NOTES & QUERIES

In 1872 Henry Willis installed a 4-manual tracker and pneumatic lever organ in St. Peter, Blackburn. The local story goes that a sea-captain member of the congregation transported and presented the timber for the Pedal 32'. Unusually for Willis, the 8' flutes on all the manuals but Solo were stopped diapasons;
the second 4' on the Great was a viola; the Swell and Great double flues were open diapasons.

Great 16.8.8.8.8.4.4.2.IV.16.8.4.
Swell 16.8.8.8.4.4.Piccolo. Vox H. 16.8.8.4.
Choir 8.8.8.4.2.8.
Solo 8.4.8.8. Grand Ophicleide.
Pedal 32.16.16.8.16.8.

   In 1974 the organ became redundant and was purchased by Mr. A.Freeman of Thame, transported by him in his farm vehicles (the 32' being sawn into manageable sections) and re-erected in a stone barn. By January 1976 it was complete and in playing order. A few days later a heavy storm removed the roof of the barn over the farm house into an adjacent field, and blew the organ to chaos, the stone walls also beginning to fall in on what was left of it.
   Reinstatement was planned to such a degree as seemed possible, but the tragic death of the owner a few weeks later precluded this, and the saleable remains were disposed of, much only fit for scrap. So perished another noteworthy organ.
   Most interesting of what I was shown by the organ builder concerned were the pipes of the Pedal Bourdon, which were of open wood, tapering outward - in fact, a Portunal. Hill put a Portunal 8' into Bolton Parish Church - I do not know whether it has survived - and the stop is rare in this country. A Pedal Portunal 16' must be almost unique, as also must be the Pedal Keraulophon '16' installed at about the same time in an organ by Hill, whose locality at the moment escapes me.
   Hill but rarely made use of the name Keraulophon anway, so far as I know. It was a Gray & Davison speciality, first appearing as 'Corno Dulciana' in the 1843 'Model Organ on the German plan' which ultimately went to St. Paul, Knightsbridge. Its origin is attributed to a workman in the factory who was carrying a pipe and caught it on a nail ! The resulting hole produced a horny element in the tone. This unlikely fairy story says that the workman's name was William Horn, and the stop was named after him, as 'keras' in Greek means 'horn'.
   Well, believe it if you like. But the name clearly comes from the tone; and William Horn's name does not appear in the surviving list of men working for the firm. I have a suspicion that it may perhaps be a tribal-memory-mutation of quite another W.H.
   It was some years earlier that William Hill specified a 'Holed Flute' for a proposed Echo Organ for Birmingham Town Hall. This was an invention of his, an open metal flute - not wood (1) - stop with holes pierced near the tops of the pipes. It was used in Hill organs and became known as 'Hohl Flute' by confusion with the thick-toned stop of German origin. Hill's stop was the antithesis of this, being light, bright, and chirpy. I found one in a country church some years ago, and my companion and I could scarcely tear ourselves away! One day I may be able to go again and examine the pipes. Davison was Hill's partner around then, and perhaps carried the idea away with him. It would not be the only William Hill invention to turn up elsewhere, in one case, in somebody else's patent specification.
   John Norman's authoritative information (2) about the Eton Spitzflute is welcome ammunition, for the claim for a group of Smith stops there continually crops up and my denials are rarely happily received ! In the England organ which Hackney lost in the Blitz, the most ancient-sounding stop was a modern Speechly; and recently I found in an early nineteenth century barrel-and-finger organ a delightful old-English-toned 4' flute which on investigation proved to have new pipes stamped 'H. N. & B.'
Stephen Bicknell suggests that the idea of the King's Lynn 'German Flute' as being of stopped harmonic pipes is improbable and due to the suggestions of modern writers (3). But E.J.Hopkins possessed a MS account of the Lynn organ written about 1812, wherein the stop "still remaining intact" was described as "a small-scaled metal covered stop with chimney and arched upper lip sounding its octave" (sic). Scale 13" at middle c, its lowest note. It still survives, and no doubt could be examined. Norman & Beard, who looked after it at one time, copied the stop as 'Harmonic Gedact' for St. Catharine's College, Cambridge, but I do not think it survived the Harrison rebuild in 1936. Were not such stops described in Praetorius ? The modern Zauberflute derives from Thynne's work.
   The Hopkins account, from a notebook whose whereabouts are now unknown, also tells us that the Lynn Great Cornet was originally 9 ranks. Somewhere amongst my papers as yet unpacked there is a rubbing of its upperboard made about a century ago.
   Courcelle was enquired about a few years ago (4). This week I made a pilgrimage to Even lode, inspired by information from R.J.Moseley, and found a small organ bearing the nameplate 'John Courcelle, 7, Salisbury Place, New Road, Marylebone, London. Inventor of the Courcellina stop'. There was one to sample - a rich, semi-geigen sound. Are other organs of his extant in Britain ? I know there are some in Australia.
   Henry Willis' name is associated with Scudamore organs, but the concept of the Reverend John Baron (5) was originally brought to fruition by Nelson Hall of Warminster in his workshop in an outbuilding of the Rectory at Upton Scudamore. An instrument bearing his name and the date 1860 used to be at North Leigh but has now disappeared; there is (was ?) one in St. Denys, Warminster; one near Chepstow is rumoured (Tidenham ?). Information sought as to any bearing his label.
   Finningley (6) - the Rector's diary, in the family's possession, says that he "called on the organ-builder Hill about our organ", which may help to find whence came the England (?) organ, installed by Brown of York who was Hill's agent, rebuilt by Meacock, and replaced in 1906; it was the gift of the Rector, the Reverend G.H.Woodhouse, in 1836, and particulars about it are desired by the family.
   Other enquiries: Kimbolton Moravian (Cambs); organ, with case, out of use - builder and history ? Terrington, St. Clement; west gallery organ with effec-tive gothic case, which preceded the present Rest Cartwright: C.H. Shepherd of Newcastle, and the organ at St. Paul, Newcastle - date unspecified, but church consecrated 1846: Joseph Hill of the Minories, 1704; any connection with later Hills ? Goddard of Newport (which ?) 1853: Jonathan Austin of Poddington c.1866: Swis 3 Cottage Organ Works, Jardin Street, Camberwell; and W.A.Bezzant of Leamington, both about 1890: Dulsanell around 1900. I'm afraid all these defeat me, except the last. Dulsanells were not organ builders, but music dealers acting as Scottish agents for Walcker who imported a number of instru- ments at that period. Finally, St. Mary, Steelhouse Lane, Birmingham, an octagonal church, had an old organ with chayre case, about which information is sought.

(1) The Organ XXXVI, p.145
(2) Reporter VII 2, p.10
(3) vii 2, p.7
(4) i4
(5) Scudamore Organs John Baron Bell & Daldy 1862 (2nd edition)
(6) vi 1

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