For weeks, it seems, my life has been spent indoors - apart from essential outings, like ringing, singing and shopping - and it's suffered as a result. It has revolved around my desk, dealing with a succession of either repetitive or never-ending interests, sometimes in a constant sequence from breakfast, via only short breaks for lunch and dinner, to bedtime.
When I first retired for good, almost a year ago now, I resolved to walk at least twice a week. Sadly this resolution - like so many - has been broken, so when I had to collect a prescription the other day, I decided to walk into the town for the exercise instead of taking the car.
I live in what was originally the industrial area of town. When I first lived here, in the 'First Garden City', it was on the site of a former pram factory; my present home, I have been reliably informed, replaces a factory where refuse collection vehicles were produced: a claim to fame not everyone can equal! One principle upon which the Garden City was established was to keep the living areas separate from industry. Since many industrial premises created unpleasant fumes or smoke from fires, they were sited to the east of the town, downwind of the housing areas, since the prevailing winds are from the west. Processes have change in the century since the town was created, and this unsavoury aspect of industry is no longer the case. Hence, the segregation of the town into work and housing no longer applies, and a derelict factory provides an ideal brownfield site for new homes. Almost directly opposite my home is a factory making parts for the motor industry that has produced neither fumes nor noise, so far as I've noticed in the last thirteen years.
As I walked out the other day, I was reminded of industrial streets in city centres where I've walked not too long ago. Maybe this week's damp conditions underfoot contributed to this. I thought in particular of Sheffield some twenty years ago and, more recently, Nottingham. In both cities I saw industrial buildings of Victorian vintage, or possibly earlier, some of which were in use but others no longer occupied. Whether awaiting re-use or demolition, or simply protected by being listed as of historical importance, they have a definite aura. Some have been given new life as flats; some, alas, have broken windows and weeds several feet high growing up the walls.
Maybe it was a product of the afore-mentioned lack of exercise, but I not only enjoyed the discovery of bus routes that I hadn't used before - at least in that way - but also the ensuing journey from one end of the town to the other, in order to complete the range of errands upon which I'd set out.
I'm now looking forward to another reminder of those early days when walking was firmly on my 'to-do' list. I've just signed up to deliver church Christmas cards next week. It will be interesting to notice as, by choice, I cover the same roads as I did last year, what thoughts and observations cross my mind as I do so. I'm not guaranteeing that they'll find their way here ... but watch this space!
Friday 25 November 2016
Friday 11 November 2016
A Political Week
Well, of course it was, but I'm neither Trump-eting about Hillary, nor Hillary-ous about Trump. Other things have kept me busy. Towards the end of last week I had a phone call from someone I met at Witney last month. He lives in the next town to me, where there was a local council by-election yesterday, and he asked me whether I would be prepared to give any help. After considering over the weekend, I advised him that I would deliver some letters on Tuesday morning. When he brought them round on Monday, our conversation revealed that we have many interests and experiences in common ... not all of which I revealed to him: it's good to keep some things to oneself!
Tuesday's experience went smoothly, in chilly sunshine, and I'm sure the exercise did me good. It was complemented in the evening by my attendance at the local party's AGM, This, too, was a first-time experience for me, and I made several new acquaintances. My new friend had also asked if I would take a turn as a Teller at the election itself. The name itself defines one who counts votes, but in practice it refers to one who notes who has voted - as I described it the other day, "one of those annoying people who ask for your number when you go to cast your vote". It has no connection at all to how you voted, merely to record the fact that you have done so. The effect is to spare one who has performed this civic duty from the attentions of enthusiastic canvassers later in the day.
Realistically at this level, little is achieved beyond maintaining a presence at the polling station, and seeing that all is done in a fair and orderly manner, although the teller has no authority to enforce this. I had been asked to undertake a similar duty at Witney, but declined. Looking back, my only reason for doing so was fear. I was unwilling to confront people. This time I decided that I must face this reticence head-on, so I said I would oblige and was allocated an hour slot during the mid-morning. Between the arrangement being made and its discharge, my imagination was working overtime conjuring up all manner of hazards and problems I might face, and it was with no little apprehension that I eventually presented myself for duty.
I recently wrote about this difficulty in my other blog; you can read about it here. I suggested that the solution to the condition is being given some external authority for this confrontation. As I now reflect on my experience yesterday, I can see that same truth in action. When I arrived at the polling station, I was greeted by the man whom I was relieving, and presented with a pen, a pad of recording sheets ... and a party rosette. Once I was wearing the rosette, I was no longer the timid and reluctant individual, but an officially accredited party worker. I moulded with the representatives of the other parties in a team, all focused on the same task, some with more devotion to the detail than others.
