1954-11-27 — Page 5

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BIRTHDAY-HONOURS

THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER,

GILES

"I've called to see if the boxing gloves we supplied for Prince Charles's birthday wore satisfactory."

London Express Service

7

years under the sea

IN 1939 an under water fisherman lost floor. A short search of the weeds cover his Rolex Oyster in deep water off the ing the rucks disclosed the watch in the cases of Greece. He could see in clearly in.......... same crevice where he hind, lost, seen 11.7. a crevice between two rocke, but could not years, belare: Affer a jule aften jon br reach it.

by a local watch-maker, it kept ás perfept-time În 1946 be returned to Greece, and took........as it had always done. up under-water fishing again; Being lent (a self-contained breathing apparatus, he immediately thought of his long-lost watch. With the aid of the new equip ment he was able to swim down to the sea

What a tribute this story is to the superb accuracy of the Rolex movement! And how well it demonitizes the perfect pro tection given to this movement by the waterproof Oyster case.

WAS THE

WORLD'S STRANGEST STORIES, NO. 15

INSPECTOR-GENERAL

A WOMAN?

S

URGEON JAMES ought to have posted Burry BARRY, holder of off the station after this an Edinburgh de incident, but he did not gree, grow tired of was all "very curious, the social climate of a West Indian military station the Art half of the inst century and took passage to England.

manded to

Nobody seems to know

in

why, Barry

some

years

later.

MICHAEL CANNON throws new light on the remarkable story of Dr James Barry, of the Army Medical Department

In 1859, after 40 years in the Army, Borry retired and took lodgings at 14. Margaret, Street, St Marylebone. There, on July 25, 1885, he died. He was buried at Kensal Green,

And that would have been

challenged Colmel that, but for Charles Dickens.

Clerke, a member of General Basil Brooke's staff. The

Scandal

Two years later Dickens

In an office at Whitehall duel did not take place due Yard the outraged Director- to the good sense of Brooke. General of the Army who declared them to be "A

couple of dam' fools" and printed an article about Barry

it his weekly made them shake hands.

magazine "AÏ The Year Round. Hip anony- Though he continued with mous contributor thinly disguis- acts that, by others, would cd Barry us "Doctor James," bul have

dates and appointments Wett mentioned that efcarly identified that person with the late Inspector-General.

Medical Department de

know what the devil was meant by such u flagrant desertion. Why sir," he support, "are you here in London"

Doctor Barry calmly replied, "I came to get my hair cut."

A performance of that nature could only result in the loss of i

commission

amounted to pro- fessional suficide, the doctor prospered and came to be regarded by contemporaries as something of a mystery,

Nothing Known

But, strangely enough. Nothing was known of Barry was allowed to soldier his antecedents save that he

He became

came from Edinburgh, but Inspector-General of Hospi- it was whispered that his

on

senior

The article startling note.

concluded on

After relating the complaint of a woman called to attend "Dr James" after death--"what do you mean by calling me in to lay out a general, and the corpor woman's?"the author

a

wrote:

--

.......The_Registrar-general.........

tals, only one rank below family was connected by at once called for a report from

#

DR JAMES BARBY: photograph taken nearly M century ago, and now in the historical muscum of the

the top in the Department. marriage with the Somer- the proper authority. The report Royal Army Medlest College,

was that after a post-mortem

Barry,

i1 seemed, did sets,

That would account examination it was found that

verything possible to blight for Lord Charles's tolerance Dr. James. .. was not only a his career. He was insuffer, after the duel at the Cape, woman but had at a very early ably rude to senior officers, and for Barry's subsequent period been a mother.'" peevish, ill-tempered and protection from the wrath One can imagine the alarming often downright insubor of higher authority, for short with which the Command dinate.

another Somerset; Lord er-in-Chier, His Royal Highness Charles's youngest brother, acknowledged the news,

the Duke of York, would have There were, for examples, became Field-Marshal Lord the fuel at Capetown and Raglan-a powerful relation the challenge to Colonel indeed! Shadwell Clerke.

A Duel

There was other cause

Evidence

Millbank.

Canada would have laken in a detour of several thousand miles to the Windward Islands.

As to the information Rogers said Sir William Mackinnon gave him there has never been a baronet namext. Buchan, And his account of the conversation with Mrs Tidy is panatically word for word that told by Lord "Albămarle in hļa miettoirs,

Colonel, Rogers, it would op- pear, was an unreliable reporter. In 1898, only 30 years after Barry's death and 28 after the pppearance of the article in Dickens' magazine, the editor of The Lancet was asked whether There was any Frifia in the Barry story. One would have expected that this mine of in- formation about the medical profession could give a certain answer. Ho couldn't and re- marked. "We have read many allusions....but none in a reliable quarter,"

