By the death of Fr Cuthbert Almond the Journal loses its founder and its editor for twenty years, and Ampleforth loses one of its ablest and most devoted sons. He was born in Liverpool in [1852], and came to Ampleforth with his younger brother Tom in 1862. But his connexion with it began long before, and had its roots almost in the foundation of the house. Two of his uncles were members of the Community, and I have a suspicion, which I cannot verify, that he was a very distant connexion of Bishop Baines. His two uncles in their separate ways were both remarkable men. Fr Bede Almond was one of the first boys to enter the School after the debacle of 1829, and I have always thought it was from him that Fr Cuthbert inherited his strong feelings about that period of our history. He was Procurator in the thin years of the house, and was probably the last who used to ride to Helmsley across the moor with loaded pistols to keep off the footpads. He was afterwards parish priest of St Mary's, Liverpool, and for years Procurator of the North Province. He was of a scientific turn of mind, and constructed an admirable electric telegraph long before it had come into general use. He had a pet theory that compressed air would one day take the place of steam as a motive power.
His maternal uncle, Fr Aidan Hickey, came to Ampleforth in the early 'forties, and was a fellow-novice with Abbot Prest in 1849. He was destined to play as leading a part in the revival of literary and artistic life of Ampleforth as Abbot Prest was on the administrative and material side. The twenty years that followed the Prior Park episode were depressing. With a depleted school and an impoverished Community it was all that could be expected if they just kept things going. But in the early 'fifties there was a breath of quickening life in the house. Fr Bury had come back from Italy, and was starting a strong school of Theology, Fr Prest was planning the new church, and had visions of a new College, and it is not too much to say that, more perhaps than anyone else, Fr Aidan was responsible for the new intellectual life that shewed itself in the School. He was a man of exquisite taste in art, and had the keenest love of literature, and those two tastes he succeeded in impressing upon the School so strongly that for fully twenty years afterwards his influence was felt. He afterwards served the mission at Ormskirk, and ended as Provincial of the North and Abbot of St. Mary's, York.
These were the auspices under which. Fr Cuthbert started life. I mention them at length because I think they help to an understanding of his character
His career in the School was something of a paradox. He was noted from the first as a boy of exceptional talent, and he was always a student - a combination that usually carries all before it. Yet, though he was always near the top of the class, he seldom if ever reached it, and was never very conspicuous in the prize lists. Some people can rise to the height of their capabilities at examinations. Fr Cuthbert never could. He was a bad window-dresser. Yet most knew that he was a better man than the prize-winner. It was the same in later years at Belmont. I lately saw some of the quarterly reports sent by Prior Vaughan to the various Superiors on the results of the examinations. While most of us would admit he was the soundest student of his time, he never gained any but a most indifferent report.
So also in his games. He never shirked them, he was no duffer, but he never excelled, at least not in organized games. His chief interests lay further afield. I think it would be correct to say that there was not a foot of ground within a few miles of the College which was unknown to him. He knew the depths of every wood and the bends of every stream, had explored the caves in the hills, and could 'find his way' on the moors as by instinct. He knew every flower that blew in the valley and every bird that built in the hedges, and the habits and the lairs of all the furred animals. It savours of adventure, and like all adventurers he had to take risks and sometimes pay the price. That love of Nature remained with him till the end. He was never happier than when sketching a landscape or watching the flight of birds, or hunting for botanical specimens.
He went to Belmont in 1870, and his fellow-novices from Ampleforth were Fr Sigebert Cady, Fr Michael Ryan, who became a secular priest, and Austin de Normanville who survived him only a month. He returned to Ampleforth in 1874, and studied his Moral Theology while teaching Science in the School. Science in those days did not occupy the place in the curriculum which it possesses to-day. It hardly figured at all in the examinations, and was looked upon rather as a sort of side-show. That suited his natural hint. Not having to work to a time-table or a syllabus he felt all the more free to take his own course and try experiments. He would have made an excellent research chemist rather than an instructor of boys. He learned far more than he could teach his pupils. There was hardly a branch of Science into which he did not venture - Chemistry, Physics, Mechanics, Light and Heat, Photography, Astronomy, Geology. It would not be correct to say that he dabbled in them. He had a good working knowledge of them, certainly more than any of his contemporaries, and I think equal to most of his successors. He had the widest range of interests and nothing came amiss to him. He knew the Library better than anyone before or since, and was always rooting in it. His knowledge of books was almost uncanny. He knew exactly where to go for information on the most abstruse subjects - what were the standard books and who were the authors. His range of reading at this time was enormous, and he had a retentive memory.
