The case is different with the Cambridge and Westminster quarter chimes on four bells, and the chime at the hour is the most complete and pleasing of all. "The repetition of four ding dongs can give no musical pleasure. From then on, the tune has been known as “The Westminster Chimes” or “Westminster Quarters.”Įdmund Beckett Denison, who designed the movement mechanism for the Westminster clock, said of the chimes:
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(The clock, bells, and sometimes even the clock tower are commonly collectively known as “Big Ben,” though the nickname originally referred to just the 13½-ton hour bell, named for engineer Benjamin Hall, who oversaw its installation). The chime was dubbed “Jowett’s Jig” by Cambridge students and later became known as “The Cambridge Chimes.” The melody was copied by the men who installed the new clock and bells at the Palace of Westminster in the mid-1800s. John Randall, a professor of music, and an undergraduate student named William Crotch, he wrote a melody reportedly based on a movement from George Frideric Handel’s oratorio Messiah. Joseph Jowett, the Regius Professor of Civil Law, was asked to compose a chime. In 1793, a new clock was installed at St Mary the Great, the University Church of the University of Cambridge. What’s it called? Where did it come from? How’d it get so popular? Here’s the story. Most United States Navy ships of the post-World War II era have actually carried two ship's bells: the official bell on deck, and a smaller one in the pilot house at the 1MC (public address) station, used when the ship is underway.Readers Meg, Wayne, and Rajiv all wrote in to ask about the tune that clock chimes typically play. A ship's bell is a prized possession when a ship is broken up, and often provides the only positive means of identification in the case of a shipwreck. If a ship's name is changed, maritime tradition is that the original bell carrying the original name will remain with the vessel. Occasionally (especially on more modern ships) the bell will also carry the name of the shipyard that built the ship. The ship's name is traditionally engraved or cast onto the surface the bell, often with the year the ship was launched as well. (a side boy is a member of an even-numbered group of seamen posted in two rows at the quarterdeck when a visiting dignitary boards or leaves the ship, historically to help him aboard) On naval vessels, bells additionally are rung as "boat gongs" for officers and dignitaries coming aboard or leaving the ship, in a number equivalent to the number of side boys to which the visitor is entitled. Ship's bells are also used for safety in foggy conditions, their most important modern use. It is a nautical euphemism for "finished". The term "Eight bells" can also be a way of saying that a sailor's watch is over, for instance, in his or her obituary. Some "ship's bell" clocks use a simpler system: It also allows the entire crew of a vessel to eat an evening meal, the normal time being at 1700 with First Dog watchmen eating at 1800.
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The odd number of watches aimed to give each man a different watch each day. The hours between 16:00 and 20:00 are so arranged because that watch (the "dog watch") was divided into two.
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Each watch would take its turn with the essential activities of manning the helm, navigating, trimming sails, and keeping a lookout. Most of the crew of a ship would be divided up into between two and four groups called watches. Bells would be struck every time the glass was turned, and in a pattern of pairs for easier counting, with any odd bells at the end of the sequence.Īt midnight on New Year's Eve sixteen bells would be struck – eight bells for the old year and eight bells for the new. When ships were run by sail power alone, watches were timed with a thirty-minute hourglass. Instead, there are eight bells, one for each half-hour of a four-hour watch. Unlike civilian clock bells, the strikes of the bell do not match the number shown on the dial of the clock.