Sherborne Times April 2020

APR IL 2020 | FREE

A MONTHLY CELEBR ATION OF PEOPLE, PLACE AND PURVEYOR

MAKING GOOD with pottery teacher, Anna Stiles

sherbornetimes.co.uk

WELCOME

I

t is never truly silent. Quiet perhaps, but never silent. Recently however silence has come thrillingly close. Leaving the house to walk our dog feels like stepping into a vacuum; the quietude creating an unsettling blur of bliss and melancholy. Senses are heightened; the screech and grind of a passing car jangles my nerves, while the call of a red kite overhead pulls me to the edge of tears. So this is where we find ourselves.

It would be hard to add to what has already been said without turning to now well-weathered words. I will though say this; in our wake, nature is treading tentatively back into long-feared spaces, for all the distance forced between us we will only grow closer and, as hideous as this thing is, it might also just be downright beautiful.

Take care.

Glen Cheyne, Editor glen@homegrown-media.co.uk @sherbornetimes

CONTRIBUTORS Editorial and creative direction Glen Cheyne Design Andy Gerrard @round_studio Sub editors Elaine Taylor Photography Katharine Davies @Katharine_KDP Feature writer Jo Denbury @jo_denbury Editorial assistant Helen Brown Social Media Jenny Dickinson Illustrations Elizabeth Watson elizabethwatsonillustration.com Distribution team (usually) Barbara and David Elsmore Nancy Henderson The Jackson Family David and Susan Joby Christine Knott Sarah Morgan Mary and Roger Napper Alfie Neville-Jones Mark and Miranda Pender Claire Pilley Ionus Tsetikas

1 Bretts Yard Digby Road Sherborne Dorset DT9 3NL 01935 315556 @sherbornetimes info@homegrown-media.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk Sherborne Times is printed on an FSC® and EU Ecolabel certified paper. It goes without saying that once thoroughly well read, this magazine is easily recycled and we actively encourage you to do so.

Whilst every care has been taken to ensure that the data in this publication is accurate, neither Sherborne Times nor its editorial contributors can accept, and hereby disclaim, any liability to any party to loss or damage caused by errors or omissions resulting from negligence, accident or any other cause.

Sherborne Times does not officially endorse any advertising material included within this publication.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form - electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise - without prior permission from Sherborne Times.

4 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

David Atkins @David747Atkins david-atkins.com Laurence Belbin laurencebelbin.com Elisabeth Bletsoe Sherborne Museum @SherborneMuseum sherbornemuseum.co.uk Richard Bromell ASFAV Charterhouse Auctioneers and Valuers @CharterhouseAV charterhouse-auction.com Mike Burks The Gardens Group @TheGardensGroup thegardensgroup.co.uk Paula Carnell @paula.carnell paulacarnell.com Cindy Chant Sherborne Walks @sherbornewalks sherbornewalks.co.uk Gillian M Constable DWT Sherborne Group @DorsetWildlife dorsetwildlifetrust.org.uk David Copp Rosie Cunningham Hector Fiennes Sherborne School @SherborneSchool sherborne.org Jimmy Flynn Milborne Port Computers @MPortComputers computing-mp.co.uk

Chris Loder MP Vickie Macintosh Sasha Matkevich The Green Restaurant @greensherborne greenrestaurant.co.uk Mark Newton-Clarke MA VetMB PhD MRCVS Newton Clarke Veterinary Partnership @swanhousevet newtonclarkevet.com Mike Riley Riley’s Cycles rileyscycles.co.uk Dr Tim Robinson MB BS MSc MRCGP DRCOG MFHom Glencairn House Clinic glencairnhouse.co.uk doctortwrobinson.com Steve Shield Sherborne Town Council sherborne-tc.gov.uk Harriet Stanley Mogers Drewett Solicitors @mogersdrewett md-solicitors.co.uk Paul Stickland Black Shed Flowers @NaughtyDinosaur blackshedflowers.blogspot.co.uk Anna Stiles Anna Stiles Pottery annastilespottery.com Val Stones @valstones bakerval.com Dee Swinton Dorset Mind @DorsetMind dorsetmind.uk

Jackie Folley PROMISEworks @Promiseworks promiseworks.org.uk

Safia and Ian Thomas Bootmakers Workshop

Andrew Fort B.A. (Econ.)

CFPcm Chartered MCSI APFS Fort Financial Planning ffp.org.uk

Jess Thompson DorPIP @dor_pip dorpip.org.uk

Jan Garner Sherborne Scribblers

Diane Tregale The Gryphon and St Paul’s Church @StPaulsSherb stpauls-sherborne.org.uk

Craig Hardaker Communifit @communifit communifit.co.uk Andy Hastie Cinematheque cinematheque.org.uk Joanna Hazelton MARH RHom London Road Clinic 56londonroad.co.uk Sarah Hitch The Sanctuary Beauty Rooms The Margaret Balfour Beauty Centre @SanctuaryDorset @margaretbalfourbeautycentre thesanctuarysherborne.co.uk margaretbalfour.co.uk James Hull The Story Pig @thestorypig thestorypig.co.uk Vanessa Lee

