Barbara Hepworth died 50 years ago on 20th May 1975 at her studio nestled in the heart of St Ives. She left a legacy in her will – the wish that her home and studio be preserved as a museum and sculpture garden for the enjoyment of visitors to St Ives. That legacy endures to this day as the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden and is partly responsible for her continued relevance to the British and international art scene, even this long after her untimely death.
Hepworth was born in 1903 in Wakefield, Yorkshire. After studies at Leeds School of Art and the Royal College of Art in London, she embarked on a travel scholarship to Italy, where she learnt to carve marble from an artisan, Giovanni Ardini, and fell in love with the Mediterranean light. Back then, it would have seemed impossible that she was to later spend almost half her life in such a seemingly quiet corner of Penwith.
Her first arrival to Cornwall was a less romantic event. On 25th August 1939 at the invitation of Margaret Mellis and Adrian Stokes, Hepworth arrived in Carbis Bay, bringing her second husband and their triplets to escape the looming threat of WW2. She arrived on a rainy night, in low spirits, a little resentful at moving to a place she’d never been before. But as Cornwall does, it got under her skin.
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The ancient stones of Penwith and the tight-knit communities reminded her of the rolling landscape and mill towns of her childhood in Yorkshire, and the pure Cornish light reminded her of those early romantic days in Italy.
Before long she was deeply connected to the Cornish ‘pagan’ landscape. Her work began to reflect the deep affinity she felt for this area; paying homage to ancient megaliths and creating emotional stringed works capturing the feeling of the embrace of the landscape and the tension she felt within it.
A pivotal moment was her purchasing Trewyn Studios, her home from 1950 until her death 25 years later. “Finding Trewyn was a sort of magic”, she would later reflect. It was Trewyn Studio that became her centre of gravity, and from here she grew her universe. Later she purchased the Palais de Danse in 1961(currently being developed into a new part of her museum by Tate St Ives), expanding her works in size and complexity – moving from direct carving of wood and stone, to bronze cast works that could be displayed outside where they had relevance and context.
She was passionate about St Ives’ old town character and was vocal in saving many parts of the town facing destruction, so it’s no surprise that she also wished her work to be displayed within the town. Today there are reminders of Hepworth all around the town, from the cobbled streets which she helped to preserve, the bronzes dotted around the town (Dual Form outside the Guildhall temporarily removed while work is undertaken) to the beautiful white marble Madonna and Child in the Parish Church and, of course, her museum.
50 years on from her death, Hepworth’s visual language is testament to her deep respect for the rhythms of the natural landscape and her work remains as vital and dynamic as it did when she first made it.
See below for The St Ives Times & Echo‘s recap of the celebratory Tea & Trains event at Tregenna Castle on the 6th September.
St Ives Archive would like to thank all who supported us at the event, especially Richard Long and Tregenna Castle Resort for its generosity in creating this important fundraiser for us.
Look out for more of the resort’s 250-year celebration initiatives.
Join us for a celebratory afternoon tea with Richard Long, author of The St Ives Branch Line: A History, at Tregenna Castle on 6th September 2024 with all proceeds to the St Ives Archive.
Marking the 250th anniversary of Tregenna Castle, the celebrations kick off at 2pm. Throughout the afternoon, you will enjoy a cocktail or glass of Prosecco served with Chef’s fish & chips, handmade sandwiches, Cornish cream tea and a delicious variety of cakes.
Richard Long will be in conversation with local historian and Archive trustee Tony Mason, who will also be sharing archival footage of the St Ives Branch Line in action. Signed copies of Long’s book will be available to purchase.
To reserve your ticket – £40 per person – please email Tregenna Castle Hotel at events@tregenna-castle.co.uk or call 01736 795254.
We look forward to raising a glass with you there!
Lyn Burchess of St Ives Archive celebrates the 250th anniversary of Tregenna Castle in St Ives with stories of secret passages, the visit of a crown prince, steam locomotives and hosting US President Joe Biden.