An hour later, when a lady came in and announced that she was relieving me, I confidently handed over my badge of authority and the 'tools of the trade', like a hardened professional ... albeit after only one hour's experience.
As I wrote that last sentence, I found my mind drifting to pilots flying Spitfires and Hurricanes, and wondering how few flying hours they might have clocked up before finding themselves in a dog-fight with Heinkels and Messerschmitts. I think the day has finally caught up with me. It's still referred to as Armistice Day, despite that being 98 years ago, and the fact that today the theme is the commemoration of the dead of all wars.
Although the official commemorations will take place on Sunday - some years on the previous Sunday - many people still stopped what they were doing this morning and remembered. I confess that, although I had intended to do so, I forgot. I recall that when I was driving, with the radio on, there was a silence before the hourly news bulletin.
On the first anniversary of '9-11', I was driving in the Cambridgeshire countryside and saw traffic coming to a halt in the early afternoon on the adjacent road, so I and many others did the same. Even so, it's hard to imagine - as is reported - the whole country stopping all activity in response to the King's call on the first anniversary in 1919. How times have changed ... in many ways, rightly so. However, the important thing is the remembering, the giving of thanks, and the commitment for the future. If this can only be fulfilled by ceasing all else, then so be it.
Tuesday's experience went smoothly, in chilly sunshine, and I'm sure the exercise did me good. It was complemented in the evening by my attendance at the local party's AGM, This, too, was a first-time experience for me, and I made several new acquaintances. My new friend had also asked if I would take a turn as a Teller at the election itself. The name itself defines one who counts votes, but in practice it refers to one who notes who has voted - as I described it the other day, "one of those annoying people who ask for your number when you go to cast your vote". It has no connection at all to how you voted, merely to record the fact that you have done so. The effect is to spare one who has performed this civic duty from the attentions of enthusiastic canvassers later in the day.
Realistically at this level, little is achieved beyond maintaining a presence at the polling station, and seeing that all is done in a fair and orderly manner, although the teller has no authority to enforce this. I had been asked to undertake a similar duty at Witney, but declined. Looking back, my only reason for doing so was fear. I was unwilling to confront people. This time I decided that I must face this reticence head-on, so I said I would oblige and was allocated an hour slot during the mid-morning. Between the arrangement being made and its discharge, my imagination was working overtime conjuring up all manner of hazards and problems I might face, and it was with no little apprehension that I eventually presented myself for duty.
I recently wrote about this difficulty in my other blog; you can read about it here. I suggested that the solution to the condition is being given some external authority for this confrontation. As I now reflect on my experience yesterday, I can see that same truth in action. When I arrived at the polling station, I was greeted by the man whom I was relieving, and presented with a pen, a pad of recording sheets ... and a party rosette. Once I was wearing the rosette, I was no longer the timid and reluctant individual, but an officially accredited party worker. I moulded with the representatives of the other parties in a team, all focused on the same task, some with more devotion to the detail than others.
An hour later, when a lady came in and announced that she was relieving me, I confidently handed over my badge of authority and the 'tools of the trade', like a hardened professional ... albeit after only one hour's experience.
As I wrote that last sentence, I found my mind drifting to pilots flying Spitfires and Hurricanes, and wondering how few flying hours they might have clocked up before finding themselves in a dog-fight with Heinkels and Messerschmitts. I think the day has finally caught up with me. It's still referred to as Armistice Day, despite that being 98 years ago, and the fact that today the theme is the commemoration of the dead of all wars.
Although the official commemorations will take place on Sunday - some years on the previous Sunday - many people still stopped what they were doing this morning and remembered. I confess that, although I had intended to do so, I forgot. I recall that when I was driving, with the radio on, there was a silence before the hourly news bulletin.
On the first anniversary of '9-11', I was driving in the Cambridgeshire countryside and saw traffic coming to a halt in the early afternoon on the adjacent road, so I and many others did the same. Even so, it's hard to imagine - as is reported - the whole country stopping all activity in response to the King's call on the first anniversary in 1919. How times have changed ... in many ways, rightly so. However, the important thing is the remembering, the giving of thanks, and the commitment for the future. If this can only be fulfilled by ceasing all else, then so be it.
Friday 4 November 2016
Where Dove and Trent Collide
I've had an interesting week ... or put it another way, the week has been busy and it's unearthed an interesting story. As you will be aware, for several months now - as time has permitted - I've been researching the families of two of my aunts, the wives of my father's two eldest brothers. The elder of these uncles lived for many years in Derbyshire and I never met his wife, who died when I was only two. It's her trail that led to this week's discoveries.
