2-970-187 - /Heritage Images

The Peace Commemoration at Plymouth - Rockets and General Illumination of the Fleet in the Sound - from a sketch by H. A. Luscombe, 1856. Celebrating the end of the Crimean War: '...it was determined that there should be a public display of fireworks on the Plymouth Hoe... there could not have been less than 60,000 or 70,000 persons present...the whole of the ships and gun-boats in the Sound and harbour were lighted up as if by magic, and the effect was of the most gorgeous description...The portholes were all lighted up, and blue lights were burnt at the fore, main, and cross jack yard-arms...there was a simultaneous discharge of hundreds of rockets from all the vessels...The display of fireworks was by Mr. Lane - a very clever local pyrotechnist...[the display] terminated with a grand discharge of shells, roman candles, and a flight of one hundred rockets at one instant'. From "Illustrated London News", 1856.