Heidi Berry Sherborne Preparatory School @Sherborneprep sherborneprep.org Frances Walker Sherborne Literary Society @SherborneLitSoc sherborneliterarysociety.com John Walsh BVSc Cert AVP DBR MRCVS Friars Moor Vets @FriarsMoorVets friarsmoorvets.co.uk Sally Welbourn Dorset Wildlife Trust @DorsetWildlife dorsetwildlifetrust.org.uk Sadie Wilkins Vineyards vineyardsofsherborne.co.uk @vineyards_wine

APRIL 2020 6

Community Support

64 Interiors

124 Tech

18 Film

70 Gardening

126 Directory

20 Theatre

76 ANNA STILES

128 Community

24 Art

86 Food & Drink

130 In Conversation

32 Family

96 Animal Care

132 Short Story

52 Wild Dorset

102 Body & Mind

133 Crossword

56 Environment

116 Property

134 Literature

58 History

120 Legal

138 Pause for Thought

62 Antiques

122 Finance sherbornetimes.co.uk | 5

elizabethwatsonillustration.com

Thinking of letting your holiday home?

We know that your holiday home is just that – a home.

That’s why our local team is dedicated to managing your property with the same care and attention you would. With tailored services to suit your needs, you can be as involved as you like, so why not get in touch today?

01929 448 708 newowners@dorsethideaways.co.uk dorsethideaways.co.uk 6 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the demand for food parcels while at the same time caused a huge drop in donations.

Sherborne Food Bank relies solely on the generous food and cash donations from the community and is in urgent need of your help.

With movement restricted and supermarket visits less frequent please consider making a financial donation via our website. For those visiting supermarkets please consider adding the following items to your trolley: • UHT Milk • Squash • Tinned meals (not pies) • Rice • Dried mash • Pasta sauce • Tea • Tinned vegetables (not beans or chickpeas) Donation points can be easily found at

Thank you.

www.sherbornefoodbank.org 07854 163869 | help@sherbornefoodbank.org

COVID-19 Support

OUR MAN IN WESTMINSTER Chris Loder MP, Member of Parliament for West Dorset

M

y first Sherborne Times column isn’t quite the ‘Life from Westminster’ piece I was expecting to write, and I make no apologies for the seriousness of what I must share with you now as your Member of Parliament for West Dorset.

Coronavirus is the biggest public health emergency in a generation and the Prime Minister has led the call for decisive action, at home and abroad, of a kind not seen in peacetime. This has included a virtual lockdown of our usual way of life, in order to halt the spread of the disease, protect our NHS and save lives.

I certainly didn’t expect, within three months of being elected, that I would be leading our constituency through its response to a global pandemic. We now have confirmed cases very close to home and we need 8 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

to minimise the transmission of this highly contagious virus. Whatever is asked of us, we must work together and follow the Government’s advice, especially observing isolation and social distancing.

My dedicated teams, both here and in Westminster, have been working with me around the clock, preparing others and helping to get what they need in place; along with handling hundreds of incoming requests for assistance with repatriation, health-related problems and business concerns. We have established strong links with GPs, hospitals and health officials; Dorset Council and town and parish councils, schools, colleges and clergy. The military, and an army of volunteers who are now coming forward, will also have our full support as they begin their work.

The situation is fast-moving and, at the time of

writing, our town centre in Sherborne is a very different place - with non-essential shops and businesses no longer open. Schools are closed to all but the children of key workers; the doors of our churches are also shut, and with that an unavoidable impact on forthcoming weddings, christenings and funerals. We have experienced a lot of change in a short space of time, and I thank you for your sacrifice, but as a community we are strong and I believe we will come out of this even stronger.

Recently I had to make a plea to visitors planning to come to Dorset to ‘wake up’ and stay at home. I do need to get the message through – holidays are not essential in the current climate. I would ask you to dissuade friends and family from visiting you until

Government says it is clear to do so. Of course we look forward to welcoming visitors back with open arms when we are through this current crisis, when our rolling countryside, Jurassic Coast and bustling market towns will be open again for business; but for now the message couldn’t be more clear: Stay at home, protect our NHS and save lives.

West Dorset is set to be one of the most vulnerable to coronavirus, with 38% of residents over the age of 60, and many in our community already coping with underlying health issues. An exercise to shield 1.5 million of the country’s most clinically vulnerable, including many in our own area, has now begun. With the help of healthcare professionals, local councils and the Armed Forces, Government will deliver essential food and medicines to those identified – in return they must isolate themselves at home for 12 weeks for their own protection. This will save lives.

On the back of all this change has come a resounding wave of community spirit. I wholeheartedly support the many voluntary networks that have sprung up all around West Dorset, including ‘Sherborne Viral Kindness’ where volunteers and local businesses are helping those in isolation with free meals from its pop-up community kitchen, along with shopping, collecting prescriptions, walking dogs – or simply offering a reassuring conversation. If you would like to support West Dorset’s volunteering effort, please sign up on my website at www.chrisloder.co.uk/volunteer Finally, I’d like to mention the topic of panic buying.

In recent weeks, press has publicised supermarkets having empty shelves but it hasn’t shown how well stocked our local independent food stores, butchers, greengrocers, bakery shops and pharmacies are. Please support the high street businesses still trading through this lockdown, many of whom are now offering free delivery, and stop panic buying — it is not necessary and harms those most in need.

