The lighthouse tree lantern from the original Swallows and Amazons film still exists, and has an unexpected connection to We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea, writes Sophie Neville…

I received an interesting series of emails recently from a stonemason called Philip Chatfield:

“Hi Sophie, I was watching Swallows and Amazons, the old classic, on Talking Pictures TV… great channel. Curiously, I have, hanging in my cottage ceiling timbers, the lantern you used for the Lighthouse on Wild Cat Island !!!!!!”

“Lanterns like this pattern are not common, so I presume it must be the one used in your film. I like to think so. There is a hole in the top of my lantern which has been plugged up and holes in the base too. If you use the lantern with candles, which is what I always do. then you cannot have a hole in the top of the lantern. Heat goes up and out of it and the rope or wooden handle may catch fire! It is stopped up with a small bolt with a flat rounded top.”

The holes would have been made to insert an electric light behind the candle so that it would show up on film.

It certainly looks like the lantern we used, which I knew well at the time. A hurricane lamp is used in the book Swallows and Amazons. John, ‘tied the other end round the oil box at the bottom of the lantern’, although candle lanterns were used to mark the Secret Harbour.

It was packed into Swallow on the voyage to the island, visible when the Walker children narrowly miss the Tern. You can see it lying in the shallow basket.

It was rather uncomfortable to lean over when handing Roger the telescope.

The basket was taken out of Swallow at the landing place and Titty moves it up the beach ‘for fear of tidal waves.’ See if you can take some screen shots of it hanging from the lighthouse tree.

The same lantern was used in the movie Far From the Madding Crowd (1967) starring Alan Bates, Peter Finch, Terence Stamp and Julie Christie.

You can also see it hanging from a farm cart.

Philip says, “Clearly all the props went back to the Turk Phoenix shed near Teddington after shooting.”

“I never thought about it before but I used to work on a sailing ship called Grand Turk, which was owned by Mile Turk of Turk Phoenix who did a lot of film work.”

“The Grand Turk played the HMS Indefatigable in Hornblower with Ioan Griffiths and co. While I was on board (as Third Mate and Gun Captain) I needed more props for the gunnery dept. The lantern was one of the props we had on board. It came from Turk Phoenix which still had one of the boats used in your wonderful film.”

“Mike Turk’s business provided nautical props.” When Mike reached the end of his life and fell ill, many of these were sold at auction in 2010, including the dinghy that played Swallow in Swallows and Amazons (1974), which was purchased by group of film fans now known as Sail Ransome.

“Before my time on Grand Turk I spent five years working on a lovely old square rig ship called Maria Asumpta. Back in 1991 we sailed from London’s St Katherine’s Dock to Ipswich. We anchored off Shotley on the Orwell pretty much where the Goblin in Ransome’s book We Didn’t Mean To Go to Sea book was set. As we hauled up our anchor we brought up a small kedge anchor. I still have it. At the time I was convinced it may have been from the story or even the sailing trip the story was originally based on. Who knows, but it is a lovely anecdote.  We had sailed the autumn before to Flushing in Holland and did a tour of the inland waters of Holland.”

“Sadly, Maria Asumpta was lost off Padstow in May 1995 with the loss of three crew. Thankfully I was one of the survivors… The ship had been built in Barcelona and launched in 1858. By the 1990’s it was the oldest square rigger still sailing.” A true shipwrecked sailor! What would Titty say?

“As a stone carver and sculptor I make memorials. A few years ago I was asked to do the memorial for one of my old school teachers and eventually his wife, who now shares his grave in Monmouth. She was Helen Bucknall but her mother was Mrs Henry Clay. The Ransome book  We Didn’t Mean To Go To Sea is dedicated to Mrs Henry Clay no less. Henry Clay was a friend and colleague of Ransome’s on the Manchester Guardian, also a keen sailor. I think Helen and her family were the inspiration for the story in the book. So Helen has a carving of the yacht they sailed as children on the large Welsh slate memorial in Monmouth cemetery.”

“The galling thing for my friends, whose mother was Helen, is that they can’t find the original first edition of We Didn’t Mean To Go To Sea that Ransome signed. Hope it turns up. At least that charming card exists. Love his little sketch of the dinghy.”

“Anyway, hope this is of interest… well done for all you do. I have a hard copy of the book on order! Can’t wait. Very best wishes, Philip Chatfield.”

To read more about some of the Swallows and Amazons movie memorabilia, including Swallow’s flag and the fishing rods, please click here.

You can read more about The Secrets of Swallows and Amazons (1974) here.

You can also buy my book about The Making of Swallows and Amazons and Arthur Ransome’s We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea from the Nancy Blackett Shop, proceeds from which go towards supporting the work of the Nancy Blackett Trust.

The original version of this story was published by Sophie Neville in October 2021.