Judith Johnson's Blog, page 7

BBC Broadcasting House - our national treasure!

​ When I was offered an opportunity to join a group tour round BBC Broadcasting House I jumped at the chance! I am an avowed supporter of our national public service broadcaster, and was keen to see how old Broadcasting House had been merged with a stunning new building, just two years old.

We started off in the Media Cafe, where Head Chef Tony showed us some of the new dishes being developed for groups visiting the BBC. I can say, hand on heart, that my Scotch egg was the best I have ever eaten,  and the beetroot humous was to die for - all the dishes were incredibly tasty, freshly made and good value.

There’s a shop for handy Christmas-stocking fillers and that elusive Dad present, and a life-size Dalek and Dr Who telephone box plus an Eastenders backdrop for die-hard fans. Our guides were superb - witty, informed, clearly spoken, and with just enough anecdote to entertain rather than overload. We looked down on the huge floor below, full of journalists working at desks, with screens loaded with incoming news stories (photos not allowed here), and over to the right, the BBC News studio familiar to viewers. On our left one of the weather forecasters was speaking live to an unmanned camera. These weather-warriors are the only people who speak without an autocue - a feat of memory and nerve. We spotted Gavin Esler chatting to a colleague, and Fiona Bruce checking her report before going live later. The integration of the World Service means that when there is a crisis, as with Russia and Ukraine lately, country experts can be brought into the studio very quickly.  And at the back of this floor are the desks that deal with photos and reports being sent in by the public - a recent development but valued by the BBC.

We went on to see the beautiful piazza, with a cafe on one side and, at the end, All Souls Chuch and the Langham Hotel. Apparently, celebrities staying at the Langham sometimes travel by car to arrive at the One Show studio for an interview, because of the waiting autograph-hunters. Lady Gaga recently took half an hour to reach the studio as she greeted fans in the intervening few hundred yards! We saw the studio, sat on the famous green sofa, and were then led on to the BBC Radio Theatre before being given an opportunity to take part in a mock-up news broadcast and radio play.

The original Broadcasting House was completed in 1932, and the Art-Deco reception was completed in 1939. I wonder if my father walked through it that year? I have a photo of him recording a show called Time to Laugh, 9 June 1939,* less than three months before Britain went to war on 3 September. The microphone is a pre-cursor of the iconic BBC version, created in 1934. Our guide told us of some of the history of the BBC, and how many world leaders, writers, artists, and musicians have passed through its doors, apart from all the hard-working employees that have contributed to our listening experience. In a nice connecting thread, Eric Gill, the artist who sculpted the statue on the front of Broadcasting House, also created the font which is now used in the BBC’s logo.

I believe that a visitor of any age would love this tour - schoolchild to nonagenarian - from the historical nostalgic parts to cutting edge new technology. One of our group had been round BBC Television Centre in the past, and half expected this tour, covering BBC News and Radio to be comparatively dull, but on the contrary, she found it fascinating. BBC TV may be spread throughout the regions (tours available at these centres too), but there still beats the original heart of the Corporation at Portland Place - Auntie is alive and well!

The tours are there to offer the British people an opportunity to see how the licence fee is spent delivering unparalleled multi-media news and radio entertainment (plus the One Show, of course!). Tourists are welcome too, of course. There are many around the world who have benefited from the BBC World Service, and there are large numbers of fans in our English-language-Big-Brother the USA who highly value the unique voice of BBC Radio. The BBC website is also a rich cornucopia of resources. I know millions of us rely on and trust the BBC, more than any other organisation, to tell us what is happening in the world with a high a degree of accuracy.

If you care about our BBC,  please do pick up your pen, mouse, or phone and take just a little bit of your time to give our government your views. We are in danger of allowing apathy to contribute to a sad diminishment of this great and hugely important part of our national culture - For what to do about it, see the Save our BBC website  -  saveourbbc.net  Please act before it’s too late!

*Presented by Van Phillips with James Hayter 
Vera Lennox 
Maurice Denham 
George Adam 
Helen Clare 
Van Phillips and his two 
Orchestras 
Orchestrations by Van Phillips. and Alf Ralston  
Produced by Vernon Harris

Walking in the Austrian Tyrol - Wilder Kaiser

Every year we come to that pleasant time when we talk about where to go on our annual holiday. The last few years we’ve got hooked on lakes and mountains. We love visiting museums, art galleries, historical sites etc, but culture-vultures like us can wear themselves out picking the carcass clean! When, for example, we stayed on Lake Garda a couple of years back, we spent three whole days ‘doing’ Verona, and came home still pretty exhausted!

So recently, although we toy with the idea of coastal destinations, cities, and new exciting countries, we’ve been drawn back to the peace, quiet, beauty and fresh air of the Wilder Kaiser region of the Austrian Tyrol.  We’ve already explored the local towns and cities on previous trips, and now we find that we want nothing more than to venture out each day with walking boots, rucksacks and yummy Austrian rolls and fruit, and wander in the mountains, listening to the birds and cowbells, resting our eyes on the views, exchanging friendly smiles and Grüss Gotts with other walkers, and having an occasional swim in mountain lakes. After another year of sitting at computer screens, being bombarded with information via social media, radio, shopping in supermarkets, sitting in traffic jams, etc, it’s the least we can give our minds and bodies. After a walk, there’s always a fresh buttermilk or coffee and an hour’s reading to enjoy before dinner! Bliss!

Austrian bread - yum! This area seems to draw many people back  -  some have been returning regularly for up to 50 years, bringing further generations with them. Must be something in the air!