To help you with information in weeks to come, I have set up a page on my website at www.chrisloder. co.uk/coronavirus which is updated every day. If you have an urgent problem that cannot be resolved elsewhere, please contact me at hello@chrisloder.co.uk and I will do my very best to help.

These next few months will be like nothing we’ve experienced before. Care for your families, care for your neighbours and, above all, please step up to care for your wider community. Stay at home and save lives.

It really is on all of us to make a difference. sherbornetimes.co.uk | 9

COVID-19 Support

#SHERBORNEVIRALKINDNESS YOU’VE GOT A FRIEND Sadie Wilkins

10 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

W

hen you’re down and troubled, and you need a helping hand… are the lyrics that spring to mind when you look at the action local independent businesses have taken in Sherborne in response to the devastating Covid-19 virus that is bringing the globe to its knees. In spite of the escalating anxiety that’s brimming in society, Sherborne Indies have a clear message: Spread kindness, not fear.

The independent businesses of Sherborne are working together to offer a range of flexible services to the community to ensure that they can still obtain their local supplies via deliveries, but more importantly, they are ensuring that those within the community who are more vulnerable are provided with some additional support and a very precious line of communication.

There is no denying that the information swirling around about coronavirus is overwhelming to say the least. With a growing uncertainty and rise in anxiety, it was paramount to the community-minded group to get something into place as soon as possible. Jules Bradburn, The Sherborne Market, is rallying together the troops as I write this on a very damp Sunday evening. For Jules it’s quite simple ‘there’s power in staying positive.’ I can’t help but feel my faith in humanity increase a little, each time I hear about what the great folk of Sherborne are trying to do.

So what is on offer and how might you access it?

Firstly, many local independent businesses are offering home deliveries, often free, and ‘drop and leave style’ in order to make it convenient and safe to receive local supplies to your door. Some businesses are co-ordinating their deliveries in order to make it a little more ecofriendly at the same time, not to mention fewer door knocks for the recipient. In return, you will be helping your town’s small businesses to survive what is going to be a difficult time. Apart from hand-sanitiser producers, there are no winners with this virus. People will be poorly, small businesses will buckle.

Most businesses have been communicating the details of their deliveries via their own media channels over the last week. However, a new Facebook page ‘Sherborne Viral Kindness’ has now been set up to collate the information and create a network of helpers.

I would suggest giving the page a follow so you are up to date with the services provided.

One of the saddest aspects of coronavirus is the fact that it separates society and can cause loneliness.

This is where the true essence of ‘Sherborne Viral Kindness’ comes into its own. Aside from enabling

you to receive goods to your door, Sherborne Indies are offering their hand… ‘all you have to do is call’.

Jules’ troops will be dropping flyers through the doors of Sherborne’s residents this week, which will allow you to request help. It’s a simple proforma, taken from a copywriter who generously produced it and shared online, and will offer a range of support from collecting pharmacy packages to walking pets, or simply having a friendly chat with someone on the end of the phone to break up the isolation. This should help to engage with those who live ‘off grid’ and those who will potentially be self-isolating at home following further government advice.

A call to arms has already been placed onto the Sherborne Viral Kindness Facebook page. If you are happy to help with this process and become a ‘street co-ordinator’, then log onto the Facebook page to enlist. The ‘Bradburn Battalion’* will then marry the requests to the offers and, hopefully, the ‘indies’ will close the gap on some of the impending loneliness.

We are being challenged physically and mentally as a society, but it is important to know that there are people that care and are prepared to go the extra mile.

There’s something special about our town and it isn’t the first time that a real community effort has paid dividends. A few years ago, Sherborne’s independent businesses reached out to the Somerset Levels Flood Cause by delivering donated goods to those suffering. If you look further back, you may remember the succesful ‘David vs Goliath’ effort to save the high street against a multi-national supermarket taking ground on the old Sherborne Hotel site.

It takes a unique group of people to come together and ‘spread kindness, not fear’ and it’s times like these that we are reminded of what can happen if you rally together. We may need to wash our hands, keep distance from others, and self-isolate, but if we mentally pull together as a town, we can get through it. You’ve got a friend… sherborneindies.co.uk sherborneviralkindness *The Bradburn Battalion includes Vineyards of Sherborne, The Pear Tree Deli, Oliver’s Coffee House, The Cross Keys, Bean Shot Coffee, Yoga Sherborne, The Sherborne Market, Anna Stiles Pottery and many more recruits to come including civilians. sherbornetimes.co.uk | 11

COVID-19 COMMUNITY SUPPORT Food & drink takeaway & delivery ____________________________ Brewed Boy

The Gainsborough Arms Meals on wheels service, as well as collecting prescriptions, delivering

shopping and running errands for local

residents. Call Fiona on 01963 250330. @thegainsborougharms.co.uk

to your door. We are also offering

fruit and vegetable boxes during these challenging times. To place an order

please ring us 01963 548181 or email info@olives-kitchen.co.uk

____________________________

Free home delivery. Great selection of

____________________________

Oliver’s

beers in cans plus 1ltr bottles of our own

The Green Restaurant

brews. 07889 731071 info@brewedboy.co.uk

Delicious cakes delivered to your door,

@Brewed_Boy

Award-winning food in the comfort of

____________________________

your own home. Available from 28th

April. Take away or delivery. Tuesday

Oxford’s Bakery

12pm-2.30pm. Visit greenrestaurant.

our ‘drive-through’ bakery in Alweston.

