No spin at Stonehenge in 1920

Here are two more press cuttings, reporting the start of excavations and restorations at Stonehenge directed by William Hawley in 1919 and 1920. A lot happened in those first few months of what became a project lasting years: stones 6 and 7 in the outer circle were set in concrete, after their pits had been excavated, and their lintel was secured with lead seals; the Aubrey Holes were discovered; sections of the ditch were excavated; and the new-found origin of bluestones in Pembrokeshire was announced after petrographer HH Thomas had examined pieces of stone from the digs.

Today academic and peer-reviewed publication of Stonehenge work follows press spin and reporting. In the 20s, however, it was quite different. The first article here (from the Salisbury Times, April 1920) describes in plain terms what the journalist saw when he or she visited the site. The second (February 1921) describes what had been found. It is essentially a précis of Hawley’s first report in the Antiquaries Journal; the photos above come from that report (Vol 1, 1921, pp19–41). It had previously been delivered as a lecture to the Society of Antiquaries in London in 1920, and it was then, in the discussion after Hawley’s talk, that Thomas had announced his discovery that most of the bluestones came from “the Prescelly Mountains of Pembrokeshire”. It would be hard to keep something like that out of the press today until after it had appeared in a peer-reviewed archaeological journal.

January 2014: adding photo for Rupert Hawley (see comment below).

William Hawley (third from right seated on stone) with Office of Works men in 1919 during early restoration work. They are gathered around the long-fallen fragments of stone 9. Behind them is the leaning stone 7, which has been clad in pitch-pine timbers ready for straightening; the lintel that joined this to stone 6 has been lifted off with the aid of the winch partly visible behind Hawley.

Like his predecessor and pioneering Stonehenge excavator William Gowland, Hawley was distinguished by a fine moustache!