THE QUEEN'S CHAMPION

Taupo Times, Volume III, Issue 129, 16 July 1954, Page 9

THE QUEEN'S CHAMPION

A FEUDAL SURVIVAL On the slim shoulders of a bespectacled officer of the Royal Lincolnshire Regiment, Captain John Lindley Marmion Dymoke, today rests the hereditary title "Queen's Champion." At the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II this twenty-six-year-old officer who inherited the title— one of the most striking relics of feudalism — with hisisuccession to the lands of the Manor of Scrivelsby, near Horncastle, in Lincolnshire, was the only commoner among the peers who carried the standards at the actual crowning ceremony in Westminster Abbey. On twenty-one occasions the Dymokes of Scrivelsby — "the home of the champions," as it is known to Lincolnshire folk — have performed the duty of Knight Champion to the reigning monarch. Ancient documents tell of the splendour and pageantry of the champion's duties at the Coronation banquet of James II. Before the second course was served at the feast in Westminster Hall, two heralds sounded a fanfare. The champion — Sir Charles Dymoke — rode into the hall mounted on a richly-cap-arisoned white charger. He wore one of the King's suits of white armour, and a helmet plumed with red, white, and blue feathers, and carried a gauntlet. Led by a ser-geant-trumpeter, two sergeants-at arms bearing maces, and his two esquires, one carrying a lance and the other a target emblazoned with the Dymoke arms, the champion followed the York Herald into the space between the groaning banquet tables. ; (- Halting in the centre of the room the York Herald made his proclamation :

If any person of whatever degree soever, high or low, shall deny or gainsay our Sovereign Lord the King .... to be right heir to the Imperial Crown of this realm of England, or that he ought not to enjoy the same, here is his Champion who saith that he lieth and is a false traitor, being ready in person to combat with him; and in this quarrel will adventure his life against him on what day soever he shall be appointed. At this point the champion defiantly threw down the gauntlet. It lay on the floor long enough to enable any venturesome person to accept the challenge, and then it was retrieved by the Herald who delivered it back to the mounted knight. Twice more the ceremony was repeated until the champion reined in at the foot of the King's table. The King drank the health of his champion and then passed him the gilt bowl. Dymoke in turn drank the King's health, made his revercnce, and then rode out of the hall, taking with him the gilt drinking bowl as his fee. — Vernon Armstrong in a BBC talk.