A visit to the village church in Buckland St. Mary high on the Blackdown Hills in Somerset.

The ancient Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary, Buckland means land granted to the thanes by the Saxon Kings, stands 700 feet high on the Blackdown Hills. 

A short drive along narrow country lanes, not far from the A303, brings you into the village and its incongruous, but impressive, Church of St. Mary.  Incongruous because of the small size of the community which it serves, yet impressive enough to be known as the “Cathedral of the Hills”.

The Church of St. Mary in the Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary.

The church was built between 1853 and 1863. It was designed by London architect Benjamin Ferry and paid for by John Edwin Lance.  It is the third church to be built on the site.  Lance, from a well-to-do family, was rector of St. Mary’s from 1832 to 1885.

On arrival John Lance had himself built a new rectory in the style of a Victorian Gothic mansion – today it is known as Buckland House.  When finished the ground floor of the rectory had a hall, library, double drawing room, dining room, parish room, kitchen, larder, pantry, butler’s pantry and bedroom.  The first floor had nine bedrooms, a dressing room, and a linen room with 4 attics above.  The house stood in 37 acres of glebe land and had a staff to match its size and stature.

It was the death of his wife which motivated Lance to have the church rebuilt.  The finished building was described by Pevsner as: “A noble incongruity, due to the rector, the Rev. J. E. Lance.  Large with a substantial s w tower and in a style not at all du pays.  Moreover far too large for a small and scattered congregation.”

The s w tower of St. Mary's church in the Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary.

The war memorial in the churchyard of St. Mary's, Buckland St. Mary, Somerset.

Sadly a carter was killed during the construction of the church.  He was carting materiel when his horses ran away; the wagon overturned and the man was crushed to death beneath the stones.  The story is on a stone in the churchyard with this quaint warning: “May all carters who read this take warning and never get in their wagon”.  I could not find the stone on my stroll around the church, but I am sure to visit Buckland St. Mary again and will have another look.

However, I did come across the grave of Lt. Col. John Conrad Pringle, Royal Engineers, who died in 1952 aged 71, and that of his wife Ethel Gladys who was over 100 years old when she died in 1991.  Perhaps the fresh air on the Blackdowns accounted for the lady’s longevity?

The grave of Lt. Col. and Mrs John Conrad Pringle in the churchyard of  St. Mary's in the Somerset village of Buckland St. Mary.

Walter Bagehot, influential mid-Victorian political journalist, born and died in Langport, Somerset.

I recently came across a twitter spat between Tim Montgomerie, conservative political activist and journalist, and Sky News presenter Kay Burley.  Apparently Mr Montgomerie tweeted: “Throughout Sky News we have pundits posing as reporters.”  This brought a reply from Ms Burley which was, shall we say, uncomplimentary.  I think I side with Mr Montgomerie!

Be that as it may, the exchange reminded me of a visit to Langport where I came upon the grave of Walter Bagehot, the esteemed mid-Victorian political journalist, in the churchyard of All Saint’s Church on The Hill.

The west tower of All Saints' Church on The Hill in Langport, Somerset.  The church is now in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.

Walter Bagehot was born in the ancient Somerset town of Langport in 1826.  In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Langport thrived as an inland port serving barge-hauled merchandise on the River Parrett.  

Walter was the son of Thomas Watson Bagehot, a leading Langport merchant, who had interests in banking and shipping.  He studied at University College, London, and in 1852 he returned to Langport to enter his father’s business. 

At the age of 31 he married Eliza, the daughter of James Wilson, founder and editor of The Economist.  When Wilson died in 1860 while in Calcutta advising the Indian government on its finances, Bagehot succeeded him as editor.  For the next 17 years, until he succumbed to pneumonia at the early age of 51, he wrote The Economist’s main article.

Writing on political, economic and social affairs, he was one of the most influential journalists of his day and had leading politicians among his friends, including William Gladstone, the first Liberal prime minister. 

It is said Bagehot did not persevere in a political career because he was not a good speaker and failed in his attempts at being elected to Parliament.  I wonder what he would have made of Twitter!

Walter Bagehot died in Langport on 24 March 1877.  He is buried in the churchyard of the town's All Saints' Church.  His headstone is on the right, to the left is that of his father and mother.

A stroll around Vivary Park in Taunton, Somerset.

Last week my wife and I had cause to visit Taunton.  We parked the car in the Orchard multi storey car park and, while my wife met up with a friend from her university days, I went for a quick stroll around Vivary Park with my camera.

The gates to Vivary Park on Upper High Street in Taunton, Somerset.

Just inside the park’s impressive cast iron gates on Upper High Street is a war memorial remembering the fallen of World War One and World War Two together with 3 who lost their lives serving in Northern Ireland during the 1970s and 1980s and 1 who died in Afghanistan in 2009.  The memorial was erected in 1922.

The war memorial in Vivary Park, Taunton, Somerset

A little further on is a fountain in memory of Queen Victoria which was unveiled in 1907.  It was built by the Saracen Foundry of Glasgow which, in 1895, also built the park gates mentioned previously.

