A view of the defence policies of the Social Democrats Party.

I reproduce below the defence policy pledges of the SDP taken from the Party's website - I hope they don't mind!  

The aim of enlarging the size of the Army and the Navy's surface fleet is especially to my liking - "quantity has a quality all its own" as someone once said!  Be that as it may, support for yet another "rebirth" of the Fleet Air Arm would be welcome.  I believe the country should return to its traditional policy of having a strong navy to protect its merchant shipping routes while avoiding at all costs entangling the Army in overseas expeditions. 

It is surprising that no mention is made of the RAF, but in future I would hope to see priority given to purchasing aircraft which were suitable for seaborne operations. In such circumstances RAF and Fleet Air Arm squadrons would have the flexibility and interchangeability to operate from land or sea as required.

All the policies advocated below are eminently sensible and should appeal to patriotic centrist voters.

POLICY PLEDGES:

• Maintain Britain’s membership of NATO and observe the NATO target of spending a minimum of 2% of GDP on defence.
• Maintain the independence of the British Military and resist any attempt to absorb it into a European Army.
• In keeping with our membership of the UN Security Council, Britain shall play a full part in fully authorised UN peacekeeping missions.
• Maintain and update Britain’s nuclear defence capabilities – essential in a world where unstable regimes have, or are, developing a nuclear capability.
• The size of the British Army will be increased and recruitment shall be put back under Army control.
• Complete the Carrier programme and related air/naval investment to make and keep HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales fully operational.  Aircraft carriers will form an integral part of our ability to protect our Overseas Territories. A larger surface fleet is also necessary to protect the Carriers.
• Learn from the mistakes of recent decades in relation to UK involvement in foreign wars.  Future decisions on defence spending will focus primarily on the defence of British territory.
• Increase spending on Intelligence to combat terrorism and cyber-warfare as a proportion of the overall defence budget and commit to the UK’s continued participation in the ‘five eyes’ security system.
• Build the UK’s own Satellite Navigation system with trusted partners such as Canada and Australia.
• Offer a significantly enhanced deal for our veterans.  Increase housing priority, dedicated medical services, and reduce employers’ National Insurance for employment in the first two years after leaving the armed service, giving businesses a clear incentive to employ veterans.

"Best Foot Forward" by Somerset born Colin Hodgkinson. The autobiography of the RAF's other legless fighter pilot of World War Two.

I recently read Colin Hodgkinson’s autobiography Best Foot Forward (Odhams Press Limited, London. 1957).  The story of the RAF’s other legless fighter pilot of World War Two.

Hodgkinson was born in Somerset in 1920 and grew up on the Mendip Hills.  He lost both legs after a flying accident in early 1939 while training to be a naval pilot. 

Inspired partly by Douglas Bader, the RAF’s legendary legless fighter pilot, Hodgkinson transferred to the RAF early in the war with the aim of fulfilling his ambition to fly in combat.

He eventually flew Spitfires under the command of some of the RAF’s most successful leaders, including the renowned “Johnnie” Johnson.

By November 1943 he was a flight commander in 501 Squadron when the oxygen supply failed in his Spitfire during a high altitude weather reconnaissance mission over France.  His aircraft crashed and he was so badly injured that he was repatriated to Britain.

As he was being transported on a stretcher across Germany on route to Sweden, he witnessed the lynching of four US airmen by a crowd in a railway station.  He feared he would be next if the vengeful mob saw his uniform.  Luckily for him his uniform and stretcher was covered by a blanket.

After the war Hodgkinson flew jets with 501 and 604 Squadrons of the Royal Auxiliary Air Force.

In 1957 he appeared on the BBC’s This is Your Life - before the famed Douglas Bader.

The book is a remarkable story of courage and determination. It also includes his account of an eventful family life on and around the Mendip Hills between the two world wars.

It is well worth reading.

A stroll through the Arlington Court Estate in the neighbouring County of Devonshire.

One from the archives!  Back in November 2011 my wife and I enjoyed an autumn stay in a National Trust holiday cottage at Loxhore in North Devonshire, a village on the edge of the Trust’s Arlington Court Estate.  The cottage, named Mortuary Cottage, is tucked away in a wooded valley through which ran the River Yeo.  The back door of the cottage was only a few yards from the riverbank. 

The cottage was given its rather sombre name due to it being designated the village mortuary in the Second World War.  Apparently every village had to have a building for use as a mortuary in case it was bombed by the Luftwaffe, but why the Germans would want to bomb an isolated village in North Devonshire is unfathomable. 

Mortuary Cottage at Loxhore in November 2011.  Cott Bridge over the River Yeo is behind the trees on the right of the picture.

