Church to Church Walk – a brief history
A challenge in the local newspaper in September 1936 to walk between the Parish Churches of Guernsey in less than 3 hours 20 minutes was made by Mr Eve D Le Page who claimed to have done it over a course from Town to St Martins, the Forest, St Peters, Upper Parishes and the Lower Parishes.
This led to the first walking race for what is now known as the “Church to Church “ originally organised by the Guernsey Wanderers Sports and Social Club, using the same route as taken today, with the only difference being the start and finish point which until 1950 was at the White Rock. The start and finish were then moved half a mile along the route, both having the same distance of 19.4 miles.
As support for the walk grew it was discovered that in 1837 a walk had been undertaken on similar lines by two men, Martel and Robert, who had walked around 17 miles between the Churches, with the report in the Star newspaper even giving the time taken for each Church.
An early feature of the walk was the touching of each Church, nowadays walker’s usually only touch the statue at St Martins Church gates.
Over the first ten years of the walk until 1946, the event was held on only five occasions as it was interrupted by the Occupation, with a shortened version taking place in 1945 for the same “1945 Guernsey Walking Race Victory Cup” that is raced for today, replacing the lost Joybell Trophy.
The current ladies trophy, the ”Highway Sports Circle Star Perpetual Trophy “goes back even further to 1938.
Organisation of the walk was passed over to the Guernsey (Island) Amateur Athletic Club in 1946 and was indeed their first promoted event. The walk continued into the mid 50`s until it stuttered in 1956 when the walk didn’t take place, but from 1957 until the present day it has remained in the Guernsey calendar, organised since 1966 by the Sarnia Walking Club.
A Church to Church Story
Numerous stories of the walk have evolved over the years and the one I like is about Otto Le Gallez who took part in the earlier walks. I remember his Barbers Shop in the Bordage, before my days as a race walker and read this story in the George Torode book “Donkeys Ears Apart”.
For those that don’t know George has to date published five books on Guernsey characters and on meeting Otto when he was 86 years old had been told to ask him of the time he stopped in the Church to Church for a pint and a fag whilst leading the event!
The story went on that he built up a lead to prove he would have won, then stopped at the Channel Islands Hotel until the second man went past, then continued to finish! The reason was given that it was just after the war and his wife wanted a set of cutlery and the second place prize was just that! The winner only got the trophy!
Results show that Otto has finished in second place in the walk, but I will have to check newspapers and George Torode to see if it was said tongue in cheek or not!