The Verdict

The Barry entry in the ple- tionary of National Biography is Though the ct of mother highly suspect, for there is no hood scems arguable, there has record anywhere of the report never been any doubt about the. It says was made to the Horse chief factor in Barry's story. It Guards, and record there would is indeed a strange tale which be if one had been made. The has been told as a novel, in bio. D.N.B. also mentions The Time graphical form and in a score or of July 26, 1885 (the, day after so of newspaper articles in the Barry's death) as a gourço present century. It is one that reference, There was no men- is well known to and accepted ion of the doctor in that or any by the Royal Army Medical subsequent issue,.. Corps, which has collections of -Nor was a report ever palled Barry na i

in its historical for by the registrar-general as the article In “All "the" "Year ** Round" declared.

ot

for wonderment. Physically? What pretty kettle of, fish, mu

musqums, Barry was a miserable The rumblings of the Crimea specimen and it seemed re- bad not subsided; Royal To me the story of lamps, markable that he had over quire into the reason why the is quite fantastic, for during my death issued by Registrar Henry Commission was about to in- Barry is not merely strange, It Finally the certificate of Nearly 80 years after the satisfied, the medical board

Army was so unattractive to research into the like of this Dunham, and, marked by Sophia duel Sir William Mackinnon on entry to the Army in young men, the Press and that remarkable person I uncovered Bishop, the nurse or landlady told Lieut.-Colonel Ebenezer 1818. He was short, slight feller Cantwell were bellowing facts that seems to have been present at the death, records Rogers, late of the 3rd West and wide-hipped like a for reform. 11. it became known India Regiment, the cir- woman. High-heeled booty hat Headquarters, which was that James Barry was a male. cumstances as he had heard improved his appearance & order, lind actually allowed in was the Lout Colonel Ebenezer pe

trenuously defending the old

The

thlet authority on Entry I cannot believe that any pressur from Service D- them from Sir Josing Cloote, little, but the fanciful woman to become an Inspector" Rogers Y mentioned before partment would have Induced the other party.

uniforms he devised did not General...Obviously, the whole Rogers wrote a novel about Registrar Dümam to falsify bie in the eyes of fellow officers, thing had to be quietly Interred Barry, who, he said, he met accounts, nor does it strike me It happened in 1818 or The sixth Lord Albemarle and mouths stopped. 1819: Cloete was aide to the met Barry at the Cape and has

aboard a steam or on voyage that Sophia would have re- from Immediately Governor of Cape Colony, left us, in his memoirs, this de scandal was successfully hushed 1807

And so, it would appear, the fron St Thomas to Barbades in trained

spreading the taflo:

Borry Telandy and Barry was assistant ccription of him. "A beardless until 01887; anyway, when surgeon there. One day, the youth with an unmistakably Dickens printed' - ing story vot

Soobch Lype of Governor received a femalo

countenance. "Dr Wümetleme Sache? L

(*1/** The only proof of Barry's reddish hair, high cheekbones. visitor and Burry remarked: There was a certain effeminacy

„Though the Army, was not to

true sex is buried in gravó. No. 19,301 at Konkal Green in his manner which he seemed be drawn into comment on the "Oh, I say, Cloete, that's to be always striving to over- article, enough evidenco was William Mackinnon, Chier of formerly bore the mple stele

He also related that Sir Camatary. The hoodstone, which nice Dutch filly the come.”

produced by officers and others, the Army Medical Department, mont James Barry Inspector who had known Bairy. · to Governor has got hold of!"

cstablish the fact of womanhood informed his 11806 that Gcheral, Army Medical Depart

the salefaction of the elfor. Barry had bear the daughter of meat" is now so eroded as to of the hallowed Dictionary of “Nationalį) Biography.

a

Whereupon the gallant.

pido cried (in fine

Bombastic

melodramatic style), "Re Barry was, there is no doubt, tract your vile expression, a brilliant medical officer, and you infernin tilo cad" and there was a bright side to his

qušer rature. "General" pulled Barry's nose.

Chamberlayno wrote that he stly vegolarián diet,

•They fought with pistols are next day at Wynberg and y Borry limped off, with. 'n wound in the thigh, that he may testily refused to have!

Unreliablemen

Fullérran

... But the D.NBgkid not decopt: the statement that Barry, had Mts", THAY borne by child". La entry begi

BARRY

of the

amont had ·been "B

The Rolex Oyster Perpetual, a meticulously accurate watch Selain movement in pritected by 'the water-||| prej Oyer tax and uljnamnd by the silent "Perpetual “rator" mechanism. The Rolex Red Seal * signifies that the chronometer en wekick it is attacked has been ancarded an Official Timing Certificate by * Swijt Government Testing Stativă,

„where ka kam laže zetu ir y perry #{This li’a truq etsey vaken from a liter", sritton ya Bodex by Mr. D. F. Penan The 'wriginal lifter way de inspected at the office of the Rolex Watch Coupery iðrar du Marthe, Geneva,

ROLEX

landmark in the history of Time measurement

A reflection of

good taste

BORN 1820

STILL GOING

STRONG

Johnnie Walke

WHISKY

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