The Townend Family Letters

www.townendletters.uk

updated 8 January 2025

Bout de Ville Times

The Bout de Ville (French for ‘Townend) Times was a Townend family newspaper, 'edited' (ie written) by Alfred Townend for his children during the period 1894 until at least 1900. During this time, the family were living at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where Alfred was Chaplain for seven years till September 1901. The newspaper called itself a monthly but by 1900 there had been only 9 issues.

The originals were all written in longhand with illustrations drawn by Alfred’s eldest son, Bill. Issues are up to 28 foolscap pages long with typical newspaper sections: editorial, births, deaths, marriages (of sundry animals), lost and found, advertisements (for sale, situations vacant, coming events) competitions (essays by each of his 9 children), news items, police reports, etc.

Issues
  1. Issue 1 (22 August 1894) Number 1

  2. Issue 1 part 2

  3. Issue 2 (September1894) Number 2

  4. Issue 3 (16 January 1895) Number 3

  5. Issue 4 (19 September 1895) Number 4

  6. Issue 4 part 2

  7. Issue 5 (3 September 1896) Number 5

  8. Issue 5 part 2

  9. Issue 6 (15 September 1897) Number 6

  10. Issue 6 part 2

  11. Issue 7(14 January 1899) Number 7

  12. Issue 8 (22 August 1894) Number 8

  13. Issue 9 (February 1900) Number 9

  14. Issue 9 part 2
© Helen Thornton 2025