Village news from Helen Price – 10/5/18

Village news from Helen Price – 10/5/18

Published 7 May 2018

Helen Price
01543 472203

KB Gardening Guild

Allan Howard expressed the hope that spring had arrived and reminded everyone about the Best Kept Village Competition, running from 1 May to the end of July and the Open Gardens event to be held in the village on 16-17 June.
The speaker for the evening was Ruth Williams who had come to talk about ‘The Living Churchyard’. Her emphasis was on the beauty and vitality of churchyards, with their wealth of wildlife, flora and fauna. Firstly, she talked about the history of the churchyard, showing that they were not just places for burials but also for fairs, gambling, drinking, games, archery practice and markets. Many parts of the churchyard are a semi-natural habitat, with long grass and piles of logs, which are deliberately left undisturbed to attract wildlife. Foxes, moles, badgers, slow worms, hedgehogs, bats, frogs and toads may be found there and often bird boxes are put up to attract birds. The trees and flowers attract bees and butterflies and there are many varieties of lichens, ferns and fungi to be seen. Ruth had lovely photos to illustrate her talk and even showed a churchyard with its own flock of sheep!
The meeting on 21 May will be an evening in Dianne Barre and Ray Conningham’s garden, starting at 7pm.

Kings Bromley Historians

At our April meeting, Allan shared with us the findings of his most recent research into the Lane family. It seems that John Lane had 6 illegitimate children by Melissa Mattingley whilst in London. He acknowledged these children and was witness at their marriages. Elizabeth Newton, a distant relative of the Lanes, left Jane Mattingley (who was 11 at the time) £1000 in her will to be paid on her 21st birthday.

John’s grandson, Cecil (born 1836), son of John Newton Lane, lived for a time on Paxos as an ‘aide de camp’. On his return to Kings Bromley, his brother, John Henry, had recently married and his mother Agnes, who had relied on him, began to rely on Cecil instead, as his father John Newton was described as ‘rather weak and fidgety’.

Cecil later married Adela Bertie, daughter of the Rev. Bertie and they moved to Whiston Hall in Shropshire. They had 4 children, Georgina, John Rowland, Percy (killed at Ypres in 1915) and Newton (killed at Messines Ridge in 1917). The latter two are commemorated by a plaque in Kings Bromley Church. Cecil died in 1897 and Adela in 1925. They are both buried in Kings Bromley churchyard.

Our next meeting will be on 29th June, when the speaker will be Richard Stone on “The Story of Map Making’. All are welcome in the Village Hall at 8.00 p.m.