The creation of Milton Keynes began in March 1967 with the founding of the Milton Keynes Development Corporation, tasked with delivering an ambitious project; the largest ‘new town’ development in the country. However, what is less spoken about today, more than 50 years on, is the futuristic Buckinghamshire town that never was – the North Bucks New City. Informally known as ‘Pooleyville’, the 1966 plans for the new town were the brainchild of County Architect, Fred Pooley, born from the County Council’s ambition to build a city of their own.
An article in praise of the plans for North Bucks New City, 1964
New County Offices under construction, c.1960s,designed by county architect Fred Pooley
By the early 1960s, the need for an overspill town to relieve development pressure on the south of the county was becoming glaringly apparent. In 1962, Planning Officer Bill Berrett first came up with the proposal for a ‘North Bucks New City’, and Fred Pooley drafted a town plan.
These days, Pooley is perhaps best known locally for his divisive Brutalist tower block on Walton Street in Aylesbury, which opened in 1967 complete with the county council’s first computer. It’s somewhat disparagingly still known as ‘Pooley’s Folly’ today. Had his plans for the North Bucks New City come to fruition, Milton Keynes might look a little like a series of Pooley’s follies!
His vision was an artful, dragonfly-wing-shaped city between Bletchley and Wolverton, comprised of a series of townships each home to 5000 people. Rather than built round a network of roads, the townships would be linked together, and to the centre of the city, by the very epitome of 1960s modernity; a rate-payer funded, free-to-ride monorail.
The Observer’s architecture critic described Pooley’s plans as ‘the most adventurous and imaginative scheme in Britain’ in 1964, when the plans were up for approval by the county council, and even went as far as to decry that if this ‘city of the future’ wasn’t approved, the chance for something so bold, so modern, would never come again.
An contemporary impression of how Pooleyville would look
Plans for North Bucks New City, ‘Pooleyville’
But was the plan for the monorail so modern?
Despite often being characterised as futuristic, the monorail was invented in the nineteenth century, in Germany. Often elevated, and operating on a single track, mid-20th century Britain viewed it as a brilliant alternative to the existing railway network, avoiding many of its traditional counterpart’s pitfalls: unsightly cables, space consumption and competition with pedestrians and drivers, pollution.
An impression of Pooleyville’s monorail by planning officer Bill Berrett
However, the rise of the motorcar meant that monorail systems never really got off the ground, as it were, outside of the odd example in the United States. In a climate that was seeing the shrinking of the UK’s railway network, it was impossible to justify new rail infrastructure, regardless of how innovative.
Ultimately, the County Council couldn’t fund the construction of Pooleyville anyway, and central government appointed Sir Jock Campbell to chair the new Milton Keynes Development Corporation (MKDC) in 1967. Pooley was appointed a local representative to advise MKDC, and still hoped to integrate some of his ideas into the plans. However, the corporation preferred a layout which put the car at the heart of city planning. Pooley didn’t give up easily, but was eventually forced to accept the failure of his plans, and the grid square layout the city has today is the result of the victory of MKDC’s vision over that of Pooley.
‘One of nature’s gentlemen’
In his long tenure at the county council between 1953 and 1974 Fred Pooley oversaw a number of important projects in Buckinghamshire, including several libraries, and was praised by critic Ian Nairn as ‘a remarkable man, completely free from pretension or arrogance…’.
Fred Pooley, county architect for Buckinghamshire, 1953-1974
He left the council in 1974 to work for the Greater London Council, where he was involved in the development of London Docklands and Thameslink. He was President of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) between 1973 and 1975, and, on his death at the age of 81, was remembered by the Architects’ Journal in 1998 as being ‘Liked by almost everyone who worked with him, [and] a quiet-voiced pragmatist – but one whose leaps of imagination could surprise’ – perhaps they still do.
Contemporary model design for New County Offices, Walton St, opened 1967
Light and airy interiors of the new library complex on the tower block, c.1967
As a local site of historical interest, Buckinghamshire Council has opened the doors to the Judges Lodgings for public tours every September, to showcase its Victorian architecture, furniture, and art. With many public buildings still closed or with limited access, the Virtual History Festival is proud to present a virtual gallery of the paintings depicting local dignitaries and Buckinghamshire scenes, all held at the Judges Lodgings.
From the first female chairman of the County Council, to the impressionist works of ‘Manchester’s Monet’, enjoy this virtual tour from the comfort of your own home!
Gillian Miscampbell OBE (b.1935), by James Orr, first female chairman of Buckinghamshire County Council (1989-1993). Her portrait hangs above the doorway to the Members’ Lounge.
Aylesbury from Court Farm Fields by N. Whittock, c1840. The County Hall is the red brick building on the upper right hand side.
Sir Henry Aubrey-Fletcher, 6th Baronet (1889-1969) Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire (1954-1961) by Norman Hepple. Sir Henry may have been better known at the time by his pen name, Henry Wade, as a leading crime fiction author and founding member of the Detection Club. His portrait hangs in the Small Dining Room.
Heath Pond, Leighton Buzzard, by Wynford Dewhurst (1864-1941). While he was known as ‘Manhester’s Monet’, Dewhurst lived in Buckinghamshire for a time in the early 20th Century, and was a Member of the County Council from 1907 to 1910. He gifted this painting to the council, it now hangs in the Small Dining Room.
An impressive reproduction of Thomas Gainsborough’s The Blue Boy (1770) from the late 19th century, by R.C. Saunders. It hangs over one of the fireplaces in the Large Dining Room.
