Story Search Results

Meet the Neighbours - Coombe Abbey # 81

...a lot of history in one place. However, when the Craven family took over in 1622, things seemed to calm down and they spent many years developing the Abbey and adding new buildings, the West Wing being one in particular.  The famous landscape gardener, ‘Capability’ Brown, re-designed the surrounding gardens and land and other parts of the Abbey were re-built over the following years. In 1921, the last Earl of Craven to live there, died tragically in a boating accident and his wife the Countess decided to sell the estate.  This must have been a very difficult decision after the family had been there for 300 years.  However, a builder bought it in 1923 th...

Mediaeval Weaponry #84

...too. The history of the sword begins well over 3000 years ago but it wasn’t until the 6th century that smiths in Scandinavia began to make blades of steel.  Egyptians used sickle-like swords, Greek swords were primarily slashing weapons but the ‘gladius’ of the Roman Legionary differed in that their swords were short and intended for stabbing.  Each to their own! Later swords had one or more grooves cut in the blade – these were known as ‘blood gutters’ which sounds pretty horrible but mainly the metal was grooved to lighten the blade without losing its strength.  By the time of the Middle Ages swords were much more elaborate, often made with inl...

Lest we forget #86

..."  Wow - history in the making and my father was there hearing it first hand - and hoping that the war was coming to an end soon.  Sadly, he had to wait another year or so before he got his wish. Diary entries in 1944   Unfortunately, not everyone got to come home and carry on with their lives.  Although my dad did come home, he contracted tuberculosis (TB) after the war and had to spend two years in a sanatorium losing half a lung.  He also ended his romance with Winnie as he didn't feel it was fair for her to wait for him or be landed with an invalid, as he thought he would be.  However, I think this made him more determined to prove himself and h...

Victorian Courtship - fans #91

...For the next few months I will be doing a series on Victorian courtship starting in February, the month of love, as we have just celebrated Valentine’s Day on the 14th.  The Victorians used various items for flirting with, namely fans, gloves, parasols and handkerchiefs!  I imagine the Meynell family at Hoar Cross Hall held lots of dinner parties and Balls back in the Victorian days where most of the young ladies would have had their fans at the ready to signal to a secret beau.  But what were these signals and why were they used? The belief that the fan was used in society to express feelings or commands dates back to at least the early 18th century.  I...

Celebrating VE Day #94

..."  Wow - history in the making and my father was there hearing it first hand - and hoping that the war was coming to an end soon.  Sadly, he had to wait another year or so before he got his wish. My dad's diary from 1944   Unfortunately, not everyone got to come home and carry on with their lives.  Although my dad did come home, he contracted tuberculosis (TB) after the war and had to spend two years in a sanatorium losing half a lung.  He also ended his romance with Winnie as he didn't feel it was fair for her to wait for him or be landed with an invalid, as he thought he would be.  However, I think this made him more determined to prove himself an...

A Bit Of Background #1

...h all its history and tragedies in the summer of 1970. My family consisted of my dad and mum, William and Gwynyth, descendents of an old Derbyshire family and from the Prices of Meirionydd, and two younger brothers, Gavin and Piers and the five of us were about to take on a stately home in the middle of nowhere, or so it seemed to me!  It was actually in the middle of Staffordshire but in an incredibly small village, more like a hamlet, with a church, a school, a few cottages and a village pub.  The local bus service had just come to an end the month we moved in so there was no public transport either or a village shop!  Of course, to us three kids it seemed...