Let me take you to the village of Marston Montgomery. As the ninteenth-century crow would have flown, it lies about one third of the way from Uttoxeter to Ashbourne. There, in the late summer of 1842, 29-year old Alice Nash presented her husband, nearly twenty years her senior, with their first son, Henry, the 'good guy' in my story. By 1871, he was one of a team of five farm servants at Eaton Dovedale, a large farm in Doveridge. Three years later, Henry married Elizabeth Gotheridge from nearby Church Broughton, and settled there. Soon she was expecting their first child and all seemed to be rosy for Henry. Their euphoria didn't last, however, for Elizabeth died during or soon after the birth of little William. She was 29 (as his mother had been when he was born) and Henry was clearly distraught, for he gave the little boy his mother's maiden name in tribute.
Meanwhile, in Egginton, just a few miles down the Dove valley, Ann Britton (or Brittan) had been growing up, the fifth child and third daughter of John and Elizabeth's family of ten. The last of her siblings was born when she was eleven in 1859 and, at some point in the next ten years, Ann struck out on her own. In 1871 she was some 70 miles away, on the far side of what is now known as the Peak District National Park, at Heckmondwike, where she was the general servant of Edmund John Dent, an iron and metal agent. Mr. Dent's household consisted of his wife and himself, three sons and a daughter, his mother-in-law and two sisters-in-law, so Ann was probably kept very busy.
Whether as a result of willing diversion or unwelcome attention, of course remains unknown, but the following summer found Ann the mother of a little girl, and during the next few years she made her way back to her native Derbyshire. She and the mourning widower Henry met and were married in the spring of 1876. At the next census in 1881, they were living in Egginton with their two children, Ann's daughter Priscilla Britton and Henry's son William Gotheridge Nash. They also had Ann's five-year-old niece Lizzie Britton living with them; Lizzie, too, was born out of wedlock and at that time her mother, Eliza, was a housemaid at a farm in the next village, Marston-upon-Dove. I've been unable to trace Eliza any further.
Our attention now turns to Priscilla. Did she inherit her mother's taste for travel? I found her in 1891 the servant to the harbour master in Morecombe, Lancs. It was perhaps after this adventure, or maybe during a visit home, that she met George Fern. In 1881, George had been a brewer's labourer in his native Burton upon Trent, where he lived with his family in the area known as Stapenhill. Perhaps he had been impressed by her stories of Lancashire; maybe she was attracted by the contrast, as it may have seemed, of returning to the normal pattern of village life. They were married in the summer of 1897 and when the new King came to the throne, they were living in Egginton with their eighteen-month-old son William. George was still travelling to Burton for work.
Priscilla's entry in the 1911 census was something of a mystery. By then Henry, 'our hero', had died and Priscilla was living with her widowed mother in Egginton. They were both employed by the Burton-upon-Trent corporation, earning a living as osier-peelers, in other words they stripped the bark from willow-wands for use in basketry. This was probably something they could do at home, for Priscilla was now accompanied by her 9-year-old daughter, also called Priscilla, as well as William, now 11. The mystery was that Priscilla described herself on the census form as 'married for 13 years', although there was no sign of George (about to be revealed as 'the bad guy' of the tale).
After some effort I found a George Edward Fern living in Coventry. His birthplace, Burton-upon-Trent, was good enough to correspond to what had earlier been described as Stapenhill (the part of Burton sitting in Derbyshire), and his age was now two years more. I couldn't believe what I thought I'd found, so I looked for this George in 1901. The only candidate was a coal-hewer living in Rosliston and born in Coton-in-the-Elms, these being neighbouring villages to the south of Burton, but he was in the same place, and doing the same job, in 1911.
George had moved some 45 miles away, and formed a new relationship. He had married Emily Holloway - rather precipitantly, we must disclose - in the June quarter of 1903, just weeks before she gave birth to their daughter, whom they called Annie Rosa, to be followed in 1905 by a son George Herbert. However George had explained himself, it seems that he was acceptd by Emily's folks. She was the eldest daughter in a family of ten; in 1911 her father was a cycle and motor filer. When Emily was born he was already a cycle fitter and, at 15, she was working as a plater in the cycle trade. By 1911, one of her brothers was making cycle wheels, another was a cycle builder, and two sisters were making leather bags for cycles. Little surprise then, that George had been found a job as 'stores clerk, cycle industry'.
And what links these events to me? That five-year-old Lizzie, living with Ann and Henry in 1881 was my aunt's mother. After her own exciting life, which I may relate here one day, Lizzie's daughter married my uncle in 1921.