Hunting Party Attacked by Wolves, reproduction after the studio of Rubens. This large artwork is hung on the staircase to the first floor.
James T. Ireland (1915-2006), by Romeo di Girolamo (b.1939). Ireland was chairman of Buckinghamshire County Council between 1973-1981 – this extraordinary painting is influenced by his role in the founding of Milton Keynes, and parts of Buckinghamshire are identifiable in the painting. It hangs in the landing on the first floor, along with many other former chairman portraits.
An exciting addition to the portrait collection in 2014 was this oil on copper of John Egerton, 3rd Earl of Bridgwater (1646-1701), Member of Parliament for Buckinghamshire in the 1680s, and Lord Lieutenant for the county between 1686-1687 and 1689-1701. This diminutive portrait, thought to be after Sir Godfrey Kneller (1646-1723), is only a few inches tall, and hangs by the doorway to the Large Dining Room, in the Members’ Lounge.
Cattle Scene, by Johann Heinrich Roos (1631-1685). This painting hangs on the staircase to the first floor.
George Grenville Nugent Temple (1753-1813) 1st Marquess of Buckingham, of Stowe House, after Joshua Reynolds (1723–1792). Also 2nd Earl Temple, he was Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire between 1782-1813. His portrait sits adjacent to that of his great-grandson, 3nd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, on the wall of the Large Dining Room.
Richard Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos (1823-1889), Lord Lieutenant for Buckinghamshire 1868-1889 and alderman for the new County Council, though he died prematurely before the first council meeting. The 3rd Duke saved Stowe from ruin after the exploits of his father, the 2nd Duke, and was well respected by his peers. His death was sadly noted in the minute book for the first council meeting in April 1889.
Henry William Cripps, Esq. (1815–1899), QC, JP by William Carter (1863–1939). Cripps was the first chairman of the County Council from 1889-1897. One of two portraits of Cripps to be found on the first floor landing, this was the first of a long series of formal portraits of council chairmen. There were only 13 chairmen in the first 112 years of the council, then in 2001 the role became a one year tenure.
As the Metropolitan Railway neared completion at its final station in Chesham, finishing touches were being made on a magnificent country residence in Waddesdon, a new addition to the burgeoning estate known colloquially as ‘Rothschildshire’. The year was 1889, and modern life as we know it was on the horizon…
It’s easy to think of the two world wars of the 20th century as being the catalysts that ushered out the old ways of life, with the advent of universal suffrage in 1928 and the birth of the NHS in the 1940s. However, in 1889 the grass roots movements behind the monumental social, political, and economic changes to come were already flourishing.
By 1889 the industrial revolution had driven Britain’s growing population into increasingly filthy cities. There were new levels of extreme poverty which – along with a concerted effort to keep at bay the bloody revolutions seen across the channel – made reform inevitable. Decades of reform had led to the Local Government Act in 1888, and county councils came into being in 1889. Five years later rural and urban district councils, and civil parishes, were introduced.
In 2020 a major change to local government has occurred, with the formation of the new unitary Buckinghamshire Council; to mark this new era, this article looks back at the dawn of modern local government 131 years ago, and examines how life was different – or not – for the residents of Buckinghamshire…
1. The new council was home to world famous millionaires
In what would now seem like the equivalent of having Richard Branson or Elon Musk elected to the local council, the new county council’s elected members in 1889 read like the roll call for a Vanity Fair cover shoot. Ferdinand de Rothschild of Waddesdon Manor, the Duke of Buckingham of Stowe, and two Thomas Francis Fremantles (Lord Cottesloe and his heir) – among others – were elected either as councillors or aldermen. This was not unusual; 137 peers were elected to new councils across England in 1889, and the entrenched deference to the ‘ruling classes’ wouldn’t begin to decline until after the First World War.
The first council of 1889, held at Buckinghamshire Archives
One esteemed alderman sadly did not even make it to the first council meeting. The sudden death of the 3rd Duke of Buckingham on 26 March 1889 signified the end of a Dukedom and two Marquessates. Well-liked and respected, thanks to his careful handling of his roguish father’s ruinous spending, the Duke’s death was a blow. In the minutes for the first council meeting, which can be seen at Buckinghamshire Archives, Lord Cottesloe made a heartfelt dedication to his friend and distant cousin, speaking of a “deep sense of the heavy loss” felt not just by the Duke’s faithful family and friends, but by the new council which would have greatly benefited by his “wide experiences, good judgement, and intimate knowledge of county business.”
There were, of course, dozens of well-to-do, working men on the council as well – such as Owen Peel Wethered, a partner in Wethered & Sons Brewery in Marlow, and Alfred Gilbey who founded Wooburn Working Men’s Club in the 1880s.
However, it goes without saying that all the new elected members were men. Women were not entitled to run in council elections although, somewhat surprisingly, they could vote in them – decades before suffragists made headlines fighting for the right to vote in general elections. In 1907, this changed and the formidable Frances Dove was elected to Wycombe Borough Council, one of only a handful of women elected to councils nationally that year. The county council would welcome its first female councillor, Mrs. Alice Broadbent, in the 1920s.
