Bowyers' Longbow Plate Day 23 July
The fourth Sunday of July is Bowyers' Longbow Plate Day at the Royal Toxophilite Society in Burnham, and on 23 July over 40 longbow archers were invited from all over the country to shoot for the ladies' and gentlemen's Bowyers' Plates, and other trophies presented by Bowyer Past Masters Robert Hardy, Christopher Ballenden, Peter Seaton and Richard Model.
The original Plates were presented by the Master of 1980-82, Anthony Wood, when Longbow Day was inaugurated in 1981 as an offshoot of Bowyers' Prize Day, which had been running since 1910 but by 1981 had become mainly a recurve bow event, and it was felt there should be a separate longbow event too.
The event is organised each year by the Royal Tox's longbow organiser, Freddie Fairfield, who also serves as Field Captain, and indeed is a competitor. The Bowyers' trophies this year were awarded by Upper Warden Ian Spring, seen here presenting the Bowyers' Plate for Highest Score by a Gentleman to Roger Spellane, who, on the York Round, scored the Most Hits at 131 and the Highest Score of 485.
Archived event reports
- A full list of archived event reports is available in the Members' area