Desert Island Docs

Our staff and invited guests introduce their favourite documents from the Bristol Record Office collections.

Ship's log: Blood for supper

Log book of the trade ship Aid on a voyage to the Mediterranean, 1867 (RefNo. 30182, vessel no. 22100)

Under the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854, the masters (captains) of British merchant ships were required to keep an official log book. During each voyage, the master narrated crew offences and complaints, treatments for illnesses and injuries, deaths, the auctioning of the deceased belongings, and other incidents. Log books can often be found alongside the crew lists that we have for Bristol registered ships covering 1863-1913.

Many of the log books that survive provide fascinating descriptions of sea faring lives. Were maritime workers obedient to their master? Not according to evidence from log books. For example, during this voyage of the “Aid” in August 1867, many of the men either refused to work on the ship whilst it was in port or in the Bristol Channel, or would only work between 6am and 6pm. One of the crew declared that if, as a consequence, anybody struck him, there would be “blood for supper”.  Eventually the master felt he had no choice but to turn back to port.

Selected by Sarah Taylor, Archives Assistant at Bristol Record Office

A festive feast at the Bush Tavern

Bill of fare at J Weeks’s Bush Tavern, Corn Street, Bristol, for Christmas 1790 (RefNo. 14182(HB)/X/28)

John Weeks, landlord of the Bush Tavern, was known as a generous host and the menu for his Christmas table testifies to that.

This vast bill of fare lists almost 140 dishes, mostly fish, fowl and cuts of meat.  These include an entire roasting pig, meat from ten deer and more unusual items such as turtle and reindeer tongue. The list also contains many unfamiliar terms, such as ‘veal burr’ (veal sweetbreads), ‘pork griskin’ (lean pork loin) and ‘stares’ (starlings). 

Items are described in odd quantities – such as '470 minced pies, 13 tarts' – which suggests that the list was printed at short notice, once the foods available for Christmas were known.

The Bush Tavern was for many years Bristol’s leading coaching inn. Weeks was landlord from around 1775 to 1801 and he is commemorated in a memorial tablet in Bristol Cathedral. The tavern was later made famous by Charles Dickens, who used it as a setting in 'The Pickwick Papers' after visiting in 1835.

The inn existed until the mid nineteenth century and the site on Corn Street is now occupied by Lloyd’s Bank.

Selected by Allie Dillon, Senior Archivist (Public Services) at Bristol Record Office

The Temporale: The Mermaid and the Monk

Surviving portions of a medieval temporale (RefNo. DC/A/6/8)

The Temporale, a medieval choir book, is one of the oldest and most beautiful records of Bristol Cathedral. It is now on display at M Shed.

Arranged according to the feasts of the liturgical year, its name comes from the Latin ‘tempora’, meaning ‘over time’ or ‘across seasons’. It contains the words and music used for services. It would have had a companion volume – the 'Sanctorale' – containing music for special services for saints’ days. The monks of St Augustine’s Abbey (now the cathedral) would have gathered on the altar steps to sing in unison from these books. 

The texts are full of wonderful illuminations such as this monk, seen waving his weapon, perhaps a strigil, at the lusty mermaid across the page.

Although incomplete, the Temporale has been lucky to survive.  After the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII, abbey service books were no longer needed. However, parchment was both durable and expensive and markings show that the pages were used to wrap cathedral accounts in the years following 1557.

Astonishingly, the pages were reassembled by Bishop Browne, who bought a bundle of old parchments and discovered the pages some 350 years later. He speculated that ‘the parcels [of accounts] had been tossed out at the burning of the bishop's palace in the [Bristol] riots of 1831 and a few of them … carried off by some chance passer-by as a memento.’

In 2009, the covers were expertly restored and the pages digitised. Mark Lee, Master of the Choristers at Bristol Cathedral, transcribed one of the sequences for the choir to perform, probably for the first time in over 450 years.

Listen to the choir of Bristol Cathedral singing one of the sequences of plainchant from the Temporale (mp3, 0.8 MB).

Selected by Julian Warren, Archivist at Bristol Record Office

The John Horwood book

Papers on the case of John Horwood, bound in his own skin (RefNo. 35893/36/v_i).

One of the most curious items in the Bristol Record Office collection is one of the UK’s few surviving examples of a book bound in human skin.

In 1821 John Horwood, an 18 year old from Hanham, near Bristol, was the first person publicly executed at Bristol’s New Gaol.

He had been convicted of the murder of Eliza Balsum, an older girl with whom he had been infatuated and threatened to kill. Eliza died following a head injury after Horwood threw a stone at her whilst she was out walking.

After his execution, Horwood’s corpse was dissected by surgeon Richard Smith during a public lecture at Bristol Royal Infirmary.

Smith had part of Horwood’s skin tanned to bind a collection of papers about the murder, trial and execution and the subsequent dissection of Horwood's body. The dark brown front cover of the book was embossed with skulls and crossbones, with the words ‘Cutis Vera Johannis Horwood’ (‘the actual skin of John Horwood’) added in gilt letters.

The Horwood book has been held for many years at Bristol Record Office. Over time, it has become too fragile to be handled but it is currently on display at M Shed, the museum of Bristol.

The book has been digitised and can be viewed via the links below.

Please note that as these PDF files contain images of an historical text, they cannot be read using accessibility software.

• The John Horwood book, part 1 (p1-61) (pdf, 9.9 MB)
• The John Horwood book, part 2 (p62-111) (pdf, 7.9 MB)
• The John Horwood book, part 3 (p112-169) (pdf, 9.8 MB)
• The John Horwood book, part 4 (p170-193) (pdf, 5.1 MB)
• The John Horwood book, part 5 (p194-251) (pdf, 8.4 MB)

If you wish to use images from this volume for publication or commercial purposes, please contact us.