Rhubarb Issue 12: November 2023

1959 By RICHARD THOMAS (Apsley, 1954-1959)

That final was against Oundle. The 1958 crew had also beaten Oundle in the final!

FEATURE

The Final vs Oundle 1959

Warming up,1959

Only recently I received an email from someone with access to the official record of the race. He writes: ‘It must have been an excellent race. After an early lead by your crew, it looks as if Oundle spurted hard and closed the gap to a quarter of a length at Fawley. St Edward’s led by a canvas at the mile and drew ahead to three quarters of a length at the mile and an eighth. Oundle must have come back at you after that as you finished 1/3 of a length ahead.’

M y first experience of rowing at Henley was in the Colts VIII. I still remember the dread I felt on rounding Temple Island, realizing we had to row to Henley church in the far distance. I learned my first lesson from rowing: if others can do it, so can I! We in the 1959 crew thought we were fairly fast, thanks to a good result at the Reading Head of the River race. This was confirmed on the Saturday before the Regatta when we rowed a full course paced by a Harvard University VIII. They expressed surprise at having to row rather than paddle over. We did a time of 6.59 which was only three seconds outside the then record time for the Princess Elizabeth Cup. One of the national newspapers then called us the ‘Young Vikings’ as we all had fair hair. Tribute must be made to our coach John Vernon, a Cambridge Blue who had also coached the winning 1958 crew. He was ably assisted by Charles Mather. For a while we were trained by Bob Barrett OSE, an Oxford Blue, who really put us through our paces. I learned my second lesson: that you can do far more work than you realise. For a few weeks the School had laid on a very welcome special supper for the crew. Duncan Bray (4 man) and I were from Apsley. Our Housemaster, John Armstrong, who later became the School Bursar, for some time provided the two of us with an additional daily steak and bottle of stout! Even then we enjoyed the full supper. By the time we got to the Henley final, we confidently believed we were going to win, for each previous day we had recorded the fastest times to The Barrier and Fawley and for the whole course, beating Beaumont (easily), Radley (easily) and Tiffin (2 1/3 lengths).

Sounds remarkably similar to this year's final!

The Teddies winning crew 1959

There can be only very few who have won the PE Cup twice. In the 1959 crew such were our Captain, Chris Sherratt (5 man), Richard Churcher (6 man) and Robert Walford (Cox). Apparently, Richard celebrated his second victory with his family in a local pub and left his newly won medal in the bar! Fortunately, he was able to recover it later. Crew: J.M. Ball, A. Fisher, S.R. Henderson, D.G. Bray, J.C.D. Sherratt (Capt), R.G. Churcher, R.J.M. Thomas, L.M.D. Nash, R.G.W. Walford (Cox)

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