 

Almost every day during our stay I went for a walk into the Arlington Court Estate. The house and estate belonged to the Chichester family for eleven generations.  I followed the footpaths along the slopes of the valley and down to the River Yeo and then on to where I eventually came upon the lake where the river is dammed.  The footpath continued across the dam and up through the wooded hillside to Arlington Court. 

Footpaths in Webber's Wood on the Arlington Court Estate.  Autumn 2011.

Autumn colours in Webber's Wood on the Arlington Court Estate in North Devonshire. November 2011.

I never went into the house - with boots muddied from the walk I doubt if I would have been welcome - nor the National Carriage Museum which is housed in the stable block.

The house dates from 1822 in its current form, but viewed from the outside it did not strike me as being one of the more attractive buildings in the Trust’s care.  However, the estate’s walks are difficult to better.

The Lake and its piers.

To quote from the National Trust information board:

“Sir John Chichester formed the lake in1850 by damming the River Yeo. 

Having built the lake, Sir John decided to impress his guests by building a long approach drive to his house which would be carried over the lake by a suspension bridge.  He died in 1851 before the project was complete.  The piers remain.”

The Lake and its piers on The National Trust's Arlington Court Estate in North Devonshire photographed in November 2011.

National Trust being led away from its core purpose.

Another letter in The Week (November 21) which I totally agree with!

The National Trust’s mission.

To The Times

Those who doubt that Hilary McGrady (“National Trust told to learn from slave row”) is on a mission to lead the National Trust away from its core purpose of looking after the buildings and land placed in its care need only read the autumn edition of the trust’s magazine.  In it, the director of volunteering, participation and inclusion says: “At the National Trust we have a duty to play a part in creating a fairer, more equitable society.”  It is clear that the National Trust Acts from 1907 to 1971 place no such duty on the trust.

However, the actions of the director-general and her staff suggest they have this ambition at the centre of their strategy.  The trust must not become a vehicle for those endeavouring to use for social and political purposes.  The trustees have a responsibility to ensure that the director-general and her staff focus on the trust’s charitable objects.  If they fail to do that, the Charity Commission should step in and do the job for them.

Dr Alan Hearne, Woodstock, Oxfordshire

The National Trust discovers Britain had colonies and links to the African slave trade - who would have known such a thing?

The National Trust seems to have just discovered that Britain once had colonies – who would have known such a thing if they had not informed us!?  And – shock, horror, - Britain was once involved in the African slave trade.  I can’t imagine that this would be startling news to anyone who was given a half decent education.  I learnt about such things at junior school in the late 1950s.

Be that as it may, in order to keep up with the wokies in academia the National Trust’s historians have compiled a list of properties which have links with colonialism and the slave trade.  The fact that practically everything British has such links does not appear to have occurred to them, therefore the national list, not surprisingly, is a long one.

In Somerset there are four properties listed: Clevedon Court, Bath Assembly Rooms, Barrington Court and, amazingly, Glastonbury Tor.

Barrington Court’s presence on the National Trusts dossier is due to the fact that the house, acquired by the Trust in 1907, was leased in 1920 to Colonel Arthur Abram Lyle, the grandson of the founder of Abram Lyle & Sons, a sugar producing company.  The business was founded after the abolition of slavery so for some reason the Trust went to great lengths to find a connection to a supposedly morally dubious past.

Here is Barrington Court’s “crime sheet” from the Trust’s national report “Interim Report on the Connections between Colonialism and Properties now in the Care of the National Trust, Including Links with Historic Slavery.”:

The National Trust acquired Barrington Court in 1907, in a derelict condition. From 1920, Barrington was leased and restored by Colonel Abram Arthur Lyle (1880–1931), using architectural salvage collected from other houses. Lyle was the grandson of the founder of Abram Lyle & Sons, a sugar-producing company of which the colonel became director, and which merged to form Tate & Lyle in 1921. Both businesses were established after the abolition of slavery. The early nineteenth and early twentieth century British sugar industry was predominantly supplied by Caribbean plantations, founded under colonialism and supported by enslaved labour.

As for Glastonbury Tor being on the Trust’s dossier, words fail me!  It strikes me that those running the National Trust cannot be happy in their job if they think many of the properties in their care have dishonourable links.  Perhaps they should resign and let pragmatists take their place.

The Law Commission following in the footsteps of the Soviet Union's Stalinist authorities? A cautionary tale!

I came across this letter in The Week (November 14) which illustrates what may happen if the Law Commission’s proposals on hate speech come to pass.  And they say an Englishman’s home is his castle!

Lethal home truths.

To The Times

The Law Commission’s proposal to extend the jurisdiction of hate speech to private homes has unhappy parallels.  In 1932 Soviet, propaganda had it that a 13-year-old dedicated Young Pioneer, Pavlik Morozov, did the “right thing” by denouncing his father, Trofim, to the Stalinist authorities.  Trofim was said to have been executed as a result.  Members of Pavlik’s family, somewhat unhappy with this, then murdered the youth.  In turn they themselves were executed.  Pavlik was lauded in the USSR as a martyred hero, an example for Soviet youth to follow.