Community Kitchen Free cooked meal delivered to those in need. Free delivery. Please email svkfood01@gmail.com or call/text

call 01935 815005

____________________________

to Saturday 6.30pm-9.30pm, Sunday

Freshly made bread, delivered or visit

co.uk for menu. Please call 01935

01963 23214

813821 or email info@greenrestaurant.co.uk

____________________________

____________________________

Parsons Butchers

____________________________

Lizzie Baking Bird

The Cross Keys

Baked goods and ready meals delivered

Meat boxes & deliveries, call 01935

07531 19879.

@sherborneviralkindness

Takeaway, home-cooked food including

to your door. 01305 816378 or email

812071 info@parsonsbutchers.co.uk

____________________________

lizzie.stablecottage@btinternet.com

The Pear Tree Deli & Café

Dorset Fine Dining

Natural Life Wholefoods

Home-cooked meals, fresh bread

01935 815756 or 01460 76568

milk, cake, soup, butter, cream, jams

to your door. Call 07525 667687

____________________________

Pizza Pasta Mondo

Olive’s Kitchen

01935 488685

Sunday lunch, call 01935 508130

____________________________

& fruit, vegetable & meat boxes direct eat@dorsetfinedining.co.uk

____________________________

12 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

____________________________

naturalife-wholefoods.com

Delicious home-cooked food delivered

Delivery service including bread, & chutneys, call 01935 812828

____________________________

____________________________

COVID-19 COMMUNITY SUPPORT Reads Coffee

Miscellaneous

____________________________

Roasted coffee delivered to your

____________________________

Alice Johnsen Life Coaching

door or available for safe collection

Abbey Pharmacy

direct from our Sherborne roastery.

Free 20-minute life coaching sessions

Order online at readscoffee.co.uk or call

07970 012539

____________________________

Charlotte on 01935 481010

Ben Brown

Sherborne Fruit & Veg Market

mindful eating. 07498 216742

____________________________ Delivery of fruit, vegetables,

Dietary advice, meal planning, ____________________________

by ‘phone or online to anyone feeling overwhelmed, anxious or unsure what to do next. To book, email

alicejohnsenlifecoaching@gmail.com,

or call 07961 080513 alicejohnsen.co.uk

____________________________

honey, apple juice. Call or email

Hayley Frances Nutrition

Midwest Office Supplies

sherbornemarketfruitandveg@aol.co.uk 07515 554549

Nutritional therapist.

01935 814225

____________________________

hayley@hayleyfrancesnutrition.com 07586 717678

Newton Clarke Vets

Free-range Tamworth pork, prime

Black Shed Flowers

isolating clients. Call 01935 816228

07802 443905 james@thestorypig.co.uk

The Story Pig

____________________________

____________________________ Poorly pet collection service for self-

cuts, sausages, hams and cured bacon

Flower deliveries, call 07859 911817

____________________________

Cat Paterson Hypnotherapy

thestorypig.co.uk

Castle Garden Centre

50% off RTT hypnotherapy for all

Vineyards

____________________________

____________________________

Free delivery 01935 814633

Wine deliveries, Tuesdays & Thursdays

The Corner Shop

____________________________

call 01935 815615

01935 815544

____________________________

NHS staff. Contact 07941 386971 or

catherinepaterson.co.uk for more details

____________________________

Paper deliveries and essentials,

The Slipped Stitch

____________________________

Thursday 11am, Saturday 2pm.

The Good Copy Company Free PR and communications support to

Virtual Knit & Natter. Tuesday 7.30pm, @theslippedstitch 01935 508249

____________________________

local businesses. thegoodcopycompany.co.uk

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 13

e V n i r r o a b l r e h S Kindness We Can Help!

We have a network of volunteers covering Sherborne and the surrounding villages. We can help with shopping, delivering food, collecting prescriptions, walking dogs and more.

If you are in isolation and need help with something - please contact us.

We can also connect you to a FREE book and DVD delivery service.

Contact us via Facebook @sherborneviralkindness or call us on 07884 115 987. All our services are completely FREE.

Dorset 1 in 4 people will experience a mental health problem

Do YOU need help with your wellbeing?

OR could YOU help others that do?

Due to the COVID-19 outbreak we’ve seen a huge rise in anxiety and poor mental health across Dorset. We know that now, more than ever, people need our support.

Which is why we’ve replaced our adult and young people services with online or phone support.

This means we are able

to continue to support Dorset’s local communities.

We can deliver support groups, befriending, counselling and mentoring in this new way. We’ve also developed a new training programme for individuals and companies.

Find out more by emailing contact@dorsetmind.uk.

Website: dorsetmind.uk • #joinourmovement Registered Charity No. 1108168

COVID-19 Support

SHERBORNE TOWN COUNCIL

S

Steve Shield, Town Clerk

herborne Town Council and Dorset Council have drawn up emergency plans to keep essential services working during the COVID-19 crisis. Our priority is to keep staff and Sherborne residents as safe as possible in the midst of a fastchanging national emergency.

Sherborne’s mayor, Councillor Jon Andrews, said: ‘COVID-19 is the biggest challenge to our way of life since World War II. We need to do all we humanly can to stay safe and well and look after our vulnerable friends, neighbours and relatives. Every business in Sherborne is fighting for survival. We will work to make sure that everyone has the information they need to access Government financial support for businesses and workers.

