Through a perilous winter night in 1897, 10
Norwegian sailors aboard the SS Nornen fought a gale chasing them up the Bristol
Channel toward the town of Burnham. At first light, her sails in tatters
and both anchors dragging, the Nornen came upon a crew of oarsmen who had rowed
their rescue boat through surf and sleet. All Nornen hands (including the ship’s
dog) were ferried to safety. Their abandoned ship survived only as splintered
remains, known from then forward as the Berrow Wreck, perpetually visible at low
tide in the mud flats.
Contrary to what I had thought, Burnham and Berrow,
the golf course that thrusts boldly through sand hills along the Channel beach
between the neighboring villages of Burnham and Berrow, doesn’t permit a view of
those fabled ruins before swinging back for the inward nine. A minor matter. As
I left the 9th green and turned for home, a glance at my scorecard revealed
wreckage enough.
Burnham and Berrow is a dignified, convivial club
in a prim neighborhood only a few minutes’ drive from the motorway. Its parking
lot is situated down a short street from a main thoroughfare; the clubhouse is
plunk in the middle of the lot; the putting green and golf shop are three steps
from the clubhouse; the 1st tee abuts the putting green
intimately.
There the tidiness ends, and a unique, howling
landscape bids you enter. The par-4 opening hole plunges players straight into a
funhouse of high dunes and deep hollows. Tee shots are partially to completely
blind and the distances of approach shots are hard to judge due to the scale of
the surrounding peaks and ridges.
The original club was founded in 1890 on a
rudimentary nine-hole course. Membership drew from prosperous Burnham, but some
players hailed from working-class Berrow. An eventual five-time British Open
champion, J.H. Taylor, signed on as golf professional, exercising his leadership
ability to quell disputes and enmities stemming from the differences in
fortune.
As can happen in these situations, the stronger
players emerged from the lower social ranks. Berrow clans that produced keen
competitors included the Whitcombes, the Days and the Bradbeers. One of these
lads, Reg Whitcombe, won the 1938 British Open at Royal St. George’s.
No. 3 offers your first open-water view—but just a
glimpse. A proper Channel vista greets the eye atop the 4th tee, which pulls
alongside the Channel course, a nine-hole knockabout built in the mid-1970s, at
the same time Burnham and Berrow governors revamped their Championship layout to
no longer ramble through a churchyard.