Michael Olizar, London.

Sunset over South Somerset.

Pleasing sunset this evening over Herne Hill on the fringe of Ilminster in South Somerset.

Sunset over Herne Hill in South Somerset on 25th November.

David Miliband, former Labour foreign secretary, has a salary four times higher than the Secretary-General of the UN.

These days I am very reluctant to give money to charities as it seems many of their CEOs are reported to earn six figure salaries.  So I was not surprised to read this story in a recent issue (November 7) of The Week magazine.  It certainly reinforces my disinclination to contribute to such institutions.

"Good week for David Miliband, the former foreign secretary, whose salary has soared to over $1m a year.  When Miliband became head of the New York-based aid charity the International Rescue Committee in 2013, he was paid $332,778. His new salary is four times higher than that of the Secretary-General of the UN."

Nice work if you can get it!

The war memorial in Watchet on the Somerset Coast.

 I visited the Somerset coastal town of Watchet back in the spring of 2018 and, while strolling around the harbour and esplanade, my wife and I came across a rather unique war memorial.  It stands by the wall of the public library, a building which was the town's lifeboat station until 1944.  The stone memorial is new and in the form of a structure representing sand bags.  It was unveiled on 28 June 2014. 

Originally Watchet had remembered its fallen by creating a recreation ground named the Memorial Ground.  It consisted of a sports pavilion and stand which was opened in July 1929.

The distinctive new memorial commemorates 42 men who were killed in World War One and 16 in World War Two. 

The war memorial in the Somerset coastal town of Watchet.

 

The loss of the armoured cruiser HMS GOOD HOPE at the Battle of Coronel. One of her crew is remembered in the village of Broadway, South Somerset.

As soon as war began in August 1914 Vice-Admiral Graf Von Spee’s Asiatic Cruiser Squadron, based in Tsingtau, about one hundred miles north of Shanghai, commenced a campaign of commerce raiding against British merchant shipping across the Pacific.  Von Spee’s squadron was built around two powerful modern armoured cruisers, SCHARNHORST and GNEISENAU, each armed with eight 8.2 inch and six 5.9 inch guns.

The Admiralty gave the task of intercepting the German commerce raiders to Rear Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock’s squadron which consisted of the old battleship HMS CANOPUS and the armoured cruisers HMS GOOD HOPE and HMS MONMOUTH, together with the light cruiser HMS GLASGOW and the armed liner HMS OTRANTO.

Cradock left The Falkland Islands in GOOD HOPE on the 22 October and sailed into the Pacific aiming to rendezvous with the rest of his squadron off the west coast of South America.  However, he left CANOPUS behind as she was suffering from engine problems.

On November 1^st 1914 Cradock’s squadron came upon Von Spee’s ships off the Chilean port of Coronel.  Cradock ordered the lightly armed OTRANTO to clear the area leaving GOOD HOPE, MONMOUTH and GLASGOW to engage Von-Spee’s two armoured cruisers and their accompanying light cruisers DRESDEN and LEIPZIG.  The two forces were not evenly matched.  The British ships mounted a total of four 9.2 inch, thirty two 6 inch and ten 4 inch guns compared to the German’s sixteen 8.2 inch, twelve 5.9 inch and twenty 4.1 inch guns.

Three hours after forming line of battle the action was over.  GOOD HOPE and MONMOUTH were overwhelmed and sunk with all hands; Cradock and 1600 men were lost.  GLASGOW escaped to fight Von Spee another day at the Battle of The Falklands.

One of those lost with GOOD HOPE was Able Seaman George Mattravers Stoker 1^st Class, the son of John and Eliza Mattravers of Broadway in South Somerset, he was aged 31.

Able Seaman Mattravers is remembered on a commemorative plaque in Broadway’s Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga, and on the village’s war memorial.  His name is also on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial.

The plaque inside the Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga at Broadway in South Somerset commemorating those who served 

Note.  The Commonwealth War Graves Commission spells Mattravers as Matravers.  I use the spelling Mattravers as it is used in Broadway’s village church and on its war memorial.  

Professor Vernon Bogdanor appears to support the balkanisation of England to save the Union. A letter in The Week.

In a letter which first appeared in The Times Professor Vernon Bogdanor  appears to support the balkanisation of England as a way of saving The Union.  It seems he is among those who believe in suppressing any political entity which exclusively represents English nationhood.

I reproduce below his letter to The Times which I came across in The Week (24 October).  I find it a disappointing read from someone so distinguished.  He gives powerful ammunition to those who argue against the establishment of an English parliament in order to discourage Scottish separatism and preserve the 1707 Union.

