Forgotten Sporting Heroes Of Gloucestershire

In 1899, Howard Blackburn became the sixth person to sail solo from America. He sailed from Gloucester, Massachusetts to Gloucester, England but what made his story more remarkable was that he had lost his fingers 15 years before through frostbite.

This one hour performance tells Blackburn's remarkable story from the losing of his fingers to his triumph of crossing the Atlantic.

In 1955, Colonel John Fleming Churchill became the first man to surf the Severn Bore. But this was only part of his story. Known as Mad Jack, he was a champion archer, commando and bagpipe player, he had a fearless spirit, leading his men into battle with his Claymore sword. Mad Jack and The Severn Bore, looks at his exploits from riding a motorcycle across Burma, to escaping from prisoner of war camps, playing his bagpipes up Vesuvius to his historic surfing of the bore.

This is a remarkable story of a remarkable man.

"Any man who goes into battle without his sword is not properly dressed." - Colonel John Malcolm Fleming Thorpe Churchill.