On a quiet August afternoon, camera in hand, I took to the back streets of West Wycombe village. Away from the busy thoroughfare, apart from the TV aerials amongst the chimney pots, not much has changed.
The St Lawrence golden ball and Dashwood mausoleum survey their village
This tiny village, that hugs the hillside looks just like a film set; steep lanes, wobbly windows festooned with impressive cobwebs, doorways for tiny residents and unexpected passageways. All authentic, medieval properties, re-purposed for 21st century life. How come there are no ghastly 1960’s office blocks, betting shops or parking garages along this delightful high street?
Wall Street
Luckily for us, through a chain of events that started in New York with the Wall Street Crash of 1929, West Wycombe village, in its entirety was sold by the Dashwood family to the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (better known as the Royal Society of Arts), as part of the Society’s “Campaign for the Preservation of Ancient Cottages”. In 1934, the Society handed the property over to the National Trust, which is why so many original 16th – 18th century facings still exist.
I have village hall envy
This was once an important stop for weary travellers heading too and from London by stagecoach, along pitted and muddy roads. The street was packed with hospitality options, although chances are you’d have had to share your noisy, scratchy bed with a stranger. In 1767 there were 17 public houses listed in the village, and today you can stop to enjoy a pint or glass of something local in the one of the tea shops or pubs. At least that hasn’t changed!
Wobbly walls and windows with doors for tiny people
Take in all attractions; the caves, St Lawrence and the mausoleum, down to the high street for a wander and then over the road into the National Trust Park. During the summer, the house is open, so set aside one day. Do the place justice!
A familiar exterior that has been the star in many films, including ‘The Importance of Being Ernest.’
Further information:
The fire had been provided by a portable BBQ, that lay discarded with accompanying beer bottles under a tree, just behind the mausoleum. I am sure Sir Francis Dashwood, creator of all I could see, would have approved of the party, but not the litter! The West Wycombe story continues with this earlier feature: Hellfire on a Hill.
West Wycombe Park is generally open from Sunday through to Thursdays between 2-6pm from April and October. West Wycombe House is open for a few months over the summer. Best to check the National Trust website. Dogs are not allowed into the Park, but are welcome on the hillside opposite.
The ripples caused by energetic trout that fling themselves through the air, somersaulting and mid-air twists hardly a challenge.
There are no refreshments in the park, but along the high street are several pubs, a coffee shop and village store to support. The Hellfire Caves attraction is further up the hill above the village.
We like to celebrate our quirky residents, past and present and for another grand design, visit the National Trust at Stowe, near Buckingham.
Why should you visit our quintessential, uncrowded, rolling shades of green English countryside, with its impressive selection of museums, villages, pubs and restaurants? That question may well have all the answers you need. Find your Chilterns.
Not just for old ladies, these fields of Chilterns lavender will delight almost everyone.
This, the northernmost town in the Chilterns, is probably the least well known of our market towns. In existence since at least the eighth century, Hitchin is one of the oldest towns in the county of Hertfordshire. Much sought after as a cure-all for anything from the plague to migraines, cultivation and production of lavender put Hitchin on the map. Successfully exploiting the crop since the 15th century, sadly only one business, Cadwell farm is still producing and selling lavender products.
The scene reminded me of tea pickers on the plantations in Sri Lanka.
The farm is open from June to October, peak season is July, when the 30 acres are in full bloom. Busy by the time I arrived, there is plenty of space to spread out and enjoy the spectacle. And what a spectacle it was! You have to tune your ear into the drone of countless bees working around your legs, otherwise drowned out by the giggles and squeals of delight.
A quintessential English experience
Some had barely got out of their cars and were already taking pictures. Once we had negotiated the oncoming cars and traffic cones to secure a brown paper bag and scissors to cut and curate our flowers, we could enjoy an English seasonal experience.
I wandered slowly up an empty aisle, keeping an eye out for the millions of painted lady butterflies that are supposed to be heading our way this summer. I spotted one. Perhaps this was the straggler and they had all been and gone? I disturbed three birds that shot out from the undergrowth, but apart from the bees, there was precious little wildlife or incidental wildflowers. It was all perfect and planned.
Experience counts!
There was a wedding party, couples, pensioners, families with small children whooping their way up the slope, posing ladies in straw hats and white dresses, a coach-load of sunhat-wearing tourists equipped with enormous lenses, a sea of expansive selfie sticks and a fascinating array of selfie poses. I think many had done this before.
My friends are going to love this picture.
The aim is to walk up the slope, proclaim loudly your deftness at hill walking, before laying out your picnic and then returning, satisfied to your car. There are plenty of places where you can part with your money to buy lavender-themed or infused goodies, plus a small museum with interesting, if underwhelming displays about the farm and former industry.