When this crisis is over — and we will survive this, however tough things are at the moment – Sherborne Town Council will do all in its power to support the community revival of our beautiful town. We have an ambitious five-year plan to create a cleaner, greener Sherborne… making the town a more attractive and welcoming place for residents, businesses and visitors.’

For the moment, many public buildings, parks and open spaces including children’s play areas are closed due to social distancing measures. The Manor House also remains closed to the public. Operational staff are working remotely behind the scenes to keep essential services working as much as possible. The grounds team are undertaking essential and priority tasks across the town.

The mayor reiterated: ‘This is a frightening time, but I do believe that what we learn from this crisis will help us build a healthier community and cleaner environment, and change our way of life for the better.’

For further information on matters relating to the Town Council, please contact the Town Clerk. sherborne-tc.gov.uk Dorset Council: 01305 221000 Sherborne Citizens Advice; 0344 411 1444

16 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Win stone Post!

In self-isolation?

Bracing yourself for lock-down?

Or simply taking the opportunity to cosy-up at home until it all blows over?

Throughout the coming weeks, we will be providing a home delivery service.

If you live within a 2 mile radius of the shop, we will deliver your books to your door* Deliveries will be made between 5-6pm the same day if the book’s in stock or the day after if we need to order it in.

For those who live a little further afield, we will happily pop your book in the post using Gardners Home Delivery service.

We can take secure payment over the phone, so just call us with your requirements and we will be very happy to help

Contact us on 01935 816128 or email winstonebooks1@gmail.com

For a list of titles worth locking yourself away with, visit: www.winstonebooks.co.uk/Sherborne or follow us online: @winstonessherborne @winstonebooks @winstonebooks All efforts will be made to keep this service running throughout this period, staff health permitting. We reserve the right to withdraw this offer at any time.

*

Film

18 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

ON FILM

W

Andy Hastie, Cinematheque

ith people having to self-isolate and social venues being shut for an indefinite period, being able to access entertainment from home becomes more critical.

Locally, Cinematheque’s season of films has been put on hold until who knows when but if you are still wanting to view some quality cinema, I hope to be able to point you in the right direction. If you are not particularly interested in the latest Hollywood fare, here are some feel-good suggestions you might not have considered, many of which have been praised by Cinematheque audiences.

Although I am not the obvious person to promote Netflix — I feel their increasing dominance in the cinema marketplace makes the availability of less mainstream films even more perilous — all these titles are to be found on their site.

• The French film Untouchable, based on the true story of a friendship between a paralysed millionaire and his street-wise carer, is irresistibly joyous and ‘the very definition of a crowd- pleaser.’ (Time Out) • ‘Amelie’ concerns a simple Parisian girl bringing happiness to other people’s lives. ‘Two hours of everything that is wonderful about life, and everything that is wonderful about cinema.’ (David Cox, i-D magazine) • ‘Jean de Florette’, an adaption of Marcel Pagnol’s novel set in the Provence countryside in the 1920s, is the world’s most popular foreign-language film ever.

• ‘Belleville Rendezvous’, a French cartoon for both young and old, tells the story of a lonely little boy, who lives with his grandmother, becoming a champion cyclist in the Tour de France. It is, ‘funny... graced with moments of genius.’ (Empire magazine) • ‘The Secret in Their Eyes’ - the original 2009 Argentinian version, not the Hollywood remake - is an Academy Award-winning, nail-biting thriller, telling not only of a brutal murder and corrupt government officials but also of lost love. ‘A masterpiece... leaves one breathless at every turn.’

• The Japanese ‘Shoplifters’ is a portrait of a makeshift family rescuing a little girl into their home. ‘A compassionate... love letter to family.’ (HeyUGuys) • ‘Roma’, Mexican director Alfonso Cuaron’s stunning tribute to the childminder who brought him up in 1970s Mexico City, is a true classic.

Another smaller site worth a look is BFI Player, set up by the British Film Institute. It features not only some of the more obscure British films but also many timeless classics of European cinema such as Bicycle Thieves, Fitzcarraldo, Rome Open City and Breathless. Do check them out.

A particular favourite of mine is Channel 81 on Freeview. ‘Talking Pictures’ is an independent, round-the-clock archive film and television channel, showing mostly black and white British films from the 1930s to the 1960s, ranging from Mr Pastry to Hammer Horror. That surely defines something for everyone!

I hope this has given some guidance to a very small selection of what is available beyond the obvious blockbuster fare. Do get in touch if you have suggestions of suitable recommendations in these unprecedented times. cinematheque.org.uk

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 19

Theatre

CONFESSIONS OF A THEATRE ADDICT Rosie Cunningham

I

f you have never heard of the director Jamie Lloyd, who is challenging the traditional concept of theatre, you will be doing so soon. Aged only 40 and brought up in nearby Poole, he is the son of a truck driver and a cleaner and didn’t go to the theatre when he was young. To this end, his production company, which he set up in 2015, offers free tickets to first-time theatre-goers, particularly community groups and state secondary schools.

