Jersey: Secrets of the Sea is the panoramic story of an Island forged by the seas, set at the crossroads of maritime history, and told through the voices of the Jersey seafarers who made it. T.B. Davis was one of them. He cheated death, crossed continents, won a fortune and walked with kings. Yet he was unable to save his own flesh and blood. This Memorial Hall is the poignant epitaph for his lost son.
Silence the guns. Turn back the clock. Let us journey to this place as it stood before, at the height of the Victorian age. In those distant days, this Memorial Hall was a billiard room, set in the lush grounds of a mansion, nestled behind a great wall.
An intruder is breaking in. He is a poor and ragged child, climbing down over the wall. His feet touch the ground. He is in the garden. The boy is dead set on nothing more than pilfering an armful of chestnuts, but the events that unfold this afternoon will echo down the pages of history. The boy is coming closer now, turning as if to speak. His name is Tom – and this is his story. Paul Darroch will be sharing it with you today.
Paul Darroch was born in Surrey and lives in Jersey. He graduated with a First in Modern History from St Hugh’s College, Oxford, where he was a Centenary Scholar. In 2000, he won the silver Shell Economist Writing Prize. Paul’s first book Jersey: The Hidden Histories was published by Seaflower Books in 2015, and the sequel Jersey: Secrets of the Sea followed in 2019. He seeks to write immersive history – bringing the past to life through the imagined stories of those who witnessed it.