It’s a fun thing to do, everyone in a holiday mood, enjoying themselves and no doubt Instagram will be awash with the days’ adventures. I wonder though, how many knew they were in the Chilterns?
It has to be perfect
Further Information
Just as the production of watercress in the Chess Valley has been decimated, with only one producer remaining, Cadwell farm is keeping a Chilterns tradition alive by welcoming visitors to wander the 30 acres to pick flowers and take endless selfies.
Low-tech, quirky museums, often in intriguing buildings with windy stairs, dusty and dated interiors, are to be treasured. We have our fair share here in the Chilterns; most under the radar, unless you live on the same street, that is where they will probably remain. ‘One Master, Three Books & 300 Boys’ tells the understated story of English education in the British Schools museum in Hitchin.
It was from a tweet shared by the Jordans Village Estate from HM Queen congratulating them on their centenary 1919 – 2019, that I knew I just had to visit.
There’s something about the Chilterns that over the centuries, attracted both political dissenters and religious non-conformers who met and worshiped in secret. Amongst the beech trees and woodland many would go on to make their mark on the nations history. This post is a celebration of the Chalfont Quakers, a community celebrating its centenary, but with a history going back to the early 17th century.
So English, so Chilterns!
You won’t come upon Jordans village, you have to set out to find it. Tucked away down higgledy-piggledy lanes east of the busy market town of Beaconsfield, Jordans village is everything its neighbour is not: compact, unexpected and peaceful, with neat cottages and terraces nestled around the village green. So English, so Chilterns!
This unassuming village is unique, with deep local roots and influence that still reaches far-off places. It owes this accolade to its Society of Friends Meeting House, one of the oldest in the country.
‘Jordans is the Quaker Westminster Abbey’.
Simon Jenkins author “England ’s Thousand Best Churches”
American connections
From the mid 17th century, Chalfont Quakers had been meeting in the woods and up the road in the nearby Jordans Farm, whose owner William Russell was himself a Quaker. Known today as Old Jordans, this collection of buildings is said to have been constructed with some of the beams and a cabin door of the Mayflower, the ship that took the Pilgrim Fathers to the shores of the future colony of Virginia in 1620. Old Jordans was also used during World War I as a training centre for the Friends’ Ambulance Unit and sold by the Quakers In 2006.
William Russel, (whose daughter was the first to be buried here), bought a piece of land in a clearing beside the Beaconsfield Road in 1671 because the Chalfont Quaker’s needed a burial site. Jordans Friends Meeting House was built in just three months by local craftsmen in 1688. This was shortly after the King James ll Declaration of Indulgence that allowed Quaker and other non-conformist groups to worship lawfully for the first time.
Looking today as it did then, this elegant Grade I listed William and Mary wisteria-clad redbrick house, would not have been an unfamiliar style across the American colonies.
Sylvania
It is also the burial place of William Penn (1645 – 1718), founder and first governor of Pennsylvania. His first wife Guilielma, his second wife Hannah, and nine of his children are buried close by. Other early Quakers who worshipped here and are buried in the grounds include Isaac Penington and his wife Mary Springett, Thomas Ellwood (poet and friend of John Bunyan and John Milton) and Joseph Rule. Despite William Penn leaving his name to a new American state that he wanted to call ‘Sylvania’, it was Charles II who ordered that the family name Penn (in honour of William’s late father) be added.
Important people. Simple headstones.
Beside his grave, pebbles are left by visitors from North America, two of whom had to be stopped from attempting to exhume his remains as they wished them to be reinterred in the state capital!
Nina introduces the group to the Meeting House story
The simple bare-walled meeting room retains most of its original uneven locally-fired bare brick floor, glass, dark wood panelling and some well-worn benches. It suffered a serious fire in 2005, when the modern extension was virtually destroyed and the roof of the original 17th-century meeting room severely damaged. The interior of the original meeting room escaped relatively unscathed, but suffered some water and smoke damage. A lucky escape! The viscous glass is removed and turned upside down each year, to retain an even thickness.
‘Some of the things that they would do included; not going to church, refusing to swear an oath, refusal to pay church rates, opening their shops on Sundays, travelling on Sundays and teaching without a Bishop’s license… the 1960’s had nothing on them!’
Mary Bellamy
Those attending the Meeting are listening to one another and to ‘the still small voice’ within. Anyone present may feel moved to speak from their own spiritual experience.
A mini henge
The burial ground reflects the Meeting House seating, where there is no formal service and people sit quietly and wait for inspiration and guidance, and from those gathered “heeding the love and truth in the heart”. 400 quakers are buried here, but few have headstones – they were deemed too flashy and worldly.
Arranged to reflect the meeting house seating, the headstones remind me of henge.