I don't think he can possibly have had an extended course of St Thomas, but he seemed to know him thoroughly, and certainly knew exactly where to find anything he wanted in him. So had he with Canon Law. He had little opportunity to study it, yet he could find his way through all the highways and byways of Ferraris and other Canonists as if he had been born to it. So, too, with History. This encyclopaedic knowledge and interest must sound incredible to one who did not know him, and I have heard it questioned more than once by those who tried to trip him up. But it was the tripper who generally tripped. He must have had some affinity with Father O'Flynn -
As a matter of fact Conchology really was one of his interests, but I don't think he was interested in Mythology further than what he learned from the paintings of his beloved Old Masters.
There was an urgent call for priests on the mission in 1877, and Fr Cuthbert, much sooner than was usual, after ordination, was sent on the mission to St Mary's, Warrington, in December. He was there five years with Fr Bury, the Provincial, and Fr Bernard Pozzi. He had time there to practise some of his chemical experiments, but the only result I can recall was that he succeeded in poisoning a dozen ducks which Fr Pozzi had bought to fatten for Christmas.
After five years he was transferred to Ormskirk, and it was during the seven years he spent there, under the influence of Abbot Hickey, that there was fostered and developed in him that love of Art which almost overshadowed his love of Nature. Here he began to collect engravings and photos of the masterpieces. From here all his holidays were spent abroad with his brother Leo. Their objective was the picture galleries, and there were very few in Germany, France, Italy and Spain, public or private, which they failed to visit. With the very limited means allowed them the journeys between had often to be accomplished on foot, and many were the economies that had to be practised and annoyances endured. In the course of years the knowledge he acquired was amazing. He could tell you offhand without any reference to a book in what public gallery or in what private collection a picture could be found. He knew all about the painters and their history, their style, their school, their values, and could tell any of them at sight. Once Mr Bradley, the solicitor, treated him and Abbot Hickey to the collection of Old Masters then showing in London. He told me he was a little incredulous about 'all this talk about Art,' and said as they were entering the Hall: 'Here, Fr Almond, I want to see what you know. Give me the catalogue and you tell us all about the pictures.' He told me that out of four hundred pictures he only failed to name the painter eight times, and only failed to name the school four times. After that Mr B. was tired and left them to finish themselves. It was indeed a pleasure to see the delight with which he contemplated a good reproduction. His face beamed and glowed with satisfaction. Often enough through sheer ignorance, and now and then in mischief, I have said: 'Well, Cuthbert, I'm amazed that you can see anything to admire in that.' With just a trace of pity, but with infinite patience, and never a sneer - he was too gentle for that - he would begin to instruct the Philistine.
When he left Ormskirk, and went to St Anne's in 1889, I think he knew all the old picture dealers in Liverpool, and was known by them. Whenever they got hold of a picture or engraving, which they thought might be of value, they were most anxious to have his opinion. If the picture was valueless, or if it was out of his reach, he gave the information readily enough, but if he thought there was any chance of it coming his way it was most amusing to see the contest of wits between him and the dealer - the latter doing his best to pick Fr Cuthbert's brains, and Fr Cuthbert looking about as dense as he could. Once Howell, the leading bookseller, had purchased at the sale of the Roscoe collection a portfolio of charcoal cartoons and studies by the Old Masters. He invited Fr Cuthbert to inspect them. He needed no pressing. He took me with him. For two solid hours I had to listen to their discussion. Howell was mainly interested in one only, which he attributed to Salvator Rosa. Cuthbert would not say whose work he thought it, but evaded the question by burying himself among the one hundred and twenty others. It ended by Howell giving up the contest and saying Cuthbert could have that one for fifty shillings. If he had had so much I firmly believe he would not have let the chance pass, but anything beyond five shillings was quite out of Fr. Cuthbert's depth. Outside that shop I taxed him: 'You knew perfectly well who drew that cartoon.' 'Of course, I did.' ' Well, why didn't you tell the poor man?' 'Why should I? He would only put his price up.' 'Was it by Salvator Rosa?' 'No, they are two heads out of the "Disputa del Sacramento," by Raffaele. Wait till we get home, and I'll shew you,' which he did. On my questioning their genuineness, he had carefully looked for signatures while apparently more interested in Salvator Rosa. 'But,' I said, 'they can copy anything now and you can't tell the difference.' 'So they can, all but the watermarks. They can't fake them.' He had noted all there were, and going home compared them with the hundreds of watermarks he had copied into a penny copy book. For years whenever he got hold of old papers or an old book he made a tracing of the watermark, and in the end he could tell the date and the paper mills of most of the paper of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