Dame (Jane) Frances Dove, by Walter Stoneman National Portrait Gallery, London
2. A royal visit sparked just as much excitement in 1889 as it does now
On 2nd July 1889, the council minutes feature “an application by the committee for providing a jublie [sic] Reception of the Shah in Aylesbury on the 9th”. This was the Shah of Persia, making his third tour of Europe in 1889. Accompanied by the Prince of Wales, the arrival of his cortege in Aylesbury market square was flanked by constables and crowds. The Shah and Prince were guests of county councillor Ferdinand de Rothschild at Waddesdon, where the Shah was very impressed with the technology on display; in particular a mechanical elephant which he asked to see perform over and over again. The elephant in question was made by French clock maker, Henri Martinet, in London in 1774 and can still be seen at Waddesdon today. These days, the elephant has its own Twitter account, @WMelephant, from where he tweets little updates about events at the National Trust manor – what would the Shah make of that technological innovation?
Detail of musical automaton. Waddesdon Image Library, Chris Lacey
Waddesdon was frequently host to Ferdinand’s royal friends, including the future King Edward VII. One such visit to Buckinghamshire by the Prince of Wales is responsible for a local myth – it’s long been assumed that Aylesbury’s General Infirmary was renamed the Royal Buckinghamshire Hospital after the prince received emergency treatment there for a broken leg. In fact, it seems likely the renaming was simply part of the Queen’s jubilee celebrations in 1887, because unless the Prince was unfortunate enough to break his leg twice in Aylesbury, the accident in question wasn’t to occur until 1898. Reportedly rushing because he had to catch a train back to Windsor, but didn’t want to skip breakfast, the prince tumbled down the stairs of Waddesdon manor – breaking his leg in the fall.
3. The workplace was more modern than you might think
Records still held at Buckinghamshire Archives give an insight to the surprisingly modern attitude to wellbeing, and employee rights, at work. An entry from September 1889 makes mention of an attendant at Stone Insane Asylum, Mercy Welch, who had been granted three months leave due to ill health, and was now deemed too unwell to continue work. According to census records Mercy would have been in her mid-forties in 1889, and had worked at the asylum for 20 years. An attendant’s role was somewhere between nurse and guard and, despite reform of treatment for the mentally ill throughout the 19th century, the job would have been physically and emotionally exhausting. Mercy received a superannuation of £20 (equiv. £2,500 in 2020) and while she doesn’t appear in the Buckinghamshire census two years later, there is a marriage record of a Mercy Welsh in London in 1892, so perhaps she had a happy ending despite her ill health.
Stone Asylum
Elsewhere in council minutes there’s a charming mention of a Mrs. Crook, who was housekeeper of the Judges Lodgings in 1889, when it became part of the new county council’s assets. Mrs. Crook had been housekeeper since at least 1882, when mention of her appears in letters between the Clerk of the Peace and a local surveyor over a “sinister smell” plaguing the lodgings, to the displeasure of the judges. The smell was nothing to do with Mrs. Crook’s housekeeping, though she had been covering the flue with a sack – it was eventually found to be faulty drains. Luckily for Mrs Crook, it was promptly agreed that she would continue to work “for the present, upon the same terms as to salary, notice, and otherwise, as are now subsisting”. In modern terms we would say that she had been TUPE’d to her new employer!
4. Long before Profumo, Buckinghamshire was home to political rebels
In 1889 Bucks became, for a time, home to two very different people who came to represent the polarising struggle for women’s suffrage. The well-known novelist, Mrs. Humphry Ward, rented John Hampden’s house at Great Missenden for the summer of 1889, evocatively described in her daughter’s memoir: ‘[We were] learning to know the Chiltern country with its chalk-downs and beech-woods… watching anxiously for the ghost that walked in the passage outside the tapestry-room on moonlight nights…’
Mrs. Humphry Ward
In 1889 Mrs. Ward was just embarking on what would be three long decades of opposing the women’s suffrage movement – a mission seemingly at odds with her passion for women’s education. Mrs. Ward was a fascinating, and divisive, Victorian character, criticised by one contemporary journalist as ‘an intellectual aristocrat, one whose ideal is of a small governing class of exquisite souls.’ Little did Mrs. Ward know that at the time she was renting Hamden, just a few miles away in Chesham the wealthy Franklin family had just purchased a 25 acre poultry farm – their infant son, Hugh, would go onto be a key figure in the suffragist movement, gaining a notorious place in history when he was the first person to be released from prison under the Cat and Mouse Act in 1913. Ultimately it was Hugh’s cause which proved the stronger.
Hugh Franklin; photo: Men’s Political Union for Women’s Enfranchisement, photographer unknown / Public domain
5. From handmade lace to bridges made of chairs, the 9-5 was very different
Buckinghamshire is known for its signature exports: chairs, lace, and Aylesbury ducks. In 1889 the cottage lace industry, which had given the women of the county a way of adding to their family incomes from their front parlours, had sadly given way to machinery for the most part. However, there was still some lace being made by hand, and in the 1891 census over 1,000 women listed their profession as lace makers; while this is nowhere near as many women as those listed as domestic servants, it was still more than any other neighbouring counties by a country mile.
Aylesbury’s famous duck, inspiration for Beatrix Potter’s Jemima, was going into decline by 1889 with the introduction of the sturdier, fatter Pekin duck from China, but the chair and furniture trade was booming. Skilled craftsmen in the thousands producing chairs for upmarket London department stores such as Liberty’s, and special occasions in the county – such as a visit from a royal – always called for a quirky “bridge of chairs” to be erected in High Wycombe. Photographs of these magnificent chair bridges can be found in Buckinghamshire Archives’ historic photographs collection.