In 1916 a group of Quaker’s met in London to establish a community partnership and three years later, the first stone was laid. This social and industrial experiment, where land was owned communally and craftsmen’s work to be sold cooperatively, grew around the village green, with Fred Rowntree the architect. The homes are uniform in style, not grand or fussy with the village shop open since 1922. Whilst there is no permanent pub, a pop-up pub called the Jolly Quaker quenches the locals’ thirst.
The accommodation waiting list is long, and the village has seen its share of famous residents; King Zog of Albania who, with his legendary chests of gold, (he lived at St Katherine’s Parmoor during the World War II). With author Fredrick Forsyth and musicians Ozzie and Sharon Osborne goes to show you don’t need to be a Quaker to live here!
Waiting for the children to come out from school
This is a typical Chilterns story set in a place you’ve probably never heard of, about people and events you will most certainly have heard of, shaping and influencing events across the nation and across the pond!
Further Information & Inspiration
This walk was organised as part of the twice-yearly Chilterns Walking Festival that includes a spring and autumn programme of fabulous walks that take you to the places other walks just don’t reach.
Jordans Quaker Meeting House and Centre offers Quaker meeting for worship every Sunday morning at 10.30, with a simultaneous children’s meeting – to which all are welcome.
Goblins Glen, Deadman’s Lane, Rotmoor Shaw and Drunken Bottom are some of the place names that surround beautiful Nuffield. A place rich in character and Chilterns history, and where we were to ‘Meet the Makers’ during the Chilterns Walking Festival.
I have written throughout this blog of the joy of discovering new places, weird place names, coming upon a vista opening up through the foliage, unexpected flavours and meeting new people happy to share their stories. In equal measure, the joy of of discovering yet more links that join together and add layers to the wonderful tapestry that is the story of A Year in the Chilterns.
Meeting the Makers
Towards Stoke Row
Goblins Glen, Deadman’s Lane, Rotmoor Shaw and Drunken Bottom are some of the place names that surround beautiful Nuffield, a small South Oxfordshire village, just over 4 miles east of the picturesque market town of Wallingford. A place rich in character and Chilterns history where we were to ‘Meet the Makers’ during the fifth Chilterns Walking Festival. We set off from Holy Trinity Church Nuffield on a circular walk to visit two business owners; master blacksmith David Gregory and cabinet maker Gordon Kent. Our guide once again, my good friend Annette, who had by good fortune, spent many happy years living nearby, with a field of sheep and shepherds hut in which to play.
Striking beech, a symbol of the Chilterns
The weather couldn’t have been better: jackets discarded, the coolness of a late spring that will soon give way to summer heat, but for the moment, the landscape is lush, full and fresh. The bluebells have left the stage, their place taken by path-hugging cow parsley, nettles, beech and oak boughs laden, blocking out the sunlight, keeping the path cool. In places, crunchy underfoot with last years beechnuts that the squirrels had overlooked. The smell of wild garlic absent from this woodland, but the bird song more than makes up for it. We cross a section of a Grims Ditch, impressive saw pits, evidence of earlier activity from those who harvested the wood to make furniture, amongst other items.
Shaken, not stirred
What Annette doesn’t know about this special place, frankly isn’t worth knowing; details of who owns what, who makes the best cheese, the friendliest pubs and why it’s important to have the services of four-wheel drive in winter. Annette spoke about the 2,300 acre Nettlebed Estate, consisting of woodland, farmland and common land stretching between Nuffield and Greys Court to the south. The Estate is owned and managed by descendents of Robert Fleming, a Scottish banker who bought the Estate in 1903. Fleming’s grandson was the renowned travel writer Peter Fleming whose younger brother was the celebrated spy novelist Ian Fleming, author of the James Bond books as well as the children’s classic, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – with another Chilterns connection at Turville in the Hambleden Valley.
The family still manage the Estate, the rich milk from their organic herd used for the delicious Nettlebed Creamery cheeses that we sampled en route. Something Annette does well; sharing all manner of locally brewed, baked or bottled treats to sustain the walkers!
Fields of Gold: the view from Heycroft Shaw
The pasture around English Farm is ablaze with buttercups, which always makes a pretty picture. There is not much plant variation however, so butterflies in these fields were limited.
There has been pasture and farming at English Farm since the 12th century, and the longhorn cattle graze the organic pasture.
“Blacksmiths are good problem solvers”
Prior to the industrial revolution, a village smithy was a staple of every town. Now, a rarity, a visit is a treat! “A problem is never too great that can’t be beaten out with a hammer” claims David Gregory, master blacksmith at Cobalt Blacksmiths at English Farm.