The sequel of the cartoons was this: For six months he nursed them, never failing to call at Howell's once a week 'to see that they hadn't gone.' At the end of that time he had worn out Howell's patience, and he said he could have not merely the 'Salvator Rosa' but the whole portfolio of one hundred and twenty for thirty shillings! He came home in triumph not unmixed with anxiety. He had just bought his month's tobacco and was not worth thirty pence. However we managed to float a company, and he was as proud of his purchase as a millionaire at Christie's who has broken the opposition. Many of these cartoons are now on the walls of the cloisters, and it is common knowledge that at least one R.A. has offered £250 for a single one of them. There is a Flemish landscape in the Hall, by Van Stratten, I think. I hope people will not undervalue it if I say he bought it, frame included, for three and six. The Sant Sebastian in the Hall he saw in an old furniture shop. It was priced at thirty shillings, and Abbot Larkin bought it for him in return for his drawing some plans for St Augustine's schools. The dealer to whom he took it to be cleaned offered him £30 cash for it. But Cuthbert always maintained it was a Rubens, and when the picture came home, sure enough, by the help of a glass, and afterwards with unaided eye, he found the signature on the bark of the tree. That was another little interest. He had copied all the regular and irregular signatures of every painter he knew and could refer to them at once.
He had a most unerring instinct for old booksellers' and antique shops. I'm sure there were few in Liverpool unknown to him. He knew all within a mile radius of Charing Cross in London. An hour to wait in Wigan Station made him acquainted with the whole tribe in that town, and so on wherever he went. There must be hundreds upon hundreds of books in the Ampleforth Library due to his keenness and patience in searching for them.
'How did he find time for all these interests on a busy mission?' Method. He was very regular in taking exercise for an hour, or two hours after dinner every day. It was that time that he devoted to his art pilgrimages. But he was a wonderful economizer of time in the sense that he never wasted a minute. After a long High Mass, e.g., there might be just five minutes to spare before dinner. He was up in his room at once, with his pipe lighted and his book opened, and taking a print of his etchings. I never saw him idle and never at a loss for something to do. He seemed to have infinite resources, unfailing interests. I believe if he had been dumped down in the middle of the Sahara he would have been perfectly happy. He would have lighted his pipe first, and then begun grubbing in the sand for old inscriptions. He was, too, an omnivorous reader. Nothing came amiss to him History, Archaeology, Hagiology, Art, Novels, Criminology, etc., etc. I have seen him read them all. You never could tell what he had on hand. It might be St John of the Cross and the higher flights of Mysticism, or it might be a 'penny blood,' such as 'Deadwood Dick on the Roaring Prairie,' or something like that. He had a zest for and appreciation of them all.
His preaching at this time was a mystery, I had almost said tragedy. He wrote every sermon till the end and preached them as written. To any who were privileged to read them they were little gems, ideas well thought out, beautifully expressed, with plenty of feeling and copious illustrations and, above all, sincere. But his delivery - ! He had a nervous habit of slightly swaying backward and forward, uttering the word as he came forward and retiring as though for breath for the next word. He had a hesitating, almost gasping, utterance which was so obviously painful to himself that it soon distressed his audience, and I fear the sermon was unheard. Luckily they were always short. Only once do I remember him overcoming this difficulty. It was a Good Friday afternoon. The service was long, and another service had to follow, so the sermon was not supposed to extend beyond ten minutes. To our amazement, Cuthbert went on and on, quite regardless of time, and not a trace of hesitation or nervousness. Ten, twenty, thirty minutes passed, but on he went, fluently and eloquently. When he came into the sacristy where were waiting he was flushed and apologetic. 'I'm awfully sorry, I must have been letting myself go. I'm sure I have been only a quarter of an hour.' We had some difficulty in persuading him that he had been preaching over fifty minutes!
