Bunga-Bunga

February 7, 2010 12:07 AM

Today is the centenary of the Dreadnought Hoax, when a group of pranksters paid a ceremonial visit to the Royal Navy's flagship, HMS Dreadnought, pretending to be the Emperor of Abyssinia and his retinue. The organiser of the hoax was Horace de Vere Cole, an inveterate practical joker whose favourite trick was to 'walk with a cow's udder protruding from his flies and then cut it off with scissors before aghast bystanders'. But one of the other hoaxers went on to become famous for other reasons. Her name? Virginia Woolf.
posted by verstegan (21 comments total)

I sometimes wish people would tell biographical stories without feeling the need to tell you how it ended. I'm not sure I wanted to know that 'with the coming of the Great Depression, he was bankrupted; he died penniless and forgotten in 1936 at the age of 50 in France, where his antics went virtually unnoticed.'
posted by twirlypen at 1:11 AM on February 7, 2010 [4 favorites]

Bunga bunga!
posted by Dagobert at 1:14 AM on February 7, 2010

Reminds me of some guys I knew who went around on the street selling cups of Kool-Aid for 5c a pop while wearing sombreros and serapes.

The cops, surprisingly enough, were satisfied once they had only smelled the Kool-Aid.
posted by dunkadunc at 1:24 AM on February 7, 2010

He gave theatre tickets to a large number of bald men whose pates seen from the dress circle spelt out an expletive: characteristically he even remembered to dot the ‘i’. He held a party for a group of men who introducing themselves in the absence of their host discovered that they all bore such surnames as Ramsbottom, Winterbottom, and Boddam-Whetham.

I love this guy.
posted by a non e mouse at 1:36 AM on February 7, 2010 [12 favorites]

'walk with a cow's udder protruding from his flies and then cut it off with scissors before aghast bystanders'

Boy, you tried anything like that today, and they'd arrest you as a sex offender; life over.
posted by Malor at 3:38 AM on February 7, 2010

Retinue. What a great word.
posted by cavalier at 3:47 AM on February 7, 2010

So this is one of those "Woolf in sheik's clothing" stories, is it?
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:14 AM on February 7, 2010 [58 favorites]

So this is one of those "Woolf in sheik's clothing" stories, is it?

Somebody get this guy an award. That's the cleverest pun I've ever seen.
posted by GilloD at 5:22 AM on February 7, 2010

Those were the days!
posted by lungtaworld at 5:38 AM on February 7, 2010

I think the particular dry, matter of fact tone of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography could keep me going for days by itself.

"His widow married Mortimer Wheeler (1939) and shot Lord Vivian (1954)."
posted by Naberius at 6:50 AM on February 7, 2010 [4 favorites]

I'll get you next time, Woolf! Next time!
posted by Dreadnought at 7:07 AM on February 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

My cousin and a few friends took Richmond back in the 70s. Not quite as spectacular, of course.
posted by MrMoonPie at 7:18 AM on February 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

His advanced deafness prevented him from realizing that his carefully timed coughing was inadequate to cover his explosive breaking of wind.

I'm not sure if having that in your Oxford Dictionary of National Biography entry would be humiliating or just plain awesome.

(And by the way, I'd like to see some proof of that "deafness." Then I'd like to see some proof of that "proof.")
posted by PlusDistance at 8:00 AM on February 7, 2010

His advanced deafness prevented him from realizing that his carefully timed coughing was inadequate to cover his explosive breaking of wind.

His "advanced deafness" doesn't seem to quite fit with the things he pulled off, and I half suspect that someone (perhaps someone with a score to settle with Mr. Cole) hoaxed the Oxford Dictionary folks regarding that. It would certainly be appropriate.
posted by Naberius at 8:52 AM on February 7, 2010

Horace Cole certainly was very deaf - the consequence of a nasty bout of Diphtheria as a child. I'm delighted that the centenary of his most famous prank has been recognised. I have just written the first biography of Cole (called "The Sultan of Zanzibar" available thru' Amazon, if you must know....) which tells the full story of the hoax and all the other strange and wonderful pranks and jokes that Cole performed (including the occasion he impersonated the Sultan of Zanzibar). I agree - now he would likely be shot by armed police for attempting the Dreadnought Hoax-at the time, he was simply horsewhipped by naval officers. Happy days.
posted by sultan of zanzibar at 10:01 AM on February 7, 2010 [8 favorites]

I find it hard to muster a lot of sympathy for the antics of an entitled toff, whose "... most ambitious stunts humiliated his victims"

I like to imagine that the assorted Ramsbottoms, Winterbottoms et al had a magnificent burst of camaraderie, fraternity, and solidarity as they realised their shared suffering, and then jointly hunted their last tormentor down for a sound and deserved thrashing.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 11:24 AM on February 7, 2010

The world was a simpler place in 1910. And if today is the centenary of the Dreadnaught hoax, that means that we're approaching an even more important centenary:

"On or about December 1910 human nature changed . . . All human relations have shifted—those between masters and servants, husbands and wives, parents and children. And when human relations change there is at the same time a change in religion, conduct, politics, and literature." - Woolf in ‘Mr Bennett and and Mrs Brown’ (1924)

posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 11:58 AM on February 7, 2010 [2 favorites]

It clearly can't have been Horace De Vere Cole because De Vere was dead by 1904, before many of the most most famous exploits, the Venetian Moor hoax, the I Come to Bury Victoria Not Praise Her speech, the Scottish Prank, all of these happened after De Vere's death. Clearly, since it can't have been De Vere, those pranks must have been pulled by Horace sir Francis Bacon Cole.
posted by Kattullus at 12:20 PM on February 7, 2010 [3 favorites]

Cole was a bit of a toff, but he wasn't titled and never sought sympathy - quite the opposite. He was a socialist and anti-establishment figure whose targets were generally the pompous and self-regarding - naval officers, bishops, members of parliament and the like. He took against the "bottoms" (in quite an elegant way) because his first wife ran off with a Winterbottom. There was more to him than meets the eye.
posted by sultan of zanzibar at 12:20 PM on February 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

In the same spirit:

"Pirate" Paul Lennon shouted: "Now hear this! The U.S.S. Bennington has been captured by Sydney University pirates!" Then, for good measure, says Lennon, "we turned two handles labeled 'Battle Alarm' and 'Chemical Warfare.' "

posted by Fiasco da Gama at 3:32 PM on February 7, 2010

I liked this little aside, from The Bloomsbury Group's retelling of the story:

"The telegram, warning the Admiral to expect us, was to be sent off after we started, and it was to be signed 'Harding', though the friend who sent it was named in sober fact Tudor Castle."

(emphasis mine)
posted by blech at 3:51 AM on February 8, 2010