English Farm, Nuffield
“Blacksmiths are good problem solvers” he adds, “as we have the right tools.” David, Billy and Tom are working on amongst other commissions, a new stair rail for the Ashmolean museum, and a set of new gates for the Waddesdon Estate Treasury, a portal into what must undoubtably be a treasure trove.
The anvil chorus
David talks with great passion about the organic nature of his craft, of the fluidity of the metal, the skill needed to work with the materials to shape it as the commissions require; tools, weapons, decorative and functional pieces that I imagine will enhance the place they will be used. That’s the magic of this ancient craft, transforming nondescript organic materials into things of beauty.
The Master David, and his apprentices Billy and Tom.
Resin and vinegar
We continued our walk through the spring countryside to meet with Gordon Kent and his team of expert cabinet makers at tucked-away Homer Farm. Furniture-making is a Chilterns tradition with the popular Windsor chairs exported all over the world and Gordon Kent continues to make beautiful furniture. Just as David and his team, Gordon’s team read their materials, they speak with such knowledge and a passion borne of years of hard work and synergy with their craft. Resins, steel wool and vinegar combine to make a fine wood stainer for the beautiful pieces crafted in ‘catspaw’ oak, walnut, cherry, maple and ash in their workshop. Their attention to detail evident in the pieces they showed us in the workshop.
Ben, Gordon and Nick.
We giggled about the naked walkers they see passing through the farm in the winter months, to avoid contact with the stringing nettles I imagine!
The greatest pleasures are so often the re-discovery and interaction with what and who is around us. We had ventured out to make connections, meet new friends, enjoy new flavours and are thankful for where we live and how it makes us feel. Helped in large doses by the tea and delicious scones baked by Gordon’t mum. Thank you very much, we’ll be back!
Goblins Glen, Deadman’s Lane, Rotmoor Shaw, Drunken Bottom, Homer Green and English Farm – new place names in my Chilterns lexicon.
Further Information
The Chilterns Walking Festival takes place in the spring and autumn at locations across the Chilterns. Find your walk here.
The Meet the Makers’ walks have one purpose; to share the experience of visiting some of our skilled craftspeople, who work in studios and locations that are often inaccessible to visitors, yet are keen to establish links to help us promote the Arts and Crafts produced in our region.
Getting to Jane’s studio meant being rained on by beechnuts as we set off from nearby Christmas Common to walk through the quiet autumnal beech woodland. Once full of the smell of charcoal burners, the sounds of wood cutters, the sight of wartime tent peg-makers and wood gathers from surrounding hamlets picking only what had fallen to the ground. Read about an earlier ‘Meet the Makers’ festival walk.
Lord Nuffield was buried at Holy Trinity Parish Church in the village, a plain, modest grave, much like the great name himself. Read his story here.
If you were asked to name the places that Ian Fleming is most closely associated, you might put Goldeneye, Fleming’s home in Jamaica where he wrote all the Bond books, on the top of your list. You might include his post-war office at Mitre Court, or you might include Nettlebed, neighbour to Nuffield. Take a tour around Ian Fleming’s Oxfordshire
Described on TripAdvisor as ‘fresh as paint’ I was interested to see the nearby restored Maharajah’s Well in Stoke Row and discover why a 19th century Maharajah felt compelled to make such an extraordinary gesture to ensure a free, clean water supply to a small Chilterns community.
It took a visit to West Wycombe Park to be reminded why the Chilterns is such a distinctive, compelling place to be.
When I started writing this blog, I was uncertain how I would maintain momentum, focused as I am, on one region. Would I struggle to find enough to write about, or would my inspiration dwindle?
Three miles west of High Wycombe, tucked away in the Wye valley, is a unique 18th century Italian-inspired Chilterns landscape, built to impress and entertain. Beside which is clustered a tiny village of the most lovely cottages creeping up the hill towards the biggest show-off structure in the region; an 18th century mausoleum to perhaps one of the most notorious and eccentric men in English history.
A loveliness of ladybirds
I have not lost my enthusiasm, is because each time I head out, despite sometimes being unsure of the nature of what I will encounter (whether Leo is allowed in too), or perhaps the write up was simply overblown hype! Without exception, I’m always delighted with what I find, discovering ever-more strands and layers to the wonderful, if slightly bonkers Chilterns story. I also pick up lots of incidental information…a loveliness of ladybirds for instance…who knew?
A loveliness of ladybirds basking on the flint wall of the Temple of Winds
A dash of history
Sir Francis Dashwood, (1658 – 1724) was a successful London merchant who made his fortune trading in the East Indies. He used his great wealth to buy the manor of West Wycombe.