To The Times.

John Kampfner is right to call for further decentralisation “to the localities”, but an English parliament would not achieve this.  Whether situated in Manchester, Liverpool or York, it would appear just as remote to most as Westminster which would be reduced to a debating chamber for the discussion of foreign and defence policy and macro-economic management, while the quasi-federal UK which resulted would be so dominated by England as to be unbalanced, and an encouragement to Scottish separatism.  There is no democratic federation in the world in which one of the units represents more than 80% of the population. 

The right course is to build on the combined authorities with directly elected mayors by strengthening their powers, and by devolving on a similar basis to those areas of England outside the city regions.  That entails a unitary system of local government in those areas, as recommended more than 50 years ago by the Royal Commission on Local Government, in place of the present two-tier system.  That is the path that I hope the Government will follow in its forthcoming white paper.

 

Vernon Bogdanor, professor of government, KCL

A visit to the village of Wambrook in South Somerset, and its Church of St. Mary.

The village of Wambrook is tucked away in the Blackdown Hills 2 miles southwest of the town of Chard in South Somerset.  To find the village you have to explore the narrow tree-lined country lanes off the A30 – the main road which climbs steadily out of Chard into the foothills of the Blackdowns.

My wife and I, after visiting The Barleymow Farm Shop on the A30, took several wrong turns before finding the village.  It seemed to consist of scattered homes straggling along an undulating country lane, and we could find nowhere convenient to stop until we came to its Church of St. Mary.

The Church of St. Mary in the South Somerset village of Wambrook.

Arthur Mee in his The King’s England, Somerset (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1968) informs us that: “In 1896 this village was transferred from Dorset to Somerset.  The little medieval church has rounded doorways and a font of the thirteenth century, bench ends carved 400 years ago, an Elizabethan chalice engraved with its price of 35 shillings, and a gallery at the back for the ringers of three ancient bells.”  However, the Wambrook parish church website states there are 5 bells in the tower!  The Church is built of Ham stone rubble and ashlar dressing, and it is thought the original roof was thatched.*  

On entering the churchyard the first thing which caught our eye was the seventeenth century set of stocks beside the wall of the church.  We followed the footpath through the churchyard and into a field.  We didn’t venture further as the going become steeper, but we could look down toward a brook and across the wooded valley. On the opposite side of the wooded valley we could see a large building which we later discovered to be the Cotley Inn.

Seventeenth century stocks beside the Church of St. Mary in Wambrook, South Somerset.

Retracing our steps through the churchyard we noticed the Commonwealth War Grave of Private W. J. Larcombe who was serving in the Royal Army Veterinary Corps when he died on 10 July 1944 aged 24.  He was the son of Charles Victor and Emily Caroline Larcombe, and husband of Louisa Elizabeth Larcombe of Islington, London.

Nearby was another headstone, that of Walter George Pidgeon. The headstone also commemorated the passing of “our dear boys”.  One of them, Sidney John Pidgeon, died at the early age of 16.  The other, Walter Frank Pidgeon, died of wounds on 24 February 1945 in Myanmar (formerly Burma) while serving as a private in the Second Battalion, King’s Own Scottish Borderers.  It seems he may have been wounded when the KOSB took part in the successful assault on Japanese positions on the Irrawaddy line in early 1945.  He is at rest in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission’s Tuakkyan  War Cemetery in Myanmar. His wife, Viola Beatrice Rosalind Pidgeon was from Chard, Somerset.

Gravestone commemorating members of the Pidgeon family in the Church of St. Mary in Wambrook, South Somerset.

The tower of St. Mary's Church in the village of Wambrook, South Somerset.

We returned to the car and drove on into the valley and up the other side past the Cotley Inn.  After more twists and turns we reached the top of the hill where there was a fine view toward Chard.  We carried on down the other side enjoying the scenery and eventually re-joined the A30.  I hope to go back with my camera to the hill above the Cotley Inn and take some landscape pictures of the Somerset countryside south of Chard.

*https://wambrookparishchurch.com/history.html

The Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga in the South Somerset village of Broadway, and an epitaph of note.

 The village of Broadway is situated to the west of Ilminster in South Somerset, just a few hundred yards off the A358.  Writing over 50 years ago in his The King’s England – Somerset (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1968) Arthur Mee tells us of Broadway: “It stands on an ancient track cut through a royal forest, leading straight as an arrow to the fortified hill of Castle Neroche; it is said that the wide verges of this old road were for preventing robbers from hiding close enough to spring out on the unwary traveller.”  I am not sure where the “wide verges” are, but when I visited the village, on the way to the parish church the 13^th century Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga, the lanes were narrow and the hedgerows thick and tall.