We bought another walking map (our first one had fallen apart) - the Mayr XL Edition Wilder Kaiser: Ellmau, Going, Scheffau,Söll - a bargain for 5 euros at the Söll Tourist Office (the new edition is helpfully crease and waterproof). It comes in a plastic wallet with a little booklet that describes local walks, but we found these unclear and not detailed enough, so, for anyone who might be thinking of staying in Söll,  here are some of our favourite walks. Just one warning: most of the mountain Hütte and Stüben, where you can buy lovely homemade eats and drinks, have a rest day (Ruhetag), and it’s worth checking this before you plan your walk. The local Tourist Office have a pamphlet giving details of all the Hütte. The whole valley can be accessed via the yellow bus, the Kaiserjet, free to all visitors with their Wilderkaiser Card, and we usually buy (our biggest expense, but worth it) a lift pass, which gives you use of all the ski-lift gondolas and chair lifts. This year we spent the first week walking on the Wilderkaiser side, and bought the pass for the second week for the Going -Hohe Salve side of the valley.

Hintersteinersee to Söll The Hintersteinersee Catch the 9 am Kaiserjet to Scheffau dorf, getting off by the church, and catch the connecting Seebus (also free) up the Hintersteinersee, a beautiful glassy green mountain lake (wonderful for swimming, access from the little café, with grass slopes, changing rooms and loos - 4 euros each entry). Then take the 822 path round the edge of the lake (at the café end) and down onto the 57. If you’ve set out early enough you could stop at the Alpengasthof Achleiten for a late morning coffee. We stopped by a lovely organic family dairy farm and sat on a bench by their bee-house for our rolls, and carried on, crossing over the Kufstein road by the Oberstegner inn, and past the Moorsee. We were back in Söll by 2pm and popped into our favourite Baguette cafe (adjacent to MPreis). You get very good coffee there and they make fresh-pressed juice drinks - yum!

On the 57 en route to the Alpengasthof Achleiten Bee House Ellmau to Söll along the Jakobsweg

Catch the 8.08am Kaiserjet to Ellmau dorf. Excellent packed lunch ingredients can be purchased at Billa in the village - another friendly small supermarket. The Jakobsweg is signposted - it is part of the pilgrims way to Santiago de Compostela (a couple of places are marked by the traditional white scallop shell), and this beautiful walk is along the Schattseite (shadow side) of the valley, through meadows where farmers are mowing and raking the organic grass, full of clover and wild flowers. We hardly saw a soul except farmers. There is a spring along the way where you can fill your water bottles (all of the villages have fountains where you can do the same, with clean mountain water). We got slightly lost at the Scheffau Brandstadl lift station, where we exited the car park at the wrong place. You have to walk to the end of the car park past the former lift building on the left, and cross under the main road to the hamlet of Blaiken, go though the houses towards Söll, then take the left-hand fork (the 70) marked Bärbichl, and back under the main road, for 54/55 paths. We arrived at the Ahornsee in Söll at 1pm, having stopped for lunch en route, and had a swim in this wonderful man-made lake. Spring water runs into it, and about a third is roped off for ‘regeneration’, planted with bullrushes and lilies, with dragon and damselflies scooting over it. In the winter, the lake is used to fuel the snow-making machines.

Summary: paths 3,1,30,14,70,54,55. Three and a half hours’ walking with half an hour for lunch and water breaks.

Spring on the Jakobsweg Ahornsee, Soll Söll to Scheffau via the Steinerne Stiege

Oh we love the Steinerne Stiege! We were first told of this way by Adrian, an excellent Thomsons Rep. It’s become a favourite, but we always give it a few days’ training before we go up it, and there are lots of heavy-breathing breaks to get the heart-rate down! This year we were only overtaken by one white-haired local, so that was OK! We set off from Söll at 8.30am, walking past the Moorsee and across the Kufstein Road at the Oberstegner Inn. You turn left along the 55 and follow it along the riverside (there’s a No Through sign and a little link chain across the path at one point but that’s just for vehicles) and up hill, past a farm or two. It comes down for a (very) short time onto the main road, but you can walk on the verge till you come to the sign for the Steinerne Stiege on the right. It’s a steep old path through lovely woods, going up and up. There a bench part way up (labelled the Schwoicher Aussicht but I think this should bear the translation The Most Welcome Bench in the World!) which is always further than we think!  Eventually you come out at the top of a green valley, and pass the Hagenhof farm before coming to the Pension Maier (we arrived at 10.45am) where there is a gorgeous view of the Hintersteinersee and excellent refreshments available. You can then enjoy a walk along the left hand side of the lake before catching the Seebus down to Scheffau and the connecting Kaiserjet back to Söll (Tip: consult the timetables for both buses before setting out - available from Tourist Offices).

Schwoicher Aussicht Top of the Stiege Up the Steinerne Stiege Pension Maier Short and sweet - Hochsöll to Filzalmsee and back

If you fancy a light day on the walking, you could get the gondola from Söll up to Hochsöll, the middle-station, and walk to Filzalmsee, which takes us about 45 minutes. You could stop along the way to play the Giant’s Xylophone, and on arrival at the Filzalmsee you could give your feet a treat on the Kneipp trail (complete with peat bog - wunderbar!) and then have a dip (free) in the lake. As with every middle-station in the valley, if you have children, you’ll find wonderful playgrounds and activities both at Hochsöll (Hexenwasser) and at Filzalmsee. Needless to say in the Tyrol, you’ll always find sparkling loos. You could also catch the gondola on up to the Hohe Salve, and eat delicious Nettle and Spinach Dumplings at the Gipfelrestaurant and then walk down to Filzalmsee via the Jordan Spring, where local legend has it that the water is especially good for eye-troubles, but the path is very steep down from the Hohe Salve, and you would be wise to take walking-sticks for this one.

Short and sweet - yep, that's me! Children's play house at Hexenwasser Peat bog at Filzalmsee - fantastic on the feet! Gipfelrestaurant, Hohe Salve - dumplings to die for! The Big Yin - Going (Astberg) to Hochsöll

We walked part of this route a couple of years back (Tea with a Wild Mountain Man) on a cold rainy day, but this year we were determined to go the whole way. On a sunshiny day with blue skies and just the occasional cloud we walked through some wonderful terrains: woods where raindrops still hung from the pines and the air was fresh and clear, meadows with cows and calves, roads past farmhouses, moor, heath, streams and swamps, with fantastic views as the way between the Wilderkaiser and Kitzbühel valleys.

