Day CBE, FRS.

For more information please contact David Le Conte: Email: dleconte@guernsey.net.

Autographs and Inscriptions

The Priaulx Library is displaying just some of its varied collection of autographed and inscribed books.

Among those on show are :

The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans, London: John Murrray, 1827.

Inscribed by Emma Austen to J. A. E. Lefroy.

This book has been included because of the very intriguing signature found on the fly-leaf when the volume was being catalogued in 2008. It reads: “J A E Lefroy from Emma Austen”. Neither of these individuals are the authors of the book, but have a literary notoriety for a completely different reason. J. A. E. Lefroy is most likely to be Jane Anne Elizabeth Austen, wife of the Rev. Benjamin Lefroy and daughter of James Austen and Anne Mathew. James was of course Jane Austen’s brother, which means that the owner of this volume was Jane Austen’s niece and biographer. She was given the volume by ‘Emma Austen’ who is most likely to have been the wife of Jane Anne Elizabeth’s half-brother James Austen-Leigh. He had married Emma Smith in 1816. Fans of Jane Austen may remember that she had supposedly fallen in love with Tom Lefroy as a young woman, but the Austen and Lefroy families would have disapproved and the affair came to nothing. Tom Lefroy went on to become Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He was also the uncle of the Rev. Benjamin Lefroy, husband of Jane’s niece Jane Anne Elizabeth.

This volume obviously came into the Priaulx Library’s possession through its first Chief Librarian, Percy Groves, who has also signed the fly-leaf.

The Scarlet Pimpernel, Leipzig, Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1911. Baroness Orczy to Vita Sackville-West.

An early edition of the classic adventure novel The Scarlet Pimpernel, signed by the author, Baroness Emmuska Orczy in 1913. Baroness Orczy was born in Tarna-Ors, Hungary, in 1865, the daughter of Baron Felix Orczy, a noted conductor and composer and friend to such luminaries as Wagner, Liszt and Gounod. Growing up in artistic and literary circles, the young Baroness took advantage of new opportunities for women and studied at the London School of Art. Although the manuscript of The Scarlet Pimpernel was unaccountably rejected by several publishers, it eventually appeared in print in 1905 to great popular, if not critical, acclaim.

This volume is inscribed to ‘Victoria Sackville West Nicolson’, who was better known as Vita Sackville West, poet, novelist, and gardener. Vita had married diplomat Harold Nicolson in 1913 and this volume may have been intended as a wedding gift. Why it has ended up in the Priaulx Library collection is unknown. The Library also possesses a copy of Orczy’s I Will Repay, similarly inscribed.

Normandy to the Baltic, Germany: British Army, 1946. 1st Ed. From Field-Marshal Montgomery of Alamein to the Citizens of Guernsey

Field Marshal Montgomery visited Guernsey in the Spring of 1947, to great public excitement and acclaim. He gave this volume as a gift, which was subsequently passed to the Priaulx Library. In a note also attached, the Bailiff Ambrose Sherwill writes: “Last Friday Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery handed me, as a gift to the ‘Citizens of Guernsey’, an inscribed copy of his book ‘Normandy to the Baltic’ and I feel that it would be in accordance with his wishes that it should be placed in the Priaulx Library. Quite apart from its value as an authoritative account of the campaign with which his name will always be associated, it forms a most interesting souvenir of his visit to this Island”.

Autograph of the Duke of Wellington

This signature, of unknown provenance and accompanied by an engraving of the aged Duke in the year that he died, was found in a box of miscellaneous prints. There is no reason to doubt that the signature belongs to Wellington, but as the handwriting is so monumentally awful, it is impossible to prove!

The Most Famous, Delectable, and Pleasant History of Parismus the most Renowned Prince of Bohemia, London: W. Thackeray, 1689.

Thomas Hodgskins, 1742, et al.

Neither a famous author nor a famous owner has signed this seventeenth-century romance, but it is worth displaying as an example of some of the elaborate marks of ownership that were inscribed in books during this period. Whether it was because books were scarce and expensive, or literacy was not widespread, is uncertain, but ownership of a book was something to be boasted of.
The page displayed here shows the name ‘Thomas Hodgskins’ prominently displayed and a date of 1742, signed not once but twice in different styles. Mr. Hodgskins has also signed and dated the rear fly-leaf. Above his names in what appears to be a different hand, is inscribed a verse of rather dubious literary merit:

“This book to you will useless bee
Till you learn to love like mee
If you are hope to move the
Sacred powers that dwell above
Then pity me who am in love
For heaven will no mercy show
To those who tyrannize below your
Prayers will never reach the skies
If you still murder with your eyes”

The verse appears to be signed ‘M L’, but whether this is the poet or the writer, or indeed both, is uncertain. The hand appears to be different than that which signed ‘John Hodgskins’. Elsewhere in the book appears another signature: “Elizabeth Ludlam Apr. 1695”. She may have been the first owner.

The Door Wherein I Went - Lord Hailsham, London: Collins, 1975

Inscribed by Lord Hailsham to Charles Smyth.

