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Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 101)

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Bicentenary celebrations; caterpillar-rearing; to Dorset for Spring Crocus, Peter Katin’s “sensitive, wonderful hands”; the fate of “Fig Cottage”; pressed flowers and a first day cover in the post; cycling with Jock; news from Scotland, and still no Nightingale.

On February 21st 1960 Gran writes:

This evening I went to a lecture and Reception at Taunton’s School, in Southampton, the first of a series of events to mark the School’s bicentenary.  The Lecture, “Content of Education”, was given by Lord James of Rusholme, an old boy of Taunton’s, former Assistant Master at Winchester College and now High Master of Manchester Grammar School.  It was an extremely interesting and thought-provoking talk, told with a quiet humour and great clarity of speech…

It seems there is much that Gran does not include in her “daily journal of beautiful things”, because on the 24th we first read of a bedspread, which she has been working on for a long time.  As a rising gale lashes rain against her window, she writes:

I made a start on the feather-stitching between the squares of my now, almost completed, knitted bedspread.  It contains one hundred and seventy squares, and I want to add one more to the width, making seventeen more altogether and a total of one hundred and eighty-seven!  About six years’ intermittent work.

On the following day, the rain still falling, she cycles out to the Hursley Road for some fresh air, noting:

It was sad to see that the whole of Hiltingbury Common, where the heather used to be so wonderful, has now been bulldozed, and a line of shops and bungalows built there.  The road is in a deplorable condition, with potholes full of water and mud inches thick.

On the evening of the 26th, there are further celebrations for Taunton’s School bicentenary – an Old Tauntonians’ Dance, for which she leaves home just as Jane arrives from Nottingham for her brief half term holiday.  At the event, Gran finds herself in elevated company, and seems to have a good time, in spite of getting closer to a Labour politician than she would normally like:

…I found myself at the table in company with a surprising number of V.I.P.s, including the Mayor and Mayoress of Southampton; Mr and Mrs Challacombe, Headmaster of Taunton School and his wife; Dr King, Member of Parliament for the Itchen Division and his wife, and Mr Freeman, Head of the Education Department and his wife.  I guess it was good for me to converse on subjects other than flowers, birds and bugs, though the gentleman on my right at dinner turned the subject to gardens and Spring flowers so this was closer to my heart!

I danced with all the mentioned gentlemen except the gardener and smiled inwardly at myself dancing the Boston two-step and the St Bernard’s Waltz, with a Labour Member of Parliament, though I found him much nicer than his political views had led me to believe.

Jane returns to Nottingham on March 1st, Gran writing that she was going via London:

…to see her friend Margot and her baby Christopher on the way.  The house seems empty without her and she will have been to Norway before I see her again, but it was good to see her looking so well and full of life.

And three days later:

Just before lunch, Jane’s friend Margot, to whom she was bridesmaid last year, brought her new baby Christopher Simon, to see me and told me she has asked Jane to be his Godmother.  He is a lovely baby, with beautiful dark grey eyes.

Joan Adelaide Goater - her journal about Chandler's Ford.

Although Gran often records the common moths that she sees, since Barry, with his expertise in this field, left The Ridge, there has been little of note to report. However, recently, he collected a female of a moth recently discovered in Britain, and it laid eggs.  Gran receives a letter from him on March 3rd, with much moth news and:

The letter also contained a request. The eggs of leautieri, from the female found at Eastbourne last year, are about due to hatch, and the young larvae will eat only the male buds of Cupressus macrocarpa.  As there are no Macrocarpas at Mill Hill, Barry wants to send the eggs to me so that I can bring on the caterpillars – plenty of their food round here.  I looked at the Macrocarpas next door but at present can see no sign of the male buds (though they are evident on my Cupressus lawsonia) only what may only be new growth buds.  So I have posted a sample of each to Barry for his opinion.  It would be quite an achievement if I could succeed in rearing leautieri!  I am willing to try!

Dad adds to the story of this moth, the full name of which is Lithophane leautieri, saying,  “It was first recorded in Britain on 26 October, 1951 by Dr. K.G. Blair, at light, in his garden at Freshwater, Isle of Wight. It became established there, and was given the colloquial name, Blair’s Pinion. The moth subsequently turned up at Eastbourne, Sussex. It is now widespread over much of England, Wales and the Isle of Man, and has become the commonest autumn moth in The Ridge garden”.