He has become Britain’s foremost Pinter interpreter and last year staged a four-month season of short Pinter plays. This year he is directing a series of three plays at The Playhouse Theatre, West End. The first, which I saw, was Cyrano de Bergerac starring James McAvoy. If you didn’t catch the play in situ, you might have seen it at the cinema as part of the National Theatre Live programme. This was something completely out of the ordinary: Cyrano, without THAT nose, and the whole play performed as a “rap”. I admit that I didn’t know what to expect but wow! Double wow!

It took a little time to get into the rhythm but once the audience picked up the thread, there was not a movement or whisper in the house. Everyone was totally involved and enthralled. The play was written in the French tradition of dramatic poetry by Edmond Rostand, in rhyming couplets of twelve syllables per line. This is a total deconstruction of the Cyrano that we have seen previously in the theatre and on film. This play is all about the use of language – to entice and to destroy. We are intoxicated by words.

Cyrano de Bergerac was a real person and the play is a fictionalisation of his life. Cyrano is a brash soldier of many talents. He is a duellist, a poet and a musician but, because of his extremely large nose, he lacks romantic courage and doubts his ability with women. He loves his cousin but believes that his ugliness is too much of a barrier for any woman to love him. He duels and fights and writes romantic words on behalf of others.

The stage is stripped back to microphones and plastic chairs. This could be a party-political gathering. Utilitarian clothing of leather and dungarees and hoodies is menacing and practical, and I applaud Southra Gilmour, the Set and Costume Designer. James McAvoy glowers and paces and fights his way through the play and keeps up a fast pitter patter throughout which is both tongue-twisting and complicated. This performance is five star in its quality and complexity. All members of the cast are to be congratulated. I would particularly like to call out the amazing beatboxer, Vaneeka Dadhria, fresh out of a BA Acting Course in 2019, who took a separate bow of her own to rapturous applause. What a pleasure to hear her beat throughout.

20 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

James McAvoy (Cyrano de Bergerac). Image: Marc Brenner sherbornetimes.co.uk | 21

MARKET RESEARCH NO.2: CARLY BROWN, UNIVERSITY OF DIVERSITY

Welcome to the Sherborne Market!

What brings you here?

Many fellow stallholders have told me that ‘The Sherborne Market’ is the place to be! I have cut down the amount of events I do and, by following your social media profiles, I have seen that this market has quality and varied stalls, and you really seem to invest into promoting each individual stallholder as well as the market itself. I just had to be part of it!

Where have you travelled from?

Creech St. Michael, just outside Taunton.

Tell us about what you’re selling?

I am the designer-maker behind University of Diversity.

I make anything - statement jewellery, fashion accessories, clothing and sometimes items for the home.

I am passionate about using mainly upcycled and vintage materials to create individual pieces that are one of a kind and that really stand out! By breathing new life into these upcycled materials I aim to bring intricate, high-quality, wearable art that is kinder to our planet.

Where and when did it all begin?

I have always had an interest in fashion. My mother and grandmother made clothes for our family, especially when it came to birthday parties or school discos.

This is also where my love of upcycling came from.

My grandmother kept everything! She would make children’s coats out of her best coats when she was done with them and I thought this was incredible. I then 22 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

went on to do an National Diploma in fashion and textiles followed by an Higher National Diploma in fashion design. I started my little business, ‘University of Diversity’, around 7 years ago when I took the plunge and gave up my day job to concentrate on doing what I love (making jewellery and clothing) full time.

What do you enjoy most about selling at markets?

Most of my creative work is done at home so it can be quite solitary at times! Selling at markets gives me the opportunity to interact with my customers. I love being able to tell the story behind my pieces and getting feedback. I can also gauge by what is selling what’s hot and what’s not. Meeting fellow stallholders helps build a network of support and advice from people doing what I do. It also doesn’t hurt to be tempted by other creative wares and I am rather partial to street food!

If you get the chance, which fellow stallholders here at Sherborne would you like to visit?

Definitely Sharan James glass. As well as having such beautiful glass creations, they are the nicest ladies you’ll ever meet! I will do my best to try and sneak away on a break and explore as much of the market and Sherborne as possible.

____________________________________________ New dates to be confirmed The Sherborne Market Cheap St, Abbey Green, Digby Hall, Digby Memorial Hall and Raleigh Hall

@thesherbornemarket

____________________________________________

THE

Hand picked & selected artisan market featuring local producers, suppliers, amazing food, arts and crafts.

STAY TUNED

new dates to be confirmed

Art

ARTIST AT WORK

No. 18: David Atkins, Spring Morning on Man O’War Beach, £4,495, oil on board, 76 x 81 cm

M

y paintings are about experiencing and responding to the places I encounter.

Working outside means I’m immersed in the landscape – my senses become alive to the weather, the sounds and smell from the sea and land, the call of birds.

The story behind my painting ‘Man O War Beach’ started with a mile-long hike down the cliff path carrying all my equipment to the shore. I had already chosen a spot and, after securing my easel with guide ropes, I set up my paints and brushes. I started by using diluted paint to draw out the composition and block in large areas of shape and colour. It takes a while to build up the surface and become focused on my subject and the paint becomes thicker and more pliable allowing me to move it or scape it off.

During the course of the painting my first responses and ideas are often superseded as I witness the landscape 24 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

transforming under different lighting and weather conditions. Seeing the dawn through to the dusk, the seasons change through the year and the constant movement of the landscape is a real privilege and one I wish to express in my paintings.

