Easter 1916 - the harmonium

Easter is coming. For Tubby, this was always a highlight. He was able to brighten Holy Week and Easter in 1916 musically thanks to the visit of a wonderful musician.

In January 1916, major Edmund Street came to Talbot House with a gift. He brings with him a portable harmonium. This allows Tubby to take it with him to the concert hall, as well as to field hospitals and dressing stations.

During Holy Week 1916, Tubby manages to get Godfrey Gardner, an organist with the Royal Philharmonic Society and lieutenant with the Suffolk Regiment, to stay at Talbot House for a week. Tubby describes in his letters how Gardner ‘divinely played the little groan box’.

After the last morning service on Easter 1916, Gardner and Tubby were invited by a colonel to lunch in his quarters a few miles away. They also visited a Battery there, although this was not so simple. Indeed, a German plane had spotted the harmonium as a suspicious object, forcing Tubby and company to take shelter.

This is not the only time the harmonium caught the eye of the Germans. Several times, this strange object was noticed by them and used as a target. Fortunately, the damaged harmonium could always be mended.

After the war, the English took the little harmoniun with them. Thus, via various detours, it ended up in Germany, England and finally, in 1930, back in Talbot House, where it can still be found today.