He had a singular aversion from making a speech. During all the years I have known him I cannot recall one single speech, either at a public meeting or at a parish meeting, or at a dinner even. During the Conventual Chapters of the last thirty years I believe I am right in saying he has never uttered one single word. Not that he had no ideas and felt no interest. Far from it. I have seen him wince and squirm with pain when things were said which he disliked, but he never replied, and in the end it became an accepted fact that no one ever expected him to speak at any meeting.
But if he failed in his preaching, he excelled in another side of pastoral work. I doubt if anyone was so generally sought out as a confessor. There were always crowds at his box when the others might be deserted. On Saturday nights in Lent, when about midnight we used to be comparing number of 'Easters' for the episcopal returns, we used to think we had done quite well if we had had about fifty 'Easters' in addition to ordinary confessions. Invariably he had had ninety to one hundred. And this was the case wherever he went. The people seemed to find him out by instinct, and once found never left him for another. Though so retiring and quiet they all loved him, loved him for his gentle, kindly ways, loved him, I think, for his quaintness and little oddities.
There is no denying that he had about him some odd little mannerisms. For instance he was quite regardless of his personal appearance. I don't mean that he was slovenly or ungroomed. On ceremonial occasions he could be as spruce as the best, but I do not think he liked high ceremony, he preferred artistic freedom. He never wore the regulation top hat of his early days, but wore a soft felt with a rather high crown, which was never dinted like the modern 'trilby,' but was poked out till it soon had almost a conical shape. By handling and pulling the front rim over his forehead it came in time to almost a point. A feather in it would have made him resemble a bandit of the Abruzzi. Then he wore, all seasons, cold or warm, a long cardigan jacket which came nearly to his knees. In all the years I speak of he must of course have had more than one. But no one could ever tell when the old one ended and the new one began. It always seemed to be the same cardigan, and always an old one. Outside, winter or summer, he always wore an extra long inverness cape. More often than not he used to carry a satchel on his back under the inverness, and particularly in hot weather it certainly had a note of eccentricity. But he never minded in the least what anyone thought of it. One hot Sunday afternoon I was with him as the Sunday schools were emptying. There were crowds of young folk pointing and nudging and giggling, so I could not help saying, 'I'm sure it is your long coat they are all laughing at.' ' Yes, I think it must be' was all he said as he went through them quite unconcerned. He must have had great powers of abstraction, for I am sure he could walk through a crowd and see no one consciously, quite absorbed in his own thoughts. I have known him say his Office in this way and stop under a street lamp to read the Nocturn lessons quite undisturbed by the children buzzing around him. He was a most delightful companion for a walk. If you were in a mood for talking he could talk, as few could, on almost any subject; if you preferred silence for a time, it suited him just as well. He was always accommodating and yielding and never obtruded his own wishes.
After five years at St Anne's he returned to Ampleforth in 1894, and was there till 1900. In 1895 he brought out the first number of the Journal. There had been talk for some years of venturing in a respectable magazine to supersede the old Diary. Now, when the Journal is well-established as one of the institutions of Alma Mater, it may be difficult to believe that there was strong opposition to it at the beginning both in the Society and in the house. It was hotly debated for two or three years, and it required all the influence of Bishop Hedley, Prior Burge, Abbot Prest and Fr O'Brien to carry the day in its favour. But with the appearance of the first number all opposition ceased. For twenty years Fr Cuthbert was its editor, and with scarcely an exception he wrote an article for each number. His versatility can be gauged by the variety of subjects of which he treated. But almost as attractive as his articles were his Editorial Notes, in which he treated of the most ordinary topics with a freshness and a delicacy of language which was always charming. Bishop Hedley was his most loyal supporter and rarely failed him for many years. Those two are the real founders of the Journal, and without them it might never have come into being. All honour to them both.
It was at this time that he began his 'History of Ampleforth.' He took enormous pains to get up his matter. He went to Dieulouard and studied all the remains he found there. He ransacked all the possible archives of Nancy and every available record he could find in England before he began to write. I don't think his accuracy has ever been questioned. There have always been slightly divergent traditions as to the origin of the English Benedictine Congregations in 1605, and he has stated the traditional Laurentian side. It is of interest that Fr Norbert Birt, the historian of Downside, sent word to him shortly before his (Fr Birt's) death that he had quite come round to Cuthbert's version of the history.
