By the end of this year the volunteers of Purton Historical Society are hoping that the name and achievements of Nevil Maskelyne will be known throughout the land (or at least Wiltshire!).

The Society has managed to secure a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to commemorate the life of one of Purton’s greatest sons, the Astronomer Royal Nevil Maskelyne who died 200 years ago in 1811.

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 Wiltshire was largely ignored by the 19^th century collectors of folk songs and it was left to a South Marston man, Alfred Williams, the hammerman poet of Swindon Railway Works. He was self educated, fluent in several languages, translated poetry from Asiatic languages and published several books, despite remaining a poor working man all his life. Between 1914 and 1916, owing to poor health he collected 600 songs from people in the Upper Thames Valley before joining the Royal Field Artillery.

 
Illustration of Score (truly local carol)

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Hello, it’s Terry again. Further to my previous blog on notable animals in Wiltshire’s History, we now have a couple more vying for that top spot. First, and being a fan of the good old British moggy, I was pleased to have the Marlborough church cat brought to my attention. Yes, it is commemorated in stone, but it seems that it really did exist. Visitors to St Mary’s Church in Marlborough will be able to pick out the outline of a cat on the south porch. This corbel, dating to the fifteenth century, commemorates a church cat that saved her kittens from a fire. Perhaps the cat was originally employed to catch the church mice, but it goes into our top ten as our most heroic animal in Wiltshire’s history.


St Mary's Church, Marlborough

Also brought to my attention and no less deserving of our respect is the bear that was the inspiration for Winnie the Pooh.  During the Great War, 25,000 Canadian troops were stationed around Salisbury Plain 1915-16. Among their number were also four American black bears, mascots of the 2^nd Infantry Brigade, the Divisional Ammunition Park, the 2^nd Brigade and the 8^th and 10^th Batteries. When the Canadian troops left for France on 7^th June 1916, the bears were left behind in the care of the Zoological Society. From there they found their way to London Zoo.  One of the bears, named Winnie after its place of origin, Winnipeg, was brought from Canada by Lieutenant Harry Coleburn. Winnie remained at the Zoo until its death in 1934. There is some suggestion that this former Wiltshire four-legged resident inspired A A Milne to name his fictional bear after Winnie.  Winnie the Pooh was published in 1926.  However, later in their lives, neither Christopher Robin nor his father could remember the origin of the name. Despite this, there is a bronze statue of Winnie the Pooh with Lt. Coleburn, by Bill Epp, erected in 1992 behind the Reptile House of London Zoo. For this and being the most unlikely inspiration for a literary character that has brought pleasure to thousands of people and associated giftware (including an old cushion in my car and my wife’s old school pencil tin) Winnie goes straight to the top of our list …. Unless of course you know a more deserving animal…


The Canadian Tented Camp on Salisbury Plain

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The answer is in the allotment movement and the work of the Great Somerford Rector, Stephen Demainbray, in providing allotments in 1809 after the local Enclosure Act had removed rights of common from poor villagers. Jeremy will speak on this and the spread of the allotment movement.

The provision of allotments as a way of improving the lot of the poor was to become a driving force in Demainbray’s long life, although the pioneer in the local area was Thomas Estcourt of Shipton Moyne. As a condition of commuting the landowners’ tithes the Rector requested that several acres should be retained for the benefit of the poor. Under the Act the land was to be kept in perpetuity for ‘the poor cottagers, Parishioners of and residing in the parish of Great Somerford, otherwise Broad Somerford’. 

 
 Detail of the Enclosure Award map for Great Somerford showing the glebe land used for the allotments.
                         
The allotments were to be allocated annually with regard to the number of people in each family and they were to be free of all rents and taxes. This is still the case today and the oldest allotments in the country are allocated to villagers on the Tuesday of Easter week, as they have been for 200 years. Read on to find out more.....

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