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Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee Celebrations on the New Ground in 1887. Photograph courtesy Dartmouth Photographs.com


Above: 1887 Jubilee fountain, Royal Avenue Gardens, modified and moved in 1903 and 2012 Below: 2012 Diamond Jubilee fountain, Royal Avenue Gardens


Bayards Cove, offering only five beds instead of ten. It eventually moved to larger purpose-built premises on the Embankment in 1894. On the New Ground, trees were planted and rockeries built with seats, the beginnings of what later became the Royal Avenue Gardens. Sir Henry Paul Seale donated a drinking fountain, though it remained unconnected with the water supply. In 1903 it was modified as an ornamental fountain and relocated at the entrance. The first ever Diamond Jubilee


marked Queen Victoria’s 60th anniversary in 1897. In Dartmouth, ambitious proposals to build “Corporation Homes” for the “aged poor” proved too controversial to succeed. But money was raised to clear the debt for the Cottage Hospital’s new building, and the New Road was renamed “Victoria Road” in the Queen’s honour, a lasting memorial. Both Victorian Jubilees involved


the town’s children. In 1897, for example, they assembled in the town’s nine different Sunday Schools (the “unattached” met at the Board School). Each received a souvenir medal to wear in the


official procession around the town, and was rewarded with a threepenny bit and a bun: “The hundreds of prettily dressed children carried banners and flags of all descriptions, and their happy and expectant faces lent additional gaiety to the scene” (Dartmouth Chronicle 25 June 1897). 1935 saw another new invention,


George V’s Silver Jubilee, marking 25 years of his reign. Dartmouth felt a close association with the King as he and three of his sons had been naval officer cadets. Seven large committees organised a week of events – sports, teas, a concert, a river trip, alfresco dances and a formal ball. Children were again given souvenir medals. Jubilee Day on 6 May began at 11am when people gathered in the Royal Avenue Gardens to hear a live radio broadcast of the national Thanksgiving Service in St Paul’s Cathedral. Extensive electrical illuminations all week featured the War Memorial, respectfully lit in “clear lighting”, and the Victorian fountain in colour. The Royal Naval College was floodlit for the first time. The present Queen’s Silver


Jubilee in June 1977 was inspired by that of 1935. The late 1970s were difficult times, but Dartmouth organised three days of official events, and many people held their own street parties. Council housing for the elderly had long ceased to be controversial and Jubilee Close in Townstal was completed in December, “the biggest single housing project Dartmouth has seen” (Dartmouth Chronicle). The newspaper presciently discussed future Jubilees: “The Queen is still young enough for us to anticipate the next 25 [years]. Shall we, in time, be talking (as they did of Victoria) about 60 glorious years?” Indeed, the Golden Jubilee


followed in 2002 and the Diamond Jubilee in 2012. By 2012, the 1887 Jubilee fountain was in bad


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