As to the style there can be no two opinions. It is written in the most interesting manner in the easy-flowing, graceful English that was peculiarly his own. An old Oxford man who was not particularly interested in Ampleforth, and who was not even a Catholic, told Abbot Smith that, he had read it through five times for the pleasure he found in its beautiful style. I have often wondered why it had not appealed to a wider public, and may be excused here if I put it down to the illustrations. They crowd the book and clog the interest of the reader. They are scattered about as though from a pepper-castor without any regard to the page on which they appear. There is hardly one instance where the picture has any relation to the letterpress. I am not saying the pictures are unworthy. Far from it. They are excellent. They are all native productions. They all appeared first in the Journal, then in its first exuberant enthusiasm, and it was to save them in a permanent book that they were put in the History. But there are far too many of them, and it is amazing to have to interrupt an interesting chapter to look at a picture which can only distract one's attention from it. It gives the book too much the appearance of a family scrap-book for a serious history, and must irritate outsiders more than ourselves. If a new edition is called for I hope the illustrations will be limited to very few indeed, and then I hope we shall find the History appreciated as it certainly deserves to be.
In 1899 or 1900 he went as chaplain to the Holy Child nuns at Mayfield, and was with them nine years. I think this was about the happiest period of his life. He was an ideal chaplain who knew his place, was regular and punctual in all his duties, very prudent, and never interfered a hairsbreadth into matters outside his office. He employed the leisure it gave him for wanderings in the Sussex lanes and downs, and he made many friends and always looked back with pleasure to his stay there. He was much respected and appreciated by the nuns.
From Mayfield he went as a Superior to our Oxford house, and after five years there he retired to Brindle, and was there another five years. The shortage of priests from which we have suffered since the war called him from Brindle to the charge of St Alban's, Warrington. He was then just seventy, and it was an ordeal, after being free from active missionary work for thirty years, to undertake the charge of a large Mission where he had worked forty-two years previously. It was too much for his energetic and sensitive nature, and it is not to be wondered at that his nerves broke down, and he retired to Petersfield. But the harm was done. He had a slight stroke in 1924, and in 1925 returned to Ampleforth for good, and quietly and slowly faded away. He died on February [23rd] 1927, after receiving all the Last Sacraments.
I have said nothing of the personal side of his character. I think it is outside the scope of the Journal and, unless there are paramount reasons to the contrary, it is an impertinence to attempt to dissect it here. Lest, however, silence may be misunderstood, let me say briefly that as a monk he was most exact in the observance of all his Rules; as a priest he was scrupulous in all his duties and the very soul of kindness and sympathy to his people. In my whole life I have never met one who had such control of himself. I never once saw him ruffled and never in fifty years heard an angry word from him to any one.
It is usual when an old and venerable father passes away to say 'a link with the past is broken.' In Fr Almond's case it is a link, I fear, which can never be mended. He knew our past as no one else knows it or can know it. He knew the difficulties and struggles and successes and realized them so thoroughly that it would not be much exaggeration to say he had lived it all. The last hundred years from 1829 he certainly knew at first hand from the chief actors themselves. Such knowledge cannot be replaced. Perhaps some thought he lived too much in the past and perhaps not many were intimate with him. But the few who knew him will cherish his memory as the staunchest and most unselfish of friends and one of the humblest, gentlest, most unobtrusive, most loveable men that Ampleforth has ever produced.
JOSEPH CUTHBERT ALMOND 23 February 1927
1852 17 Aug Born Liverpool
1863- Educ Ampleforth
1870 5 Oct Habit at Belmont
1871 6 Oct Simple Vows
1874 17 Dec Solemn Vows Ampleforth Prior S Kearney
20 Dec Minor Orders Belmont
1875 18 Sep Subdiaconate
1877 24 Feb Diaconate
18 Nov Priesthood Bishop Hedley
1878 St Mary's Warrington
1883 Ormskirk
1889 St Anne's Liverpool
1894 Returned to Ampleforth
1898 Grassendale
1899 Chaplain at Mayfield Convent
1909 Superior at Oxford House of Studies
1913 Feb (?or1914) Assistant at Brindle
1919 Dec Head Priest at St Alban's Warrington
1923 Jun Petersfield
1924 Sep Retired to Ampleforth invalided
1927 23 Feb Died
Buried at Ampleforth
Was first editor of The Ampleforth Journal 1896-1913
A Congregational Censor of Books for many years
Cathedral Prior of Worcester 17 Jan 1922
Published History of Ampleforth Abbey 1903