We took the 8.08am Kaiserjet to Ellmau and popped into Billa for rolls, walked along the road to the Going Chairlift (road forks at the end of the village, take upper fork). We took the chair-lift up at 9.30am onto the Astberg, then took the 11 path (straight ahead from top of lift) through woods and heath, then turned right at the bottom of this path where it met a road and past a red bench (lovely to sit on and gawk!), and beautiful farmhouse ‘Kathen’. On past the Hohenangeralm, Boden Alm. Then we took the 11/99 direction Brandstadl Scheffau/Jochstuben See, and then the 11A, up, up up!

At sign marked 1388m we turned right up a path through woods (99/11) and then the 99. We sighted the Hohe Salve at 12.55pm, stopped for lunch, then left at 1.15pm. Before you get to the Jochstuben, take the 96/99 for Filzalmsee. Arrived Filzalmsee at 2.15pm, had a coffee, a Kneipp, and left at 3.10pm for Hochsöll, getting downward gondola at 4pm!

Incidentally, for a shorter version of this walk, you could walk from Astberg to the hut at Jochstuben (SO welcoming and gemütlich!) and then take the lift down from Brandstadl to Scheffau and get the Kaiserjet back to Söll. Or even shorter, just do the Astberg round walk through the woods, and go back down the chair-lift and Kaiserjet back!

I’ll finish with my husband’s amusing off the cuff comment on this long walk:

Me: Pyrenees are supposed to be good for walking.

Martin: Yeah, I’d be lost without my knees.

Perseverance keeps the honour bright

Martin's Onion Bhajis - nearing perfection! There's a marvellous passage in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's A life in Letters (Penguin Classics), in a letter to his father, dated 17 October 1777, about Stein, a man who makes pianos:

'However I attack the keys, the tone is always even. It's true, he won't part with a pianoforte like this for under 300 florins, but the effort and labour that he expends on it can't be paid for. A particular feature of his instruments is their escape action. Not one maker in a hundred bothers with this. But without escape action it's impossible for a pianoforte not to produce a clattering sound or to go on sounding after the note has been struck; when you strike the keys, his hammers fall back again the moment they hit the strings, whether you hold down the keys or release them. He told me that only when he's finished making a piano like this does he sit down and try out all the passagework, runs and leaps, and, using a shave, works away at the instrument until it can do everything. For he works only to serve the music, not just for his own profit, otherwise he'd be finished at once.

He often says that if he weren't such a great music lover and didn't have some slight skill on the instrument, he'd long since have run out of patience with his work; but he loves an instrument that never lets the player down and that will last.'

When I read this letter I made a note at the back of the book (reprehensible habit, my husband has chided, writing in books): 'P 186 Stein - like my Martin, a maker of good things!'

I have in the past accused my husband of being a perfectionist, but in truth, it is, more than that, an essential part of his being that he loves to make things as good as he can get them, while acknowledging that there is a point at which he is happy to sit back and say to himself - that's good enough.

He trained as an actor at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, but eventually, like so many actors (they say only 3.5% of actors work are lucky enough to be in full-time work), that work began to dry up.  Over the years we have been together, I have seen him work at all kinds of things with an increasing capacity for stamina and perseverance, often with no more instruction than the careful, thoughtful study of publications like The Reader's Digest Complete DIY Manual or Geoff Hamilton's Organic Gardening! 

In our first home he built shelving and cupboards. In the next he replaced a whole floor of wood-wormed planks, built kitchen units, and dug out a concrete bomb-shelter that had been buried in our Hackney kitchen. When we moved to Sussex, he cleared, designed and laid out two gardens, one with a huge vegetable patch, where he grew brassicas, legumes, roots, sweet-corn, squashes. In our current home he has renovated virtually the whole house, and recently re-pointed the gable end of the external brickwork, laid some beautiful brick paths and low walls. And when I look at our son, now expecting his own child, I see someone who shows the tangible benefits of having received constant good fathering.

For the last few years I have also seen my husband's energies turned to something flowering later in life: writing. Again, the same dogged determination and love of creating, polishing and getting something as good as possible, is being applied to the art of writing what he likes to think of ripping yarns. He doesn't aspire to be a great writer, though he loves to read them (Charles Portis is a current joy!) - but there's nothing more gratifying to him than a new review or communication from a reader who has throroughly enjoyed one of his books.

Lacking interest from the established publishing world, and even most book-sellers, we have published Niedermayer & Hart and Roadrage under our own imprint, Odd Dog Press. Consequently, even with the help of the internet, no mass-marketing means that it is a struggle, in the face of an ever-growing book glut, to encourage readers to nudge the books onto their book-pile.

But here's where the perseverance comes in - Martin is writing the sequel to Niedermayer & Hart, and labouring hard at making it something that the former's fans will enjoy reading. Working to serve the writing.

And in the meantime, also finding time to perfect his recipe for onion bhajis (see picture)!

Private EM Jones - died 100 Years ago, 19 July 1915

E M Jones Edwin Malcolm Jones lived with his parents John & Harriet Jones at 111, Camden-Road, Tunbridge Wells (today the site of the Mei-Mei Chinese Takeaway).  As a boy he had attended High Brooms Council School (now St Matthew’s Primary) and the Wesleyan Sunday School. After leaving school he was employed as a clerk in the office of the High Brooms Brick Company. 

He joined the Army in August 1914 at the outbreak of the First World War, and embarked for France the following summer on 1 June.

Ironically, in the Courier of 30 July 1915,  a letter from Private Jones (in the column LETTERS FROM LOCAL MEN ON ACTIVE SERVICE), which showed his obvious delight in, and talent for, writing, was printed on the same page as the report of his sadly premature death.