6. In the era of the bank holiday, people were good at making their own fun
Both bank holidays and shorter working days were late Victorian inventions, which, coupled with the advancements in public transport, revolutionised leisure time. One of the new county council’s early powers was the granting of licences for stage plays, and in the December 1889 council meeting minutes there are several requests for new licences – was it Panto season, perhaps? Large houses, such as the Grenfell family’s riverside residence Taplow Court, were often the scenes of charity concerts, plays and the 19th century equivalent of your internet connection failing while you’re watching Netflix – the tableau vivant.
Taplow Court, John Preston Neale / Public domain
With their acres of lush green grounds, large estates were also natural homes for local sporting teams, such as the Little Marlow Cricket Club, which played for many years in the grounds of Westhorpe House, Marlow. Meanwhile, over in Wycombe, a new football team had just been founded by young men who worked in Wycombe’s thriving furniture industry – hence their surviving nickname, the ‘Chairboys’.
The Thames was also undergoing an image makeover at this time, as its function as a vital commercial transport link was being usurped by the railways, freeing the river up for play rather than work. The wealthy Hammersleys, bankers from London, moved to Abney House in Cookham in the 1880s, and soon instated a river enthusiast culture that still thrives today. Eights from Oxford and Cambridge could frequently be seen in training for the boat race on the river here, and hotels and public houses, as well as improved housing, sprung up to support south Buckinghamshire’s new riverside playground culture, then immortalised by the 1889 novel ‘Three Men in a Boat’ by Jerome K. Jerome. He described Marlow as “one of the pleasantest river centres… there is lovely country round about it too, if, after boating you are fond of a walk, while the river itself is at its best here.”
A page from a scrapbook held at Buckinghamshire Archives, advertising a concert at Taplow in 1888
This blog was written by local researcher, Beth Mills, using resources held at Buckinghamshire Archives.
For many, 2020 has become ‘virtual’ in all sorts of ways, with meetings and events being online. For others, being at home has led to sorting out boxes that remained untouched in busier, normal times. For Bucks Family History Society’s Tony Sargeant, one collection has led to thoughts on how war has changed lives on the home front as we go through our own changes. Below, Tony has put the findings of his research in chronological order, in his guest blog for Buckinghamshire Virtual History Festival.
Book cover Hurricane
Part 1. The Great War and a factory
In 1906, on the borders of the historic county of Buckinghamshire, a factory opened. Messrs Cosgswell and Harrison applied for an explosives licence after the purchase of Poyle Farm in the parish of Colnbrook. Edgar Harrison spoke in support of the application that was granted. By 1911 the local census shows a variety of jobs appearing linked to the works. In the past the local mills had been used for flour, paper, and asbestos, in Staines, four miles away labouring jobs existed in the Linoleum factory. The new factory offered a different sort of employment for both men and women. Some employees were from outside the locality, bringing members of their family with them. There were also jobs for established families as sons and daughters worked for Cogswell and Harrison. A new generation of young men became apprentice gun-makers which provided a skill based alternative to the manual jobs in farming or market gardening. Before the factory there were no jobs for young women, who normally went into service or took up dress making. Dexterity was required to make shotgun cartridges, and the women were most suited.
The 1914-1918 war changed the work at the factory with large scale Cordite production taking place. During April 1915 experiments were taking place to improve quality and ease of production. At 3pm on Friday 16 April 1915 there was a terrible explosion when seventy pounds of gun-cotton ignited, causing the death of Mr Cogswell Harrison and Miss Dorothy Moss lost their lives. The blast could be heard five miles away in Uxbridge and the building was severely damaged. Three other workers from Colnbrook were injured, receiving first aid from the local doctor who rushed to the scene. Also on the scene was the Rector of Horton Revd. Reed Davis who was the Commandant of the local Special Constables. On the 21st he would have the job of burying Miss Moss in the burial ground extension that was opened that year. Dorothy Moss made her last journey from Colnbrook to Horton churchyard in a Washington car according to the report in the newspaper. The funeral turnout was exceptional with over 50 mourners, including the workforce of Cogswell & Harrison who closed the works for the day.
Burial entry for Dorothy Moss in the Horton Burial Register
The penultimate paragraph of the report named Mr F Sargeant as the funeral director. Which opens another line of research as in Berkshire Record Office are “Records of Sargeant’s Funeral Parlour, Colnbrook 1910-1950” D/EX1801. Next time I am there will check the entry, which should give more detail about the arrangements on the day. Dorothy Moss has not made it on to any of the war memorials in the area, although recently somebody mentioned that flowers are still being left on her grave.
Part 2. The Explosives Works
The disaster bought great change for the powder mills at Poyle. One of the questions concerned – whether aliens were involved in the accident – could be seen as prophetic, while the reply was negative. It may have been a surprise to some, that aliens, in the form of Belgians, took over the factory and supplied a much expanded workforce. The Belgian Government required factories in England to supply ammunition for their weapons as they were a different calibre than the British equipment.
I have not found any direct records concerning the factory while it was managed by the Belgians, all the information comes either from parish registers, the 1939 register, or newspapers. There was an assessment carried out by Historic England in 2015. Some comparisons can be made with the National Projectile Factory Birtley, Co. Durham, but that was much larger, employing 3500 people. The clues appear when the factory and equipment was sold off after the armistice.
In the Uxbridge and W. Drayton Gazette Friday 11 July 1919:
SALE TUESDAY NEXT.