Sir Francis Dashwood, 2nd Baronet embarked on a series of Grand Tours and liked the villas of the Italian renaissance so much, wanted to emulate and transform his fathers more modest Buckinghamshire Manor House. Work began in about 1735, but the great design project took so long, that over the 40 years, Palladianism had been replaced by Neoclassicism. This has left some quirks to the house, that I can explore when it opens to visitors in the summer months.
West Wycombe House is architecturally inspired by the villas of the Veneto
A more natural landscape
Sir Francis transformed the formal garden into a playground of Italian-inspired temples, water features and follies, arranged around an ornamental lake, with broad avenues with far-reaching views down the valley or across to the Dashwood Mausoleum. There are plenty of places to read a book, admire the views, watch the swans, or to daydream.
The Temple of the Winds, inspirited by the classical Tower of the Winds in Athens
Similar in style to Stowe, the Capability Brown-designed National Trust landscape garden in Buckingham, this Humphrey Repton-inspired space will also transform through the seasons. The structures sit well with the landscape, complimenting, rather than competing, or imposing.
One of the many bridges over the ornamental lake
Kitty’s Lodge
There are two symmetrical lodge houses at the north-east corner of the park that mark the entrance to the old drive up to the house. Kitty’s lodge is named after Kitty Fisher, a famous courtesan who was possibly the first celebrity ‘famous for not being famous’. Named too, in that popular nursery rhyme, and quite probably, lady friend of Sir Francis, 2nd Baronet.
“Lucy Locket lost her pocket, Kitty Fisher found it; But ne’er a penny was there in’t Except the binding round it.”
The Temple of Venus stands on a small mound and takes the form of a rotunda enclosing a copy of the Venus de Milo. The parlour is a grotto beneath the mound, entered through an oval opening flanked by curving screen walls. Specifically designed to represent ‘the opening through which we all enter into this world’. It was intended as the central focal point of the park when viewed from the house.
The notorious Temple of Venus
Saved by the Crash
West Wycombe village was sold by the Dashwood family to raise funds following the Wall Street Crash of 1929. It was bought in its entirety by the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (better known as the Royal Society of Arts), as part of the Society’s “Campaign for the Preservation of Ancient Cottages”. In 1934, the Society handed the property over to the National Trust, which is why so many original 16th – 18th century facings still exist. It’s worth walking, and if you take the cars away, not much has changed.
Church Loft, West Wycombe village
Increasingly I am given greater access to properties, places and people across our region. Made possible by many individuals who I have acknowledged. I would like to thank the National Trust for supporting my work and giving me access to so much of the great swathes of land and historic properties across the Chilterns that they manage. Their support will enable me to share even more of these wonderful stories.
Speaking of wonderful stories, there are plenty more colourful Chilterns characters where this one came from!
Further Information
The fire had been provided by a portable BBQ, that lay discarded with accompanying beer bottles under a tree, just behind the mausoleum. I am sure Sir Francis Dashwood, creator of all I could see, would have approved of the party, but not the litter! The West Wycombe story continues with this earlier feature: Hellfire on a Hill.
West Wycombe Park is generally open from Sunday through to Thursdays between 2-6pm from April and October. West Wycombe House is open for a few months over the summer. Best to check the National Trust website. Dogs are not allowed into the Park, but are welcome on the hillside opposite.
There are no refreshments in the park, but along the high street are several pubs, a coffee shop and village store to support. The Hellfire Caves attraction is further up the hill above the village.
Why should you visit our quintessential, uncrowded, rolling shades of green English countryside, with its impressive selection of museums, villages, pubs and restaurants? That question may well have all the answers you need. Find your Chilterns.
All around are signs of past lives; graves in the shape of wool sacks, an 18th water pump (although ale was preferable), window openings at unhelpful heights and a red lion above a lintel where a pub used to be.
Amersham is a modern Chilterns market town once again under pressure from the onward march of progress and development.
Renowned for its Christian martyrs burned for their beliefs, successful black lace industry and perhaps on a more frivolous note, a perfumery, this is a town of two halves: the modern town on the hill and its medieval twin in the valley below.
Metroland
The Misbourne Valley in the central Chilterns is a delight. Dotted with woodlands, pretty villages and market towns, this once quiet corner of the Roman Empire is now a busy Metroland corridor, linking London highways with Chilterns byways. A mere 25 minutes from London on the Met line, Amersham offers train-to-trail countryside escapes, and space to breath.
Served by the Metropolitan Railway, Metroland was the name given to the suburban areas that were built to the north-west of London.
Once the centre for black lace production, 16th century craftswomen specialised in fine silk veils and wide flounces of black lace that were used to decorate white dresses. In fact the industry continued late into the 19th century because almost everyone, from kings to babies at one time, wore lace on their clothing! Another industry synonymous with the town was the Goya perfume factory, that supplied large qualities of fragrances and perfumes to women after the Second World War. I wonder what the town smelt like?