This year marks the 250th anniversary of Tregenna Castle in St Ives, Cornwall. Originally the country house of Squire Samuel Stephens, Tregenna Castle, has since 1878 evolved into a luxury holiday hotel. Perched high above the town it offers breathtaking views of the historic St Ives Harbour, with its centuries-old cottages and the rugged North Cornish coast (see photo above).
Travelling Westward (Country Life May 13, 1922) described Tregenna Castle ‘as a standing sentinel amid its parks and woods above and behind the town of St Ives’, a position it proudly asserts to this day. The original house was attributed to John Wood the Younger famous for his work at The Assembly Rooms Bath and was constructed by a local builder from Penryn. It was built on the site of the old Tregenna homestead named after the long extinct family of that name. Beautifully hand coloured architectural drawings by Plymouth architect George Whitwick in 1845, now in the RIBA collection at the V&A, show the north side wing extension and the creation of service quarters at the rear. A further south side wing was added in 1922 thus achieving the symmetry seen today (see photo below).
Samuel Stephens Junior, who had inherited the property from his father, was the Member of Parliament for St Ives from 1818 to 1820. Papers held by The National Archives recall that old inhabitants can remember being told by their parents how they were brought up to the castle to line the drive and cheer the Squire’s departure to London. The day was a general holiday and the four horse coach took three weeks to arrive at its destination. The coming of the railway to St Ives was to dramatically change all that.
In 1871 Henry Stephens placed the house and the estate, which comprised most of the old town, up for auction. It was bought by mining industrialist Thomas Bolitho who was a director of Barclays and the local Bolitho’s Bank. The Great Western Railway (GWR) were looking to build a branch line to St Ives from St Erth on the main Paddington – Penzance line, which was completed in June 1877. Thomas Bolitho as one of the railways promoters quickly saw the opportunity to lease Tregenna Castle to GWR and the 42-year lease was signed in March 1878 by the famous GWR Chairman Daniel Gooch who with Isambard Brunel designed most of the broad gauge locomotives for GWR.
Tregenna Castle today
On 4th August 1878, the grand opening of this railway hotel took place. Coverage in the local Cornishman Newspaper announced the modern facilities provided and also commented on the beautiful lantern at the top of the staircase embellished with the Stephens coat of arms (see photo below). The Cornishman heartily wished the GWR scheme every success and what a success it was. This necessitated various alterations over the next 50 years, which by 1932 witnessed the expansion from the original 12 rooms, to 120.
In 1926, the Great Western Railway Magazine boasted a recent discovery, during the alteration phase ‘of a certain underground passage under the wine cellar leading to a secret underground room large enough to hoard many a smuggled hogshead in the Squires days. The underground passage made an unsuspected exit where the dining room now stands’. The hotel unusually benefitted from a heating system that was not only powered by boilers maintained by The Swindon engine works but were also fired by railway coal. The integration with the railway brought many other benefits according to GWR minutes, including a handed down GWR bus and in 1936 the redundant telephone system from Paddington Station.
The Hotel has played host to many famous visitors, including Herr Ribbentrop, Hitler’s Foreign Secretary who it is understood enjoyed visiting Cornwall, particularly St Ives. Because of this, it has been suggested he wanted to make Tregenna Castle his retirement home. Crown Prince Chichibu of Japan, who played an important part in Japan’s post WW2 reconstruction, also stayed on separate occasions. More recently Tregenna Castle hosted Joe Biden, President of America and his entourage, the United Nations, the Presidents of Australia, South Korea, South Africa and the EU Council for the 2021 G7 Summit held at Carbis Bay.
The Stairwell Lantern with the Stephens Family Coat of Arms
As an established golf resort, Tregenna bravely allowed its golf course to serve as a helipad. Marine One and Two were landed as required but it was the three accompanying V22 Osprey that left burn marks, causing much damage at the time. The downdraft of helicopter blades displaced large quantities of sand from the bunkers that needed replacement after the event. A marquee erected there too, served 6500 meals to contractors and staff during the course of the week. The dignitaries dined in the elegant Trelawney Suite
It is also noteworthy that from 1880-1940 four ships owned by the local Edward Hain Line, latterly P&O, were named Tregenna in homage to this renowned location. Adding to the prestige Tregenna Castle also lent its name to the famous GWR ‘Castle Class ‘locomotive which pulled The Cheltenham Flyer on its world record breaking speed journey on 6th June 1932 achieving a blistering average speed of 81.6 mph.
