Freedom or Kiteboarding on Brighton Beach

As free as the sky

As free as the sea

As free as she wants to be

As free as the wind

As free as the breeze

As free as she hopes for ease

As free as flight

As free as the air

As free as she wishes to dare

Zink Zonk Zunk

This is space/time warping 30 degrees

The air rotating to an acute angle

The sea flowing down and to the west

The breeze churning into a mighty easterly

And she who was as free as . . .

And she who was free . . .

And she who was . . .

And she who . . .

And she . . .

Is taking a last glorious, epic leap - up, up and beyond

Never to be seen again

Sheridan’s Brighton Belle

Thirteen years ago today, the Scottish writer Sara Sheridan launched her most well-known character in the first of the eponymous Mirabelle Bevan mystery novels. Brighton Belle - which can be freely borrowed online - is set in post-war 1951 Brighton. It follows Bevan, a former Secret Service operative who has retired to Brighton after the death of her lover. She works at a debt collection agency, hoping for a quieter life, but is drawn into a complex investigation when a pregnant Hungarian refugee, Romana Laszlo, goes missing under suspicious circumstances. Chapter one opens with this aphorism: ‘Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.’ And the first few paragraphs take us straight to Brighton Beach.

‘Mirabelle Bevan surveyed Brighton’s beachfront from her deckchair. The weather had been so fine the last few days she was picking up a golden tan. 

Well put-together and in her prime, Mirabelle always ate her lunch on Brighton beach if the weather was in any way passable, but out of sheer principle she never paid tuppence for a chair. We did not win the war to have to pay to sit down, she frequently found herself thinking. Mirabelle’s stance against the deckchair charges was one of the few things that kept her going these days. In an act of personal defiance, she carefully timed the coming and goings of Ron, the deckchair attendant, and concluded that it was perfectly possible to sneak enough time to enjoy her sandwich while he tended the other end of his pitch. By selecting the right chair she could have an average of twenty-five undisturbed minutes, which was perfect. Mirabelle’s life these days revolved around small victories, little markers in her day that got her through until it was time for bed.

She loved the beach! There was something soothing about the expanse of grey and cream pebbles, the changing colour of the sea and the movement of the clouds. Mirabelle didn’t mind if it was cold or if there was a spot of rain and it was only during a full-blown downpour or a gale-force wind that she retreated to the steamy interior of the Pier Café. Now she ate her fish paste sandwich with her large hazel eyes on the ocean and her sixth sense switched on in case Ron returned early.’

Sheridan was born in 1968, in Edinburgh, Scotland. She studied English at Trinity College Dublin, and soon set about a writing career with her first book Truth or Dare. She has authored over 20 books, including the nine-part Mirabelle Bevan Mysteries, and several historical novels such as The Secret Mandarin and The Fair Botanists. She says, on her website, that she is deeply interested in diverse readings of history and has worked on projects like remapping Scotland according to women’s history. She is also an occasional journalist and blogger, contributing to outlets like BBC Radio 4, The Guardian, and The London Review of Books. She has one daughter, Molly by her first marriage to Irish businessman, Seamus Sheridan, and she married her second husband, Alan Ferrier, in 2011.

Brighton Belle, first published by Polygon on 20 March 2012, follows Mirabelle as she investigates, with a colleague Vesta Churchill, Romana’s death. In so doing, she uncovers a web of intrigue involving Nazi war criminals, counterfeit coins, and murder! The narrative is said to explore themes of post-war austerity, societal changes, and racism while evoking the atmosphere of 1950s Britain. Other titles in the series include British Bulldog, England Expects, and Operation Goodwood.

It is worth noting that the name ‘Brighton Belle’ is more famously associated with The Brighton Belle, a named train operated by the Southern Railway and subsequently British Railways from Victoria to Brighton. Commissioned as the flagship of the Southern Railway’s mass electrification project, which commenced in January 1931, the world’s only electric all-Pullman service ran daily between London Victoria and Brighton from 1 January 1933 until 30 April 1972.

The Blue Seafrog

Maggie had been told - firmly, repeatedly - that there was no such thing as a seafrog. But here it was, on Brighton Beach.

It lay among the bladderwrack, a queer, knotted thing, its four long legs stretched as if it had been caught mid-leap and petrified. The tide had left it stranded among the glistening pebbles, tangled in seaweed that clung to it like old lace. She knelt down, brushing wet strands of kelp aside.