“In the shallow of depression at a spot 100 yards left of this monument, seven Protestants were burned to death at the stake. They died for principles of religious liberty and for the right to worship God according to their consciences.”
The Amersham Martyrs were called Lollards, who demanded to read the bible in English.
In the face of protest
There are two parts to this pretty town; medieval Amersham with its unusually spacious high street, and the new town and railway station. This came about because the town fathers didn’t want a railway mucking up their medieval streets in the 1890’s, and insisted it be routed 20 minutes away up the hill. And now, 130 years later, the town is once again facing pressure and change from another huge railway project; this time from HS2, that will thunder right through this peaceful valley, changing it in ways we don’t yet know. I have written about it in another article called Evolving Landscapes.
Little Missenden
On the poor side of the street
Go with a guide! You simply turn up at the museum to join a tour at 2.30pm on a Sunday. As I waited, numbers grew to include a couple from London on a weekend break, the leader of the Amersham Band and a couple who were mysteriously ‘just passing through’. My companions on this town tour with Euan, volunteer guide and purveyor of intriguing Amersham insights and stories.
Dear HS2…
We began our tour in the museum garden, filled with herbs and plants our medieval ancestors would be familiar with, to help them get through life without a GP, or symptoms to Google. Being on the poor side of the high street, this garden would have been considered small. The houses to the other side of the high street in comparison, still have substantial plots. This garden is bordered on one side by typical knapped Chilterns flint and brick almshouses, and a discreet long-drop privy overhanging the river Misbourne.
The view from the museum garden
The museum itself is situated within a 15th century structure that has over the centuries, undergone many changes. It charts the towns story through the voices of past residents who lived and worked in the many industries and local trades, the great and the not-so, including those mentioned above. Thanks to a substantial restoration project, the beautiful medieval and Tudor floors and wobbly beams (made from green oak) are revealed. If I’d have had more time, I’d be trying on all those Tudor dresses!
A missing stream
A typical Chilterns chalk stream, the Misbourne (missing stream), meanders through the centre of town, behind houses, through a meadow and under a lot of bridges. The current low water level attests to the temperament of this stream, following as it does, the variations in the annual rainfall. It is still known to flood however, with memories fresh after the last sandbag event, despite the river being confined to a narrow channel.
The River Misbourne flows gently through the town
Open plan living
You may be familiar with the Kings Arms hotel, a former posting inn, made famous by the 1994 British romantic comedy ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’. It served as the place to change horses on the London to Oxford route, and perhaps give the weary travellers some respite after 25 bumpy miles from London, with quite possibly another 30 miles onwards to Oxford to endure. It looks quaint and olde-worlde, but the majority of the facade is in fact ‘Brewery Tudor’ added by the local brewery about 100 years ago to cover up an unsightly earlier facade. It seems there was a lot of this about with false frontages been added by successive owners to modernise their old fashioned structures. So common was the practice it’s difficult to know where medieval stops and Georgian begins.
Brewery Tudor
It is the equivalent today of stripping out the kitchen to make way for ‘open plan’ living.
There are several notable examples of grand houses built with a former industry in mind, but now repurposed for other lives. Many of them have tell-tale features and locations, and the guess-work is fun.
The houses of the most important people in town: the coopers house, and to the right, the brewery managers house.
Past lives
The Market Hall, a Grade II listed building that was built in 1682 bySir William Drake as a gift for the town, is not hard to miss. Commanding the most prominent spot on the high street, it was intended for the upper floor to be used for meetings for traders’ guilds, and the ground floor as a market and lock-up for miscreants.
The coldest room in the coldest corner of the market awaited those who fell foul of the law.
All around are signs of past lives; graves in the shape of wool sacks, despite this never being a wool town, St Mary’s resplendent in excavated flints from the new railway, an 18th water pump (although ale was preferable), window openings at varying unhelpful heights in the building that was the water mill, a red lion above a lintel, where a pub used to be, the maltings, a stable for the brewery dray horses and a parapet blocking out light to the servants’ rooms following some fashionable structural updates.
Wool sacks as gravestones in the local church
There is great hope in Amersham for facing down disruption and continued changes to their way of life. A thoroughly modern town doing things their way, which bodes well for residents and businesses to thrive and continue to be an example of how towns adapt, yet still retain their historical roots and proud Chilterns heritage.
Through the back gate and over the Misbourne
Further Information
This article doesn’t do the town justice; visit and enjoy the independent shops, restaurants and pubs along the high street with not a chain store in sight. But do start with a browse around the exhibits at the wonderful Amersham Museum, join a town or martyrs walking tour available on Sunday afternoons from April to September.