I meet many people too when I’m painting. I listen to their stories and share thoughts on the weather and politics; some bring me tea and offer food. All of this adds to the richness of being and painting in the landscape, and to the finished work itself.

For more images of David’s work and a virtual tour at Elementum Gallery, please ring 01935 813776 or email hello@elementumgallery.co.uk david-atkins.com elementumgallery.co.uk

Wishing you and your families peace at this time.

This is the time to be slow, Lie low to the wall Until the bitter weather passes.

Try, as best you can, not to let The wire brush of doubt Scrape from your heart All sense of yourself And your hesitant light.

If you remain generous, Time will come good; And you will find your feet Again on fresh pastures of promise, Where the air will be kind And blushed with beginning.

John O'Donohue

ELEMENTUMGALLERY.CO.UK @ELEMENTUMGALLERY

Art

AN ARTIST'S VIEW Laurence Belbin

26 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

R

ecently I was approached by Luke Mouland from Sherborne Museum who asked me if I would be interested in producing a stylised map showing the waterways that course through Sherborne. I thought it would be something interesting to do, so we got talking.

This map shown here is on display at the museum as part of their exhibition celebrating the rivers and the importance of the mills and the extent they played in the town’s prosperity. A few I was aware of but there were many which were new to me.

The first stage of this project was to obtain from the museum a copy of an old map showing the waterways and sites of the mills. After a little consideration, I began to mark out the main streets of the town and locate the mills along the rivers. Building up the main shapes and colours first, I settled on delineating the field lines. As I said at the beginning, it is a stylised map so some artistic licence has been used to make it more attractive to look at. I decided to illustrate it generally as a flat image, i.e. like a normal map but brought to life with trees and fields which have a more three-dimensional feel to them. Of course I’d no idea where all the trees were or how many of them there were so I used my knowledge gained from many years of painting to make my own landscape. With a little modelling with light and shade, I created a feeling of flying over the town in a balloon. I’ve not gone overboard with detail as it is designed to illustrate a subject. I then placed an image of a mill in the seven locations and one of the Abbey and the Castle to help orientate oneself. Once everything was dry, I painted on some of the street names - that was rather interesting as a few have been changed over the years but I stuck to the present for clarity. I gave the frame a coat or two of black and then a varnish.

This project made me look at the course of the rivers and streams and, in doing so, I found a small sluice gate that was worth drawing. It is a small sketch using HB and 2B pencils on cartridge paper.

This informative exhibition is on at Sherborne Museum (once reopened) for the rest of the year. Entry is free but donations are welcomed. laurencebelbin.com

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 27

28 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 29

B O U T I Q U E

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‘ for something different ’

Clothing Jewellery

Scarves Gifts

& more Sherborne DT9 3LN 01935 814027 30 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Dorchester DT1 1BN 01305 265223

The Joinery Works, Alweston Sherborne, Dorset DT9 5HS Tel: 01963 23219 Fax: 01963 23053 Email: info@fcuffandsons.co.uk

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DESIGNERS AND MAKERS OF BEAUTIFUL FINE BESPOKE JOINERY SINCE 1897

elizabethwatsonillustration.com 32 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

THE ANNUAL SHERBORNE TIMES EASTER EGG HUNT

Email your answers to helen@homegrown-media.co.uk Strictly no grown-ups (you can buy your own).

Terms & Conditions: Correct answers require the page number of each hidden Easter egg. Entrants must be UK residents, aged 12 years or under. No purchase is necessary. One entry allowed per person. There are ten prizes to be won. All prizes are non-refundable, non-transferable and non-exchangeable and there is no cash alternative offered. The prize will be sent via recorded delivery to the address supplied within two weeks of notification. The promoter is Homegrown Media Ltd, 1 Brett’s Yard, Digby Road, Sherborne, Dorset DT9 3NL. Closing date: Monday 20th April 2020. Ten names will be drawn from a hat on Wednesday 22nd April 2020.

Image: Katharine Davies

Hidden among the pages of this month’s Sherborne Times are 20 delicious Easter eggs. Find them all for your chance to win your very own chocolate bunny from The Chocolate Society

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 33

UNEARTHED Nathanael Fagerson, Aged 18 Sherborne School

P

eople often say that they are mainly an academic, or mainly a sportsman, or mainly a musician but rarely all three. Nathanael Fagerson, whose family lives in Aberdeen, breaks that mould. Having discovered Sherborne School through a music scholar friend, Nathanael successfully applied for a Music Scholarship on the bassoon, the cello, the piano and the voice, arriving four and a half years ago as both an academic and a musician. Nathanael’s brother plays rugby for Scotland and it might have been the case that Nathanael would become involved with rugby, were it not for an injury to his hands and the fact that he and his family didn’t think it would be possible to pursue all three disciplines to a high level.

Following Nathanael’s total immersion in boarding school life, he is pursuing music and sport alongside his academic studies without any one being exclusive, and, contrary to his early doubts, he is flourishing in all three disciplines.

Nathanael is an ATCL diploma bassoon player and plays in the orchestras; he has just taken his LTCL performance diploma as a singer and performs in both the Choir and Barbershop group. Despite his injury, Nathanael plays for the 1st XV rugby team, has played for Bath Rugby and Scotland in their U16 squads and also plays 1st XI hockey.

