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Albert Edward 'Bert' Powsey (1866–1956), known professionally as Professor Powsey, was a British high diver who performed for crowds on piers and at fairgrounds throughout the UK between 1900 and 1941. Powsey was among a number of the periods similarly employed professional high, trick and fancy daredevil divers who entertained seaside visitors.

During the period of Powsey's career there were similarly occupied divers at pier, seaside and fairground locations around Britain including Professor Cyril, Professor Gautier, Professor Davenport, Professor Reddish, Zoe Brigden, Walter Tong, and Powsey's own daughter Gladys and son Herbert Powsey.

Early life

A. E. 'Bert' Powsey was born in 1866 in Sheerness, Kent. At the age of 13 he embarked on a six month cruise to the West Indies on a cargo boat and on his return was assistant to a grocer. On 7 September 1880 at the age of 14 he received a Royal Humane Society Bronze Medal for life saving as 'A. E. Powsey, 'Boy, T S Cornwall'' (case number 21075). The T. S. Cornwall, formerly HMS Wellesley, had been a 74 gun ship of the line converted to a floating reformatory, or training ship. Powsey apprenticed as a steam pipe fitter, eventually becoming a foreman.

In 1890 at age 24 he married Rose Emma Ellis who had been touring the world as the first woman deep sea diver. At the time of their marriage Powsey joined the staff of Marlborough College in Wiltshire for ten years and there evolved his high diving act.

Diving career

Powsey first undertook regular diving routines on the Herne Bay Pier for several seasons at the turn of the century and during this time trained his daughter Gladys and son Herbert. Offered facilities at Brighton's West Pier he left Herne Bay leaving son Herbert to perform regularly there. From Brighton he then moved to Clacton-on-Sea and then in 1903 to Southport pier where, when working, he performed three dives daily until 1933, apart from a two year absence during which he made a world tour. Online postcard, photographic and film evidence suggests he took his towers and pools on excursions to dive elsewhere during his active years. After Southport pier he took to diving at the Southport fair ground/pleasureland.

Dives

Powsey's diving routines included the 'Terrible Cycle Dive', which involved cycling off a ramp positioned above the pier deck. Also The Sack Dive, in which he dived in a sack, and the 'Sensational Dive In Flames' in which he either was placed in a sack with cotton wool affixed and then doused with petrol set alight just prior to jumping, or dived into water with petrol on the surface that was set alight. He also dove from an 80 foot tower into a tank with 4 feet of water. In Southport he offered to dive from a height of 150 feet from an aeroplane but was refused permission.

Powsey made his final dive at the age of 75 in 1941 at a gala in Southport for the Soldiers', Sailors' and Airmen's Charity Funds, retiring at his home in Virginia Street. He died in 1956.

Recollections and legacy

Among the spectators who viewed divers during this period was a young Southport-born A. J. P Taylor, who recalled Saturday visits to Southport's Pleasureland with his father to watch a "deep sea diver called Professor Powsey, who performed spectacular dives, which included on a blazing bicycle".

Powsey's grandson, Albert, in 2014 recollected being 11 or 12 and watching dives and "there being a huge crowd of people around. My grandfather would often dive into a small pool and people would wonder why they could not get closer. I remember he would call out 'Are you ready, ladies and gentlemen?' Then, as he was about to leap you could hear the intake of breath as everyone gasped, almost as if they did not believe he was going to do it. Then he would plunge down into the water and it would splash out all around him – and that is why they couldn't stand any closer, because they would have got soaked."

'Real photo' postcards of Professor Powsey and contemporary stunt divers are bought, sold and collected to this day, and can be searched and found on online auctions or articles.

On Southport Pier there is a statue of Professor Powsey diving on a cycle.

See also

• Roy Fransen
• Flying The Foam
• Professor Splash
• Diving Horse

References

1. Robertson, Dan (29 September 2021). "Diving on the Piers". Brighton Museums. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
2. Jordan, Paul (1 July 2011). "Albert Huggins Heppell – 'Professor Cyril' (1866-1912)". Brighton Museums. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
3. "Professor Gautier's high dive from Hastings Pier, 1904". Hastings Pier. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
4. "Newspaper coverage of Professor Davenport's diving stunts". Hastings Pier. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
5. "Fun in the Water Aquatic Entertainers". www.thepostmagazine.co.uk. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
6. Krystynapickering |. "Diving on the Piers". Discover. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
7. The Lady Diver (1926), retrieved 29 November 2021
8. "Death of Famous High Diver". The World's Fair. 31 March 1956. Retrieved 1 December 2021.
9. "Life Saving Awards Research Society".{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
10. T.D.S (31 March 1956). "Death of Famous High Diver". The World's Fair.
11. "West Cliff Regatta | Canterbury Amateur Film Archive". 27 May 2017. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
12. T.D.S. (31 March 1956). "Death of Famous High Diver". The World's Fair.
13. Corbin, Tianna (13 September 2020). "Fascinating pictures show Brighton's forgotten West Pier divers". sussexlive. Retrieved 30 November 2021.
14. T.D.S (31 March 1956). "Death of Famous High Diver". The World's Fair.
15. Burk, Kathleen (2000). Troublemaker: The Life and History of A.J.P. Taylor. New Haven, CT, Yale University Press. p. 6. ISBN 9780300087611.
16. "PressReader.com - Digital Newspaper & Magazine Subscriptions". www.pressreader.com. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
17. "Pier Divers, Promenade, Southport, Merseyside UK - Figurative Public Sculpture on Waymarking.com". www.waymarking.com. Retrieved 30 November 2021.

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