3-028-600 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Procession of Boats at Cambridge - "Three Cheers for the Cambridge Eight", 1870. 'The annual competition, which occupies a whole week of the May Term, takes place between all the college boats on the Cam, for the honour of leading their procession...There are three divisions of boats, the first and second consisting each of fifteen, and the last of ten boats; but only those of the first and second divisions engage in this contest...The boats of the first division are all outriggers. They do not attempt to pass each other, the river being too narrow, but each boat tries to bump the one before it, when it is deemed a conqueror, and entitled to take the place of the boat which it has bumped. These races attracted crowds of spectators every evening to Grassy Point and the meadows on the banks of Long Reach...The leading boat, First Trinity, 1, was honoured with the customary triumph, of which we give an Illustration. Its crew is composed of Messrs. A. Morley, F. S. Gwatkins, C. R. Leighton, C. S. Read, H. J. Lomax, G. R. Rives, A. Barratt, and J. B. Close (stroke), with H. E. Gordon, coxswain. The University authorities propose to forbid the use of outriggers or narrow boats above Newnham, because of the danger in that part of the river'. From "Illustrated London News", 1870.