Broadway’s village church stands some way outside the village because, it is thought, of an outbreak of the plague.  Ronald Webber in his The Devon and Somerset Blackdowns (Robert Hale & Company, 1976) informs us: “The church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburgha (sic), well outside the village, has a chancel and transept of late 13^th century or early 14^th century construction.  The interior abounds with solid oak bench ends with a preponderance of poppy heads.  The chancel has carved beams and bosses while the 16^th century pulpit has carved panels depicting the five wounds of Christ.  An octagonal font of the Perpendicular period has a small figure on each side.”

The Church of St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga in the South Somerset village of Broadway.

There does seem some uncertainty as to who the church is dedicated.  St. Aldhelm was an Anglo-Saxon literature scholar born in the 7^th century.  He became Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey and Bishop of Sherborne.  However, there is some confusion over St. Eadburga.  Is the dedication meant for St. Eadburh of Winchester granddaughter of King Alfred, or St. Eadburga of Bicester an English saint from the 7^th century and a daughter of King Penda of Mercia?  English Heritage gives the dedication as St. Eadburh while outside the church a sign names it St. Aldhelm and St. Eadburga. 

Whatever its name may be, it is a charming little church with a well maintained graveyard.  Several of the gravestones have interesting epitaphs, but the following one in particular caught my eye.  It was on the reverse of the gravestone of one Frank Fawcett who died on 13 June 1971, aged 73 – the words suggest he was a farmer:

Teach me to work

diligently, with courage

and fortitude, but above

all with meekness and

humility, not striving for

profit or the gratification

of vanity, but seeking

rather to produce the fruits

of your good earth so that

my fellow creatures and

the community in which

they live may enjoy them.

Will breaking the Brexit withdrawal agreement damage Britain's reputation? A letter in the Western Daily Press.

 Letter in the Western Daily Press 22 September 2020.

Treaties only last while they last.

It is all very well for Geoffrey Cox MP, the former Attorney General, to say breaking agreements and treaties does “unconscionable” damage to Britain’s reputation, but there are circumstances when standing by them can be disastrous.

In 1914 those in government didn’t want conflict with Germany, but because they did not wish to break the treaty which guaranteed Belgian neutrality ministers reluctantly decided war had to be declared when German troops marched into Belgium.  They felt it was a matter of upholding Britain’s honour and reputation to do so.

Devastatingly, to put it mildly, World War One cost Britain and The Empire millions of dead and wounded to defeat Germany and her allies.  That victory lead to an unjust peace, the rise of Nazi Germany, and another world war.

With the benefit of hindsight one might think fighting for Belgian neutrality and maintaining Britain’s reputation came at too high a cost.  

Perhaps, in present circumstances, Mr Cox might consider the words of President de Gaulle: “Treaties, you see, are like girls and roses: they last while they last.”

S.W. 

Ilminster, Somerset.

Morning sunflower and evening sunset in South Somerset today.

 Absolutely clear blue sky in South Somerset this morning so I took a photo of a neighbour's sunflower peering over the garden wall.  

In the evening there was a pleasing cloudscape as sunset approached.

The British Army's Main Battle Tank. To ditch or not to ditch.

My late grandfather was a regular in the Somerset Light Infantry, but during the First World War he was transferred to the Royal Tank Corps and took part in the Battle of Cambrai where tanks were first used successfully, and en masse.

Therefore I was interested to see in the press that there are those in our Conservative government who advocate abandoning the use of tanks in the British Army.  I came across an article and a letter in The Week (5 September) which argued for and against the retention of the tank.

The case against was made by Jack Allen, a former Cold War tank commander, in an article originally published in Reaction. Life.  I reproduce the points I found of interest below:

Tanks for the memory, not for war today.

MBTs were already proving ineffective when I was a tank commander at the end of the Cold War: they’re even more so today.  For a start, being huge (some weigh 70 tons) they’re hard to move around the battlefield, hard to hide from drones and attack helicopters, and notoriously bad at fighting in cities.  On the modern battlefield – think Iraq or Syria – they’re easy prey to the lone operator on a moped with an anti-tank gun.  Or to roadside IEDs.  Even if the attacks only damage a tank, it all adds to the vast amount of support needed to keep the tanks on the road.  It’s not as if NATO general staff believe the next conflict will be fought on the open North European Plain, where MBTs come into their own.  No, Moscow prefers to work by destabilising governments and infiltrating militias.  By all means let’s invest in light armoured vehicles.  But let’s ditch the tank.    

The case for retaining tanks was originally made in The Times. I reproduce it below as published in The Week.

Why tanks are vital.

To The Times.

