200,090 Visited Navy Week Here: Another Increase: Critics Confounded by Public: The faces of Paymaster Captain H. C. Pinsent, the General Secretary of Navy Week, and of his committee, careworn and anxious throughout the week with hard work and worry, wore expansive and beaming smiles on Saturday night as they congratulated each other and celebrated another increase in Navy Week figures. They could afford to smile, for the improvement in attendance was an answer to their many critics, who, when there was a definite drop last year said: “Navy Week Is dying; it cannot last much longer.” Justifying the efforts of the Committee and the hopes of the Comdr.-in-Chief, as expressed at the opening ceremony, the attendance at Portsmouth exceeded, for the second time in history, the 200,000 mark and although the figure did not reach record, three separate day records were broken, and a new high total recorded for any day in any Navy Week. The grand total for Portsmouth was 200,090, which was an Increase of 9,220 on last year, and only 6,669 short of the record figures. Separate records were established on the opening Saturday (14,038), Wednesday (33,361) and Thursday (43,801) the last being the highest dally total ever returned during Navy Week at any of the three home ports. The last day (Saturday) resulted in a total of 17,144, compared with 15,312 last year, and on only one day of the Week (Tuesday) was there a fall off compared with last year’s figures. Commodore W. E. C. Tait, M.V.O. (commanding the Royal Naval Barracks and President of Navy Week Committee) took the salute from performers in the Victory Arena Display on Saturday.
Transcribed in whole or part from scanned originals: Presented with or without modified text and punctuation. For absolute accuracy refer to the original newspapers. Source: The British Newspaper Archive
Referenced
GRO0391 India: Harold Charles Frank Pinsent: 1884 – 1968