Forty Years in Chandler's Ford - a Journal (Part 84)

Kindness to a bee; to the cinema – again!; high praise for her flower paintings; birds should build their own nests!; the wonders of the Universe – already understood by naturalists; dancing The Gay Gordons!; the healing gift of flowers and a “sad and bitter day”.

It’s February 17th 1957, and Gran attends a B.E.N.A field meeting at Pagham in Sussex. Apart from describing the whole day’s findings, she is, as she says,:

…both surprised and pleased to find that we had in our party, Bruce Campbell, the well-known author-ornithologist and broadcaster, and his final decisions upon matters of identification were invaluable.

For instance, they identify Cormorants, which:

…unmistakable from any angle, were drying wings on the extreme point, but three recumbent birds near them puzzled all of us for a very long time. At last, the official verdict, from Bruce Campbell, pronounced them Eiders, a new bird for my list.

Yes, female Eiders *are* a bit nondescript, but nicely subtle nontheless. Image by C.E.Timothy Paine via Flickr.

The 19th, Gran writes, is “not really a very pleasant day but at least, no more snow has fallen in this area” and she gives a rather touching instance of her concern for even the smallest of creatures, affected by the weather:

A bee, which had been for weeks hibernating in the downstairs toilet, today emerged into the kitchen and, since I knew that the recent mild spell had wakened it into activity, I thought that in today’s cold it might die, because once stirred, it was unlikely to return to a dormant state and would be without food. So I fed it on moistened sugar and was pleased to see that it ate a good quantity. Now it has disappeared but, no doubt, it will appear again in due course.

On the following day:

This afternoon I was persuaded by Mary to go to the pictures in Southampton – the second time in the last ten years!! But I was glad I went. We saw “The King and I”, a musical, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story was a mixture of humour and pathos, and the colour and movement exquisite. There was some very beautiful and expressive Siamese dancing and the dresses were magnificent. I particularly liked the Siamese version of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in ballet form… I liked it too, largely because there was no overacting – it was sufficiently natural to move me to tears in places!

How typical of Gran to make no mention of the film’s stars, Deborah Kerr and Yul Brynner! These would have meant nothing and have been of no interest to her.

A B.E.N.A. Exhibition is staged in Guildford towards end of the month. Gran attends, showing sixty of her flower paintings, “…the thirty orchids, fifteen other flowers and the fifteen berries painted for Jane”. She is both overwhelmed and embarrassed by the great interest shown in them, and their positive reception:

One lady asked me if I had ever used mediums of which I had never even heard, and a gentleman wanted to know how I achieved the transparent look on some of them. Of this, I told him, I had no idea, I simply paint the flowers as I see them, and this seemed to astound him.

I was introduced to David Seth-Smith, President of the B.E.N.A., and a well-known personality in the world of Natural History, and when he was told that I was the artist responsible for the flowers at which he had been looking so intently, he took my hand in both of his and said, “I do congratulate you, Mrs Goater, they are really quite wonderful. Something should be done about getting them reproduced, for the world should see them”. I was so amazed, I could only murmur, “Thank you very much”. We talked about cost of printing, reduction to three colours, and such, and he agreed that to reduce these to only three colours would take away much of their value, but he insisted that something should be done.

On Gran’s departure from the Exhibition:

Mr Seth-Smith came forward and said, “Goodbye. I am proud to have met you”. I felt proud too, but also humbly grateful for this precious gift and so pleased to have been able to do something worthy of the inspiration which dear Adrian’s love and friendship gave me.

On the 28th, she is next door at the Hockridges, watching another Look programme, introduced by Peter Scott but narrated on this occasion by his friend, the actor James Robertson Justice:

…showing pictures of the training of Falcons in Hungary. I was amused by a remark made by the speaker that one must not speak rudely or unkindly to a falcon, else she will not return, and it was reassuring thus to realise that they are trained entirely by patience and kindness.

She learns from Jean Hockridge that a Blackbird is nesting beneath her dining room window, and Gran is gladly given permission to visit regularly to record its progress. However, on March 2nd, Gran believes that the nesting attempt is doomed:

…since the small girl, Ruth, [Hockridge] told me this morning that her Mummy had cut her hair and Daddy had put what she cut off into the nest to help line it. I do not think the bird will appreciate that attempt at helping, no matter how well meant, and I foresee some disappointment among my neighbours.

