Basingstoke’s wealth of Mayoral regalia and historical artefacts is receiving long-deserved attention from current incumbent Cllr Brian Gurden.
The £380,000 collection - re-valued this year by Cllr Gurden - has grown this month with the addition of a silver salver dating back more than a century. The salver was presented to former Mayor Henry Jackson, in 1901 at the end of his service and was handed over to the borough by his great-grandchildren last Thursday.
Cllr Gurden has a keen interest in Basingstoke history, and has taken time in his mayoral year to add to the collection and set up new displays in the civic offices.
“I went down into the store room and no other mayor had been there for years,” he said. “There were old pieces dating back to when this building was built.” Among the pieces were maps and documents from the 1780s. “They show how in those days this was the parish of Basingstoke, and was mostly open fields and woods,” Cllr Gurden explained.
The Mayor’s endeavours have dug up secrets kept for centuries.
“One of the maces is from the 17th century,” he said. “It turns out that some dubious member of authority had stolen a silver part from the mace, and replaced it with an iron one. When we were valuing it the man just pulled out a magnet.”
The collection’s latest treasure, the silver salver, had been presented to Mayor Henry Jackson at the end of his 1900-1901 mayoral year.
Mayor Jackson’s great-grandchildren, Yvonne Bax and John Musselwhite, came to the Mayor’s Parlour Room to hand it over. Yvonne, who turns 90 this year and lives in the Chilterns, had kept the salver for 22 years.
“Before that my mother used to keep it at the back of the sideboard and take it out on special occasions,” she said.
Mayor Henry Jackson’s parents were shop keepers, and six of their ten children became mayors in different parts of the country. “We were only kids, but I remember when Basingstoke got a new fire engine and he went down to the ceremony and named it Yvonne,” said John.
Despite the memories that the salver holds, the two are happy to hand over their family heirloom. “I’m very pleased that it should come back to where it belongs,” Yvonne said.
