29 April 2024

By Chris Morrell

Chris Morrell M.B.E., rowing coach at The Windsor Boys’ School, tells the story of his father, Charles Morrell Morell, and his exploits during the two World Wars and his rowing life as a member of Thames Rowing Club. Chris Morrell presented a splendid silver rose bowl, The Island Challenge Cup, for student women’s eight as an equivalent to The Temple Challenge Cup, for student men’s eight, to Henley Royal Regatta. The trophy was first competed for at the regatta in 2021.

The bowl is more than one hundred years old and was presented to my father, Charles Morrell Morrell, in May 1917 by colleagues and friends at the British Legation, in recognition of an act of bravery when he rescued a young man from drowning in rough seas off the pier at Scheveningen, the beach resort of The Hague. An account of the rescue was printed on 26th May 1917 in the Morning Post, London. It reads:

LIEUT. MORRELL’S MORRELL’S EXPLOIT

From a letter written by a British officer interned in Holland we extract the following account of the recent exploit of Lieutenant Morrell, of the Munsters (attached R.F.C.) in saving a drowning man.
Sunday was a day which I shall not forget in a hurry, not for my sake but for Morrell’s, who performed an act of bravery which won the admiration of all. We were walking on the pier and were attracted to the side by a sudden rush of people, whose attention was attracted by some object in the sea. When I got to the edge of the pier I saw a man in the water, obviously drowning, and after about a minute’s interval somebody jumped in to save him quite a distance away from me. The sea was particularly rough, and the rescuer had great difficulty in holding the man, but finally managed to drag him ashore amidst the cheers of thousands of people.
I then heard somebody at my side say that it was an English interned officer that had jumped into the water to save the drowning man, so I immediately rushed down on to the sands and pushed my way through the crowds, and thus saw Morrell, practically exhausted, surrounded by soldiers. I took charge of him, and half led and half carried him on to the front, and with the help of some friends put him in a carriage, but as there was no coachman near I decided to drive the cab myself. The coachman caught us up on the way. We then gave Morrell a bath, and he soon recovered.
Naturally he is now the hero of the day and will assuredly get both an English and a Dutch life-saving medal, which he thoroughly deserves, as the height of the pier cannot be less than 40 ft., and Morrell had all his clothes on except boots, and had a strong current against him and a high sea. The papers have been full of the incident, and the house is inundated with telegrams and letters of congratulations.

Charles Vollhardt was born on the 30th of May 1889 and was christened with Morrell as his middle name to recognise the marriage of his widowed grandmother to a William Morrell six weeks before he was born. He went to Emanuel School at the turn of the century, not a rowing establishment in those days, but was introduced to the sport by his father’s involvement in the Royal Savoy Club. This club was based at Putney and was for the pupils and alumni, the Old Savoyards, of Her Majesty’s School of the Chapel Royal. In 1912, he became a life-long member of Thames Rowing Club. In September 1914, with the impending conflict looming, the family understandably changed their surname to Morrell. Thereafter he was known as Charles Morrell Morrell, informally to his friends as “Chas”.

Whilst working for the Daimler Motor Company after leaving school in 1906 Vollhardt volunteered with the Artists Rifles, part of the 1908 Territorial Force, and spent several years on summer training camps. In September 1914, he was commissioned into the Royal Munster Fusiliers before being seconded to 8 Squadron of the Royal Flying Corps as an observer.

In April 1915, the squadron was sent to St. Omer in northern France as a long-range observation unit. On 5th June, whilst on a mission over Ypres, engine trouble made a return to base impossible and Morrell with his pilot, Ernest Hodgson, managed to cross the Dutch border into internment. Initially held at “Timbertown” in Groningen, they were sent to Fort Wierickerschans near Gouda. After much deliberation by the British War Office, the interned officers were eventually allowed to give their parole and live freely within the local community, reporting weekly to the Dutch authorities.

Apart from learning to speak Dutch fluently, Charles joined Roeivereniging (RV) De Laak, the local rowing club in The Hague where he was living. He competed for the club at local regattas on many occasions and also took part in the 1916 Rondvaart with three club colleagues. This was an opportunity to row along the canals, rivers and lakes of Holland in a sailing/rowing skiff, collecting pennants from the many towns and villages visited. During 1916, 1917 and 1918 he religiously kept a diary in which he described in brief detail his life in Holland including this rowing tour.

In November 1918, whilst working in the commercial section of the British Legation in The Hague, he was asked by Lady Susan Townley, wife of the British Minster, to drive her to Maarn to witness the arrival of Kaiser Wilhelm in to exile. According to his diary entry, he stood within three feet of the Kaiser, “… a marvellous experience!” He then drove Lady Susan, accompanied by a lady companion and Rupert Mitford, into Belgium as the German army retreated, arriving in Brussels to be present when King Albert of the Belgians returned in triumph amid scenes “…of frenzied joy!”

