ON THE THIRD DAY OF BETWIXTMAS...

Name a Tudor warship. Go on: I'm laying down the leather gauntlet. It's a challenge, a jousting contest, a quest of which I consider you worthy foes. Can you think of the name of any bona fide sixteenth century, English-built hulk of oak timbers and iron cannons, of fluttering standards and golden sails, heaving and creaking across the English Channel to do battle with France? Can you name her? Can you retrieve a magnificent barque from a glittering age?

Did you say the Mary Rose?

Yep, me too. I went to see her today; or at least, what's left of her. On the 19th of July, 1545, just a mile or so into the Solent, the Mary Rose turned upon the waves and listed in a sudden gust of wind. Taking in seawater through her open lower gunports, she toppled and fell. Within minutes, she was under. The French fleet, purring from the Isle of Wight, cheered as she sank below the waves.

I peered through the thick glass at the cavern of wrecked timbers. It is a cathedral of sodden oak, ripped to pieces, yet unmistakably the hull of a once great ship. A feat of astonishing engineering in 1982 had lifted the silted wreck from the sea. For 437 years the starboard side of this great ship had been wedged beneath the sand, buried, preserved, protected while the port side rotted away in the salt-water. Now all that's left is the fragile shell of half a Tudor warship in all its eerie magnificence.

You could have said the Henry Grace a Dieu or perhaps the Peter Pomegranate. You could have gone for the Regent or Sovereign: all fine examples of Tudor seafaring in the time of Henry VIII. However, none of these illustrious names are as famous as that of the raised wreck of Henry's flagship.

And that's interesting don't you think? That a lost wreck, missing for almost half a millenium should be here with us now, when those other vessels have long since disappeared? Had it not sunk on that blustery summer's afternoon, to gasps of shock and horror from those who watched from Southsea Common, we might not have heard of the Mary Rose at all. In a curious twist of irony, had it not sunk, it would certainly have disappeared forever.

Sometimes in life, it looks like hope has been lost for good. I've seen it flicker out like the final candle in a darkened room. I've felt the loneliness pull me beneath the waves and shuddered at the terrible, overwhelming darkness of depression closing in around me. Perhaps though, like the Mary Rose, there is a hope, there is a rescue, way off into the future, or perhaps not that far, when someone remembers your name and comes to find you; when a light you never expected overwhelms the darkness of the deep and lifts you to the surface and the daylight.


I'm really tired. It was such a lovely trip to Portsmouth today. Usually, by the third day of Betwixtmas I'd have gone a bit crazy, but a day out has sorted me out. It was the Intrepids' idea. They really wanted to go up the Spinnaker Tower and see the Solent stretching out to the Isle of Wight in the winter sunshine. I wanted to see the Mary Rose, HMS Warrior and the Victory. Where the Mary Rose represented a famous tragedy at the beginning of the Royal Navy's great history, the Victory returned to Portsmouth in tatters at the height of its finest hour. I like Portsmouth. There's lots to go back for.