Spion Kop

[Mark_Rowlinson]

I'm involved in the centenary book of Flackwell Heath, a club in Buckinghamshire.  One of the holes was named Spion Kop after the Boer War battle.  I know there are other holes named Spion Kop but I can't remember where.  Can anyone help me out, please?

[Brian Walshe]

Mark,

Have a look at;

http://www.golfvic.org.au/dir127/vgasite.nsf/pages/featureclub-flinders

It is a history of Flinders Golf Club about 90 mins south east of Melbourne.  In the article you'll see that Mackenzie visited relatives in 1902 and built some holes at Flinders, one of which was named Spion Cop.  It was perhaps Mackenzie's first work.

Brian

[James_Livingston]

Brian
What are they trying to say?  That Mackenzie designed the Spion Kop on one visit, or then recommended it be gotten rid of on a later visit?  Sounds like a very dubious attempt by the club to cash in on what is most likely a very tenuous Mackenzie link.  Not that they would be the first to try.

Mark
Either way, Spion Kop at Flinders now only exists in a photo on the clubhouse wall.  It was removed over fifty years ago.

[Mark_Rowlinson]

Why didn't I think of it before?  I did a search of the GCA site and in August 2002 Brian Ewen posted a list of 15.  What a fund of information GCA is! Thank you Brian - add Flackwell Heath to your list, but it's nle.  

[JohnV]

From a quick search of the web:

SPION KOP, a mountain in Natal on the north side of the Tugela River, and 24 m. W.S.W. of Ladysmith. It is celebrated as the scene of a battle (Jan. 24, 1900) in the Transvaal War, in which the British forces under Sir Redvers Buller were defeated by the Boers (see TRANSVAAL and LADYSMITH). The Spion Kop incident led to much controversy; for an admirable elucidation of the facts see The Times History of tile lVar in South Africa. The name itself (Dutch for Look-out Hill ) is fairly common as a place-name in South Africa.

Of course, only the British would immortalize a defeat in the name of a golf hole.

[Bob_Huntley]

Mark,

Flackwell Heath is one tough course on which to work as a caddie. I remember, I tried as a ten year old and those hills were brutal.

For the benefit of Americans on this site, the most famous place named Spion Kop is at Anfield Park, home of the Liverpool football team.

[Mark_Rowlinson]

Brian - My post reads badly.  I didn't mean that the hole no longer exists, it does, but it no longer has a name.  It's a 290-yard par 4 on which the drive must cross a deep gully and climb as far up the other side as possible before making a steeply uphill pitch to a shallow hilltop green beyond bunkers.  Seems to fit the requirements of a Spion Kop.

Bob - thanks for your comment.  I can quite envisage how dreadful it would be to caddie there especially with today's monster bags full of kit.

Mark.

[swindon uk]

Mark, i have an idea its in the Liverpool area, Stanley Golf Club? maybe.

[stovepipe]

No such club Bob. the only kop i know, is the kop end, in Anfield     zzzzzzzzzzzzz you there?

I might be wrong, but sure i am correct, maybe in Hoy, or Birkdale?

[Brian_Ewen]

Mark
Glad I was able to help and good to see the search facility works well.

We have quite a few Spion Kops in my area , due to the amount of courses being built as the war heros returned from the Boer War .
Every one of them that I have played has always been a cracking hole , and I was interested in how many there was around the world.

Its great to hear of one more.

Best Regards
Brian Ewen

[TEPaul]

I'm still confused as to what exactly a "cop bunker" is. It seems with this inclusion of "Spion Kop" that a "cop" or "Kop" must be a hill of some kind (from Spion Kop of the Boer War?) and logically a "cop" bunker must be a bunker in a hill or more prevalently in a mound or mounds. That's what I always thought a "cop bunker" was.

But we had Tom MacWood on another thread providing a photo of what he thinks a "cop bunker" is which to my eyes looked very similar to a regular cross bunker on perhaps a flat piece of land but having something in the way of a somewhat raised face.

What the hell is a "cop bunker" anyway? It can't be both a bunker in a hill or a mound and also a cross bunker on a flat piece of terrain with a somewhat raised face.

[Bill_McBride]

Although the fairway in the hole I'm thinking about is flat and there's no carry across a gully, #17 at Columbia CC in suburban Washington DC seems to be a "Spion Kop" hole -- it's about 290 yds and the fairway ends at a very steep hill. The pitch to the green is straight up hill and blind to a very small green.  Great short par 4 followed by a tough uphill 430 yd closer.

[Brian_Ewen]

Bill
What you have described is pretty much what I would expect from a Spion Kop hole.
Sometimes it is a par 3  or as you decribed a short par 4 , but it will always finish up to a high plateau green.

Brian

[Mark_Rowlinson]

The cop at Hoylake is the 3-ft high turf wall surrounding the practice area (between the 1st and 16th holes).  There was also one to the left of the 7th green (Dowie) over which lay another out-of-bounds.  

I'm now old enough to share with you one of my worst excesses of description in a book which is (happily) no longer in print.  Of the 1st hole at Hoylake I wrote:

No golfer can stand on the 1st tee at Hoylake without experiencing something of the feelings of the doomed at Balaclava:

Out-of-bounds to right of them,
Out-of-bounds to left of them,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell.  

How these things come back to haunt you!