Quote Originally Posted by fortinian View Post
Yes Cad, but surely Hand and Stonehouse are secondary sources... this appears to be a primary source and actually backs up what H & S say.

I'm familiar with Hand and Stonehouse's writings on the tunnels, I seem to recall that Hand wasn't very imressed with Stonehouses work and set out to correct him on many issues. But Hand himself lacked immediate knowledge... so they were both a bit stuck.
Yes and no really. Stonehouse doesn't appear much in Williamson's records but was a well noted friend - he wasn't simply a historian who came in after 1840 when he died. So I would say that Stonehouse's version is the most 'correct' version, simply because in Williamson's full will, it is stated that he only gave Stonehouse 'full and unlimited' access to his network of tunnels and that is why he seems to be the only source at the time of Williamson.



Hand has made lots of factual mistakes in his text, both from what we have found today and from other records we have come across of Williamson but are always grateful to Hand simply because he gave the two 1926 shots of Paddington, and of the 'lower rubble' in the Banqeting Hall. He also spoke of walking for 'over a mile' in Paddington and if it wasn't for that information, we wouldn't have come across Paddington today.