The following article was kindly submitted by Keith Brettell as part of our ongoing project of gathering information about life at LNS in the 50’s

London Nautical School Memories of Walking Holidays

The Geography master was Mr Smith. He was a strikingly good-looking chap and a good deal younger than his colleagues. He clearly knew his stuff, was undemonstrative and I held him in high regard.

When it was announced that the Pennine Trail was to be opened during the Festival of Britain Year, Mr Smith either knew the Way or conducted a recce as he led a party of about 35 boys on it. He was helped by his wife and ANother who may have been a friend or was it the science lab assistant? (Curiously, in about 1970 I met Smith and his wife at a builder’s merchants in Leatherhead, Surrey. I recognized them immediately. I guess that he must have been fast approaching retirement then).

We all bought ex-army service boots into which we drove studs and purchased sufficient tents and thick socks. I think that we hired or borrowed the rucksack frames. When the packs were assembled with tents they came to just under 40lbs, fortunately my 14 year old frame only had to manage this every 4 days as that was the number per tent! I think my mum stumped up with £20.00.

We trained from Euston to Matlock and then, on the first day walked to camp within sight of Chatsworth House. We camped and cooked and used our meagre funds to supplement with snacks. Washing was not high on the agenda even though, in those days, hot water may not have been readily available at our homes, the Dale streams were freezing!

Since the Way was new we were lionised to a degree. I seem to remember Sturgess having his picture in the northern Daily Express. We went to the Peak Cavern and, possibly to The Blue John Mine and over the ridge to Edale, that led to the hardest day, from there over Kinder Scout to Glossop. My principle memory is the interesting World War 11 bomber we found crashed on the top and of the severity of the climbing in and out of peat bogs. We coached from Glossop to Skipton passing through the mill towns (‘O’ level Geog in Mr Smith’s mind). We then marched northwards across the Yorks Dales to Hexham and then bussed into Newcastle. Our arrival timed to coincide with the launch, at Swan Hunter’s, of the BP tanker ‘British Bulldog’. This remains to this day the only ship launch I have ever seen. Since she was of about 18,000 tons she was a big ship for her time. We were taken round the ways, where the gangs were knocking out the final wedges before leaving the last trip to be released by the good lady pulling the champagne lever. We had ringside seats. I was always most impressed with the prescience of this visit and the quality of the timing - the ship launched on time and we came home on the train the day after - amazing!

The Welsh Trip was the year after. I have very few memories of this. We trained to Rhayader and I remain impressed with the Elan Valley and the lakes until this day. I walked around them only a couple of years ago. I recall climbing Snowdon, the sense of achievement on reaching the top, the litter, the views and the breathless rush down.

It is so difficult to place oneself back to those times. Revealing, though, to mull over the fact that I was a founder member of Mr Usher’s Photography Club yet did not take a camera on those trips. All I had was the precious family Brownie Box and could not afford to buy the films even if they could then be processed in the school dark room on the mezzanine floor (sepia prints were made by sunlight exposure, we made our own developers and fixers in 3F lab).

I could go on!

Hope this is of interest.

Keith Brettell ‘49-’53        Email: keithbrettell@yahoo.co.uk