Article author, Kim Bachl (left) pictured around 1977, with her sister
My family hold the proud accolade of being the first ever family to move into Websters close Glinton. The development was brand new and the year was 1976.
These were the first houses to be built in the tiny village of Glinton for years. The fields to the back of our house were later to become Saddlers Close, but throughout my formative years Glinton Park was my back garden (despite what kid’s from elsewhere in the village had to say on the subject !)
The Park only had a swing, a slide and a climbing frame, but I don’t ever remember being bored, In the summer we were out until dusk and I recall games of ‘tag’ and ‘kiss chase’ (my personal favourite)
Later we were far too cool for games and hung out in ra ra skirts and Frankie says relax T. Shirts… Kiss Chase progressed to just kissing.
There is one particular day however that will stay with me forever . It was 1977 and council workmen had kindly ‘left’ some enormous concrete pipes for local children to play in, ( the sort that are usually buried underground during construction. ) We had a fine time rolling them around the park with several children inside them.
After several days of general wear and tear the unthinkable happened and when it was my turn to be ‘rolled around’ with two other friends, the concrete collapsed on top of us.
I can remember hearing my sister screaming my name over and over. Then, I was later told, she tried to lift a piece of concrete and unable to hold it dropped it back on top of me… I think I must have passed out after that as the next thing I remember was waking up in an ambulance.
I was very lucky, a broken shoulder, cuts and bruises, stitches to my head and arms. The injuries sustained by one other friend were much more serious and she was rushed straight to Addenbrokes.
In the aftermath I got my first taste of what it really is to feel part of a community… presents, cards, even a knitted doll (well it was 1977.)
Lots of visitors to my sick bed all regaling me with details of what happened. There were people everywhere, thank goodness a doctor arrived on scene, they drove the ambulance right into the park!’
Of course life soon went back to normal… Council officials removed the pipes, (health and safety was still in it’s infancy.)
I had to go back to school (right arm in a sling for several more weeks, what a blow that I happen to be left handed )
If you have any memories of events or ‘incidents’ in our Tribune villages we would love to hear your story. Simply email your recollections (and photographs if possible) to: villagetribuneeditor@mac.com or type and post them to: Tony Henthorn, Editor, Village Tribune, Golden Drop, Helpston, Peterborough PE6 7DW. All efforts will be made to return photographs to their owners after publication.
By Avril Lumley Prior
Bridget Hirst’s interesting article on Torpel Deer Park (‘Beyond the Pale’, Issue 59) has stirred me into retrieving some research on Robert de Torpel that has been hibernating inside my computer for several winters.
Robert de Torpel had an illustrious yet bewildering pedigree. He was one of only two male heirs of the ‘Honour of Torpel’ [several manors held by one lord] that did not bear the name Roger, which makes it exceedingly difficult to distinguish between the generations. Robert’s father or grandfather, Roger Infans [‘the younger’], had fought for William the Conqueror at Hastings in 1066 and three years later had joined the retinue of Peterborough’s first Norman Abbot, the belligerent Turold de Fécamp (1069-98). Holding lands in Torpel, Helpston, Ufford, Bainton, Ashton, Ailsworth, Glinton, Lolham, Maxey, Northborough, Nunton, Southorpe, Pilton, Cotterstock and Glapthorn, Roger de Torpel was one of the foremost knights of Peterborough Abbey.
A ‘Description of the knights of Peterborough Abbey’ copied into a twelfth-century charter-book, suggests that Robert inherited his father’s estates c.1130. Unfortunately, scant information survives relating to his career. However, it is feasible that as part of his knightly duty Robert embarked upon a Crusade to the Holy Land, for in 1146 he began to manifest symptoms of leprosy, which was rife in the Middle East, and as a result he was obliged to withdraw from society. There must have been other cases of this contagious and erstwhile incurable disease in the region. A second document preserved in the same charter-book reveals that a leper hospital had been established on the outskirts of Peterborough close to a ‘healing spring’ before Abbot Ernulf’s rule (1107-14). The colony was virtually self-sufficient with its own farmstead, chapel dedicated to St. Leonard and the right to levy tolls on people and goods entering Peterborough from the west.