First recorded on the Isle of Wight in 1951. Now known as Blair’s Shoulder-knot. Image by gailhampshire via Flickr.

Book 85

Signs of Spring, including wild Daffodils in flower on her front bank, raise Gran’s spirits, and on March 4th she:

…went ot Chilworth where I have, for many years, seen Daffodils in a small wood, but now a bungalow has been built in the field through which I passed and access to the wood is barred.  I did, however, find a few in the hedge further up the lane and these, with some Periwinkles, have now provided me with a very lovely Springlike bowl in the kitchen.

She and Wynefred Way join forces on another outing with Spring flowers the goal, on March 7th.  They travel to Dorset:

Arrived at Studland we alighted from the bus and walked down a lane to see the main object of our excursion, the Spring Crocus (Crocus purpureus) which was new to me and with which I was enchanted.  Smaller than the garden forms and of a paler purple colour.  Sadly one of its fields had been ploughed, but some remained round the edges and the grass area of a nearby house had been left to them entirely and the sight of them was an indescribable joy to me.

A field of Spring Crocus. Image by Marta Boron via Flickr.

They see much more besides, but the Crocus is the main prize, and Gran takes a sample to paint – which she does on the following day.

Mid-month brings her the joy of two days’ “pursuit of nature”, with Norris, always referred to as “Brother”.  They visit Dibden Bay and Titchfield Haven, seeing a fine range of birds, including their first Chiffchaff of the year, but of more interest to me is her brief description of an utterly typical scene whenever I saw the two of them together in the field:

We laughed helplessly at our stiff and elderly efforts to get through the barbed wire, wishing that our backs would bend more easily as we pushed each other downwards to clear the upper strand of wire!

Gran and “Brother” some years later, overcoming another obstacle in typical fashion in their search for plants.

March 15th:

A special treat this evening was a visit to the Guildhall in Southampton to hear a piano recital given by Peter Katin.  He is a superb player, still very young, and utterly devoid of the exaggerated mannerisms, which sometimes mar the playing of some artists and make them appear slightly ludicrous.  Peter Katin is a slight, pale and delicate-looking man but he has great power in his sensitive, beautiful hands and he plays with a great deal of expression and animation.

The first part of the programme consisted of the Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, by Bach, Brahms’ Intermezzo in B flat minor, Op.117 No2, and the Sonata in A major by Schubert.  This last I found very dramatic and satisfying.  During the interval a small, and enthusiastic girl raved about Peter Katin and his playing, and he was obviously her idol.  The child had a great knowledge of music, too, as I found out later.

Works by Debussy and Chopin follow, and there is such tremendous applause that Peter Katin gives two encores, “before spreading his hands in a gesture of finality and leaving the stage after several reappearances”.  Gran continues:

In the bus I found “the“ child again and she promptly deserted her mother and sat by me, pouring out her adoration of pianists in general and Peter Katin in particular.  We discussed music, ballet, singers, dancers and pianists of all kinds and I was amazed at the tremendous knowledge that the youngster showed, for she could not have been more than ten years old!  I was quite sorry when I had to leave the bus.

She is back in Southampton on the 16th:

…to get my new evening gown for tomorrow’s Dinner-Dance at the Polygon Hotel, and, though normally I detest choosing clothes, now I have it I must say that it is a glorious colour – difficult to describe, being nearer to red than pink, but, though bright, certainly not crude.  It is brocade.  The famous Horse-chestnut tree in Southampton is now in an advanced state of foliation.

Later that day, visiting the Harding family in Merdon Avenue, Gran finds “the family augmented by a young Australian relative-by-marriage of Mary’s brother.”  She adds,  “Jill sang for us during the evening – she has a lovely, well-controlled voice with a good range”.

Looking for more wild Daffodils with Peg Eagle in the Chilworth area, on the following day, Gran writes:

Incidentally, the road here, once winding and lined by hedges, has now been straightened and the little Fig Cottage, bombed during the last War, has quite disappeared.  I felt sad, for, in the 1914 – 18 War, we had been there for eggs and potatoes and continued until I came to Chandler’s Ford to live in 1928.  The old Brother and Sister, Bob and Agnes Snelgrove, lived together there until Agnes died as the result of a motor-car knocking her down outside the cottage, and a German bomb in 1940 made it uninhabitable.  Now all trace has gone except for a few fruit trees where the garden used to be, and traffic tears along the road…

That evening, she quite enjoys the Dinner-Dance, but remarks: “if only they did not last so long”!  And she says her “new dress is lovely, and comfortable to wear”.