Amersham has a number of Alms Houses that add to the great variety across the Chilterns. Not least of all the Drake Houses on the high street, originally built to house six local widows.
You will find the martyrs memorial either along a footpath leading from St. Mary’s Church, or from an overgrown footpath from Station Road.
No previous Instagram nor Facebook posts have raised as many comments recently following a post that included the countryside around Little Missenden. The comments referred to the impending High Speed 2 (HS2) rail project will rip through this pretty Chilterns valley.
Evolving landscapes
We tend to look at a landscape and imagine how things were, or to enjoy the temporary transformation through the year (the focus of this blog); less so perhaps on how things might be. The Chilterns are a living, evolving landscape, shaped by its people, industries and natural resources. After all, nothing stands still, or is set is aspic.
It is a moment for me to recognise the importance of capturing some of this huge change.
HS2 is something I have ignored.
This vast, expensive and disruptive engineering project is the brainchild of our government who think that spending upwards of £56b is worth the minutes shaved off the London to Birmingham rail journey is well worth it. Perhaps that should be the national priority, but it is above my pay grade to know for sure. There has been much written, much revised and many cross words exchanged however, but for me, HS2 is something I have ignored, until I walked in the Misbourne valley and appreciated the scale of what is about to happen.
The route through the Chilterns
I have included a web link below, but to briefly summarise the route through the Chilterns; from London Euston, the route will enter a tunnel until West Ruislip, where trains emerge to run on the surface. From here the line crosses the Colne Valley on a major viaduct, and passes through a 9.8-mile (15.8 km) tunnel under the Chiltern Hills to emerge near South Heath, north-west of Amersham. The route will run roughly parallel to the existing A413 (through the Misbourne Valley), passing to the west of Wendover in what HS2 call a ‘green cut-and-cover tunnel’. After passing west of Aylesbury, the route will run north westwards through North Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire, South Northamptonshire and Warwickshire and into the West Midlands.
Misbourne Valley
The River Misbourne rises above the lovely market town of Great Missenden and flows south east for 17 miles (27km) through the village of Little Missenden, onto Amersham and the Chalfonts to Denham, where it meets the River Colne.
St John the Baptist
Cottages in the Chilterns vernacular
The Manor House
This valley and its river are no stranger to controversy and has suffered damage to its natural and built resources; most recently the natural chalk stream was rescued by a successful campaign to stop the abstraction of valuable drinking water and further down the valley, Shardeloes mansion, ancestral home of the Tyrwhitt-Drake family was saved from demolition by the formidable Amersham Society.
I was drawn to the valley when I read a piece about rare medieval wall paintings uncovered by accident (aren’t all the best things?), in 1931 that had been hidden behind lime wash and plaster and are now restored inside this wonderful 1,000 year-old church. Still a valuable community hub inside a building designed, built and tinkered with by the Romans, Saxons, Normans and Tudors. I expect the Victorians had a hand in there too.
It could almost be Roman
St John the Baptist
Along the walls, the paintings reveal a different view of the world
My walk took me from the parish church, through the village, up the hill to Mop End and down through the woods to Shardeloes, just outside Amersham and back to Little Missenden along the South Bucks Way. Details and maps are below.
A break in the boundary
Fighter-pilot blackbirds, skilfully navigated the twists and high speed turns
It was a beautiful still January morning, relatively quiet, with only bird chatter in the hedgerows for company. Leo and I crossed the field behind the village and joined the leaf-strewn sunken path, with helpful winter breaks along a familiar tree-lined boundary to enjoy far-reaching views back across the valley towards Great Missenden. Our guides, a couple of fighter-pilot blackbirds, skilfully navigating the twists and high speed turns upwards along the path. We passed an enormous pile of gently smoking, freshly dumped manure, ready to spread across these busy fields. There are a few isolated cottages with their lovely gardens, views and one sporting a tennis court! Not too many ‘gerroff my land” signs tacked to the trees either, which is always reassuring.
Our way downhill towards Amersham is cleared by the squirrels, their grey tails catching the sunlight as they race across the woodland floor, over logs, along a decaying fence and up the nearest tree, as fast as their little legs will take them. The vista then opens up and you can appreciate the sense of space and place as the landscape turns from natural, to managed and designed.
Horses are king in this meadow
Enter landscape designer, Humphry Repton who was commissioned to lay out the grounds in the classical English landscape fashion, in the lee of the hill upon which the Shardeloes mansion stands, damming the River Misbourne to form a pretty lake.
