A postally unused Frith's Series postcard. The divided back of the card has been stamped with the following:
"M.F. Proctor. 1 Aug. 1922'
The Benedictine Abbey in Shrewsbury
The Benedictine Abbey in Shrewsbury was founded in 1083. However in 1836, Thomas Telford cut the London to Holyhead Road through the Abbey and destroyed most of the monastic buildings.
The jewel in the crown of the remains of the Abbey is the Refectory Pulpit, built around 1300. It is located in the Abbey Foregate.
It is a minor architectural masterpiece, and Sir Nikolaus Pevsner went into raptures describing its ogee arches, crockets and lancet arches.
It is likely that Brother Cadafel stood at the pulpit in order to lecture the novices.
The Balfour Note
So what else happened on the day that the card was stamped?
Well, on Tuesday the 1st. August 1922, Great Britain published the Balfour Note.
This declared that Great Britain would give up reparations claims as well as claims on other Allies to the extent that the United States would do the same with respect to Britain's debts.
The Balfour Note was met with great anger by the Americans because it portrayed them as greedy, and it became an obstacle to international recovery.
The Auch Train Crash
Also on that day, 40 people were killed and 50 injured when two trains carrying pilgrims to Lourdes collided near Auch.
In all, almost 500 passengers were on the two trains, both of which were climbing uphill to Tarbes and Lourdes.
According to the investigation:
"The first train was too heavily laden and unable to climb a sharp gradient, and the driver decided to return to Agen and ran down the hill backward without regard to the second train."
Pilgrims don't seem to have a lot of luck where train travel is concerned:
-- On the 6th. October 1972, near Saltillo, Mexico, a train carrying religious pilgrims derailed and caught fire, killing 204 and injuring over 1,000.
-- On the 15th. January 1989, at Maizdi Khan, Bangladesh, a train carrying Muslim pilgrims crashed head-on with a mail train, killing at least 110 people and injuring as many as 1,000. Many people were riding on the roof of the trains and between the cars.
-- On the 24th. July 2013, just outside of Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain, a passenger train carrying pilgrims derailed and crashed. At least 78 people were killed, and dozens more were injured.
-- On the 19th. August 2013, at Bihar, India, 37 Hindu pilgrims were killed while crossing the tracks near a remote station in eastern India when an express train crashed into them. After the crash, surviving pilgrims dragged out the train's driver and beat him to death. The crowd also set the train on fire.
-- On the 31st. October 2019, 73 people were killed and 48 others injured when a fire completely destroyed three coaches of a train travelling near the town of Liaquatpur in Pakistan. The dead and injured were mainly pilgrims from the Bismillah Mosque, on their way to a religious festival near Lahore. The fire started when a gas canister was used to cook breakfast on the heavily overcrowded train.
Travelling by boat is also not without its risks for pilgrims. On the 25th. November 1908, a fire broke out on the SS Sardinia as she was leaving Malta's Grand Harbour, resulting in the ship's grounding and the deaths of at least 118 people.
The ship was carrying Moroccan pilgrims on their way to Mecca. It is believed that a cooking fire on deck accidentally ignited nitrate in one of the ship's cargo holds, resulting in a number of explosions and causing the ship to run aground.
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