The Tregenna Castle Hotel continues to this day its tradition of giving back to the community with the support and funding of the Saints Boarders two storey Tregenna Surf Club House this facility provides accessible toilet facilities, board store , club house and cafe located by the Tate St Ives Gallery. As part of the 250 year celebration The Tregenna Castle team are also giving back to the environment by planting 250 trees in the Resort. Tregenna aims to minimise their ecological footprint, preserve natural beauty and enhance bio diversity. James Parker Operations Director said ‘together lets grow a greener future and ensure that Tregenna Castle remains a beacon of sustainability and natural beauty for the next 250 years and beyond.
A celebratory afternoon tea with Richard Long, author of The St Ives Branch Line: A History, is being held at Tregenna Castle on 6th September this year with all proceeds to the St Ives Archive.
The 15th April 2024 marks the 112th anniversary of the most famous shipwreck of all and a chance to look at the fate of St Ives’ Titanic passengers. Of 2,233 on board, 7 were from our town. AGNES DAVIES (née FRIGGENS), her son JOHN and friend MAUDE SINCOCK (née ROBERTS), were among the 705 picked up by RMS Carpathia. As Titanic broke apart and sank, Maude thought the loud noise she heard was the boilers exploding. Agnes tells what happened next:
My older son Joseph (Nicholls) had dressed and he came to the stateroom and put lifebelts on us. Through all this time we had received no warning from the steward, no orders to prepare for anything like what we were to experience. Had it not been for our curiosity to learn what was going on we might have perished. We went on deck about 12.15 and my son (John) and myself were placed in the 3rd lifeboat.
Joseph helped to place us in the boat and asked permission to enter it himself, this being refused with the threat that he would be shot if he attempted to get in. I pleaded with the officers in vain that he be allowed to come with me. There were about 50 in the boat but there was room for more. After we were lowered away and before the boat left the ship some men entered it by sliding down the davit ropes. The men in charge of the boat rowed as hard as they could to get away from the ship. By the time she sank, which was at 1.45, it seemed as if we were miles away, although I could hear the screams, cries and moaning of the drowning passengers.
They spent the night in that lifeboat among the icebergs and when morning came a sailor called out “That’s a ship” as he saw a speck appear on the horizon. The lifeboat rowed toward Carpathia and it was only when she was aboard that Mrs Davies learned that Joseph was among those who perished. Agnes married Richard Henry Nicholls in Penzance in 1886, a union that produced 3 children, one of whom was Joseph Charles. Listed on the 1901 census as a widow, she remarried insurance agent Robert Davies in 1903. John Morgan was their only child.
The St Ives newspaper of 3 May 1912 carried the following letter written by Maude on the Carpathia to her mother in Cornwall:
I am saved but have lost everything. I must however be thankful for my life. I have not a penny and no clothes. I was thrown on board a little boat in my nightdress and boots. I had no stockings on. We were in this little boat in the middle of the ocean for 6 hours. And I was nearly frozen when we were picked up. I shall be a pretty sight when I land.
We were rescued by a passing ship, Carpathia. Titanic struck the iceberg just before midnight and was underwater at about 2 o’clock. There were over 1,000 persons on board when she foundered. Mrs Davies and her son John Morgan (of the Stennack, St Ives) are saved, but we have seen nothing of Joe. We think he is drowned. We have not seen anything of the other ‘boys’ (William Berriman and William Carbines) who left St Ives. We could hear the screams from the men as the Titanic was sinking. I think there are hundreds drowned.