Shardeloes is a sprawling 18th century country house, the current structure replacing an earlier building
Shardeloes was the ancestral home to the Tyrwhitt-Drake family until the Second World War, when the house was requisitioned as a maternity hospital for pregnant women from London, saw some 3,000 children born there. Amazing! Following the War the house seemed destined to become one of the thousands of country houses being demolished, until the formidable Amersham Society, assisted by the Council for the Protection of Rural England fought a prolonged battle to save the house. Subsequently purchased in the early 1970’s by a local property developer who converted the house and outbuildings into a complex of private flats, with nearby equine centre and cricket club.
Shardeloes gatehouse
Expectations
I am reminded of another great regional railway project that saw Victorian railway designers, who sought to build the London to Birmingham Railway directly through the Norman Berkhamsted castle, but was saved by strong local opposition. The Act of Parliament that authorised the construction of the railway also protected the castle, making it the first such property to be protected by law.
There is an expectation that the HS2 archaeology will be rich and varied; grasping at straws perhaps, but I am hoping there will be access and tours available so we can see for ourselves what is happening. From the conversations I have had, both professionally and in my personal capacity, the locals are now resigned to the railway, and will make every effort to minimise disruption to their businesses and lives.
What is the Misbourne Valley going to look and sound like in the next decades? I will be back to find out as I will seek to harness and record the passions that these projects evoke with many more Instagram, Facebook and blog posts that encourage discussions and comments. You are welcome to comment below.
Further information
This website has interesting plans and maps so you can see where the route is and where the tunnels are – not too technical either.
There are three lovely walks to be enjoyed along the Misbourne valley, information can be downloaded here.
“The best church I have ever seen (and I’ve seen a few!)” enthuses A Simms, from Paris who visited the lovely church of St John the Baptist Little Missenden. Their website and visitor interpretation are excellent, the wall paintings astonishing and is well worth your support. I believe they serve a mean cream tea in the summer!
Explore the neighbouring market town of Amersham, with its enviable history of black lace, perfume and beer.
Read about another fine Chilterns Doom painting that was saved by the Chilterns summer rain.
The local market towns of Great Missenden and Amersham are worth a visit, not least of all to see the Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre and the Amersham museum.
We seem to have lost a month, August feels like September, then parched landscape offering up wild berries ready to pick, and the barley bales dot-dash-dotting the fields.
We seem to have lost a month, August feels like September, the parched landscape offering up an early feast of wild berries ready to feast on, and harvested barley bales dot-dot-dashing across the fields.
So neat and tidy, not a bale out of place
In years to come, we’ll be saying “oh it’s never as hot as ’18” in reference to the benchmark that once beat all heatwave benchmarks – the summer of ’76. Even that infamous summer heatwave has been trounced. I am used to the looks of pity, once I confess to not having shared this great cultural experience.
Records Tumble
Well, this year has really strained those weather conversations to the absolute limit. We’ve had the icy ‘beast from the east’ and are just stumbling and sweating our way through the hottest summer. Ever. Scorched earth is the new summer look; shades of brown, yellow, dead (apart from the weeds), hard baked, cracked earth. Whatever happened to those green fields that visitors flock from all the world to admire? Did they imagine the Chiltern prairies as their planes touched down at the start of their English country holiday?
The Chilterns prairies
We don’t show off our best side in the heat, and the national obsession has been taken to new levels; replacing the low-level grumbling that ‘it’s too wet, not wet enough, too cold, spring is too early, too late, there’s been no spring, and it’s definitely far too hot’….you get the gist.
Across the northern hemisphere, people and the land have been baking in this prolonged and extreme 2018 summer season. Minds far greater than mine will be calculating if this is what climate change looks like, with temperature extremes that bring wild fires, drought, storms, infrastructure pressures and failures, even death.
Cooling off
The effect on the parched landscape has been dramatic. Some rivers and chalk streams have continued to flow following the long wet winter, but enough impact that has seen Crestyl Watercress farm at Sarratt closed since early June for over two months. Even the duckpond at Albury is bone dry.
The duckpond at Aldbury is bone dry
The seasonal wildflowers came and went through their spring and summer palette far too quickly, with Queen Anne’s lace left to pretty much carry the can, while the rest finished up and went home early. None of those hardy slugs either, such a summer feature that do a sterling job cleaning up the countryside (and each other), are nowhere to be seen.
An early bounty
We seem to have lost a month, August feels like September, the parched landscape offering up wild berries ready to pick, and the barley bales dot-dot-dashing across the fields. In the past few weeks the emergence of the end of summer berry-bounty that festoons the hedgerows and along the pathways with blackberries, sloes, hawthorn, rose hips and elderberries ripe for picking. The blackberries are lovely, although a bit undersized. I’ll cope.
Blackberries, sloes and elderberries make an early show
2018 really is the summer that just keeps on giving…but I suspect we would secretly prefer those middling damp summers, green countryside and wet picnics, that means we can gently moan that a few days of summer sunshine wouldn’t go amiss!
