Gatherings    

         

                                        2010                 Worcester, UK, June 26th

                                                                    Milton, Ontario, Canada, September 17th

                                                                                                 

                                             

Society members and guests are able to attend gatherings held annually in the UK and also in North America. Where possible these take place at venues which have specific relevance to Henty or his writings. The 2005 UK gathering was held at the Royal Naval Dockyard at Portsmouth. Delegates visited the Naval Library where the librarians displayed  publications of Henty’s period and afterwards a visit made to HMS Warrior. Henty was a skilled yachtsman and knew the Solent well. He also served as a Captain in the Purveyors Department of the British Army at Portsea. The gathering in 2007 was held at Cambridge and coincided with the 30th anniversary of the Society and the 175th anniversary of Henty's birth. While at Gonville & Caius College Henty rowed in the College boat and the single and double sculls (1852 to 1854) so members retraced the route of the boat races down the river Cam in a riverboat. In 2008 the gathering took place at Duxford, Europe's premier aviation museum following the military bookfair. The 2009 UK gathering took place at Ashwell, Hertfordshire and in 2010 the society meets at Worcester University on June 26th. At Worcester members are able to see a comprehensive Henty collection originally assembled by the distinguished founder member of the Society, the Reverend Basil Brown, and presented to the University of Worcester in 2005.

In 2004 Members of the Society visited Oxford and at the Bodleian Library were shown examples of the rarest of Henty titles. Previously in 2002 the centenary of Henty’s death had been commemorated at Weymouth, most appropriately, as he had died there aboard his ocean going yacht ‘Egret’ on 16th November 1902. The twelve surviving members from the founding year of the Society contributed short articles to a commemorative booklet, and limited edition souvenirs were available to members attending. To celebrate the publication of G A Henty (1832-1902) A Bibliographical Study the culmination of many years work by one of those founding members, Peter Newbolt, a gathering was held in Cambridge where Henty had been an undergraduate at Gonville and Caius College. The Henty Arms at Ferring in West Sussex, the locality of Henty’s father’s family, was a further venue for a gathering.

In 1983 a successful series of North American gatherings was begun centred at Varna, Ontario in Canada. In 2000 and 2005 the North American gatherings were held at Springvale, Maine, in 2001 at Charleston in South Carolina and in 2006 at Lethbridge, Canada. In 2009 the North American gathering took place at Springvale, Maine, at the kind invitation of Harland Eastman and in 2010 it will be in Canada.

Information regarding gatherings is available only to members.