Thomas Duncombe and 'No Pasaran!' 10 km stroll, mid-May

Thomas Duncombe. and 'No Pasaran!' 10 km stroll, mid-May

‘No Pasaran!’ walk in Wotton Under Edge on Saturday 17^th May to celebrate the life of Thomas Duncombe of the International Brigade and Wotton; killed in action at Gandesa. Meet at the parish church at mid-day. 

Let me know if you want to attend. 

There will be readings from A Gloucestershire Declamation when we reach the Spanish mountain oaks that we planted at the tail end of the last century.

This piece of research records the names and contributions of supporters of the anti-fascist cause in our area.

It is a unique piece of research that we lost and then re-discovered in a dusty old box, just before the box was thrown out.

Thank goodness Trish suggested one last search and a proper search inside the capacious and paper-filled box.

May Day Walk: from the Source of the Slad Brook to its Confluence with the Frome

May Day Walk:

 from the Source of the Slad Brook to its Confluence with the Frome

Seventeen of us gathered at Bulls Cross,

(Oblivious of the midnight ghost coach spectre)

To cross longitude line 88 and a threshold

To another liminal world,

Where the hangman swung in Deadcome Bottom,

Where Cabbage –Stalk- Charlie and Percy-from-Painswick

Watched us from the shadows of the bluebell woods.

We reached the source of the Slad Brook,

Beech leaf green with a gravity rainbow,

Tripping to the sea, and tripping us

Two hundred years to water wheels and weavers.

We talked of Lee and Robert Frost and Edward Thomas -

But before we could take a path less travelled,

A redcoat appeared out of the wood to read the riot act.

We descended towards the village,

(Miss Flynn there: down by the pond)

When a young spinner stopped us in our tracks,

She told us why she had to go on strike,

Why there had been riots and gatherings

At the mills and on the hillsides and in Stroud;

She showed no remorse, nor regret, but pride.

Others looked for the invisible

What is hidden in the landscape,

But denoted on a map:

I saw Kel bend down and pick a roadside leaf,

Just as we reached longitude line 87;

We talked of longitude, chronometers, the Empire and slavery,

Just as we reached Stroud scarlet town.

The brook had now lost its wild dignity;

Culverted and trapped and tunneled,

But sometimes finding daylight in the streets,

At Badbrook, the bus station and the railway viaduct,

Then trickling past Macdonald’s and the main road,

Beneath and around a roundabout,

To reach the Frome, the Severn and the sea.

Slad to Stroud Walk: May Day 2pm

Laurie Lee Centenary Walk: Slad Brook from Source to Confluence

(As featured in the Site Festival 2104 Programme)

‘Without the Slad Brook there would have been no cloth trade in the local valleys around Slad. Without the cloth trade there would have been no riots in Slad and Stroud in 1825. Join us on a walk from the source of the brook to its confluence with the Frome in Stroud. Help us recreate the past along the partially culverted brook with psycho-geographical musings, notes on flora and fauna, together with performance.’

We’ll probably meet at Bulls Cross, rather than the Camp – will confirm – but it will definitely be on Thursday May 1^st at 2pm.

The Site Festival Guide also says about the whole Laurie Lee Centenary Walks:

‘… All the walks are led by writers, poets, artists and historians… Walk leaders will each offer their own unique approach…’

We will have Kel Portman from Walking the Land leading us; John Bassett from Spaniel in the Works performing; I will do the historical contextualization bits.

UKIP and Cosmopolitanism

He, an Egyptian, an auxiliary;

She, secret- keeper for the Dobunni,

Had arranged to meet by the sacred oak,


Sheltered and hidden from keen Roman eyes

By dense, dark woods of smooth barked beech.

He, a skilled boatman from the River Nile,


And now, deserter from the garrison


At Kingsholm; beaten, whipped, lashed and abused


By officers for drunken amusement,

Found silent sympathy, trust and love


From this mute young woman at the wine shop;

She, like him, violated just for fun


And entertainment - forced to play the fool,

Was also a skilled, rehearsed dissembler,

For inside that apparently dumbstruck


Mind was mysterious Druidic lore,


Hidden safe within a tribal dreamscape.

She, beyond Roman suspicion and law,


Led him by the hand, as the red sun's rays


Sank behind the high shrine to Mercury;


She, night-navigator of marshland paths,


She, sure-footed through the night-rustling forest;


They, sheltered and sleeping through the daylight hours,

They, slipping unseen past messenger posts,


Up the eastern scarp, then down to the river.

He, Nile-native, expert boatman, stared west

Across the Severn to the Silures -

Their boat eased its way with gentle paddle


Across that broad swathe of dangerous water,

Until exhausted, they breathed freedom.

Three centuries later, loyal-subjects,

Their children’s lineage, dark-skinned Britons,

Were destined to fight for Rome and Glevum

Against Anglo-Saxon invading migrants,

Who steadily renamed the landscape.

Inundation: Past, Present, Future

Dunwich

We biked to Dunwich through reeds and windmill creeks,
That led through sluice and weir flatlands
To a shingle-scape of submerged churches:
Drowned Domesday town
Where All Saints, Greyfriars, the harbour,
Merchants' houses, quays, wharves, inns,
Ale houses, overhanging upper storeys,
Pilgrims' paths and thronged market streets,
Cowled ghosts, cursing mariners and bleached bones, 
All drift with the North Sea tide,
The hungry shoals and eager crabs. 

Laurie Lee Walking Programme

1          1. The Slad Brook from its source to its confluence with the River Frome in Stroud (10   kms); meet at 2 pm at Bulls Cross.

          2.  'As We Walk Out’: from Slad to Southampton (approx.. 160 kms); 10^th - 17^th May; time and meeting place tbc; invited walkers, artists, writers.

      

3.      Wotton-under-Edge: Thomas Duncombe International Brigade Memorial   Walk; 17^th May, meet at noon at the St. Mary’s Church (10kms).

4.    From Slad to Whiteway Colony (10 kms); 7^th June, meet around 11.30 – 12 at the Woolpack; refreshments on arrival at Whiteway and then a performance of No Pasaran!

5.    Slad family walk, 29^th June (5 kms); meet at the Woolpack, time tbc.

6.    ‘Crossing the Border’: Spanish Civil War Pyrenees walk, Ceret to La Agullana (36kms), 24^th-25^th July, meet 8.30, invited walkers, artists, writers etc.

7.    From Purgatory to Paradise: 11kms, 2^nd November, meet at 10 am at Knapp House Barn, Slad.

Go to http://www.walkingtheland.org.uk/ to book a place on any of these walks; scroll down until you see the Laurie Lee logo and details as to how to book are there. You need to follow the procedure there, I’m afraid; we have to be formal so that we stick to tolerable numbers for the walks.

Thanks,

Stuart

Money and Liquidity in Stroud and Slad, 1825

She, a cord wainer from Slad,
He, a loom weaver from Stroud,
Their master clothier employers,
From Slad and from Stroud,
Men, upright, Christian and proud
Of their Master Clothiers' Association,
Against any weavers' combination,
Ordered angry weavers to Hell,
So they were dipped in the Stroudwater Canal, 
A succinct explanation
By the weavers' combination
Of the liquid nature of capital.