LUTTRELL’S TOWER, CALSHOT, SOUTHAMPTON

Looking for a “place in the country”, Guglielmo Marconi’s Irish wife, Beatrice, found Eaglehurst, which included Luttrell’s Tower, at Calshot in the parish of Fawley, Hampshire. Eaglehurst was let to the family in 1911, and Marconi used the top room of the tower as a laboratory.

A stone plaque, affixed to the base of the tower, bears the following inscription:

“Luttrell’s Tower, built 1730. Here Marconi concluded his wireless experiments during the great war of 1914 – 1918.” 

In 1912, he and his family were invited by the White Star line to be their guests on the maiden voyage of the Titanic. Fortunately Marconi left three days earlier on another ship, and the rest of the family were delayed by his son Giulio’s sudden illness. Degna, his eldest daughter, recalled how she and her mother climbed the tower on the morning of April 10^th to watch the Titanic sail by. Degna was not yet four years old, but she remembered vividly: “….together we waved at the ship, huge and resplendent in the spring sunlight, and dozens of handkerchiefs and scarves were waved back at us. As the Titanic passed from our view over the calm water, we slowly descended the steps. It was a long way down….” The tragedy of the sinking of the “unsinkable” liner had thus nearly destroyed the family, but Marconi’s radios did save many lives subsequently. His youngest daughter, Gioia, was christened at Fawley church in 1916, and the family left Eaglehurst for Italy the same year.

Marconi with his children at Eaglehurst