 
Former offices of High Brooms Brick Company FROM CAMDEN ROAD TO THE TRENCHES: Pte EM Jones, of the Machine Gun Section of the Royal West Kent, writes to the “Courier” from “Somewhere in France”. 

“During the lull in the firing I now – as a lad from 111, Camden-road, Tunbridge Wells, have pleasure in sending you a narrative of ‘Trench Warfare’ which I shall be pleased to see published for the benefit of the readers. Perhaps you wonder what the trenches are like. This is just a brief idea. The first thing that meets the eye is one long, zig-zag line. In front of this line is another, and so on, ad lib. A nearer view shows you a deep cutting or trench divided into bays, each with a ledge inside on which to stand when firing. The depth may be from seven to nine feet, counting from the top of the innumerable sandbags. The trench should be deep and narrow, with dug-outs in the square bays opposite the firing steps. This is the main trench. Smaller ones are dug leading out of these, either backwards or forwards, to trenches behind or in front, respectively. 

These are the communication trenches, up which the rations, ammunitions, etc, are brought. There is something very fascinating about the field of action. Take a peep over the parapet at night, when a star shell flares up. You see just the trees and hedges, as in England, only the trees are spread with wicked barbed wire, as well as being torn and grotesque. Not a soul is to be seen, but with the ground alive with men, each with death in their hands. There is a continuous crackle of snipers’ rifles, the ‘zip’ and ‘whine’ of bullets. In the distance a gun might boom, a shell may scream overhead, to be lost in the night, or it may burst, with a flash and a roar, which is followed, in the case of shrapnel, by the swish of falling iron, or, if high explosives, by a cloud of falling earth and bricks. Inside the trench are sleeping men. ‘Familiarity breeds contempt’. For instance, you may be making tea. Suddenly you hear a dull boom, followed later by a whistling noise as the revolving bullet rushes towards you. ‘Look out!’ says your pal, ‘another of the beasts’. You bend low and wait. Crash! ‘Near’, says your pal, ‘Come on with tea’, sometimes to find it spoilt by lumps of fallen earth. Further up the line may come the call ‘Stretcher-bearers, forward’. The person with the tea looks up. ‘Wonder who it is?’ says he, and goes on with the tea. A Tommy is very cool.

We relieved the -------- on Friday, and times without number we have had miraculous escapes. We have twice had the gas alarm, but the precautions taken keep us all right. It is awful stuff – like a low, white mist creeping towards you. Then your eyes begin to tingle, your throat aches, and you wait with ‘smoke-helmets’ or ‘respirators’ on until it has passed. There was a heavy bombardment the other night. For nearly an hour guns belched forth death, and everything used during war-time was in occupation. All that time we got covered in earth, sand etc and the earth shook. The noise was intense. Up to the time of writing we have had few casualties, and I myself am in the ‘pink’. There were many who prayed that night, and many an answered prayer. You know it is quite exciting at times, this game, and at times very gruesome. Souvenirs galore, ‘if’ you can get them, but it doesn’t do to worry.”

Further down the page, friends and relatives must have been distressed to find the following: 

The news of the death at the Front of Pte Edwin Malcolm Jones, of “B” Company, 6th Service Battalion, Royal West Kent Regiment, has been received with deep regret at High Brooms, where he was very popular.  His widow is now residing with her husband’s mother, Mrs. H Jones, at the Home Club, Camden-road, Tunbridge Wells, and the sad news of their bereavement has brought many messages of genuine sympathy during the week.  Pte Jones, who was 24 years of age, had lived in High Brooms all his life, and was much esteemed by his numerous acquaintances ... He had rapidly become an efficient soldier, and was much liked by his officers and comrades. He met his death exactly seven weeks after arriving at the Front. Letters to the family included the following: “Pte Jones was on guard with a Machine Gun Section in one of the trenches, when, happening to show his head above the parapet, he was immediately marked by a German sniper and shot through the head, death being instantaneous.  He was buried with military honours on the following day, Tuesday of last week, at a quiet little spot in Flanders … carried out just as reverently as if he had been buried in England.” and  “Knowing the fact that he died while fighting for his King and Country. It will help you to bear what must naturally be a great loss to you. I am sending you his cap-badge, which I took from his cap as he was being carried from the trenches, knowing that you would like to have it. Hoping you are as well as can be expected under the circumstances. With deepest sympathy, yours very sincerely, Lance-Corporal HW Moon, Machine Gun Section, 6th R West Kent.”

It is possible that Lance-Corporal Moon may have been related to one of the several Moons who are also remembered on Southborough’s War Memorial, as are many other Southborough and High Brooms Men who serves with the Royal West Kents.

Private Jones,  353, “B” Coy, 6th Bn, Queen’s Own (Royal West Kent Regiment), who was killed in action on 19 July 1915, is  buried in Poelcapelle British Cemetery, Langemark-Poelkapelle, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium: Grave ref. LVI.D.8. His wife remarried, and as Mrs Ada Wren, lived on at 83, St James Park, Tunbridge Wells.

 

On the Hollyhock Trail

One of the many joys of living is the annual cycle of favourite plants flowering, in their turn - in spring there are snowdrops, daffodils, bluebells of course, and I love to see the horse-chestnut coming into bloom and then the conkers forming once they start to die off.  Hollyhocks always  lift my heart; I watch them growing upwards in June and early July and wait eagerly for the flowers to open. This traditional old cottage-garden plant isn't much in evidence in the urban setting locally, but there is a trail of them through Speldhurst, Penshurst and Chiddingstone Causeway. I thought I'd share them with you - enjoy!

Cabinet of Curiosities

Cabinet at Johnson Towers! Blast! I was going to start this blog with a scholarly quote from Simon Winder’s witty book Germania about German noblemen’s cabinets of curiosities, but we’ve recently had several walls plastered, and as a result I can’t lay my hands on books with my usual dexterity - they languish in disorganised piles around the house. Bah humbug!