‘A seafrog,’ she whispered.

Behind her, Alfie was balancing a stick on his nose, utterly uninterested. ‘If it's a frog, it’ll be dead,’ he remarked, letting the stick fall and rolling his eyes skyward as if this conversation were a terrible burden.

 

[With a nod to ChatGPT, and apologies to Edith Nesbit (Five Children and It). See also The Red Spider and The Green Gecko.]

Maggie ignored him. She had read enough to know that creatures of the sea were never quite as they seemed. What if it was sleeping? What if, with just the right words, it might wake?

She prodded it. The blue skin was coarse like rope. There was a knot at its middle, a sort of cruel binding, as if some careless fisherman had captured it and then forgotten it here.

Alfie sighed. ‘It's a bit of old cord, Maggie.’

‘You don’t know that.’

‘It’s got fraying at the ends!’

Maggie looked closer. The fraying did look suspiciously like threadbare rope rather than amphibian limbs. But something in the air - something in the hush of the retreating tide - made her doubt Alfie’s certainty.

‘You never believe in anything,’ she said crossly.

‘And you believe in everything,’ he replied, stuffing his hands in his pockets and scuffing his boot against the pebbles.

Maggie picked up the thing - dead frog or sea-rope or something else entirely - and carried it with great care toward the sandy pools under the pier by each of its support columns. The water was still, the sort of glassy stillness that made you feel as if something beneath was watching. She laid the thing down in the shallow water, and waited. Alfie joined her.

For a long moment, nothing happened.

Then, quite suddenly, Alfie shouted.

‘Maggie!’

They both jumped back. The thing in the water was moving. No - not moving. Unraveling. The knotted shape loosened, the ends wriggling like living limbs, stretching as if waking from a long, enchanted sleep. The pool darkened around it, the water began to swirl as though something larger was rising from the depths.

Alfie grabbed her hand. ‘Come away!’

But Maggie stayed, her breath caught in her throat. The thing - once cord, once lifeless - slipped silently beneath the surface and was gone.

Only the faintest ripple remained.

Alfie stared.

‘I told you,’ Maggie said softly.

For once, Alfie had nothing to say.

The tide crept in. The sea took its secrets. And the blue seafrog - if that’s what it had been - remained as much of a mystery to Maggie as it had ever been.

Raving and misbehaving

It’s Tuesday, and Tuesday can mean only one thing on the Brighton Beach club scene: CU Next Tuesday at The Arch. It is claimed that this is Brighton’s biggest midweek clubbing event, and that it has been a staple of the city's nightlife for over 15 years. The organisers, ROX Promotions, promise ‘a night full of raving and misbehaving’ and that ‘Wednesday mornings in Brighton are officially cancelled’.

CU Next Tuesday takes place at The Arch, 187-193 Kings Road Arches, just a step away from the beach pebbles. The event features two rooms of music, catering to various tastes with a mix of hip hop, grime, house, drum & bass, and chart remixes. The night offers a range of attractions to entice partygoers: free pizza and donuts, on-stage games and confetti blasts, £3.50 doubles all night long, free inflatables and temporary tattoos.

Among The Arch’s various weekly themed events are the following: McDonalds Motive with free fast food, Get Your Croc Out celebrating the famous footwear, ABBA x Mamma Mia Night for dancing queens, and Bringing Shreksy Back complete with swamp shots and Shrek-themed entertainment. The venue is known for its commitment to both underground and commercial music scenes, having welcomed in the past notable acts such as Carl Cox, Fatboy Slim, Annie Mac, Stormzy, Skepta, and Tinie Tempah.

The Arch’s atmosphere, the Ticket Fairy says, is characterised by its industrial aesthetics, ‘featuring exposed brickwork and metal fixtures that create an edgy, raw vibe’, The Tuesday session - only for 18+ - usually opens from 11 pm to 4 am, with last entry at 12:30 am; tickets generally cost from £5.50. 

The club has occasionally been in the news. In May 2024, rising rapper ArrDee highlighted - in Time Out - the  venue’s significance in his musical journey, noting that it kept him connected to his roots and the local music scene. Moreover, in April last year, according to Brighton and Hove News, The Arch hosted a notable psychobilly event featuring three bands, including the UK's founding psychobilly band, The Meteors. 