The Queen Victoria Memorial Fountain in Vivary Park, Taunton, Somerset.  The Keep of Jellalabad Barracks is in the background.

The plaque on the Queen Victoria Memorial Fountain in Vivary Park, Taunton.

At this point I took cover in a wooden shelter as a shower of rain passed.  From the shelter I took some photos of the very well-kept flower beds and the Keep of Jellalabad Barracks which towers over the eastern side of the park.  

Jellalabad Barracks was completed in 1881.  It takes its name from the siege of Jellalabad in 1842 during the First Afghan War.  The 13th Regiment of Foot, which later became the Somerset Light Infantry, held the fort at Jellalabad for 5 months before being relieved.  Hugh Popham writes in his The Somerset Light Infantry (Hamish Hamilton, 1968): “The honours quickly began to flow.  Even before the regiment left Jellalabad it was announced in the London Gazette that ‘Her Majesty has been graciously pleased to approve of that Regiment assuming the title of the 13th or Prince Albert’s Regiment of Light Infantry; and its facings be changed from yellow to royal blue’.  By the same order, a ‘mural Crown, superscribed Jellalabad’ was added to the Colours and appointments, where it has remained ever since, to mystify those to whom the First Afghan War is as remote as the Peloponnesian.”  I suspect Afghanistan’s troubled history is far better known today than when Hugh Popham wrote those words 50 years ago!

With more rainclouds on the horizon I took advantage of a sunny spell and hurried off to Taunton Library in nearby Paul Street.  There I settled down in the Military History section where my wife and I had arranged to meet before heading back across the Blackdown Hills for home.

A stroll around the centre of the ancient South Somerset market town of Ilminster.

Recently I had a quick stroll around the historic centre of Ilminster, one of South Somerset’s ancient market towns.  Mentioned in the Domesday Book, the town takes its name from the little River Isle which passes close by and the Church of St. Mary, also known as The Minster. 

At the bottom of North Street is The George public house, obviously once a coaching inn, where the plaque above the door proudly states: “Queen Victoria stopped here one night, 23rd December 1819, this hotel being the first at which she ever stayed”.  However, I doubt that the future Queen Victoria remembered much of her visit to Ilminster as she was less than a year old at the time and travelling with her father, the Duke of Kent, to Sidmouth in Devonshire.

The George public house in Ilminster, South Somerset.

A few more steps brought me to the Market Square where stands the Market House with its Tuscan columns.  It was “newly built in 1813” according to Pevsner. Its colourful hanging baskets and the nearby traditional phone box made a picturesque photo.  

The Market House in Ilminster, South Somerset.

On the wall next to the Co-op a very informative information board shows a timeline of Ilminster’s eventful past.  Opposite, next to Boots, another information board tells of the Pitchfork Rebellion of 1685 and Ilminster’s role in the Duke of Monmouth’s doomed bid to seize throne of England.

Turning west along Silver Street soon brings into view the imposing Church of St. Mary behind which stands what was once Ilminster Grammar School.  The school is described by Arthur Mee in his The King's England, Somerset (Hodder and Stoughton Ltd, 1968) as: “. . . proudly facing the churchyard, a fine Tudor building with massive walls, stone mullions, a grand old doorway, ancient glass in the windows, and a sundial which has marked the sunny hours since Elizabeth I’s day.”  The school closed in 1971 and has been converted into private dwellings.

St. Mary's Church, known as The Minster, in Ilminster, South Somerset.  The building on the right behind the church is what used to be Ilminster Grammar School. 

I cut back through Church Walk to North Street and, having taken some photos, my short stroll around Ilminster’s town centre was over.   

The English and Bristol Channels' ship canal. An ambitious 19th century scheme to link Stolford in Somerset and Beer in Devonshire.

Until I read Somerset Mapped (Somerset Archaeological and Natural History Society in association with Halsgrove Publishing, 2016) by Emma Down and Adrian Webb I had never heard of the ambitious scheme to link the Bristol Channel and English Channel by constructing a ship canal between Stolford in Somerset and Beer in Devonshire

The idea first came about in 1768, but it was not until James Green, under the supervision of Thomas Telford, surveyed the route in 1824 that the project became a serious proposal.  In 1825 an Act of Parliament gave the scheme the go-ahead, but although 600 subscribers came forward by 1828 the estimated cost of £1,712,844 had not been raised and the canal never saw the light of day.

The ship canal would have had new docks and harbours at Stolford and Beer.  From Stolford on the coast of the Bristol Channel the canal was planned to pass close to Bridgwater and east of Taunton then on through Somerset skirting the Blackdown Hills between Ilminster and Chard before entering Devonshire to end at Beer.  Building new docks and a harbour at Beer might have been feasible, but I am curious to know how a canal would have negotiated the high cliffs and steep hills surrounding that picturesque little coastal village – no doubt Georgian and Victorian engineers could have found a way!     

A view of the beach at Beer in Devonshire looking west toward Beer Head.

The beach at Beer in Devonshire on the English Channel coast.