When we visited Audley End recently I was reminded very much of the marvellous Erddig, a house which is now National Trust property, but which in the late 1960s was inherited by my father’s old pal Philip Yorke. Phil and Dad were in rep together in the late 1920s and early 1930s, after Dad left RADA in 1926, and went off touring round Britain with small fit-up theatre companies. When Phil’s older brother died, leaving him with enormous death-duties, he moved back to Erddig with another old bachelor, Uncle Hoo-Ha (the erstwhile actor Bertram Heyhoe), using the old Servants’ Hall for meals and abstemious living.

Phil invited Dad to come up for holidays, so my parents, together with the ‘lower division’ of their eight children, motored up to Wrexham in the family charabanc (one of Dad’s many old bangers, in this case a Commer Camper). Erddig was heaven for children, especially ones  like myself who had devoured CS Lewis’s Narnia stories, E Nesbit’s tales about the Bastable children, Enid Blyton’s adventure stories, George McDonald’s The Princess and Curdie, Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, A Little Princess etc.

Simon Yorke, Philip’s brother, had also been unmarried and something of a recluse, and Erdigg Hall had barely  altered since they were boys. There was no electricity, and all kinds of Heath Robinson contraptions that Phil had improvised - including a burglar alarm underneath a carpet on the stairs to entrap creeping burglars in the night.

There was a cabinet of curiosities in one of the ground-floor rooms - a huge museum-case filled with all kinds of exotic things brought back from foreign travels - skulls, weapons, natural history collections - but really the whole house was a giant cabinet of curiosities. We were allowed to roam freely, from the attic bedrooms where the servants had slept, the chapel with its pews and stained-glass windows, to the salons with their Gainsborough portraits. Down in the Butler’s Pantry, above the long wooden table where we ate, was a circle of Wilkinson’s swords, ready for the defence of the house. I once found an ornate invitation to Princess Victoria’s birthday party next to a pack of castrating rings for lambs.  Phil had a passion for collecting things, until, he said, they got too expensive. These included horses (he had three ponies, all very naughty, who he allowed local children to ride), musical instruments (some marvellous contraptions involving handles, a wax cylinder on which we could hear the long-dead Caruso, a huge organ, and his own musical saw, on which, at a boy-scout bonfire in the garden, he played while Dad accompanied him on the ukulele) and bicycles (Phil would demonstrate the penny-farthing, at alaming speed, on the drive).  In an upstairs gallery there was a huge doll’s house and rocking-horse. Part of the stables was home to a  dusty, cobwebbed collection of old carriages, both horse-drawn and motorised.

Like I said, childhood heaven!  I’ve been back to Erddig since, and I’m sure Phil must have been very happy before he died to have seen it so sympathetically restored, but I must confess to a twinge of nostalgia for the muddled, wild, dusty, unpeopled house we  explored as children.

My own cabinet of curiosities has grown over the years  - and I’m happy to say my son has one of his own! Throughout his childhood we would delight in finding things when we were out and about, and museums were always a source of wonder - we had many happy visits to the Bethnal Green Museum of Childhood, the Geffrye Museum, Queen Elizabeth’s Hunting Lodge in Epping Forest, the British Museum and many others.  We never quite made it to a theme park!

Audley End

Cook in the Kitchen A visit to Audley End had been on my wish-list for years, so a recent gift of a year’s entry to English Heritage properties combined with a friend’s birthday celebration in Maldon, Essex, gave me all the impetus I needed.  We were lucky enough to arrive on Audley in Bloom day, with music from the Saffron Walden County High School Jazz band and gardening events laid on. Readers of this blog will already know that I have a great passion for museums, history and gardens, so my English Heritage card is, for me, the equivalent of an enormous box of chocolates, only much better!

Like that of many English country houses, Audley End’s history is a long, eventful one. Thomas, Lord Audley, Henry VIII's Lord Chancellor, converted the buildings of the original Benedictine priory, Walden Abbey, into a mansion after the abbey’s suppression in 1538. His grandson Thomas Howard, 1st Earl of Suffolk, rebuilt it in about 1605–14 on the scale of a royal palace, which it briefly became after Charles II purchased it in 1667. In the 1760s Robert Adam transformed the house for Sir John Griffin Griffin, while Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown landscaped the park. Richard Neville, later 3rd Baron Braybrooke, made further changes after 1820. During the 1940s the House was taken over by the Ministry of Defence, and used, among other things, as the headquarters of the Polish Section of the Special Operations Executive. There is a memorial to the 108 Poles who died in its service on the main drive.


There were some fascinating things to see in the house  - I particularly liked the cabinets of curiosities, packed with shells, minerals, oddities picked up on travels, including some grave-beads from Egyptian tombs. Not for me the cases of stuffed creatures, though this might attract visitors who have embraced the recent trend for taxidermy classes!  There is a small case in the Saloon of mementoes from the Crimean War, in which two Neville sons, Henry and Grey, were killed, a touching reminder that war brings grief to families across the social divide. An envelope with faded writing contains “Flowers gathered from cemetery of Scutari where the English officers are buried”, and another “Flowers gathered from the grave of The Hon Henry Neville, Grenadier Guards, picked at Cathcarts Hill Cemetery on 6th September 1867. The gravestone was in a good state of preservation”.  Henry was killed aged 30 at the Battle of Inkerman on 5th November 1854, and his younger brother Grey died six days later, aged 24, in hospital at Scutari (Florence Nightingale’s base) after being injured in the Charge of the Heavy Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava on 25th October 1854. Was it their mother, or sister, I wonder, who picked these flowers after making the long journey to Turkey?

The children’s nursery wing has been restored, and there are drawings of the two boys, along with their siblings. Here, as in other parts of Audley End, there is a living breathing personification of a former staff member - the governess, who is happy to chat, in character.  There are dressing-up clothes, a large dolls’ house, and wooden Ark and animals to play with for younger visitors, and, gratifying sight for this former child, the bookworms’ delight - a full book-case in each room.

