• Our new ticketing site is now live! Using either this or the original site (both powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

Settlement Association

Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

EbbwJunction1

Established Member
Joined
25 Mar 2010
Messages
1,778
Location
Newport, South Wales
Peterborough Cathedral was vandalised during the English Civil War in 1643 by Parliamentarian troops. Some of the damage was repaired during the 17th and 18th centuries, but extensive restoration work began in 1883, which was initiated after large cracks appeared in the supporting pillars and arches of the main tower. These works included rebuilding of the central tower and its foundations, interior pillars, the choir and re-enforcements of the west front under the supervision of John Loughborough Pearson RA (1817 – 1897). He revived and practised largely the art of vaulting, and acquired in it a proficiency unrivalled in his generation, working on at least 210 ecclesiastical buildings in England alone in a career spanning 54 years. He best known for Truro Cathedral (1880), the first Anglican cathedral to be built in England since 1697.
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
Littleport would appear to be quite prominent in the annals of tales of spectral, alarming large black dogs -- material re which has featured quite recently in the game. This lore would seem to be something of an East Anglian speciality -- but not exclusively so: Burnley , Lancashire -- far to the north and west -- is reputedly haunted by a similar supernatural canine, locally called Trash or Skriker.
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
The venerable and greatly-esteemed naturalist, and broadcaster on that theme, David Attenborough, was born in Isleworth. In 1936 Attenborough attended in Leicester, a lecture by the Canadian naturalist and conservationist "Grey Owl" (Archibald Belaney): which fired his lifelong enthusiasm for nature / wildlife / conservation thereof.
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
Risking accusations of obsession with travelling naturalists / zoo collectors / media bods: Gerald Durrell spent a fair amount of time in his 1940s youth, in and around Bournemouth. In his "collecting" and pre-Jersey days, he had a considerable professional relationship with Belle Vue Zoo, Manchester.
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
Exeter also has a ship canal.

Chester also has a twin town in Italy. "Twin" of the former, Terracina; of the latter, Senigallia -- never hitherto heard of either, but I'm no fan of Italy (would be prepared to revise that opinion in the unlikely event of my visiting the country).
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
There is a mariners' song -- an East Anglian version of "Maggie May" -- which mentions both Blyth; and Pin Mill (Suffolk) -- on the River Orwell estuary, a few miles downstream from Ipswich.
 

EbbwJunction1

Established Member
Joined
25 Mar 2010
Messages
1,778
Location
Newport, South Wales
John Lyall, who had a long career, both as a player and Manager at West Ham and as the Manager at Ipswich Town died at Tattingstone on 18th April 2006, aged 66. He was born in Ilford on 24th February 1940.
 

EbbwJunction1

Established Member
Joined
25 Mar 2010
Messages
1,778
Location
Newport, South Wales
The current SS Peter and Paul Church dates from about 1100, but has been the subject of much work since then. One such occasion was between 1877 and 1884, when the Church was restored to designs by the Gothic Revival architect James Brooks, although little of Brooks' work survives. Another secular building designed by James Brooks was the Rectory for St Mary's Church, Maiseyhampton, Gloucestershire (c.1872).
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
A couple of miles from Maiseyhampton (alternatively rendered Meysey, or Maisey, Hampton) is the village of Down Ampney, where the composer Ralph Vaughan Williams was born in 1872.
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
The name Wiggold is thought to come from Old English: "the piece of high open land belonging to a man called Wicga". Further north: Wigginton, Staffordshire (near Tamworth) is reckoned derived from this same personal name -- "Wicga's farm".
 

Calthrop

Established Member
Joined
6 Dec 2015
Messages
3,689
In the year 757, King Aethelbald of Mercia was assassinated -- supposedly by his own guardsmen -- at Seckington. A likely somewhat similar episode took place in 1100, when King William II (Rufus) was killed by an arrow when out hunting: strongly suspected of being assassination in the guise of an accident. A monument called the Rufus Stone, supposed (dubiously) to mark the spot where this occurred, is located near Minstead, Hampshire.
 

EbbwJunction1

Established Member
Joined
25 Mar 2010
Messages
1,778
Location
Newport, South Wales
The grave of the novelist Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, best known for his Sherlock Holmes books, is under a large tree in the churchyard of All Saints. Sir Arthur was originally buried in a vertical position in Crowborough and re-interred in Minstead by the family of his deceased first wife after the death of the second Lady Conan Doyle. Minstead figured prominently in Conan Doyle's historical novel The White Company. Alleyne Edricson, the main character is the second son of the late Franklin of Minstead and brother of the Simon, Socman of Minstead.
 

Top