Perhaps impressed with his treatment in the hospice and, doubtlessly, concerned about his prospects in the afterlife, early in 1147 Robert decided to make his peace with God by surrendering the profits from his manors at Glapthorn and Cotterstock with their woods, meadows and arable land to the ‘infirmary at Peterborough at the chapel of St. Leonard’. He also pledged his body and soul to St. Peter, the monastery’s patron saint, and vowed to live on ‘the diet of a monk’, declaring that he wished to be buried in a monk’s habit. As Abbot Martin de Bec (1133-55) was in Rome seeking an audience with Pope Eugenius III, the charter was witnessed by two eminent brethren, Hugh Candidus, who compiled the ‘Peterborough Chronicle’, and the master scribe, Galfridus [Geoffrey] of Ufford. It is possible that Robert de Torpel only intended the tithes from the Cotterstock and Glapthorn to be paid to St Leonard’s hospice for his lifetime or for that of his brother, Roger II, to whom the ‘Honour of Torpel’ passed. By the time of Abbot Benedict (1177-94), both manors were under the monastery’s direct control and remained so until Roger III, brokered a deal by which Benedict relinquished his Cotterstock and Glapthorn concessions in return for the church at Maxey, an arrangement that was confirmed by Richard I’s charter to Peterborough of 1189.
By 1535, the medieval leper hospital had become an almshouse for eight poor men and now has long been demolished. Nevertheless, Peterborough continues to combat the disfiguring and debilitating disease and improve the lives of sufferers through the excellent work of the Leprosy Mission, which has its headquarters at Orton Goldhay.
In the eastern corner of Northborough parish on a headland between the medieval courses of the Welland and Follies Rivers lies an enigmatic collection of earthworks and a so-called pack-horse bridge, which represents all that remains above ground of Walderam Hall (Figure 1). Formerly in Maxey parish, Northamptonshire, and strategically positioned close to the river-crossing of the old road to the Deepings, the hall has had an exciting and varied history which may be traced back as far as the twelfth-century through documentary and cartographical evidence. [click to continue…]
A Brief History of the Langdyke Bush Meeting-Mound by Avril Lumley Prior
‘O Langley Bush! The shepherds’ sacred shade,
Thy hollow trunk oft gain’d a look from me,
Full many a journey o’er the heath I’ve made,
For such like curious things I love to see,
What truth the story of the swain allows,
That tells of honours which thy young days knew,
Of ‘Langley Court’ being held beneath thy boughs,
I cannot tell - this much I know is true.’
John Clare, ‘Langley Bush’, Helpestone, 1821
Fig. 1: ‘View of the Langdyke Bush and countryside adjacent taken on Helpston Heath near the hedge’ (Thomas Eyre, 1721)
MYSTERIES OF SEVEN VILLAGE PUBS LOST IN THE MISTS OF TIME – OR WAS IT THE EXTRA STRONG ALE ? [click to continue…]
The restored tap-jars from the tip to the rear of the Glinton Artesian Water Company site
The 1922 advertisement for Hydrox Soda Water that illustrated Bob Randall’s article on ‘Helpston Groundwater Project’ (Issue 55) reminded me of nearly 30 years ago when my late father and I were excavating a tip to the rear of the Glinton Artesian Water Company (Sobrite and Hydrox), where we discovered a cache of broken tap-jars and numerous mineral-water bottles in perfect condition. Bob’s item prompted me to dig out my old research notes in order to recollect more about the site. [click to continue…]
August is supposed to be hot and dry so you could be forgiven for thinking this August was the coldest and wettest on record. However, August 1912 easily takes the award. [click to continue…]
The Second World War ended over 60 years ago, only now have members of the Women’s Land Army and Timber Corp been awarded a badge to commemorate their contribution to the war effort. [click to continue…]
Welcome to a new series by Bob Randall featuring old photographs of our villages. We start at Helpston in 1896 during the boring of an artesian well for a new village water supply. [click to continue…]
By Avril Lumley Prior
Our knowledge of the Fenland Saints - Guthlac of Crowland and his sister, Pega of Peakirk, is extracted mainly from an eighth-century Life of Guthlac, compiled by a monk named Felix, probably at Repton Abbey in Derbyshire. [click to continue…]