Child's bed, Nursery Wing The house’s libraries are spectacular, including the main one, full from floor to ceiling with reference books, a combination of three collections. I would have liked to leaf through Sir Richard Hoare’s History of Modern Wiltshire, as not only do my Hayter ancestors hail from that county, but I am also related to Hoares.  Pepys aficionados might be interested to know that Richard Griffin, 3rd Baron Braybrooke, edited the first published edition of the diary, deciphered for the first time in its entirety and transcribed by the Reverend John Smith, and released in two volumes in 1825. I am currently on the 1664 volume of the Diary, and was very pleased to see, among the many paintings on display in the House, a portrait (from the studio of Peter Lely) of Barbara Villiers, the Lady Castlemaine admired so much by our Samuel!  Pepys himself visited the house, so I look forward to reading his comments.  

There is a Portrait of an Unknown Gentleman by Hans Holbein the Younger in the Drawing Room - I’ve seen original Holbeins now in The Hague, Berlin, London and New York, and the excitement of viewing this great painting master’s work at first hand never diminishes. 

There is a piano in the Library, on which visitors may sit and play a tune. My fingers sadly had forgotten the piece of Bach I used to practise as a child, and ‘Chopsticks’ seemed a little unsuitable for the august surroundings!  There is a wonderful illuminated book here, and beside it an extract from a letter from the American visitor Elizabeth Davis Bancroft, recollecting her stay (published in Letters from England, 1847): “In the immense bay window was a large Louis Quatorze table, round which the ladies all placed themselves at their embroidery, though I preferred looking over curious illuminated missals.” A woman after my own heart!

I liked the Coal Gallery, on the attic floor, where the fuel for the house was kept, along with stores of candles to light residents to bed. Even here the English class system was evident, with two different types of candles, one for domestics and another kind for guests. In the 1880s, we were told, between 175 and 200 tons of coal were used to heat the house each year. That’s a lot of coal-scuttles...

Which takes me on to my other favourite features of Audley End: the Laundry, Kitchen, and Dairy. These have been restored to their former glory, with relevant artefacts, and written, audio-visual or living witnesses bring to life the past days of those who worked there.  Personally I find the stories of those who laboured Downstairs as fascinating as those who lived Upstairs! For children, this could be a great, hands-on introduction to our social history.

So to the garden: we joined the guided tour of the Organic Walled Kitchen Garden led by Head Gardener Alan North, who sported, if I may so, a very fetching pair of tanned knees!  We saw the glorious irises and peonies border, the 200 year old vines in the old greenhouse, splendidly healthy-looking brassicas, and more. The organic vegetable gardeners among us nodded sagely at mention of garden pests, nuisance weeds and seaweed fertilisers.  We missed the guided tour by expert local volunteers of the landscape gardens - maybe another time!

After our morning's exertions, we eagerly headed for lunch in the Tea Room - good value at £7.95 for a generous bowl of delicious slow-cooked lamb stew with coriander and chick-peas, corand a large hunk of bread and butter, modestly advertised as a light lunch!

Last but not least, there was the Stable Block, with its beautiful Jacobean brickwork. Informative displays explained the annual cycle of work on the estate, and its inter-connected commerce with the communities surrounding it. There was a stunning table in the block, made from a huge septarian nodule unearthed in the grounds. And there was the gentle Bob, a gorgeous, massive black cross Shire-Percheron, impeccably groomed, with soft feathered hooves. His young groom kindly invited me to stroke Bob while he continued to eat from his hay sack in a dignified manner. His head alone, I reckon, was getting on for a metre long! 

When our son was small and funds were tight, we invested in family membership of the National Trust. His favourite local attractions were Scotney Castle, Bodiam Castle, and Rudyard Kipling’s home, Batemans.  We made innumerable return visits and got a lot of wear out of that card! English Heritage annual family membership of £88 includes up to six accompanying children, which seems excellent value, and on our visit to Audley End we saw lots of little ones enjoying the child-friendly exhibitions, the beautiful grounds where they could run, cycle and see the ducks and swans, even a pony in the stable-yard available for short rides on the rein. For Mums, Dads and grandparents, there was the added benefit of a lovely playground right next to the Organic Garden’s adjoining Cart-Yard Cafe, affording a relaxing cuppa while the kids wore themselves out on the climbing-frames. Bliss! Head Gardener Alan North Good enough to eat!

Areas of Ignorance

Every now and then, in the blizzard of information that comes at us from the media, something goes straight home. Such a moment came along for me last week when Professor Alan Tomlinson of the University of Brighton talked, on BBC Radio 4, of "areas of significant ignorance we should remedy". I believe in this instance he was referring to the unholy shenanigans of FIFA.

A friend of mine gets up early every day to read the papers in depth. She likes to read a British broadsheet, a German one, and an American one, taking in the different points of view in order to gain a textured understanding of current affairs. I listen to BBC Radio 4's Today programme before work, and skim the BBC website for news, but I prefer to wait for an in-depth book on most subjects.

On the evening of the recent general election I was chatting with the young daughter of an acquaintance, who told me that one of her teachers was descended from a suffragette, and had talked to her pupils about her grandmother's struggles. I asked the girl's mother, had she voted yet? She replied that she hadn't, that she might pop in on her way home, but that the trouble was she didn't really know anything about politics, and didn't know who to vote for. I heard similar views on the radio leading up to the election from others who felt it was nothing to do with them.

One of the books I've read this year was Martin Meredith's The State of Africa. I wanted to make up for my woeful ignorance of modern African history. It's a really accessible work - although most of it made deeply grim reading about Africa's corrupt leaders and the immense human suffering resulting from their self-will run riot (bar the shining exception of Nelson Mandela). If this book doesn't make you feel grateful for living in a liberal democracy (with all its faults), I don't know what would. It caused, for me, a fundamental shift in my thinking, and it confirmed again the truth of the old adage that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

So what other areas of significant ignorance have I begun to remedy this year? I've benefited from the efforts of William Dalrymple (The Last Mughal illuminated some of the back story of my Indian great-great-grandmother), Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography (background to American democracy, and Jackie Kay (Red Dust Road told me something about being adopted, and having a mixed-race ancestry). Of course, good fiction too  helps me find a deeper understanding of our human condition, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun  met both requirements superbly (a beautifully told story with wonderful characters and an introduction to modern Nigerian history).