On View Saturday and Monday.
THE BELGIAN GOVERNMENT WORKS,
COLNBROOK, MIDDLESEX
THE SURPLUS MATERIAL, LOOSE PLANT and STORES, including 200 tons steam coal, new lead tanks and coils, earthenware and silica pipes, 6,000 deal cases 8.700 yards unbleached calico, Worthington, Wilcox, and Douglas Philps weighing machines, new 25-h.p. Siemens motor. 6-h.p. and 3-h.p. motors, dynamos, ironmongery, electrical fittings, chemicals, office furniture, typewriters, desks, filing cabinets. 75 bedsteads, mattresses, and 500 blankets.
Note the beds and mattresses, required as local accommodation could not provide for the workforce.
With factories working night shifts there could be as many as 150 people accommodated, but there is no proof. Another advert for the same sale included a “substantial timber building of 5000-ft floor space”. This building appears to be the canteen that was not part of the original factory. Some enterprising Colnbrook residents must have purchased the building and moved the components to Tan House Farm, Mill Street. The sales of machinery and the site did not go to plan, with subsequent adverts repeating lists of items for sale.
In Uxbridge & W. Drayton Gazette Fri 29 Aug 1919:
COLNBROOK BUCKS.
SALE OF FIRST-CLASS BUILDING
MATERIALS
Messrs. ROBT. NEWMAN & SON
Are instructed to Sell by Auction, at the Tarn House Farm, Colnbrook (to where the materials (to where the materials have been removed from the Belgian Government Works at Colnbrook).
On FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 5th 1919,
At 11 for 12 o’clock, in convenient lots.
ABOUT 8,000-ft of nearly-new quartering of various sizes, from 3 by 2 to 7 by 2 1/2. 200 square of matching, 100 square feather-edge boardding, 50 square flooring, 300 sheets of galvanised iron, 50 casement sashes, 20 doors, quantity of ironwork, nails and other useful items.
May be viewed the day previous and morning of Sale. Catalogues can be obtained at the “George” Hotel; and Mr F Sargeant, High Street, Colnbrook; or of the Auctioneers, Harlington, Middlesex. Telephone : 39 Hayes
A similar advert appeared on the 30th August 1919 in the Slough, Eton & Windsor Observer. The adverts were not repeated as building materials were in short supply after the war. In contrast there were no takers for the factory site which was left derelict until Faulkners Ltd occupied the site. There are photographs on Heritage England’s Britain from Above website.
Faulkner Works, Poyle, 1947
Part 3. A man with many jobs
In the previous sections, a Frederick Sargeant has appeared in the story as the funeral director at Dorothy Moss’s burial. There needs to be some explanation concerning his role. He was a Colnbrook boy, who became apprentices to a plumber in Tottenham, then going on to start a business in that area. Evidently Frederick was still in touch with friends in Colnbrook, as he found out about a business opportunity there, and was able to take a lease of a house with shop from Lt Col. Meeking of Richings Park, starting Ladyday 1899 for the sum of £22 per annum to be paid quarterly. Frederick Sargeant was already describing himself as a plumber, painter and decorator, although his entry in Kellys Directory only said Plumber. Being an undertaker and monumental mason started in 1910, and by 1912 Frederick Sargeant was employing men to build four houses in Meadfield Road, Langley. We have seen that Frederick Sargeant was taking on large jobs with little notice like the removal of the building from the explosives works.
A further note about the shop in the High Street, Colnbrook – besides a shop, there was also a lounge and kitchen on the ground level, three bedrooms on the first floor and another in the second floor. It was demolished in the 1960s.
Counterpart of 1899 agreement between Frederick Sargeant and Lt. Colonel Meeking
Part 4. Another factory, another war…
With Colnbrook being an old town with a narrow High Street, it was a candidate for a bypass. It was constructed in 1927. This moved through-traffic away from both Longford and Colnbrook and rejoined the old Bath Road at Brands Hill on the edge of the parish.
Major new industry did not appear in the area until 1937 when Parluant Farm, Langley was purchased by Hawker Aircraft Limited. Work started building a factory complex with a grass airfield. For the projected numbers of Hurricanes required it was clear that the company’s factories at Kingston upon Thames were inadequate. The aircraft were built at Kingston and transported to Brooklands for final assembly, clearly another facility was required.
In 1939 the factory was nearing completion and workers were moving into the area. The construction company McAlpine were still on the site. Many histories about machines during World War 2 say little about the people involved with the actual production. There are plenty of discussions about all the various marks of aircraft and the test pilots, but little inside the factory doors.
Hawkers Factory, Langley
There must have been materials and components being delivered. There has been one report that High Duty Alloys, normally based at Slough Trading Estate, had a shadow factory at Langley. The distribution of aircraft was organised by Air Transport Auxiliary, headquartered at White Waltham, with pilots flying in to collect Hurricanes, and later Tempests and Typhoons. The place could be quite busy. Security would have been in place, probably involving R. A. F. personnel. For further protection Hawker Aircraft Ltd. workers formed their own detachment of the Home Guard. The workforce was distributed in local accommodation in the surrounding parishes of Colnbrook, Horton, Langley and Iver. There were also two hostel camps in the area, one near St Mary’s church, Langley and another at Crown Meadow, Colnbrook. Air raid precautions were taken around the factory with the use of smoke screens. An elderly resident recounted to me that the smoke screens were a problem as the smoke was created by burning dirty fuel oil in barrels. Houses nearby would stink of the smoke for a few days and all the net curtains needed washing.
