A Sudden Appearance

Beautiful red poppies have appeared recently on a wall of the Old Phoenix Works just off the main road on King Street, Longton, not far from the station

The site of the old Phoenix works has, over the last few years, undergone renovation work and some areas have been turned into shops and offices.

The factory was built around 1879 - 1881 by Thomas Forester and Sons pottery manufacturers who specialised in producing Earthenware and Majolica.  In 1881 Thomas Forester is said to have received the largest order for the very popular Majolica Wares ever received by a Staffordshire Pottery.

Above The Glost House Cafe Bar

Above The Portmeirion Pottery Factory Shop and the Period Property Store.

Anyway, back to the poppies.  This work was commissioned for the centenary of the end of WWI and was produced by the  Entrepreneurs Network over a few days last week.  I wish I'd have seen them working on it.

It's rather beautiful.

Poppies, Photos, Peregrines and Princes

On Friday we drove over to Derby to see the Weeping Window poppies which are at present adorning the tower of the Silk Mill at the side of the River Derwent.  

 The tour of the ceramic poppies is organised by '14-18 Now' the UK's art programme for the centenary of the First World War.

The poppies were the concept of and designed by Paul Cummins and the installation was designed  by Tom Piper.  These poppies are some of those from the original installation 'Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red' which were first seen at the Tower of London in 2014.

They looked wonderful in the bright sunshine.

I like the Silk Mill building anyway so it was great to see it draped with poppies.

As we stood and looked at the poppies we could here the mewling up above from one of the peregrine falcons which nest every year on the nearby Cathedral.  My camera was stretched to its limits but I did get a mediocre photo of the bird.  Here is a link to the Derby Cathedral Peregrine Project's Blog.

I like this little area of Derby with its individual shops and cafes and a small independent department store called Bennetts.  The bunting was out blowing in the breeze which added a quite festive feel to the street, it was good to feel the warmth of the sun too.

The statue above is of Charles Edward Stuart usually referred to as 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' or 'The Young Pretender.' On 4h December 1745 at the height of the Jacobite Rebellion he marched with around six thousand men from Ashbourne towards Derby intending to ride towards London.   Two days later he was beating a retreat northwards and back to Scotland.  Four months later, on 6th April 1746 he was defeated at the Battle of Culloden.  Here is more information

We met him again in the Museum and Art Gallery.  We had popped into the museum to see a photographic exhibition before it closes this weekend.

The exhibition is called People Place and Things and explores early studio photography from 1854 onwards by using a collection of photos taken over the years by local photographers W.W. Winter which is, apparently one of the oldest running studios in the world.

There were lots of visitors enjoying the photographs and several finding people and places they knew.  There was a small group of people who were delighted to find their grandfather and uncles on a wonderful photo of Walter Tickner's butchers shop.  Below is a photo of the WW Winter photographic studio in the early 20th century.

Paul was thrilled to find a photo of a trainee pilot in a flight simulator at Derby Airport c. 1938.  So, as an early birthday treat for him, we bought the book which accompanies the exhibition.

Have a lovely weekend everyone.

In the Trenches

The Staffordshire Regiment Museum is at Whittington Barracks just outside the centre of Lichfield on the A 51 road to Tamworth.  It is a museum I'd never visited before but they had a WWI exhibition that we wanted to see. 

In the Museum was this wonderful tapestry made with lots of crochet poppies.

There is also a knitted pigeon.  This represents the pigeon known as 'Cher Ami' or 'dear friend' a male name for what was found later to be a female homing pigeon who saved the lives of 194 American soldiers.  Here is a link to the full story.  Cher Ami was the last pigeon to be sent with a request for help in October 1918 from the Lost Brigade at the Battle of Argonne and was awarded the Croix de Guerre for her bravery.  Despite being badly wounded she got her message back to the division headquarters.

The trench is a reconstruction of a hundred metre section of a British trench.  It was built in 2000 but updated and added to for the centenary of the commencement of WW1 last year.  

The trench is named after Lance Corporal William Coltman, VC in memory of him and all the Staffordshire men who served in the war.

There are several re-enactments, educational tours and experiences planned through this year in the trench but when we visited there was just us two.  