My list of reading goals this year includes a study of the EEC. I learnt something about the EEC when I did my French A-Level (my kindly Francophile teacher told us how deeply it had depressed him researching the subject, when he saw how the French had manipulated the EEC), but ever since I have tended to slide away from reading most stuff on the subject, seeing it as dull, dry and bureaucratic. I intend, especially with a referendum looming, to make an effort to remedy my shameful ignorance. Any recommendations would be very welcome.

I love good fiction, so I sometimes have to tear myself away from the information smorgasbord! I note, for instance, that I've read thirteen non-fiction books this year and only  six fiction, so I'm aiming to balance that up before the end of the year.

My 91 year old mother has been an avid reader all her life, and read under the bedclothes with a torch when a child (as I did!). She still has a discerning eye. My husband, a writer himself, has recently been reading The Brain That Changes Itself by Norman Doidge, passed on to him by Mum, who said of it, "It was absolutely fascinating, I couldn't put it down". She did, however, abandon Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose after several chapters, describing it as: "boring".

We hesitated about giving her Martin's first book, a supernatural thriller, Niedermayer & Hart , to read, but she lapped it up.

"It didn't give you nightmares then, Mum?"

"Oh no, darling, I stayed up all night reading it."

An author's never sure who will like his story-telling, so Martin was even more delighted when, having asked for a copy of his 2nd book, Roadrage, Mum gave us her feedback on our next visit:

"Oh darling, I must tell you, that book's a cracker! Very well-written, I loved it!"

Mum still wants to be reading interesting, informative books, although she still entertains the odd bit of romantic fiction for light relief. Last time we visited she complained she'd run out of good reading material, so I nipped out to the local Pepenbury charity shop this morning and bought her six lovely fat ones!

I asked the nice young man serving me if he read much?

"Oh yes!"

"What do you like to read?"

"Oh, existential literature, you know - Albert Camus, Franz Kafka, that kind of thing. Melancholy stuff."

"Don't worry", I said, "that'll probably wear off after you're 40!"

The Boys Who Died on the Beach - 28 May 1940

Frank Sutcliffe With every passing year, and as the generation who lived through the Second World War die away, the anguish of their grief becomes the stuff of history books. When I met Dorothy Drawbridge, whose brother Frank died at the age of 20 on the beach at Dunkirk, she still had tears to shed as she recounted his story to me.

When Hitler, on 24 May 1940, ordered his tanks to halt their pursuit of the retreating Allied forces, the call went out in England for ships to help evacuate the British Expeditionary Force, and two days later all kinds of vessels set sail for France, boats large and small, including ferries, barges, fishing and even pleasure boats made their way across the Channel. They travelled through difficult waters, to the men stranded at Dunkirk, crowded on the beaches, under constant attack from German bombers, fighter planes and artillery. The operation, code-named Dynamo, carried on until 4 June. At the outset, it was expected the combined efforts might be lucky to save 50,000 men. In the end, approximately 340,000 British, French and Belgian troops were rescued. 40,000 were left behind, either killed or captured.

Frank Sutcliffe was born in 1919, and when he was five, his father died of cancer. The family lived in Southborough, Tunbridge Wells, and his mother, having five children, took in lodgers to eke out her widow's living. She later married Bert Andrews, a carpenter on the local Bentham Hill estate, who had five children of his own, and they all then lived together at its South Lodge.

Before the war, Frank worked at Constables, lily-growing specialists in Kibbles Lane. Dorothy recalled they used to exhibit at the Chelsea Flower Show, and that Frank met a number of notable people on the stand, including the actor Charles Laughton. Frank used to say that after the war, he hoped to have a piece of land in Jersey, to grow tomatoes, and eventually lilies.

Frank was already married when, as a member of the Territorial Army, he was called up, as soon as war broke out in 1939, as a Lance Serjeant in the 4th Battalion, Queen’s Own (Royal West Kent Regiment).  He and his older brother Bill were both among the soldiers on the beaches on 28 May during the evacuation from Dunkirk, and Bill, who had been shot through the shoulder and was bleeding badly, was told to get on a boat. He replied that he wanted to go and see where Frank was, but was ordered to get on board. Frank died on the beach that day, and was posted missing, presumed killed. Eventually his remains were buried in Le Grand Hasard Military Cemetery, Morbecque, Nord.

It was 39 years before his older sister Dorothy was able to make the journey to visit Frank's grave. She caught the train from Tonbridge to Dover, crossed the Channel to Calais and then found a taxi-driver willing to take her the 44 miles to Morbecque. She had less than half an hour before they had to depart for the drive back to Calais; only time to have a few quiet words with her brother, and leave some flowers on his grave.

There were other young men from Southborough & High Brooms who died in the retreat from France including Charles Barton, 21 and Frank Hemsley, 19, both of whom served in the 4th Battalion, Queen’s Own, died on 28 May 1940, and were buried in the same cemetery, as was Frederick Funnell, 25, who died two days before on 26 May. Edward Smart, 29, of the 6th Battalion, was killed in action eight days earlier on 20 May. Just 11 days after this, on 31 May, Edward Smart's brother Clarence, 24, also 4th Battalion, was killed. His body was not recovered, but he is remembered on the Dunkirk War Memorial.

Frank Sutcliffe's brother Tom was killed in action aged 25 on HMS Arethusa in November 1942, and has no grave but the sea.

