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The View From Windmill Hill

If you have read Flora Thompson’s book ‘Lark Rise to Candleford’ (forget the TV adaptation of the later parts of the book), you will have glimpsed the only recorded first hand memories of a village girl growing up in late 19th century rural England. This was someone who experienced the poverty and love of the agricultural labourer’s family, not the musing of the toffs who wrote the contemporary novels about the Victorian English countryside. Juniper Hill, a hamlet in Oxfordshire, could as easily have been Stoke St Gregory.

 

Most modern local history books and articles are produced by individuals and local history groups. They base their work on research and interviews, and then give an account which emphasises the aspects of village life they would like to represent.

We are lucky in Stoke that three of our former residents recorded their memories in print. What they have to tell us is first hand experience of a village that can still teach us lessons.

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Marjorie Pearce wrote 'No Time to Spare - The Story of a West Country Farmer's Wife' in 1998, and  Ron Woodland wrote 'Reflections' in 2000. We start our introduction to these writings, though, by introducing the book that Eric Hembrow (Sue’s father) wrote in 1990 - 'Winter Harvest'. In Chapter 2, entitled ‘The View From Windmill Hill’, Eric makes the point that Stoke is isolated, but not far from anywhere: “A would-be visitor to Stoke, asking for directions, received the hesitating reply, ‘Now come t’think of it, it baint on the road t’anywhere’. This unhelpful observation is nevertheless true, for with main roads running either side of us, no advantage is gained by actually coming through the village. This means that if you should ever find yourself in Stoke, there are only two possible explanations, either it’s intentional or you’re lost.”

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As Eric points out, “The best vantage point to view the village and surrounding area is Edgar Garland’s Windmill Hill . . . . Standing there in 1985 I look at one of nature’s contradictions, for the view before me, whilst ever changing, has remained basically the same for centuries. Four ranges of hills surround me, each its own particular shade of green. To the east is the wooded ridge of Curry Rivel . . . . To the south, the Blackdown Hills, with a triangular monument to the Duke of Wellington . . . . To the west, a barrier between us and the Bristol Channel, rise the gentle slopes of the Quantocks. Northwards are the Polden Hills. Immediately below me is Curry Moor, with the River Tone snaking its lazy way from the hills beyond Taunton to join the River Parrett . . . . To my right is Stanmoor, with the road through Curload following every turn of the Tone. Over the river, giving few clues of its significance to history is the Isle of Athelney. Here, in AD 878, Alfred the Great, as he was later to be known, took refuge, and, whilst planning the campaigns that brought him sweeping over the Danes at Edington and Chipenham, the legendary cakes were burned . . . . Beyond the Parrett, two hills rise unexpectedly from the low lying moors. On certain mornings the mist hugs the ground and they take on the appearance of icebergs breaking the surface of the Atlantic. The nearest hill, with a ruined church is Burrow Mump, now given to the National Trust. The other is Glastonbury Tor, its tower standing out on the skyline watching over the ruins of the once great and influential Abbey.”

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Take away the M5, the other roads and buildings and you are looking out on the same basic lansdcape as the first settlers would have seen. The men and women who cleared our sandstone ridge of the native hardwood trees and formed thre various hamlets that make up the present parish of Stoke St Gregory. As Eric reminds us - the same landscape, but ever changing.

 

Many thanks to Sue Hembrow for letting us use extracts from ‘Winter Harvest’. The book is now out of print, but who knows? If there is enough interest it would be wonderful to see it on the shelves again.

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