In all the articles (about the rationale for scrapping tanks), we could find no mention of deterrence.  Is there anyone left in Whitehall who understands deterrence strategy, which we are all signed up to in NATO?  Simply put, it requires an ability to outdo an enemy at all levels of conflict up to and including nuclear; if you can’t do this at each level, with a reasonable level of assurance, the strategy loses credibility.  The test for disposing of a capability that an enemy might retain is whether whatever is deemed to be a replacement will deter that enemy.  If not, then escalation or capitulation are the only responses.

When our conventional forces are as limited in number compared with those of our potential enemies as they now are, escalation could quickly rise towards a nuclear conflict.  Under these circumstances, our nuclear capability might well become a cuckoo in the nest.

Air Chief Marshall Sir Michael Graydon; Vice Admiral Sir Jeremy Blackham.

 

Without a big increase in attack helicopters to replace the tanks, I lean towards agreeing with Sir Michael and Sir Jeremy.

Viewed in a South Somerset garden on the last day of August.

 Crab apples, slow-worms and the sunset viewed on the last day of August.

Crab apples.

Slow-worms in a compost bin.

Cumulus Congestus boiling up over the Blackdown Hills in Somerset.

After a showery morning on the 28th August the afternoon brought forth Cumulus Congestus clouds boiling up over the Blackdown Hills in Somerset.

Cloudscape over the Blackdown Hills in Somerset on 28th August 2020.

Cumulus Congestus over the Blackdown Hills in Somerset on the 28th August.

Epitaphs of interest. At rest in the Churchyard of Christ Church, Redhill, North Somerset is C.T.D. "Sox" Hosegood FRAeS.

 The epitaph on his gravestone includes the description “A good egg”.

Charles Thomas Dennehy “Sox” Hosegood FRAeS is best remembered for his career in aviation.  He joined the Royal Navy just after the outbreak of World War Two and gained his Fleet Air Arm wings in July 1940.  Late in the war he was one of the first six Naval Pilots sent to America to convert to helicopters on the Sikorsky R4.  In March 1945 Hosegood became the Navy test pilot at the Joint Service Helicopter Test Unit of the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment (AFEE) at Beulieu.  He left the Navy in November 1946.

In 1952 Hosegood became Chief Test Pilot of the Bristol Aeroplane Company’s Helicopter Division.  He worked on the Bristol Sycamore, the first British helicopter to gain its Certificate of Airworthiness.  He made the initial flights of the Bristol Belvedere and saw it into service with the RAF.

After Westland took over Bristol’s Helicopter Division in 1963 Hosegood joined the South Western Electricity Board to set up their Helicopter Unit for power line inspection duties.  He managed the Helicopter Unit for 20 years up to his retirement by which time it had expanded to cover power line inspections for 4 neighbouring Boards.

He is buried in the churchyard of Christ Church in the village of Redhill, North Somerset.

Source:

https://www.aerosociety.com/news/obituary-charles-thomas-dennehy-sox-hosegood/

The Church of England and "The hastening death of the parish".

As readers of this blog may have noticed I enjoy photographing churches and wandering around churchyards.  I am obviously stating the obvious, but there is history inside the church as well as outside where the locals are laid to rest.  Churches with their nineteenth century and earlier architecture make wonderfully picturesque photos, and when exploring a churchyard I always find something of interest whether it be a grave of a notable local or an interesting epitaph on a headstone.

An English town or village would not be the same without its church so it is sad to see that many churches are now unused.  Thankfully, many have been taken over by various church conservation trusts, and they do a fine job in preserving them. 

The Church of St. Thomas in the Somerset village of Thurlbear.  It is in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.

Therefore I was disappointed to read an article in the 8^th of August edition of The Week.  It suggests that the Church of England will become more remote from its parishioners resulting in fewer active churches – no doubt more will regrettably close.  I reproduce the article, first published in The Daily Telegraph, below.

The C of E is killing off the parish church.

Giles Fraser

The Daily Telegraph

The parish church – “for centuries the bedrock of the Church of England’s engagement with communities throughout the land” – is dying, says Giles Fraser.  It’s not just secularisation that’s killing it, but the controlling nature of Church leaders.  As a recent piece by Revd Stephen Trott in The Church Times pointed out, the rot set in back in the 1970s, when the assets of individual parishes were effectively nationalised by the General Synod.  This enabled money to be redistributed from wealthy parishes to smaller ones, but it also spawned a burgeoning central administration that has since employed ever more accountants, administrators and archdeacons.  Ever fewer communities, meanwhile, have their own vicar.  Covid has accelerated this trend, with talk of digital aids such as zoom reducing the need for “analogue priests”, and the Archbishop of Canterbury ordering parish clergy not to enter their own churches over Easter to pray.  Such centralisation is a “recipe for institutional collapse”.  “The hastening death of the parish will tear the beating heart from many a small place that is reliant upon church to help organise its common life.” 

A lovely late evening sky over South Somerset.