 Of course it was lacking the mud

 and the damp and the vermin

 and the smells

 and the danger

 and the fear

It  lacked the cold and bleakness of winter, the autumn fogs, the cool of spring and the searing heat of summer.  It lacked the smell of woodbines, the sound of the voices of the men as they went about their duties or rested before heading for the front but it did have the sound of sniper fire and the constant boom of the heavy guns.  I thought of Private Baldrick's poem in Blackadder 4 - Boom, Boom, Boom ........

 How dreadful it must have been, how brave they all were and how afraid they must have felt - all the time. 

This was quite a splendid reconstruction of how the trenches must have looked when first created but no one could or would want to recreate the appalling conditions experienced as the war progressed.

I did climb up the ladder to look at 'no man's land' and the German front line.  

There is also a Sap or mine adit.  Many miners were recruited to dig tunnels under ground towards the enemy lines.  If you have read Sebastian Faulks' novel 'Birdsong' you will have read about the mines and the tunnels running close to those of the enemy.

In the bright sunshine of an ordinary August afternoon it was sometimes hard to imagine how truly awful it must have been.

For everyone

Here and there

Hasn't it been wonderful weather for the last few days?  A golden September and an extra bonus to still feel the warmth of late summer during the day.  We've been gardening like mad during the last week.  Creating paths and laying gravel, planting spring bulbs and clearing areas of the garden we'd let get dreadfully out of hand.  

 We also managed a day out earlier in the week and visited two National Trust properties, not too far away from us, just over the county border in Cheshire.

Our first visit was to Dunham Massey a house we've visited a couple of times before and I'm sure I've written a post or two about it - especially about the winter garden. This time though was different because for the centenary of the start of WWI parts of the house have been transported back to the time when, from April 1917 until February 1919, it became the Stamford Military Hospital.

 The exhibition itself is called 'Sancturary from the Trenches' and with its peaceful gardens, sumptuous rooms and extensive grounds Dunham Massey must indeed have seemed like a haven from the relentless horror of life on the battlefields and in the trenches.

We looked around the new visitor centre and shop where we booked a timed ticket for the hospital.

We had just over an hour so we walked towards the gardens taking in the wartime propaganda posters dotted around - there were some very interesting ones to discover.

The gardens were looking wonderful with their late summer flowers and I was struck by the contrast between the joy of the peaceful and colourful garden and the horrors the soldiers in the hospital must have endured.  I thought of their bravery and also that of the nurses and doctors who worked day and night to cope with so many dreadful injuries.

Below is a sculpture in the gardens which consists of 282 individually cast concrete cubes one for each soldier who was admitted to the hospital, each cube carved with the admission number of the solider it represents.

Even more moving for me was to be found on the mound against the lake.

It was a sculpture of words, each poem written by soldiers who had been treated at the hospital in the autograph books belonging to Lady Stamford, who in 1917 offered the hall to the British Red Cross for use as a hospital, and her daughter Lady Jane Grey who was just 15 when war broke out.  Lady Stamford administered the hospital from her summer parlour and Lady Jane Grey trained as a VAD (Voluntary Aid Detachment) nurse and worked at the hospital.

Below a poem written by Private G A Bownes of the 2/4 York and Lancaster Regiment.

We spent ages reading the poems marvelling at the positive, peaceful and thoughtful words and sitting and taking in the tranquillity of the place we found them in.

It was time to make our way to the front door of the hall where we were greeted and told what to expect.  We may be lucky and see some of the characters as we moved through the house.  The actors would perhaps enact a scenario for us but they would not communicate with us or even make eye contact as they kept in character all day.  The first display boards dealt with the kind of injuries and diseases that the soldiers suffered with in the trenches things like trench foot and trench fever.  Also shrapnel wounds and shell shock.

We then entered the corridor leading to the hospital ward. I won't show you inside the rest of the house as this post is already getting too long but we may return later to look at the grandeur of it all.  

The ward is bright and cheerful but in some cases the men are very sick with injuries both physical and mental.  The whole atmosphere is very moving with quotes from the men who had been treated there and also from the  doctors and nurses dotted around for us to read.  

On pillows

and on walls.
So simply displayed and yet so powerful too.

The nurse was trying to pacify the young soldier who had somehow got himself into his day clothes with the intention of leaving the hospital and returning to the trenches because he felt that by being in the hospital he was letting down  his comrades who were still at the front.  

He eventually calmed down and fell asleep as the nurse sang 'Keep the home fires burning' in a soft, gentle voice.

There was of course, lots more to see in the house including the state rooms and kitchens.  I'll write about those another time.