Report Summer 2016
The Duke of Lancaster’s Own Yeomanry (DLOY) Regimental Museum
The DLOY Museum was established in 1979 with a Trust Deed devised by the Army Museums Ogilby Trust (AMOT); they have been very considerable benefactors in the years since and are currently playing a crucial role in efforts to keep open military museums where local authorities or the Ministry of Defence are withdrawing funding.
Initially the Museum was at Rufford Old Hall, a National Trust Elizabethan manor house near Southport but in 1982 it moved to Preston. The old Sessions House next to the Preston prison had become vacant after the local motor taxation office left and since then has been home to the DLOY collection. The premises are shared with the Northern Museum of the Kings Royal Hussars (KRH), one of whose two ancestor units, the 14th/20th Kings Hussars, were Lancashire based. Indeed, the DLOY and 14th/20th had a long association stemming from the Italian campaign in the Second World War where they fought together; the DLOY as medium artillery and the Hussars in tanks.
A further component in the Museum at Stanley Street has been the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment but the bulk of their collection is now at Fulwood Barracks with efforts under way to find a new home for the recently amalgamated Lancashire infantry unit, the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment. This similarity of name is confusing for some but in the DLOY we are keen to point out that our title goes back to 1834!
To begin with the DLOY had two rooms and entrance lobby of the handsome stone building but is now in one large room and corridor on the first floor. On show are uniforms, weapons, pictures and drums as well as historic documents and a significant back room archive. Notable events marked by exhibits include the Peterloo massacre in 1819 when the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry rather lost the plot and charged down a demonstrating crowd. Strong opposing views are still held about this event even today and, in the aftermath, there was a spate of legal proceedings. The Museum has the sword presented to Major Birley when the jury at Lancaster Assizes found him not guilty of murder! Interestingly, the Cheshire Yeomanry were also there on the day (16 August 1819) but seem to have avoided the fray. As a military operation it is a classic example of the dangers of a split command and inadequate liaison with the regular military and civil power but here is not the place for details.
Perhaps the most opulent item in the collection is the complete full dress uniform of a Lt Farrell who was a member of the Lancashire Hussars (LH) formed in 1848 but long since merged with the Artillery. The busby, gold-laced shell jacket, pelisse and overalls are excellently preserved and, I believe, were found in an Irish attic about thirty years ago. As so often, we were helped with grants from AMOT and the Victoria and Albert Museum’s Purchase Grants Fund as it then was. Other attractions include an oil painting of the Lancashire Hussars on parade in the 1850s by John E Ferneley and a Simkin watercolour showing both the DLOY and Westmorland and Cumberland Yeomanry at camp in the 1870s. In addition there are numerous portraits of officers.
Although small in area, the Museum is a richly diverse panorama of military life from 1798 when the unit began as the Bolton Light Horse Volunteers until the present time. Over the last thirty four years the Trustees have been most fortunate to have the help and support of the curatorial team of the Lancashire County Council (LCC) who have their extensive civilian collection in the same building. Unfortunately, at the end of last year it was announced that LCC would close all of its five museums around the county and which include the Judges’ Lodgings at Lancaster, the Helmshore Mills and Fleetwood Fishing Museum.
The original closure date was to be April 2016 but a stay has been granted until September enabling strenuous efforts to be made to see whether a consortium might be able to take on Stanley Street and its collections. These efforts are continuing in conjunction with KRH and are being led by Col Brian Gorski, a former Fusilier CO who is able to draw on the experience of establishing the new Fusilier Museum in the centre of Bury. We aim to be able to put together a business plan by early August which may keep the DLOY and KRH Museums open but it will be a big ask.
So, while you can, do visit the DLOY Museum in central Preston and see for yourself the rich history of a unit which remained intact until 1991 and of which I was the penultimate Commanding Officer. I do hope that readers of the journal and their friends will be able to visit the Museum where they will be given a very warm welcome. The Museum is open on reduced hours between Wednesday and Saturday from 10.30am to 5.00pm and is accessible on the internet under “Museum of Lancashire”.
Finally, should the time come for any appeal for funds, I hope that some of you may be able to help to keep open this priceless collection of local history along with those of all the other historic units now represented by the Queens Own Yeomanry.
Martin Steiger
29 June 2016