There is a long history of performance at this site starting with The Zap in 1984. A pioneering venue it was credited with regenerating Brighton’s seafront in the mid-1980s and in launching the careers of many young artists. It hosted an eclectic array of performers, including comedians, musicians, and artists, and was known for its innovative approach to alternative culture as well as for its acid house nights. The premises underwent various changes of brand in 2005-2014 before reopening as The Arch. See Wikipedia for more on Zap’s, and also for some background on the original See You Next Tuesday band, complete with an explanation of its (x-rated) name.

Happy birthday Passacaglia

Happy 27th birthday Passacaglia, the giant iron sculpture to be found on Brighton Beach not far from the old fishing quarter. Created by Charles Hadcock and installed on 17 March 1998, it has become an iconic part of the local landscape, inspiring photographers, climbing children and passersby. The sculpture is said to be in the shape of ‘a giant wave crashing on the beach’ - indeed, one could imagine the curved form having been inspired by Hokusai’s 200 year oil woodblock print The Great Wave. But no, it seem Passacaglia was directly inspired by a musical element from Peter Grimes. 

Hadcock was born in Derby, England, in 1965, and was educated at Ampleforth College Cheltenham College of Art, and the Royal College of Art. His sculptures, he says, reflect ‘an interest in geology, engineering and mathematics, and are enriched by references to music and poetry’. He established his first studio in 1989 in Bermondsey, London, where he worked until his practice outgrew the space. In 1999 he moved to Lancashire and established a large studio complex at Roach Bridge Mill ‘to facilitate the physical and conceptual space necessary to develop his sculpture’.

Throughout his career, Hadcock has gained recognition for large-scale sculptures. Passacaglia was constructed from recycled cast iron. The sculpture's surface is ‘a tapestry of tiles, some flat and others curved, creating a dynamic interplay of light and shadow’. Brighton & Hove Council’s text states: ‘The tiles have textured surfaces that resemble Yorkstone paving, some are curved and some flat which gives the sculpture the shape of a giant wave crashing on the beach. The reverse side of each tile reveals the nuts and bolts of the sculpture which was constructed by Hadcock on location in 1998.’ Only a few years later, in 2004, a crack appeared in the base tile, necessitating the work be dismantled - reinstallation took place in 2007.

Encounter gallery online has the typescript of a long interview with Hadcock which includes the information I’ve not found anywhere else - i.e. that Passacaglia ‘is directly inspired by the passacaglia in Peter Grimes by Benjamin Britten’. Britten’s most famous opera, Peter Grimes, is set in Aldeburgh which has a long pebble beach - not dissimilar to Brighton’s - and it tells the forlorn tale of an outcast fisherman’s trials at sea and in society. (NB: Passacaglia is defined as an instrumental musical composition consisting of variations usually on a ground bass in moderately slow triple time.)

Hadcock’s website provides stunning photographs of many of his other notable works, and Wikipedia gives more biographical details about the sculptor.

The Secrets of Silas Thorne

Here is the fourth of 25 stained glass window designs on the Palace Pier which AI and I are using as inspiration for some of these BrightonBeach365 daily posts - see Stained Glass Window 1 for background. This image depicts a lighthouse standing tall against a deep blue and red-toned sky, possibly representing dusk or dawn. A bright full moon is visible near the horizon, and the lighthouse’s beacon shines in a sweeping beam across the scene. Below, stylised waves and rocky shores complete the coastal imagery. 

Limerick starter

There once was a lighthouse so grand,

In a window, not out on the sand.

Though it shined with great might,

It had one major plight - 

No ship ever saw it firsthand!

The Secrets of Silas Thorne (in the style of John Buchan)

The salt-laden wind whipped at my tweed coat as I stood before the small, circular window in the vestry of St. Nicholas Church. It was a peculiar thing, a stained-glass lighthouse, nestled amongst the more traditional depictions of saints and biblical scenes. The colours, a swirling vortex of deep blues and fiery reds, held an almost unsettling energy, the lighthouse beam cutting through the glass like a celestial sword.

‘Odd, isn't it?’ A voice, dry as parchment, startled me. Reverend Ainsworth, a man whose face seemed etched with the same lines as the ancient stones of the church, stood beside me. ‘Not quite what one expects, is it?’

‘Indeed,’ I replied, my eyes fixed on the window. ‘Do you know its history?’

