The Brighton Sea Cadets
Fr Beau Brandie brought the Brighton Sea Cadets to the National for 36 years
Fr Beaumont Brandie MBE was well known as Chief
Steward at the National Pilgrimage and for the party of
Sea Cadets that he brought with him each year to
provide both an Honour Guard and a construction and
demolition team ... In the 2002 Pilgrimage programme
he wrote a short history of the Guard, part of which is
reproduced below: it was the 20th year of the Cadets'
association with the Shrine and also the year in which
the Principal Celebrant was Bishop Noël Jones, who
had been Chaplain of the Fleet.
Sea Cadets first came to form an Honour Guard for Our Lady
of Walsingham at the Golden Jubilee of the Holy House in
1981 when they escorted her from the Parish Church back to
the Shrine. All this came about because the Navy was unable
to provide a Guard on this occasion. Shortly after the war Fr
Colin Stephenson invited trainees from HMS Ganges in
Suffolk to form just such a guard when it was heard that the
Kensitites (the protesters of the era) were going to make an
attack on the image. An attack actually took place, and the
sailor lads closed ranks and 'repelled boarders'. The tradition
continued during Fr Stephenson's life and Fr Roland Webb, a
Clerk of the Holy House, remembers bringing various parties.
By 1981, however, Ganges was closed and the Navy fully
stretched and otherwise occupied. As a Chaplain in the RNR
Fr Brandie was asked if he could provide any sailors to
replace them. Because the RNR divisions were all on exercise
that weekend he suggested bringing Cadets from his unit in
Brighton, and so the tradition started.
When Fr Brandie was invited to become Chief Steward in
1982 the Cadets joined him not only in providing an Honour
Guard but also as part of the construction and demolition
team from his parish that do the backstage work at the
National Pilgrimage, without whom it would not be so easily
achieved. Pilgrims saw them out and about helping around
the Shrine in other ways during National Pilgrimage
weekends.
Not a pre-service organisation as such, many Sea Cadets go
on into the Armed Forces. Sadly for us, a member of the
initial Guard, Stephen Avey, was killed when he was knocked
from his motorbike on his way home for his RN leave. A lamp
burns for him and for the Brighton Sea Cadet Unit on the
outside wall of the Holy House.
above: Fr Beau was appointed
MBE in 2007 for services to Sea
Cadets, and in 2009 the Shrine's
Holt Road entrance archway was
renamed The Brandie Gate in his
honour in recognition of his
work, particularly as Chief
Steward at the National
Pilgrimages 1982-2018
below: Our Lady's Guard
preparing for the Procession
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
FR FRANK BURNETT 1907-1941
Fr Beau wanted the story of Fr Frank Burnett to be more widely known. He wrote this piece to be added to
this website’s Reminiscences page, but for the time being we put it here, with Fr Beau and his Cadets.
For me the story of the Norfolk-born and Mirfield-trained priest, Fr Frank Burnett, is poignant. He was one of
the four deacons of honour who carried the Image as she was translated from the Parish Church to the Shrine
in 1931. He was a curate at St Peter with St Julian Parmentergate in Norwich. His Vicar was Fr Paul Raybould
who had been a curate at St Martin’s, Brighton, just after the First World War, and returned to help out there
with Fr Gill in his retirement. Fr Raybould was also one of the clergy in the procession of priests on that
October day. Priested in 1932 by Bishop Bertram Pollock, whose relationship with Fr Patten was famously
fraught, Fr Frank continued to serve in this working-class area, home for the brewery workers, till the outbreak
of war.
In 1939 he joined the Navy as a Chaplain, and in the Eastern Mediterranean in 1941 he was chaplain of HMS
Barham. This ship had been built in the First World War and served in the Battle of Jutland with successful
gunnery on a day when the British Admiral growled “there’s something wrong with our guns today”! She was
refitted and repaired on several occasions in the inter-war years, and served in various fleets during WWII till
on the afternoon of the 25th November 1941 she was hit by three torpedoes from a German submarine at
close range and heeled over to port. Eye witnesses recorded that Chaplain Burnett made it into a life boat with
those in his care, but as some of them did not have life belts he returned to the obviously sinking ship to
collect some for them. While engaged on this life-preserving mission the ship suddenly exploded, probably as a
result of a fire in the shell magazines, and he died along with some 850 of the 1200 crew. He was just 34, and
it was ten years and a month since he had carried Our Lady of Walsingham.
The events were captured by a Pathe Newsreel Cameraman on a nearby ship (still available to see via
YouTube), but the footage was not released till after the war. The shock to morale was probably second only to
the loss of the “Mighty” Hood, so the whole story was suppressed, and the relatives were not informed till 1942
when Bletchley Park revealed that the German High Command now knew of their success. Even then they were
asked not to share the news with any but the closest relatives. However, another Naval Chaplain wrote to Fr
Raybould in February 1942 saying: “that splendid priest, the Reverend Frank Burnett....a staunch and
courageous upholder of the Catholic Faith”.
The 70th anniversary of his death was marked at St Julian’s in 2011, but, sadly, I was unable to be there.
link to Fr Burnett’s Index entry
photograph of Fr Burnett in the 1931 procession
from Our Lady’s Mirror Autumn 1942 Number
“So many pilgrims knew Fr Burnett. Twenty years ago he started to bicycle over for the pilgrimages from the
other side of the country, bringing his food for two days, having with care saved up enough to pay for his bed.
He said he often tried to ‘gatecrash’ at the time of the pilgrims’ tea, and not infrequently went hungry as he
ate all his provisions on the first day of the pilgrimage! Still these difficulties did not deter him. His visits to the
Shrine became more and more frequent and his great desire was to join the proposed College of Priests when
he left the Navy. Alas, it was not to be. All who came across him in the Navy speak of him as a fine priest.”
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