Mrs Davies told me to ask you to send a message to Balnoon to tell her aunt she is saved, but that we don’t know anything about Joe. I don’t know what I shall do when I get to New York. I am frightened to death nearly, and afraid I shall catch my death of cold by the time I get to Hancock. I will write again as soon as possible and tell you more news. I don’t know where they are going to put us when we get to New York.
Your loving daughter,
Maud
She was also known as Maud or Maudie and only stopped making pasties when she was 92, passing away a year later in 1984.
John and his mother settled in Hancock, Michigan. Agnes married an English-born firefighter named Richard Edwards in 1921, dying of cancer in 1933 aged 70. John took his own life aged 48 in December 1951, almost certainly from depression due to his divorce a few weeks earlier, by barbiturate poisoning while working in a Detroit drugs store. He was buried 4 days later in Lakeview Cemetery, Calumet, Houghton, Michigan.
The remaining 4 were travelling to mining work in Michigan.
William Carbines
The only repatriated body was that of WILLIAM CARBINES (19). Willie boarded the Titanic at Southampton as a second-class passenger (ticket number 28424, £13) with his friend William John Berriman and they were planning to join Carbines’ brothers Robert and John in Calumet. His body was among 306 recovered from the sea by the cable repair ship Mackay-Bennett and identified by his 2 brothers. On 10 May it was taken aboard the White Star Line’s Oceanic for transport to Southampton, arriving by train at St Ives on 27 May, met by a long concourse of people on the terrace overlooking the railway. Over 500 mourners paid their respects as he was interred in his grandparents’ (William and Anne Carbines) grave in Barnoon Cemetery on 30 May. A few weeks later his parents suffered further heartache when their youngest child George died on 24 June.
William Carbines’ funeral, 30 May 1912
The body of Agnes’ older son JOSEPH CHARLES NICHOLLS (19) was recovered from the sea on 23 April by the MacKay-Bennett, the first of 4 ‘mortuary’ ships chartered by White Star Line to search for bodies in the aftermath of the disaster. He was buried at sea as identification proved impossible. Possessions removed from the body were taken to Halifax, Nova Scotia and identified as belonging to Joe Nicholls by Carbines’ brothers. There is a memorial to him in the same Calumet Cemetery where his mother Agnes and younger stepbrother John are also buried.
William Carbines’ grave at Barnoon Cemetery
The body of WILLAM JOHN BERRIMAN (23) if recovered, was never identified. He is the only one of the 4 without a permanent memorial. His family suffered more heartbreak in the First World War when his brother Samuel was killed in action on 4 September 1916 while serving in the 8th Battalion of the Devonshire Regiment.
STEPHEN CURNOW JENKIN (32) was born at Nanjivey on The Stennack, emigrating with his elder brother to Houghton County, Michigan in about 1903 where he worked in the copper mining industry. They subsequently became U.S. citizens. He returned to St Ives in the summer of 1911 to visit his family. He was not due to return to the USA on Titanic but coal strikes meant his second-class reservation (ticket number C.A. 33111, £10 10s) was switched. He had misgivings about the new ship and left his valuables, including his watch, with his parents in case anything should happen to him. A postcard he sent from the ship read as follows:
Dear Father and Mother and Sisters. I am sending another photo of the same ship. This is the 3rd one I sent you. This goes from Queenstown and the last one I sent from Cherbourg, the first one from Southampton. They are three different views of the same ship. I am not sick yet. She is a nice ship to ride on. I’ll write from New York next time.
From your loving son,
Stephen.
His body was not found but he is remembered on the family headstone at Barnoon. Messrs Carbines and Nicholls lived at The Stennack. William Berriman lived at Hellesveor.
Stephen Curnow Jenkins’ inscription on the family headstone
In all 12 ‘Cousin Jacks’ were lost in the disaster. Fairview Lawn Cemetery near Halifax, Nova Scotia is the largest single resting place for Titanic victims. See the video below for a video taken at the ‘Titanic Cemetery’.
30 of the 121 graves are unidentified.
Article and video by: Tony Mason
Featured image: RMS Titanic departing Southampton on April 10, 1912(Wikimedia Commons).