Part 5. A memento
Book cover of Hurricane, by F.H.M Lloyd
In my collection there is a rather scruffy book, Hurricane by F.H.M Lloyd published in December 1945. Its contents said a lot about Hawkers Aircraft Ltd at Langley.
The image below shows the directors of Hawker Aircraft Ltd, who are seated, with the managers standing behind them. The text names the individuals and their roles, including Sir Sidney Camm who was the designer and P. W. S Bulman the Chief test pilot. Other companies were represented like Rolls-Royce and Rotol the propeller manufacturer. There is still more to discover about these managers, and how the company operated with the logistics involved in aircraft production.
Photograph from ‘Hurricane’, taken at Langley on the day the last Hurricane left the factory, July 1944
Inside the book is a collection of signatures including some individuals who appeared in the photograph. The original owner of the book appears in the photograph – W. F. Clark, Works Manager, Homewood. Homewood was the name of the smaller factory unit north of the main building at Langley. Clark’s career started with Hawkers after being an Air Mechanic with the R.N.A.S. in Malta. Clark was working for Hawkers at Brooklands in 1935 when the prototype of the Hurricane was first flown. In 1942, he was transferred to Langley to manage Homewood. One person whose signature appears, but is not in the photograph, is Neville Duke who became a production test pilot at Langley on the 1st January 1945, for a year on secondment from the R. A. F. It was probably during this time Neville Duke and W. Clark met. Later they were both working for Hawkers based at Dunsfold, Surrey. There is a section about Langley in Neville Duke’s autobiography “Test Pilot”.
Signatures on the inside cover of ‘Hurricane’
Signatures on the inside cover of ‘Hurricane’
Notes
First World War National Factories:
An archaeological, architectural and historical review
by David Kenyon
pub Historic England 2015
Aero Films image reuse covered in Britain from Above
Blogging Use – use of specially prepared images on a non-commercial basis on a personal blog or website that is free to use and presents no logins.
Many of us will have sat down with a cup of tea and the crossword. Some of us may also have had a version of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary (OED) at hand to check spellings and meanings of words. But how many of us really use the OED to its full potential to learn about the history of words, where they came from, how their meaning has changed and even about the wider history of the world…
The first volume of the OED was published back in 1884, but it was not until 1928 that the final 10th volume of that first edition was published. It was designed by the Philological Society of London to be a complete re-examination of the language from Anglo-Saxon times, different from other dictionaries of English, where the focus is on current meaning. The OED does have present-day meanings of words, but also the history of individual words, and of the language, traced through over 3 million quotations, taken from a wide range of publications, including classical literature, letters and cookery books. One Isabella Mary Beeton is quoted over 150 times! Don’t forget those essential grape-scissors when laying the table and anyone for brickbat cheese? Mary Berry with only 1 quote has some way to go to catch her up.
At one time, to consult the full version of the OED which can take us beyond spelling and meaning, you probably had to visit a library, as it consisted of 20 hefty volumes at a considerable price. However now you can access it online for free through your library service and use the flexibility of the digital version to search for so much more than individual words. So what actually can you use the Dictionary for, apart from the obvious spelling check for a contentious Scrabble word?
You can search the dictionary by year or range of years to see which words entered the language at a particular time, giving an insight into national and international events, scientific progress and discoveries and changing attitudes and concerns. It is fairly easy to estimate when Bolshevism, tank, Gallipoli and machine-gunning were added to the OED. You might find it harder to guess the date of the first recorded use of O.M.G (as beloved by teenagers), parmigiana, mobile phone or internet. Picking out the words that are first recorded in the Dictionary for a particular year can be a great way to mark special events and anniversaries. Any wordsmiths celebrating a Golden Wedding this year would be delighted to know that the words humongous, jobsworth and the phrase punk rock are first recorded in the OED for 1970. Less appealing are carjacking and kalashnikov. For film buffs the phrase “Mrs. Robinson” is recorded from 1970, taken from the film The Graduate.
The online version is far more regularly revised than a print version could be, with quarterly updates. This year was remarkable for an extra update in April outside the quarterly cycle. You will not be surprised to read that the words and phrases added or updated include Covid-19, self-isolating, and elbow bump.
A July update also covered linguistic developments relating to the Covid-19 pandemic¹. What will this tell those looking back in 50 or 100 years’ time at the words recorded first for 2020 about what was happening in the world? “Nightingale ward” is in the OED, but “NHS Nightingale hospital” is yet to appear, though there is an entry in Wikipedia, so maybe in the OED soon, together with “Nightingale courts”?
So what is the oldest word recorded in the OED? The policy of the OED at the start, as stated by James Murray, the first editor, was to exhibit “ the history and signification of the English words now in use, or known to have been in use since the middle of the twelfth century. This date has been adopted as the only natural halting-place, short of going back to the beginning, so as to include the entire Old English or ‘Anglo-Saxon’ Vocabulary. To do this would have involved the inclusion of an immense number of words, not merely long obsolete but also having obsolete inflexions… Hence we exclude all words that had become obsolete by 1150.”