She watches the Sadler’s Wells Theatre Ballet in Southampton that afternoon, loving every minute of it and spellbound by the skills of Margaret Hill, John Field and Audrey Farriss, “a dainty little thing with a very expressive face”. The programme includes. Solitaire, Apparitions, L’amour Supreme, The Bluebird Pas de deux from The Sleeping Princess and a collection of dances called Façade.

Brigadier Venning, President of the Southampton Natural History Society, gives a talk which Gran, Diana Fowler and Timothy Harding attend. It was entitled “Beginnings”, and, Gran recounts, told of current explanations of the formation of:

…space, the universe, stars, worlds, planets, the earth, its rocks, strata, its continents and seas, how they were formed and how animal and plant life evolved… but in the end we were still no nearer the actual beginning. This was all very learned and interesting, but left me feeling extremely ignorant and I came to the conclusion that I was content to accept the universe as it is and to cease wondering how it began.

Best to cease wondering how it all began? Did Gran see the Milky Way as well as this in those less light-polluted days? Image by Sathish J via Flickr.

By March 10th, she finds that next door’s Blackbirds’ nest still contains no eggs, though the birds had continued to build, she notes, after Ruth’s hair was deposited in the cup. And the following day, she learns that heavy rain, dripping from a gutter, wet the nest badly and has surely caused the birds to abandon the nesting attempt. Clearly all is confusion in relation to this nest, however, because by the morning of the 12th, “an egg had been laid therein” and there is a clutch of four by the 15th.

“This evening”, Gran writes on the 16th:

…I went to a film entitled, “Hidden Treasures”, shown by the Chandler’s Ford Evangelical Fellowship and intended to introduce the God of Creation to those who were not familiar with Him. It was an American film and was scientific as well as spiritual and, to me, conveyed no more of the wonder of the Universe than I already knew as a Naturalist.

Of course, it carried a spiritual message to all of us, but this again, of course, was not new to me. Still, the wonder of Creation remains and one never tires of it. I walked home with Jean Hockridge who had asked me to go with her.

Following one of her regular visits to Adrian’s Mother, and disliking the Underground, Gran, on the way to see the Family at Mill Hill, takes a “Green Line coach to Finchley where the railway emerges into the open…” She likes the journey this way, noting the Ideal Home Exhibition being held at Olympia, and in Holland Park, enjoying watching:

…a small company of Horse Guards riding through, their red-plumed helmets and silver cuirasses gleaming in the sunshine. Near Marble Arch, the coach waited to let past a picturesque scarlet coach and pair, greys, driven by coachmen in traditional old-world costume, and belonging, rather incongruously, to Rothman’s of Pall Mall, advertising cigarettes!

“Red-plumed helmets and silver cuirasses gleaming in the sunshine”. Image courtesy of Leonard Bentley via Flickr.

Book 64

Returning from the village on March 25th, Gran’s disappointment with the developments in Chandler’s Ford is clear:

…I heard Goldfinches singing in Park Road, near the pathetic swamp-encircled bungalow, which has been rather incongruously named “Golden Acres”. I only hope it will not prove to be anything but golden acres, for it is to be a market garden, and this morning a tractor plough was endeavouring to turn over the sodden ground in which last year all manner of marsh plants flourished, and the only gold I could see was the brilliant flowers of Marsh Marigolds in the plot nearby.

She follows this with:

This afternoon Jean Hockridge came in to me with baby Anne in her arms, in an agitated state because the man from Atherley Cleaners had told her there was a snake on her front bank, and she had come to ask me about it. As I thought, it was a Slow-worm, which, mercifully, the man had not murdered in his ignorance.

Gran finds the rather torpid animal, and gently smooths its tail before it quietly slithers away into the grass.

“This evening”, she writes on the 28th:

I went to a Dinner-Dance at the Polygon Hotel, and, though not much in my line, I really enjoyed it once I was there. Mary Harding came to help me into my gown, a voluminous affair of dark turquoise lace with three underskirts, but really very lovely.