Let me take you to the village of Marston Montgomery. As the ninteenth-century crow would have flown, it lies about one third of the way from Uttoxeter to Ashbourne. There, in the late summer of 1842, 29-year old Alice Nash presented her husband, nearly twenty years her senior, with their first son, Henry, the 'good guy' in my story. By 1871, he was one of a team of five farm servants at Eaton Dovedale, a large farm in Doveridge. Three years later, Henry married Elizabeth Gotheridge from nearby Church Broughton, and settled there. Soon she was expecting their first child and all seemed to be rosy for Henry. Their euphoria didn't last, however, for Elizabeth died during or soon after the birth of little William. She was 29 (as his mother had been when he was born) and Henry was clearly distraught, for he gave the little boy his mother's maiden name in tribute.
Meanwhile, in Egginton, just a few miles down the Dove valley, Ann Britton (or Brittan) had been growing up, the fifth child and third daughter of John and Elizabeth's family of ten. The last of her siblings was born when she was eleven in 1859 and, at some point in the next ten years, Ann struck out on her own. In 1871 she was some 70 miles away, on the far side of what is now known as the Peak District National Park, at Heckmondwike, where she was the general servant of Edmund John Dent, an iron and metal agent. Mr. Dent's household consisted of his wife and himself, three sons and a daughter, his mother-in-law and two sisters-in-law, so Ann was probably kept very busy.
Whether as a result of willing diversion or unwelcome attention, of course remains unknown, but the following summer found Ann the mother of a little girl, and during the next few years she made her way back to her native Derbyshire. She and the mourning widower Henry met and were married in the spring of 1876. At the next census in 1881, they were living in Egginton with their two children, Ann's daughter Priscilla Britton and Henry's son William Gotheridge Nash. They also had Ann's five-year-old niece Lizzie Britton living with them; Lizzie, too, was born out of wedlock and at that time her mother, Eliza, was a housemaid at a farm in the next village, Marston-upon-Dove. I've been unable to trace Eliza any further.
Our attention now turns to Priscilla. Did she inherit her mother's taste for travel? I found her in 1891 the servant to the harbour master in Morecombe, Lancs. It was perhaps after this adventure, or maybe during a visit home, that she met George Fern. In 1881, George had been a brewer's labourer in his native Burton upon Trent, where he lived with his family in the area known as Stapenhill. Perhaps he had been impressed by her stories of Lancashire; maybe she was attracted by the contrast, as it may have seemed, of returning to the normal pattern of village life. They were married in the summer of 1897 and when the new King came to the throne, they were living in Egginton with their eighteen-month-old son William. George was still travelling to Burton for work.
Priscilla's entry in the 1911 census was something of a mystery. By then Henry, 'our hero', had died and Priscilla was living with her widowed mother in Egginton. They were both employed by the Burton-upon-Trent corporation, earning a living as osier-peelers, in other words they stripped the bark from willow-wands for use in basketry. This was probably something they could do at home, for Priscilla was now accompanied by her 9-year-old daughter, also called Priscilla, as well as William, now 11. The mystery was that Priscilla described herself on the census form as 'married for 13 years', although there was no sign of George (about to be revealed as 'the bad guy' of the tale).
After some effort I found a George Edward Fern living in Coventry. His birthplace, Burton-upon-Trent, was good enough to correspond to what had earlier been described as Stapenhill (the part of Burton sitting in Derbyshire), and his age was now two years more. I couldn't believe what I thought I'd found, so I looked for this George in 1901. The only candidate was a coal-hewer living in Rosliston and born in Coton-in-the-Elms, these being neighbouring villages to the south of Burton, but he was in the same place, and doing the same job, in 1911.
George had moved some 45 miles away, and formed a new relationship. He had married Emily Holloway - rather precipitantly, we must disclose - in the June quarter of 1903, just weeks before she gave birth to their daughter, whom they called Annie Rosa, to be followed in 1905 by a son George Herbert. However George had explained himself, it seems that he was acceptd by Emily's folks. She was the eldest daughter in a family of ten; in 1911 her father was a cycle and motor filer. When Emily was born he was already a cycle fitter and, at 15, she was working as a plater in the cycle trade. By 1911, one of her brothers was making cycle wheels, another was a cycle builder, and two sisters were making leather bags for cycles. Little surprise then, that George had been found a job as 'stores clerk, cycle industry'.
And what links these events to me? That five-year-old Lizzie, living with Ann and Henry in 1881 was my aunt's mother. After her own exciting life, which I may relate here one day, Lizzie's daughter married my uncle in 1921.
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