The Online version of the OED now includes over 3500 words from Old English (or Anglo-Saxon) where the first evidence of use dates from between 650 and 950, but where use continued beyond 1150. These include many of our common pronouns, adverbs and verbs such as he, with and have, as well as nouns such as town, earl, and thief, although the spelling and exact meaning may have changed. These early words form a significant part of the core vocabulary of English. The earliest 2 listed are dated from around 680 – the nouns ward and streale, the latter now obsolete
There are over 4000 entries for which the first evidence of use is dated 950 -1150. Again there are many words still common today such as who, take and no. The months of the year as we know them today start appearing. Childhood and childish are first used, as are sunset, duck and catacomb. Popular in use was probably alehouse and less heard these days are truefast, bridelope and beswike.
Locally the word Chiltern makes its appearance at this time:
After 1150, we move into the period of Middle English, 1150-1450, the time of Chaucer and a significant increase in the number of words used in English: over 32,000 words have their first instance of recorded use in the OED in this period, many of which reflect the use of Latin and French in the county at that time. After the Norman Conquest, the rulers in England were French speakers and Latin was the language most commonly used for writing in the post-Conquest period. However in 1362, the Statute of Pleading made English the official language for Parliament which meant that all nobles and the King finally spoke English well enough to conduct official business. Henry IV was the first English king to speak English as his first language. His son, Henry V, was the first to use English in personal communications.
Not surprisingly given the dominance of French at this time, by 1500, over 40 per cent of all of the words that English has borrowed from French had made a first appearance in the language, including a very high proportion of those French words which now play a central part in the vocabulary of modern English. The online version of the OED allows us not only to see which words entered the language at a particular time, but also to combine into the search from which language they originated. So we can see that there are over 8550 words of French origin entering the English language 1150-1450. Venison, beef and pork give witness to the eating habits of the nobility, a move away from the cow, sow and boar of the farmyard. Other French additions from this time include damask, palace, liege and decree, reflecting the position in society of those using these words.
Today, just over 30,000 words (excluding derived forms) have French identified as part of their history in the OED. However for Latin, the corresponding figure is over 50,000, ranging from everyday words such as candle and sock which both entered the language very early to the more recent (and obscure) maiasaur and perilune
Scandinavian languages had a significant input to the English language from early on, showing the significance and the Viking settlements from the middle of the eighth century to the beginning of the eleventh. The Vikings were Germanic tribes of the Scandinavian Peninsula and Denmark and mounted a series of raids across the North Sea, leading to them conquering large areas of England which would later be known as the Danelaw. Gradually the English and the Scandinavian amalgamated and the Old Norse spoken by the invaders continued to significantly impact on the English language, shown in basic vocabulary such as egg and sky, the pronouns they, them and their, and common verbs like clamber and fling. Hints of the violent times of the arrival of the Vikings are shown in the words berserk, slaughter and ransack. More recent, and peaceful, borrowings include ski and ombudsman.
Other languages that have heavily influenced the English language and reflect different times and influences on our history include the Celtic of course with the close proximity of Welsh, Scots and Irish Gaelic speakers.
As the world opened up with exploration and travel so the number of languages influencing the English language increased and the changes in the language reflect the spread of the English people to new lands and continents. In particular this can be seen in the introduction of new words for foods and the names of animals. Even those British staples, tea and potatoes came from elsewhere. Tea came from Chinese Amoy dialect te. Potatoes were introduced to Europe from Peru by the Spanish and this is reflected in the origin of the word from the Spanish patata. Budgerigar and koala are first recorded in the OED for the Nineteenth century reflecting the colonisation of Australia and the adoption of Aboriginal words for the unique animals there. You might be surprised at how early the words elephant, rhinoceros and giraffe appear. Polar bear took a little longer!
There are over 1400 words listed as taken from the languages of the Indian subcontinent, the earliest of these from the Fifteenth Century, such as Brahmin, to the more recent samosa in 1955. African languages account for over 500 entries, dating from Seventeenth Century and range from the well known safari (dating back to 1859, so not just used for modern tourists) and gorilla to the more obscure sufuria and gorah.
History can also be reflected by the Dictionary at a more local level. I have already mentioned Chiltern and Aylesbury. Ridgeway is also in the Dictionary and the infamous Hell Fire Club at West Wycombe warrants an entry:
Can you find what the present day place name of Le Onhandedecruch is?
Lace making in Buckinghamshire
Chair making High Wycombe
The entries for the words plaited, Kattern Day, mechlin and trolly amongst others reflect the importance of lace making industry in Buckinghamshire at one time, whilst those for bodger, seat and chair evidence the history of chair making in the Wycombe area.
The influence of people and publications on the language can also be traced through the OED by looking at the sources for quotations. Clicking on the link to sources from the home page of the online OED will take you to a listing of the 1000 top sources for the OED. Not surprisingly with its long history going back to 1785 and daily publication, the Times newspaper is the most quoted source, with 43348 quotation, athough still only 1.2% of the total number. Given his much shorter life span Shakespeare does well to follow with 32827 quotations – not bad for 52 years! Other writers in the top 10 are Walter Scott, Geoffrey Chaucer and, coming in at 8, John Milton, whose cottage survives in Chalfont St. Giles where he completed Paradise Lost, and was inspired to write its sequel, Paradise Regained, the which two together provided an astonishing 5812 quotations for the OED!
