The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-09-28 00:00:00

A PEOPLE'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE MANSION HOUSE

FUND.
For four and twenty years the "Regent's Park
Band" has been in the habit of executing a musical
programme every Sunday afternoon during the summer
season, under the management of the Council of the
National Sunday League, the funds derived from the
sale of programmes being devoted to the support
of the band. It was announced that the receipts
from Sunday's performance would be handed over
to the Committ, of the Mansion-house Funds
for the relief of the sufferers from the recent calamities
by the collision in the Thames and the colliery ex-
plosion in Wales, and the consequence was that, the
afternoon being genial, the crowds congregated in the
vicinity of the band enclosure, close to the Zoological
Gardens, was greatly in excess of those usually to be
seen there. The attraction was increased, too, by the
addition to the ordinary "People's Band" of the
band of the S Division of the Metropolitan Police, the
two combined performing selections from the worke
of Handel, Haydn, Rossini' Ghys, &c. Some esti-
mate of the numbera may be formed from the fact
that during the day over ten thousand programmes
were sold, from which sale, as well as that of tickets to
the enclosure, together with donations dropped into the
collecting boxes, it may be safely Roncluded the managers
Will be enabled to hand over a handsome sum to the Man-
Eden House Committee. Only once before has a similar
collection taken place, and that was on the occasion of
the Lancashire Cotton Famine, when a very consider-
able sum was realised. A special feature in Sunday's
proceedings was the placing outside the enclosure of a
tarpaulin, supported at each corner by an upright
piece of timber, crowned with a bouquet of choice
flowers, and inte this coins' silver as well as copper,
were rained for the special benefit of th4o- safferers by
the catastrophe to the Princess Alice,

The Countess Dowager of Lichfield has, through her
son, the Hon. and Rev. A. Anson, sent a special dona-
tion of £5 as a mark of her appreciation ot the excel-
lent conduct and services of the police at Woolwich
during the late sad and trying tithes. Other sums
amounting to £37 have also been paid into the Mansion-
house for this specific purpose.

The Princess Alleo Relief Concert at the Skating
Rink, Woolwich, on Monday evening, lost much of its
public interest through the unavoidable absence of
Air. Gladstone, who sent the tolLowing letter to Mr.
Vincent, the secretary :—" Hawarden, Sept. 21.—
Dear Sir,—l regret I cannot be in your neighbourhood
on Monday to attend the concert, but I enclose R 1 for
my ticket. —Your faithful and obedient, W. E.
GLADSTONE." As an entertainment, however, and
also as a means of adding to the relief fund, it was a
thorough success. An immense audience attended,
and the artistes, who all gave gratuitous service, gave
also complete satisfaction. General Sir John Adye,
the Hon. and Rev. A. Anson, rector, and most of the
principal inhabitanta were present. -

A meeting of the committee of the Mansion House
Fund for the relief of the sufferers by the loss of the
Princess Alice steamboat was held on Monday, when
It was reported that the fund amounted to £26,1,A

Inquiries continue to be made for missing persons
who were known or supposed to have been on board
the Princess Alice on the day of the calamity, and of
whom no trace has yet been discovered. Drowned
bodies generally rise to the surface within a fortnight
in such weather as we have recently and, and it was
three weeks on Tuesday since the disaster happened.
but when a number of boys belonging to the training
ship Worcester were drowned in "larking Reach some
years since not one of the bodies was found for nearly
three months, and then the whole of them were re-
covered within a short time of each other.

On Tuesday the Mansion-hoase fund was further in-
creased by subscriptions exceedieig £1,200. Among
the contributors was the Duke of Cambridge, who
Sent 220.