Who on earth in Trinity House...?

Hilarious!! At least it was in position. A few years ago we were heading up the Blackwater and could not find it. We stopped off Marconi for the night and I spent some time with binos looking for it. No sign on a clear night.
Next morning the CG local weather broadcast revealed that it was "off station". Turned out to have been sunk!
 
Get your club to fix a visit to them at Harwich and you can ask them. They put on a good show and give you a fascination look round.
 
Could be worse, at least it's the right buoy. They seem to have swapped the Yokesfleet and Potton Creek buoys when they put them in, which is terribly confusing for first time visitors to the Roach anchorages.
 
There is a serious likelihood of that is how some locals call/write it. After all Whistable is the proper spelling and a 'lust' is the correct term for a 'list' (as in leaning over;)
 
Dick - you live in Kent. Probably they spell it right (and speak it right as well). In some other place... all right I mean Essex, you would be surprised then how many don't (but not all).
 
Ah, I thought you meant it was originally spelt without the first 't'. It seems the evidence shows the name developed from 'Witenestaple' mentioned n the Domesday Book although another more recent theory involves the French 'huitre'. Either way, that 't' seems to have a long history.
A local whimsical pronunciation is 'Whitstabubble', can't think why as it's more effort to say it.
 
johnalison said:
Get your club to fix a visit to them at Harwich and you can ask them. They put on a good show and give you a fascination look round.
Click to expand...

Reminds me of the Mike Peyton cartoon:-
Two guys wandering around the TH yard, looking at all the buoys in various state of repair and painting.

One says to the other, "I suppose this is where they magnetise them".
 
Cantata said:
Ah, I thought you meant it was originally spelt without the first 't'. It seems the evidence shows the name developed from 'Witenestaple' mentioned n the Domesday Book although another more recent theory involves the French 'huitre'. Either way, that 't' seems to have a long history.
Click to expand...

There weren't really any 'correct' spellings of place names until surprisingly recently. Places names were variously spelt as the writing was often an imitation of the customary oral name (which probably varied quite a bit, too) It was largely as a result of OS mapping place names were regularised in Britain. While knowing nothing of Whitstable and its history, I can well imagine there were variants with and without Ts.
 
Actually thinking of one long standing local nautical family at Heybridge Basin, they always pronounced Thirslet as 'Thustlet'

Now for some research:

1. Messum 1902 = 'Thistley' (that's when there was a pole and no buoy)
2. Imray 'The Pilot's Guide for the River Thames' = 'Thistley' (Beacon no buoy) (several drying patches dans the middle of the Blackwater!!!
3. Irving 1927 = 'Thirstlet' (No pole, red can buoy - think about that!)
4. Irving 1933 = 'Thirstlet' (Beacon, no buoy!)
5. Imray's 'Guide to the Thames Estuary and Norfolk Broads 1935 = 'Thirslet'
6. Imray chart 1940 = 'Thirslet' (!!!)
7. Imray's 'Guide to the Thames Estuary and Norfolk Broads 1949 = 'Thirslet'
8. Stanford's Coloured Charts for Coastal Navigators and Others 1950 = Thirslet'
9. Jack Coote, East Coast Rivers 1956 = 'Thirstlet' (Beacon, triangular topmark, no buoy)
10. ECR 1957 = Ditto as 9.
11. ECR 1961 = Ditto plus "square posts have been erected on Thirstlet Spit
12. ECR 1965 = Ditto
13. ECR 1967 = Ditto
14. ECR 1970 = Ditto except topmark 'square'
15. ECR 1974 = Ditto
16. ECR 1977 = Ditto
17. ECR 1979 = Ditto
18. ECR 1981 = Ditto
19. ECR 1983 = 'Thirslet' (!!!!!) on the chartlet, 'Thirstlet' in the text.
20. ECR 1985 = Ditto spelling difference, no beacon, now a green buoy;
21. ECR 1985 = Ditto
22. ECR 1988 = Ditto
23. ECR 1989 = Who's borrowed that one? I had it once.
24. ECR 1993 = Ditto
25. ECR (Janet) = Ditto
26. ECR 1998 = As per chartlet and text 'Thirslet' - image of the new buoy 'replaced in 1997' reading 'Thirslet'
27. ECR 2001 = All 'Thirslet'
28. ECR 2003 = Ditto
29 ECP x 4 - all 'Thirslet'

So I make that:

Thirsley = 2
Thirstlet = 16 (straight out)
Bit of Thirslet and Thirstlet = 6
Thirslet = 7

Vote now!

Given that the new edition of the River Blackwater Admiralty Chart is about to be finalised (this week) should it be 'Thirslet' as drafted or 'Thirstlet' as Thirstlet trumps Thirslet ?
Should the thread be canned before litigation from Trinity House closed down the Forum?
Do we attack Jack Coote's reputation of proof reader (after all I have never made a typo ........... honest .......... that statement is true ........ ok, fair enough, I have never caused ONE typo; far more!!)?
Do we attack East Coast Pilot for plagurisim for copying Janet's correct/mistaken spelling (delete the choice according to your preference)?
Or do we celebrate the living, developing, changing language of the current times of our lives?

[SHOUTING] PLEASE NOTE I AM TRYING TO BE COMIC! :encouragement:
 
I agree there are lots of variations of spelling and pronunciation. If you look at old maps you will see lots of examples.

We have a print of a 16th C map of Essex - where I grew up - and Chipping Ongar was Chipping Hangar. Where we live now, Chelmondiston, is shown on earlier maps as simply Chemston! How it acquired it's unnecessary prolongation I have no idea. I expect the old spelling was how the locals then said it? These days they call it Chelmo.
 
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