What about other writers associated with Buckinghamshire? Another prolific source of quotes for the OED is the poet William Cowper, who lived at Olney and supplies 5896 quotations (36th most quoted source). Benjamin Disraeli is the 243rd most frequently quoted source in the OED, with a total of 1718 quotations from his novels and other writings. Less quoted, but still significant Buckinghamshire connected authors, include John Betjeman (a teacher for a while at Gerrards Cross and fond of “beechy Bucks”), who is quoted, not surprisingly for deb and ginger-beery and the evocative buttercuppy day and lin-lan-lone, but also for nuclear fission and air–conditioned. Mary Shelley contributes Frankenstein, from her novel of the same name, written whilst living in Marlow. Enid Blyton, who lived at Bourne End and Beaconsfield is quoted for adventure (naturally), don’t-carish and tell-tale amongst others. More recently the effervescent Roald Dhal supplies Oompa-Loompa and quotes for golden and chocolate, of course! As can be seen the Oxford English Dictionary offer so much to those who study the history of the English language and also to those who study history. The English language is constantly changing and evolving, reflecting the world of those who use it. If you wish to explore the Dictionary further, or look up some of those words mentioned above, you can do so by going to Buckinghamshire Libraries catalogue and following the link to our e-Library
You will need your library card and PIN to log in.
Find some doozy and pawky words to amaze friends and family and win at word games and explore the wonderful history of English and the world that has formed it.
To make the most of all the Dictionary has to offer, once logged in, click on Help below the search box or select from the list of helpful resources on the home page. There is also a link to the blog posts which are full of fascinating and quirky information.
Should you need any more information, please contact Buckinghamshire Libraries Information and Learning Team lib-ref@buckinghamshire.gov.uk
Thank you to Oxford University Press for their permission to use quotations from the Oxford English Dictionary Online edition.
By Gina Nicholls, Information and Learning Services Manager, Buckinghamshire Libraries.
To celebrate the reopening of the Roald Dahl Museum on Thursday 10 September 2020, we invited the team at the museum on board to take over our social media channels for the day to tell our history loving fans about the beloved local author, and key literary figure of the 20th century.
We’re proud to republish here some archived blogs by the Roald Dahl Museum, with their permission, which all reveal more about Dahl’s time in Buckinghamshire, and how it influenced his writing.
Roald Dahl lived in the Chilterns for over 40 years of his life and wrote many of his most famous books for children ensconced in his little writing hut in the Buckinghamshire village of Great Missenden. However, his stories were often influenced and sometimes even inspired by the surrounding landscape. Roald Dahl explained in the pamphlet Reflections: A Profile of Roald Dahl in 1975, when looking for the plot for his next book he would “mooch around the house, the garden, the countryside, the village streets, searching and searching for this bright and fantastic new idea…” Read more…
Living and working in the Buckinghamshire countryside was a source of stimulus and pleasure for Roald. His garden and the local area provided the seeds of inspiration for several of his stories, from James and the Giant Peach to Fantastic Mr Fox.
Roald’s love of the natural world went back to his boyhood. He would write his diaries high up in the tall conker tree in the family’s garden in Llandaff, later describing the experience as sitting in a ‘cave of green leaves surrounded by hundreds of those wonderful white candles that are the conker tree’s flowers’, hidden from the rest of the world. Read more…
Great Missenden is a busy but inviting village, and living here provided Roald with a great deal of material which he poured into his books. It just goes to show that the strangest things, like a bright red petrol pump, can inspire a brilliant story. Take a walk around Great Missenden, and discover the place that inspired and influenced Roald Dahl in some of his wonderful children’s books. Read more…
Petrol pumps in Great Missenden that inspired Danny Champion of the World
Much of Roald Dahl’s life was spent living and working in the Buckinghamshire countryside, and provided the setting for some of his most beloved children’s stories such as James and the Giant Peach. However, his early experience of rural life in the area during the late 1940s and early 1950s also inspired some of his short stories for adults. Published together in the 1988 collection, Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life, these stories explore comical schemes, devious deceptions and countryside occupations with a gruesome twist. Read more…
The cottage in Grendon Underwood where Dahl lived with his mother, c. 1946
Florence Nightingale. Image courtesy of Buckinghamshire Archives.
In this guest blog for Bucks History Festival, the Libraries team use online resources, available for free using a Buckinghamshire Library card, to follow Florence Nightingale to see what they could find out about her. You can use your Buckinghamshire Library card to access all the resources used below, and many more, for free at home, using our eLibrary.
Florence Nightingale. Image courtesy of Buckinghamshire Archives.
Florence Nightingale with nurses at Claydon House. Image courtesy of Buckinghamshire Archives
Why Florence?
This year has been designated as the “International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife,” in honour of the 200th anniversary of Florence’s birth. However, a little known fact about her is that as well as healthcare, she was passionate about libraries and even had a special connection to one in Buckinghamshire.
What’s more, Florence was a frequent visitor to Buckinghamshire, staying so often at Claydon House, the home of her sister Lady Verney, she had her own bed! It can still be viewed at the house today, now a National Trust property. If you fancy your own desktop research project, find out more about Florence and the Verney family connection using Oxford Dictionary of National Biography on the eLibrary – search for ‘Verney’ or ‘Florence Nightingale’ to get started.
Click on any image in the image below to discover how Buckinghamshire Libraries followed Florence...
If you would like to find out where your family used to live you can explore the wonderful history of you, using Ancestry at home for free with your Buckinghamshire library card. Or you could research someone famous like we did with Florence or, if you live in an older house, trace who lived there in the past. Researching the past, whether it is delving into the history of your own family or that of someone famous, has never been easier.
Use your Buckinghamshire Library card to access the resources above, and many more, for free at home, using our eLibrary.