I was struck by the beauty of the late evening sky over South Somerset on the 8th August about half an hour before sunset.  

The mares' tails were fascinating.

The South Somerset village of Ashill and its Church of St. Mary.

I passed through the South Somerset village of Ashill recently, and stopped to have a quick stroll around.  The village is just a few hundred yards west of the A358 and sits peacefully in the shadow of the Blackdown Hills.

Thirty four years ago Paul Newman described Ashill in his Somerset Villages, (Robert Hale Ltd., 1986):  “The village centre blends brick house with Victorian Gothic and sturdy stone cottages: a tight sociable combination of dwellings served by a primary school and a post office.

Ashill’s church durably combines Norman, Early English, Decorated and Perpendicular work.  Inside snowy whitewash blends with honey Hamstone, creating an effect of delicate austerity.”

I couldn’t see the Post Office, but there is a pub and the school is still there with just beside it the Church of St. Mary with a pair of giant yews in its churchyard.

The Church of St. Mary in the South Somerset village of Ashill.

There is a Commonwealth War Grave sign on the church gate so I walked through to pay my respects.  The grave was that of Driver Charles Frank Donald Ottery of the Royal Army Service Corps who was killed on 29^th September 1941 aged 25.  He was the son of William Baker Ottery and Hannah Jane Ottery of Ashill, and is at rest beside others with the same surname; presumably relatives.

On this day in 1941 Flight Lieutenant Hugh Speke DFC died in a flying accident. He is at rest in the village churchyard at Dowlish Wake, South Somerset.

Hugh Speke was a descendant of the noted English soldier and explorer John Hanning Speke who discovered the source of the River Nile.  Speke was born in South Africa on April 14^th 1914, but after the early death of both his parents, William Speke and Gwendoline Constance Speke (nee Maitland), he came to England with his twin sister and brother to be brought up by relatives in Pigdon, Northumberland.

He joined 604 ‘County of Middlesex’ Squadron, Royal Auxiliary Air Force, in 1937 and subsequently began full-time service on 24^th August 1939.  On the outbreak of war the squadron was flying the twin-engined Blenheim Mk IF, a not very successful fighter as it was merely a conversion of the Blenheim light bomber fitted with four .303 inch machine guns in a pack under the fuselage.

With 604 Sqn. now operating in the night-fighter role, on the 24^th August 1940 Speke’s Blenheim crashed near Odiham during a night patrol – fortunately both he and his gunner escaped unhurt.  However, before the end of 1940 Speke and his gunner, Sergeant A. K. Sandifer, intercepted and damaged He111s on two occasions.

By the spring of 1941 many of the RAF’s night fighter squadrons were using to good effect the radar equipped Bristol Beaufighter Mk. IF.  It was armed with four 20mm cannon and powered by 2 Bristol Hercules radial engines which gave it a top speed of 324 mph at 11,750 feet and a service ceiling of 27,000 feet.

In May 1941 Flt. Lt. Speke was flying a Beaufighter with 604 Squadron from Middle Wallop in Hampshire, an airfield in No.10 Group of RAF Fighter Command.  At 0100 hours on the 4^th he shot down a He111 of 1/KG26 which had just bombed Bristol.  The German bomber crashed in Binford Wood, Crowcombe Heathfield, in Somerset.

On the night of the 7^th/8^th July Speke, assisted by his radar operator Sergeant G.L. Dawson, shot down a He111 of Kgr100 into the sea off Bournemouth.  Twenty-seven minutes later near Lymington he shot down another He111 from the same unit.  The next night he shot down a He111 from 3/KG26 near Lulworth.

On the 26^th July Flt. Lt. Speke and Sgt. Dawson were killed during a night flying test flight in Beaufighter X7548 NG-S.  For reasons unknown the aircraft flew at high speed into Oare Hill near Pewsey in Wiltshire. 

On the 27^th July 1941 Hugh Speke was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for destroying 4 enemy aircraft at night and damaging at least 2 more.

Speke is buried, alongside several of his ancestors, in the churchyard of St. Andrew’s in Dowlish Wake, near Ilminster, in South Somerset. The tomb of his ancestor John Hanning Speke is within the church itself.

The grave of Flt. Lt. Hugh Speke DFC in the churchyard of St. Andrew's Church Dowlish Wake, South Somerset.  

The Church of St. Andrew in the village of Dowlish Wake, South Somerset.

Sadly, Hugh Speke’s brother, Captain William Maitland Speke MC, was killed in action at the age of 35 in Libya on 18^th February 1942 while serving with 72 Field Regiment Royal Artillery. He is buried in Knightsbridge War Cemetery, Acroma in Libya.

A visit to Natural England's Barrington Hill National Nature Reserve in South Somerset.