Returning to London in 1919, Charles resumed his rowing career with Thames, competing for the club at Henley in the Thames Challenge Cup in 1920, as bow in the 1921 “old men’s eight” in the Grand Challenge Cup and the Thames Challenge Cup again in 1924. In the Grand crew were Julius Beresford (“Berry”) at stroke and Karl Vernon (“Bean”), both veterans from the Olympic silver medal in the coxed four in the 1912 Olympics.

In 1919, he had obtained employment as General Secretary to the British Chamber of Commerce for the Netherlands East Indies, which involved extensive travel in the far-eastern Dutch colonies. Despite these frequent absences abroad, he was asked in 1928 to be the British rowing team manager in the Amsterdam Olympic Games where the GB coxless four triumphed and the eight pushed the USA crew closely to earn a silver medal. Following this Charles was asked to be the England rowing team manager at the first British Empire Games (the forerunner of the Commonwealth Games) in Hamilton, Ontario 1930. Overseas commitments in 1932 would have precluded his involvement in the Los Angeles Games.

Charles was again involved as team manager at the Berlin Games in 1936, probably in rowing terms best remembered now for “The Boys in the Boat” triumph. The final two events in the regatta were the eight and the double sculls – Germany had already triumphed in the previous five, confirming no doubt in Hitler’s mind the superiority of the Aryan race! The British double sculling crew of Jack Beresford and Dick Southwood, both Thames RC, had comfortably qualified for the final through the repechâge round, having lost to the German double in the first round. Beresford’s son John describes how the starter, standing behind the start pontoons, had his view of the crews obscured by the large megaphone. Using this to their advantage the German crew of Willi Kaidel and Joachim Pirsch had been ‘jumping’ the start, going on the first “p” of prêt!

Despite this, the German crew established an early lead which the British crew gradually reduced, drawing level at 1800 metres where a massive surge left the demoralised Germans more than two lengths behind at the finish line. Apparently, Hitler was so enraged by this massive setback to his ideology that he stormed out of the stadium! A postage stamp had already been issued in anticipation of a German triumph.

In his report of the Berlin Games in the Java Gazette, Charles Morrell commented “Beresford and Southwood’s (Thames RC) glorious victory in the Double Sculls is a classic example of what can be achieved by a British crew intensively trained only for the Games. They had been together for about ten months and were probably fitter and tougher than any other competitor in the Olympic regatta, in spite of the fact that their respective ages are thirty-seven and thirty.”

As a sequel to this Olympic triumph, an invitation double sculls event was included in the Henley Centenary programme of 1939. In the final was the crew of Beresford and Southwood, now aged 39 and 33, against the reigning European champions G. Scherli and E. Broschi of Trieste. The outcome was a dead heat. With both exhausted crews slumped in the boat tents, Beresford strolled over to the Italians and casually suggested a re-row in half an hour, which was politely declined! In the first Henley Regatta after the war in 1946, The Double Sculls Challenge Cup was included in the HRR racing programme.

During the Second World War, Charles Morrell, at the age of 50, was commissioned into the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, initially as assistant to the Naval Attaché in The Hague, Admiral Dickens, narrowly avoiding capture by the invading Germans in May 1941. He worked with Dickens on two further occasions, firstly with the Principal Naval Liaison Officer looking after the welfare of allied navies fighting alongside the Royal Navy and then on the staff of the Flag Officer Holland in 1945. In that role he was one of the first allied officers into Holland as the Germans retreated, almost a repeat of his November 1918 experience.

After the war in 1949, Charles was leading a Thames RC trip to Belgium when the usual meticulous travel arrangements encountered a problem – there were no seats reserved on the train. Whilst berating the Belgian railway official in the local vernacular, his voice was recognised by one the local passengers from his wartime radio broadcasts, when he sent messages of hope and support to the beleaguered inhabitants of the occupied Low Countries. A carriage was cleared for the Thames rowers!

Charles Morrell Morrell unexpectedly died on 13th December 1949 whilst on a business trip in Amsterdam.

The above is a very brief resumé of the life of Charles Morrell Morrell. Two books are available which give a more detailed account of his life, A Life Well Lived – Charles Morrell Morrell, and The Ready Pen of Charles Morrell Morrell. The latter is a collection of, inter alia, descriptions (an early Lonely Planet guide?!) of his travels whilst on business in the Netherlands East Indies between the two wars – Java, Sumatra, Bali, Borneo and the Celebes – an extensive history of the East Indies, rowing reminiscences, and articles on early commercial aviation and Rudyard Kipling.

Enquiries about these books can be made to Chris Morrell at ccjmorrell – at – gmail – dot – com