‘A tale best told in whispers,’ he said, his gaze flickering towards the shadowed corners of the vestry. ‘It was commissioned by a man named Silas Thorne, a notorious smuggler, some seventy years past. He’d made his fortune running brandy and silks along this very coast. But Thorne, you see, was a man haunted by the sea. He lost his son, swept away during a storm, and sought solace in this . . . peculiar offering.’

The Reverend paused, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. ‘They say Thorne believed the lighthouse in the glass was a beacon, a guide for his lost boy’s soul, trapped in the watery abyss. He’d sit for hours, gazing at it, convinced he could see his son’s face in the moonlight reflected off the glass.’

‘A tragic tale,’ I said, my fingers tracing the cold stone of the window frame.

‘Tragic, yes,’ Ainsworth agreed. ‘But there’s more. Thorne was a man of dark secrets. It was whispered he’d made pacts with . . . less than holy entities. The lighthouse, they say, isn’t just a symbol of hope, but a conduit.’

‘A conduit?’ I raised an eyebrow.

‘To something . . . other,’ he finished, his voice barely audible. ‘They say on nights of the full moon, when the tide is at its lowest, the lighthouse in the glass glows with an unnatural light. And if you listen closely, you can hear the faint sound of a boy’s laughter echoing from the depths of the sea.’

The Reverend’s words sent a shiver down my spine. I glanced at the window again. The moon, a pale disc in the stained glass, seemed to pulse with an eerie luminescence. I felt a strange pull, a sense of unease that settled deep in my bones.

That night, I found myself drawn back to the church, the moon casting long, skeletal shadows across the graveyard. The tide was out, the sea a dark, undulating expanse. I slipped into the vestry, the air thick with the scent of damp stone and incense.

The lighthouse window glowed with an unearthly light, the colours swirling and shifting. I pressed my ear to the glass. A faint sound, like the distant echo of laughter, drifted from the sea. It was a chilling sound, a sound that spoke of loss and longing, of something trapped between worlds.

Suddenly, the glass shimmered, the lighthouse beam intensifying. I recoiled, a sense of dread washing over me. The laughter grew louder, closer. I felt a coldness, a presence, pressing against me.

Then, just as suddenly, it was gone. The light faded, the laughter ceased. The window was still, silent. I stood there, my heart pounding, my breath catching in my throat.

I left the church, the salt wind biting at my face, the moon a silent witness to the night’s strange events. As I walked back towards the lights of Brighton, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had glimpsed something beyond the veil, something dark and ancient, stirred by the haunted lighthouse in the stained glass window. The secrets of Silas Thorne, it seemed, were still alive, waiting for the next full moon, the next low tide, to rise again from the depths.

Palace Pier light and dark

As part of Britain’s coastal defence strategy, the War Office mandated - in May 1940 - the closure of Brighton Palace Pier in order to mitigate risks of invasion or sabotage. Just a few weeks earlier - on 15 March, exactly 65 years ago today - this beautiful postcard of a lit up Palace Pier was mailed by Mr E. Thomas, stationed at Preston Barracks, to his cousin Lil Groom in Bridgend. The striking image can be found in Palace Pier, Brighton by Albert Bullock and Peter Medcalf. Overleaf from that image, can be found another, darker image of the Palace Pier - its polar opposite.

During the war, the pier, once a symbol of seaside joy, underwent a dramatic transformation as it became part of Britain’s coastal defence system. A then-secret War Office paper identified the possible direction and scale of a German invasion, and recommended that the majority of piers around the country should have three spans removed to prevent the passage of troops and light infantry vehicles. The Palace Pier was cut in half by a team of sappers from the Royal Engineers led by Captain Peter Fleming. It was left with a 40 ft wide gap. 

The remaining structures were heavily reinforced with sandbags and defensive barriers. Soldiers were stationed, and anti-aircraft guns were installed, turning it into a lookout and defence post against aerial attacks. The closure also involved deactivating the pier’s lighting system, which had previously required 67,000 bulbs to illuminate its length. These measures aligned with broader national efforts to darken coastal areas, reducing visibility for enemy aircraft and naval forces. 

The war years saw a significant decline in the pier’s condition due to the lack of maintenance and constant exposure to the elements. Resources were diverted to the war effort, leaving little for the upkeep of civilian infrastructure. The pier was not repaired until September 1945, four months alter VE Day. It reopened on 6 June 1946.