A HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX 



a boat on the river in i8i5. 56 This six-oared 

 boat, the F/y, though not apparently built 

 for racing, won a race against the Temple 

 in 1 8 1 6 and another with the Defiance ; and 

 two subsequent boats, the Challenge and the 

 Victory, are said to have never been beaten in 

 the races with London clubs to which the 

 rowing of the school was limited till iSag. 67 

 It was not until this year that the first race 

 with Eton previous challenges from which, 

 between 1814 and 1820, Westminster had 

 been prevented by the prejudices of its 

 head masters, Page and Goodenough, from 

 accepting 88 took place. 59 This the first 

 recorded amateur race of importance and 

 two subsequent contests in 1831 and 1835, 

 ended in a victory for Eton. In 1837, 

 however, Westminster had its revenge in a 

 race which is further memorable for the fact 

 that it led to the adoption of pink as the 

 recognized colour of the school, the crew of 

 which had previously, like that of Eton, worn 

 blue and white ; and also for the attendance 

 of King William IV, whose rashness in 

 insisting on witnessing the race seriously 

 aggravated the fatal illness from which he was 

 suffering. 60 In 1846 Westminster again beat 

 Eton but was easily defeated in the following 

 year. Under the head-mastership of Liddle, 

 who did not regard rowing with favour, 

 the sport was for a while suppressed. 61 In 



1853 the school rowed Leander in a race from 

 Battersea to Putney, losing by a length, and in 



1854 it defeated the club in another contest 

 from Vauxhall to Putney. 62 



Among the most noted of the numerous 

 celebrated oarsmen whom Westminster pro- 

 duced were Sir Patrick Colquhoun, winner of 

 the Wingfield Sculls in 1837, Sir Warrington 

 Smyth, and the first Lord Esher. 63 The last 

 named, as W. B. Brett of Caius, rowed in the 

 Cambridge crew which won the first University 

 Boat Race from Westminster to Putney in 

 1836, and in the following year defeated the 

 Leander Club in a race over the same course. 



Leander, the oldest club on the tideway, 

 was founded in 181 8 or 1819 by members of 

 the old Star and Arrow Clubs, and was at 

 first limited to sixteen, then to twenty- 

 four and later to thirty-five members, until the 

 removal of this restriction in 1857 which 



66 Rowing (Badminton Library), 5, 6. 

 " Ann. of Westminster School, 225 ; Ency. Brit. 

 art. ' Rowing,' 



68 Ann. of Westminster School, 225. 



69 Ibid. 238. 60 Ibid. 



61 Ibid. 248 ; cf. Markham, Recollections oj a 

 Town Boy at Westminster, 143. 

 61 Ibid. 142. 

 Ann. of Westminster School, 238. 



was suggested by the success of the London 

 Club founded in the previous year converted 

 it into the largest club on the river. 64 In its 

 earlier races it was steered by its waterman, 

 Jim Parish, and it was the first club to lend 

 a helping hand to promising young members 

 of the craft for whose benefit is instituted a 

 coat and badge for scullers. 65 When it rowed 

 Cambridge in 1837, Leander, to quote a 

 description given of that race by Lord 

 Esher, Master of the Rolls, at a dinner in 

 celebration of the fact that four of the 

 appellate judges were old ' varsity oars ' was 



a London Club consisting of men who had never 

 been at the University but . . . were recognised 

 throughout England, and perhaps everywhere in 

 the world, as the finest rowers who had up to that 

 time been seen. 66 



In 1831 the club had defeated Oxford in a 

 race rowed from Hambleden Lock to Henley 

 Bridge, but when it lost the match with 

 Cambridge six years later, the members are 

 said by Lord Esher to have been 'verging 

 on being middle aged men.' In 1858 it began 

 to be recruited from both the universities, 

 but it was not until 1875 that it won its 

 first victory at Henley with an eight of 

 one Oxford and seven Cambridge men, stroked 

 by J. H. D. Goldie. 67 Since 1880, when it 

 again won the Grand Challenge with a crew 

 of seven Oxford and one Cambridge oars, 

 stroked by T. C. Edwardes-Moss, there have 

 been only three years when it has not entered 

 at Henley, 63 and between 1898 and 1905 it 

 has won the Grand Challenge Cup seven times. 

 Besides the two just mentioned it has included 

 amongst its famous oarsmen R. H. Labet, C. 

 W. Kent, Guy Nickalls, V. Nickalls, G. D. 

 Rowe and Lord Ampthill. The present cap- 

 tain is Mr. C. B. Johnstone, president of the 

 Cambridge eight which beat Harvard in 

 1906. 



The London Rowing Club and the 

 Thames Rowing Club, which have combined 

 with Leander to raise amateur rowing to its 

 present high standard, have had similarly suc- 

 cessful careers, though both of these famous 

 clubs are many years younger. The London 

 was founded by members of the Argonauts Club 

 in 1856, and was the first really large rowing 

 club unlimited in numbers. Within three 



M Rowing (Badminton Library), 185. 



65 Ency. Brit. art. ' Rowing ' by Edwin D. 

 Brickdale, and cf. an art. on 'Twelve Famous Clubs' 

 by an Old Blue in the Daily Telegraph 20 May 

 1907. 



66 Rowing (Badminton Library), 12. 



" Twelve Famous Clubs. * Ibid. 



288 