This, I imagine, was a Pirelli General or Masonic event, Gran probably accompanying her husband, Bill. The Fowler family, including Gran’s Godson, John, is there too and we see a gay side of Gran, generally dormant in her. She writes that on arrival she is presented with “a beautiful bouquet of crimson Topsy and yellow Asa Thor Carnations and mixed Freesias (made by Fowler’s and carefully arranged without any wiring, since Bob knows my aversion to wired flowers!)”.

After dinner, she tells us, “at which the ladies received a gift of two dainty Irish linen handkerchiefs, there was dancing”:

…and believe it or not, I danced nearly every one, including the hilarious “Gay Gordons”, with John – a dance which I had never done before in my life! But John was insistent and declared that it was quite easy, as indeed it was, but rather strenuous for an out-of-practice Grandmother! Just wait until I tell Jane! There were several prizes, and I won a pair of nylons…

The last day of March sees her, with other B.E.N.A. members, at Titchfield Haven, getting muddy and wet-footed, but enjoying the first spring migrant birds as well as a couple of lovely Cirl Buntings.

I wonder if the Cirl Bunting will ever be a Hampshire bird again. Image by Frank Vassen via Flickr.

And two days later, she we see her love of flowers and their healing power, when she writes:

The little mountain Thrifts, which Hazel Bidmead brought me from Scotland last year, are coming into flower and new shoots are appearing on the Alpine Lady’s-mantle – a delight to me. During the morning I arranged a bowl with Siberian Crab, Muscari, Forget-me-nots, and Primroses in many shades for an old school-friend of mine who has recently had the misfortune to lose her seventeen-year old only son during a heart operation. It looked very lovely and she was much touched when I took it to her at Compton later.

Then on April 4th, for the Women’s’ Institute, she is judging a competition in the Ritchie Hall:

…for a spray of flowers, six inches long being the limit for size. Two appealed to me particularly but I chose a dainty one, which included Anemone buds and blue Anchusa as the winner. I later learned that it had been entered by Margaret Bishop, with whom I play tennis but I did not see her today.

Enjoying the arrival of more Spring migrants in these early days of April, Gran records:

I was sorry to see, at the top of Otterbourne Hill, that the Gorse and undergrowth, with some Birch and Sallow trees, have been grubbed up in order to make a car park, but I am truly thankful that, if it had to be done, it has been carried out before the Nightingale arrived and nested there as usual.

And this, on April 6th, in horrible contrast:

A sad and bitter day for me… for the builders this morning commenced felling and burning our glorious Yew Trees opposite here, destroying inevitably countless nests, eggs and young birds and filling the air with suffocating, acrid black smoke. I unashamedly admit that I wept, and, utterly downcast and frustrated, phoned the R.S.P.C.A. and wrote to the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, but realizing that any action taken will now be too late to save them. But I hope the perpetrators of this horrible inhuman crime will be made to pay, and pay heavily, for their disregard for the Bird Protection Act. They were warned by the R.S.P.C.A. last year and the year before so there is no possible excuse.

Her day is further marred by a migraine but she nevertheless manages to join a Natural History outing to Stanpit Marshes in the afternoon, and is delighted to see, from the train between Sway and Hinton Admiral, “Green-winged Orchids in bloom in numbers, including a group of five white ones” – a little more healing by the power of her beloved flowers.

A white Green-winged Orchid, showing its green-veined “wings” particularly well. Image by Bjorn S… via Flickr.

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Tags: Chandler's Ford, Chandler's Ford Today, family, Hiltingbury, Hiltingbury Road, history, Joan Adamson, Joan Adelaide Goater, local interest, memory, nature, writing

Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 84)

Kindness to a bee; to the cinema – again!; high praise for her flower paintings; birds should build their own nests!; the wonders of the Universe – already understood by naturalists; dancing The Gay Gordons!; the healing gift of flowers and a “sad and bitter day”.

Book 64

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Kindness to a bee; to the cinema – again!; high praise for her flower paintings; birds should build their own nests!; the wonders of the Universe – already understood by naturalists; dancing The Gay Gordons!; the healing gift of flowers and a “sad and bitter day”.

Book 64

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