I put some fuel in the car on July 16^th  - the first time since March - and decided to take a run over to Natural England’s Barrington Hill National Nature Reserve.  The entrance to the reserve is on a country road around half way between the South Somerset villages of Horton and Bickenhall – about 4 miles north-west of Ilminster.

There is only enough space for about 3 cars at the entrance to the reserve which is set back off the road, but luckily I found no-one around.  It was a very hot sunny afternoon with a slight breeze so it wasn’t too difficult walking up the quite steep slope to the highest point on the reserve.  The going was firm underfoot – no mud!

Although not especially high the nature reserve has some pleasing views in an arc from the north-east to the south-west.  I think I could make out the church towers in the villages of Ashill and Broadway, and the field patterns on Herne Hill south of Ilminster.  I will have to take some bearings and check the OS map next time I visit.

The view to the south-east from Barrington Hill Nature Reserve in South Somerset.

The view to the south west from Barrington Hill Nature Reserve in South Somerset.

Lots of common knapweed on Barrington Hill Nature Reserve in South Somerset.

Windmill Hill as seen from Barrington Hill Nature Reserve in South Somerset.

The view to the north-east from Barrington Hill Nature Reserve in South Somerset. The church tower in the village of Ashill is just visible on the skyline to the right.

An expedition to Hinton St. George, a village in South Somerset.

On a recent visit to Merriott in South Somerset I noticed a signpost for Hinton St. George so one day at the end of June I decided on a trip there to take some photos of the church and village.  I took a route through the very narrow country lanes from Kingstone, south east of Ilminster.  However, my navigation went awry driving through steep, deep cut lanes, but I found myself at Dinnington and then followed the Fosse Way to Lopen where I turned right onto the road to Merriott.  On the outskirts of Merriott the signpost for Hinton St. George – the one I had noticed previously - directed me along a gently rising country lane to the centre of the village.

The village cross at Hinton St. George in South Somerset.

Maxwell Fraser, writing of Hinton St. George in his Somerset (Great Western Railway Company, 1934.), informs us that: “It was the ancient seat of the Poulett family, who settled there in the reign of Henry I, and whose magnificent tombs enrich Hinton church.  It was one of the Pouletts who became the keeper of Mary Queen of Scots during her imprisonment. There is a fine cross in the centre of the village and a delightful old house known as The Priory.”

Amias Poulett, “the keeper of Mary Queen of Scots”, was ordered to treat her with severity, but instead, while declaring he would kill her rather than let her escape, paid the expenses of her large household from his own pocket.*

Paul Newman in his Somerset Villages (Robert Hale Ltd., 1986) writes of a seventeenth century Poulett:  “John Poulett (d.1649) was a fervent Royalist, in many ways an intemperate and self-seeking man, who was heavily fined for his allegiance after the triumph of Cromwell’s army.  The fact that he was the brother-in-law of the immensely effective Parliamentarian commander General Fairfax might have proven a mitigating circumstance.”

The Pouletts, originally from Pawlett near Bridgwater, held the estate at Hinton until 1968 when the 8th and last Earl Poulett  (b.1909 d.1973) sold up and moved to Jersey.

The Priory, Hinton St. George, South Somerset.

I parked the car opposite The Priory and walked the short distance to St. George's Church where I took some photos and had a look for the three Commonwealth War Graves which are listed as being in the churchyard.  I did find one headstone which looked very much like a CWGC one, but the inscription was, unfortunately, practically indecipherable.

St. George’s Church is described by Arthur Mee in his Somerset, The King’s England (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd., 1968) as having: “. . . a fine tall tower with pinnacles and pierced battlements, and a window on every side to let out the sound of the bells.  The porch has a ribbed stone roof and an old traceried door, and ancient timbers make the panelled roofs of the nave and south aisle.”

The Church of St. George in the South Somerset village of Hinton St. George.

The war memorial is just inside the gates to the east of the church.  It commemorates 18 men from the First World War including Captain William John Lydston, the 7th Earl Poulett, who served for 3 years in the Royal Artillery, and later in the Anti-Aircraft Corps, but died in the 1918 influenza epidemic at the age of 34.*

There is only one name on the memorial remembered from World War Two; that of  Lt. Col. William Murray Leggatt who served in the Royal Artillery and spent most of the war in North Africa. He was awarded the D.S.O. for his part in the Second Battle of El Alamein where he commanded the 11^th Regiment (HAC) Royal Horse Artillery.  When his health began to fail he was posted home to England in May 1944 and given another command, that of 3^rd Royal Artillery Reserve Regiment.  In April 1945 he was sent on sick leave. On the 13th of August 1946, aged 45, he died of a heart attack in the Cavalry Club, Piccadilly.

The war memorial in the South Somerset village of Hinton St. George.

*Robert Dunning Somerset Families (Somerset Books, 2002)