Quintin Hogg, Lord Hailsham of St. Marylebone (1907-2001) needs little introduction as one of the leading Conservative Politicians of the 1960s and 70s, serving as Education Minister and Leader of the House of Lords under MacMillan and serving nearly 14 years as Lord High Chancellor in the 1970s and 80s. His autobiography “The door wherein I went” was acclaimed for its spiritual honesty and he frankly discusses his own faith and beliefs. It is therefore appropriate that this inscription and note are directed to his friend and contemporary, Charles Smyth (1903-1987), historian, cleric and Canon of Westminster. The inscription reads: “dono deditâ€¦Amicitiae causa” – Literally: ‘I make this offering in the cause of friendship’

The Principal Speeches and Adresses of his Royal Higness the Prince Consort etc., London: John Murray, 1862

The Priaulx Library has three books inscribed by Queen Victoria, and these are by no means rare as Victoria was known to have inscribed many thousands in her lifetime. However, this particular inscription is interesting for a number of reasons – firstly that it was written only 15 months after Prince Albert’s death – a period when the Queen was still in deep mourning and secondly, it is addressed to the Bishop of Oxford. The Bishop during this period was Samuel Wilberforce, third son of William Wilberforce the famous philanthropist, Politian and abolitionist. Wilberforce went on to become Bishop of Winchester and Dean of Westminster, but Victoria would have best remembered him as chaplain to Prince Albert – a position he was appointed to in 1841.

Victoria, more open with the Bishop than she would be with other acquaintances writes:
“To the Bishop of Oxford from the great, good & beloved Prince’s broken-heard Widow, Victoria. Windsor Castle, March 31, 1863”

A Handbook to the Poetry of Rudyard Kipling, London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1914. Inscribed by Rudyard Kipling to Ralph Durand.

Ralph Durand, Chief Librarian of the Priaulx Library from 1929 until his death in December 1945, had a slight reputation as a writer of adventure novels, but also wrote some non-fiction, producing this highly acclaimed concordance to Kipling’s poems in 1914. That he was an admirer of Kipling is undoubted, and their lives were somewhat similar – Durand had left home at a young age, travelling in African, Australia and the South Seas and working with intelligence staff during the Great War.
Kipling obviously admired Durand’s work, as his letter to Durand testifies. The book is still considered, but the Kipling Society, to be the foremost work on Kipling’s verse. The letter was written from Kipling’s famous house Bateman’s, now a National Trust property.

Guernsey in Photographs

From 5th July 2008 some thirty photographs were exhibited at the Gallery in Mansell Street, St Peter Port, to great acclaim, as Early Guernsey Photography 1845-1900. This was supplemented in late 2009 by a new set of around seventy slightly later photographs from the collection, all of local interest. Reproductions of all these are now available for purchase and some of the photographs are on public view at the Library and the Gallery. This major 2010 exhibition, Guernsey in Photographs, includes the work of photographer Carel Toms and includes many previously unpublished works.

The new set of photographs can now be viewed online as small images; a full catalogue is in preparation. All of these prints can be purchased, framed at the following sizes and prices:

A4: £45.00, A3: £65.00 and A2: £95.00

For further information and to order please contact the Gallery.

The Chief Librarian was interviewed by the BBC about the 2008 exhibition.

A Guernsey Press photographer for nearly fifty years, Carel Toms accumulated an unparalleled archive of images detailing Guernsey’s past and present, many of which were given to the Priaulx Library after his death in 2002. These exhibitions provide a unique opportunity to view some of these unseen images.

Appointment with Venus - A Celebration, 5-9 May 2009

CineGuernsey, the Priaulx Library, and the Guille-Allès Library joined forces to celebrate the book and film, Appointment with Venus (1951).

Appointment with Venus is a novel by the Irish author, Jerrard Tickell (1905-1966). Set on the fictitious Channel Island Island of "Armorel" during the German occupation, the story involves a plan by the Nazis to export a valuable pedigree Guernsey cow, named Venus, from the island to Germany. The Ministry of Agriculture in London realise that Venus is in Nazi hands and they petition the War Office to mount a rescue, and so an entertaining farce begins. The film adaptation was made in 1951, the same year as the novel's publication, starring David Niven and Glynis Johns, and was directed by Ralph Thomas. "They came home with the milk!" was the film's tagline. There are strong similarities between "Armorel" and Sark, and several scenes from the film were shot on the island.

To accompany the screening of the film by CineGuernsey to coincide with Liberation Day, the Priaulx Library hosted an exhibition of original photographs from the film shoot and open readings of the novel.

Copies of the novel Appointment with Venus are available from the Guille-Allès and Priaulx Libraries.

Christian Corbet, Artist: July 2009

Works on Guernsey themes by this Canadian artist were on display in the Library's refurbished exhibition room; some can still be purchased. The artist, who is a descendant of the Guernsey poet Denys Corbet, attended the private opening on Friday 10th July. The Bailiff, Sir Geoffrey Rowland, unveiled a portrait of himself recently completed by the artist. Also on display is a new portrait of Denys Corbet, featured in the recent Denys Corbet Centenary Exhibition and on loan from the Forest Primary School.

Jane de Carteret, Milliner: February 2009

Poster for the exhibition of Spring 2009 From February 10th the Library hosted an exhibition of the work of Guernsey milliner Jane de Carteret. The hats from the exhibition were for sale, along with jewellery made by Jane. Items of from the milliner's toolbox were also on view, including rare vintage French wooden hat blocks and unique fabrics from Paris, and Jane was available to answer questions at the Library. The exhibition proved very popular. Please contact a Librarian for further information.

Guernsey on the Map

In 2004, an important exhibition of local maps was shown at the library and a book produced in parallel. Visit http://www.guernseyonthemap.co.uk/ for further details on this attractive publication.