Postscript: Some time ago I had a stall selling copies of Southborough War Memorial at a fair at St Matthew's School High Brooms, and was approached by a parent, a veteran of the Iraq War. He was still suffering from the after-effects of what he had witnessed, unable to work, and relatively unsupported in his efforts to return to a normal life.  I thought of him this week when I went to see We Are Many , Amir Amirani's feature-length documentary on the story and legacy of the biggest anti-war protest in history, which took place on 15 Feb 2003.  I highly recommend it.

The Book Glut - Enough Already!

Current book-pile! All my life, I have furnished my living-space, however humble at times, with books. Yet even I have felt overwhelmed, this last decade or so, by the sheer weight of my to-read pile. Like someone served at an eat-as-much-as-you-like buffet with a plate piled too high, it's beginning to dull my appetite. I don't feel the same excitement at going into a bookshop, indeed I can be observed these days (my late mother-in-law would be amazed!) actually walking past the odd one!

When I was a voraciously-reading child in the 1960s, my mother would buy me a paperback each Saturday morning at the village bookshop. I wasn't really that interested in more toys, apart from my Champion the Wonder Horse. The cost of Penguins at the time ranged from 2 shillings (10p) to 3/6d (17 and a half pence), and my most expensive book was Lord of the Rings, 30 shillings (£1.50) in paperback.

Where else, in the next thirty years or so, could you buy books at less than the fixed retail price? At second-hand bookshops, jumble-sales, latterly boot-sales, and, of course, if you had no spare cash, there were Public Libraries, or the Library Vans for those in rural communities.

What has changed and produced such an enormous over-supply of books?

The International Publishers' Association's Global Fixed Book Price Report, 23rd May 2014 includes the following:

"Fixed book price (FBP) systems have existed for more than 150 years. Most countries with a significant book industry have, at one time or other, introduced a mechanism to fix the price at which books are sold to the public. FBP is viewed by many nations (eg France, Germany) as an important, flexible and effective policy tool in maintaining a sustainable book industry."

"In the 19th century, publishers and booksellers began to set up agreements which fixed the price at which books were to be sold to the public. In 1829, publishers in the United Kingdom applied a price-fixing scheme to combat excessive retailer discounts." (Nothing new there then!) "... In 1900, the UK introduced a Net Book Agreement between publishers and booksellers. As in Germany, it prevented retailers from applying discounts; anyone doing so would no longer be supplied by the publisher in question ... The UK’s Net Book Agreement remained until 1995, when it collapsed following scrutiny by the Office of Fair Trading and the withdrawal of the support of leading publishers and retailers." (Motive? Desire to increase sales at the expense of non-leading publishers and retailers, perhaps?!).

"Supporters of FBP point out that books have a special value in that they are indispensable to our individual development, as well as to society. As objects of culture, they deserve to be treated differently from other tradable commodities. A sustainable book industry, in particular a distribution infrastructure which makes available a wide variety of titles, even in remote areas, should be a matter of national importance. FBP is held to create a level playing field for retailers, allowing small booksellers to survive despite the existence of giant stores. In the absence of FBP, independent booksellers would invariably be at the losing end of price battles with larger stores – eg supermarkets offering bestselling new releases as loss leaders."

According to the report, recent developments indicate that many countries are legislating for a return to forms of FBP, and I was intrigued to read that "while FBP as a topic is considered a non-issue in British politics, the situation may change in Scotland if the country becomes independent following its referendum in September 2014." My Google-search did not reveal any further information on this subject, but I would love to hear from any SNP member or candidate who knows more!

Another change is the proliferation of charity shops - in a nearby town, the much-loved independent bookshop looks in danger of being undermined by the extensive Oxfam Bookshop just a block away, which, to all intents and purposes, is probably even better stocked. There seems now to be a common currency of 50p for most books, even in our local charity shop, where the manager moves donated books on (where? to a book pulper?) after just a month on the shelves. A number of our local shops (including Tesco and Homebase) have 2nd hand books with an honesty box for a charity they are collecting for.

Discounting, particularly in big supermarkets, where you can get the latest top-list paperbacks (the publishers I understand pay shops to feature their books in certain prime spots) for approximately £3 each in many cases. How can writers, publishers, printers, paper manufacturers, bookshops survive, when you are only paying £3, the cost of a coffee at a motorway services, for an item which has taken so much labour and resources to produce, which might give you hours of enjoyment which can be repeated any time you choose to re-read it?

Libraries too are suffering from the book glut. Where will those of us who can't afford even 50p (I have been there in the past) go when they've all shut? Alison Flood reported in The Guardian in December 2014 that the number of branches still open in Britain had fallen 8% since 2009, with visits down 40 million since 2010. Perhaps because people wonder: Why bother with libraries when you can get books cheap everywhere you look?

My reading time is limited, so the last few years my annual average has been about 40 books a year, whereas my sister, who has a regular train commute, gets through a lot more. I've read over 1300 books, but obviously, unless I get a lot more free time or curtail all my other leisure activities (unlikely), I'm going  to remain selective about what I buy. But as a book-lover, I find it very hard, with them so cheap and readily available, not to buy buy buy! Also, I want to support our libraries, so I try to remember to regularly to get books out. I like reading poetry, and our local branch of Waterstones had a very narrow selection last time I looked, but my most recent visit to our tiny Southborough Library yielded a nice haul of Jackie Kay, Seamus Heaney, and John Hegley!

Finally, for independent authors, like my husband M J Johnson , there is always the problem, in the absence of mass-marketing, of getting people to find and read your work. One of the tools these authors use is book promotions and give-aways, but even this doesn't always yield result; some readers appear to simply collect books to add to their war-chest of literally thousands of unread volumes!

Save our libraries and bookshops! Bring back the fixed price! They still have it in Germany, and there are beautiful, thriving book-shops there that offer a far wider and  more diverse range of books than what we're used to seeing on our own high streets!

Links:

http://www.internationalpublishers.org/images/reports/2014/fixed-book-price-report-2014.pdf

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/dec/10/library-usage-falls-dramatically-services-visits-down-40m