On march 22nd, she is at Lymington, botanising and birdwatching along the sea wall with Peg Eagle.  “The tide was out”, she writes:

…and twice, Whiskey, Peg’s little terrier, slid down the wall onto the mud and then could not get up again.  I had to sit on Peg’s legs whilst she hung over the wall and hauled Whiskey up by his collar!

At Stanpit on the same trip, she records Danish Scurvy-grass Cochlearia danica, a not uncommon coastal plant in those days but one that has since spread inland along the main road network of the UK, aided by the salting of roads in winter and the stony edges of the motorways creating a perfect “coastal” habitat for it.  The plant’s distribution map today consequently strongly resembles the road map.

April 11th sees Gran talking on the subject of the District’s Wild Flowers to Winchester Inner Wheel:

This meeting was in the lounge of the Westgate Lodge Hotel and I found a very friendly and appreciative audience.  They were so easy to talk to, partly because they asked questions as we went along, instead of leaving me to lecture to a sea of faces – a situation which tends to make me want to dry up altogether.

She illustrates the talk with her paintings and afterwards was told it was “one of the nicest talks they had had”!

It is a good day for Gran, for not only is she buoyed up by this remark but she also receives a letter from Jane in Norway, written on board a vessel travelling between the small islands between Stavanger and Bergen, and she adds:

I also received a first-day cover from Kuala Lumpur, with special Malaysian Refugee Year stamps, sent by Gaden Robinson, and a long letter from my pen-friend, Ellen Kniep, in Western Australia, who enclosed about a dozen pressed specimens of Australian wild flowers.

Image courtesy of Andy Brenan.

A few days later, we learn that Jock is in Chandler’s Ford, staying with her mother in Kingsway for a few days while Barry remains in Mill Hill looking after the boys.  On April 16th the two ladies enjoy a four-hour cycle-ride on the Downs, noting with dismay that almost all of the Cowslip-rich fields at Cheesefoot Head have been ploughed.  They attend Evensong together at Compton on the 17th and are out again in each other’s company on the 18th, cycling through Upper and Lower Slackstead, Braishfield and Ampfield.  They sit together in sheltered spots and talk.  “Jock returns to Mill Hill tomorrow – I shall miss her”, writes Gran that evening.

A long letter arrives from Barry on April 19th with detailed news of his recent trip, with boys from Haberdashers’ School, to Speyside.  They had camped at Glenmore Lodge near Loch Morlich and explored the, still snowy, mountains and pine and birch woods.  Dad clearly spent as much time as possible hunting for moths – species and northern forms – new to him. Gran relates one search for a famously localised early Spring species:

…the Rannoch Sprawler, a most beautiful insect, which sits about at the bases of the large birches, newly emerged. Unfortunately there was no emergence whilst Barry was there and many hours were spent to no avail. Commander Harper [Mike Harper’s father, who lived at Newtonmore] with whom Barry stayed two days, gave him one out of his trap and then, on his very last day, one was found at rest on a birch behind which they sheltered from a heavy snowstorm.  Renewed frantic efforts, however, produced no more.

The Rannoch Sprawler – so named because of the way its caterpillars behave when disturbed.  This is a continental one; those in Scotland look darker.  Image by Ilia Ustyansev via Flickr.

She adds more moth news contained in the letter:

The Teasel heads, which I sent Barry from Dibden By, (full, I thought, only of Ladybirds) he has now transferred to a warm room, and opening two of them, he found in each a fat larva, for which he hoped!  He writes, “so well done you!” A word of encouragement gratefully received!

The larvae, Dad informs me, were those of the tortricid moth, Endothenia gentianaeana, the adult of which is shown below.

Image by Ben Sale via Flickr.

April 20th: “Diana Fowler came to tea and afterwards took me for a drive…”.  They have a pleasant evening out, though discovering near Droxford that the car’s driver’s door would not close properly, “so, after a long and futile attempt to make it, we had to tie it shut with string!”

She ends Book 85 and her entry for the day with, “It had been a most enjoyable outing, though the Nightingale still eludes me this year, and I certainly expected to hear one in the very suitable wood at Bramdean”.

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Fort Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 47) Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 50) Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 54) Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 74) Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 94)
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