Nathanael hopes to read Mathematics at St Andrew’s where, hopefully, orchestras and choirs will fit around studies and rugby! sherborne.org

KATHARINE DAVIES PHOTOGRAPHY Portrait, lifestyle, PR and editorial commissions 07808 400083 info@katharinedaviesphotography.co.uk www.katharinedaviesphotography.co.uk

34 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Open Doors ut througho the year

Visit the Prep, Senior and Sixth Form on a normal teaching day.

Contact our friendly Admissions Team to book your place. www.leweston.co.uk | 01963 211015 | admissions@leweston.dorset.sch.uk

Do you have a spare room in your home?

Are you caring, nurturing and supportive?

Become a Host Family for an international pupil at a local boarding school Attractive daily rates Occasional weekend and half terms only

Contact Laura to find out more on laura@pippasguardians.co.uk or call 01684 252757

www.pippasguardians.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 35

Family

BEAT THE BOREDOM

FREE HOME CRAFTING PACKS! Safia and Ian, Bootmakers

W

e’ve temporarily closed our workshop doors and are crazily preparing and sending out FREE scrap-based creative packs to homes all over the country. Text us on the number below and we’ll send you a pack that will hopefully help keep your children/grandchildren entertained. Feel free to spread the word by telling your family and friends. We have a mountain of beautiful scrap and a team of artists so we’re hoping to keep these packs coming out. We don’t want to earn money from these as it’s lifting our morale and most of the materials were donated by the community so we’re just asking you to pay for the postage.

To make it easier to get your pack out fast, when you text in please give us your name, address, the age of your child/children, how many packs you would like

36 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

(one each or one to share) and make sure to tell us if it’s someone’s birthday! To make things even more fun, we’re working on templates and videos to share on our FB page, @Bootmakersworkshop, and we’re asking you all to share photos of what your children make so we can see what they come up with.

Some people have texted us wanting to make donations. We will happily take donations of scrap materials if you live locally, especially small items that can go into packs, but please note that we don’t need donations of money, though it is incredibly kind of you to offer!

To order a free home crafting pack(s), text 07419 760737 £2.90 postage and packing.

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 37

For cute hair you can choose some wool, paper or fabrics

Paint a cute face!

The arms are made with cardboard and decorated

Hands are made with pieces of fabric

The legs are made with fabric stuffed with cotton

38 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Clothes are made with fabrics but you can create a good outfit with paper, paint or ribbons and anything you can imagine

Shoes are made with fabric, plastic and wool

The body and head are made with a tube like this

and stuffed with cotton

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 39

Family

Children’s Book Review Anna, Aged 9, Leweston School

Grow – Secrets of our DNA by Nicola Davies, illustrated by Emily Sutton (Walker Books April 2020) £12.99 Sherborne Times Reader Offer Price of £10.99 from Winstone’s Books

G

row explains in an easy way how DNA works, how our bodies are made and how things change - caterpillars into butterflies, seeds into trees or flowers. It explains what DNA looks like and this is useful as I certainly didn’t have any idea of this before reading the book.

The writing in the book has two levels: larger text and then some smaller text for older children. At the back of the book there is a useful section that includes details of how we grow. Did you know that by the time we’re born we are made up of 26 billion cells?!

I really loved the illustrations; they made me smile. I could spend ages looking at them as they are colourful and fun to look at. I will copy some into my sketchbook.

Some of the drawings are a bit like a Where’s Wally? picture with lots of detail, so the more you look, the more you find. My favourite page is the one with 40 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

hundreds of animals and plants on it; it tells us how we share our DNA with all living things – including all those that have ever lived on earth. Now I know that I’m related to a dodo!

I also know why I look like I do; it’s because of my genetic code which comes from my parents. For example, it takes four genes to shape a nose, and it takes over 100 genes to design a person’s hair colour and texture.

I really enjoyed this book. The subject of DNA is very complicated, especially for someone my age, but with this book you wouldn’t need an adult to help you understand it. It includes some complicated words that would help if you were being tested on DNA. I thought this book was extremely detailed and is probably suitable for 7-9-year-olds but my daddy enjoyed it and he learnt things from this book too — like the fact that he’s related to a tyrannosaurus rex!

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 41

Family

MINDFULNESS FOR CHILDREN Ness Lee

Archv/Shutterstock

42 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

W

ouldn’t it be wonderful if we could pack a tool kit for our children and young ones, full of the life skills necessary to equip them for the many and varied pressures that come their way?

Sadly, ‘anxiety’ has become a buzzword when talking about the mental health of our children, with a worrying 30% of UK adolescents reporting anxiety-related issues.

Life is fast-paced, and social media ensures that children are fully accessible from the moment they wake up until the moment they fall asleep. Gone are the days when the school day ended and there was a natural breathing space to re-group before the next day began. Add in the age-old exam stresses, relationship problems, self-image worries, family upheavals and friendship dynamics, and it’s no wonder that life can sometimes be overwhelming.

It is therefore becoming more important than ever to build children’s emotional resilience and to armour them with the tools to navigate the ups and downs of life.

The practice of mindfulness has been proven to have a profound impact on wellbeing. There is an evergrowing body of evidence that consistently demonstrates the benefits of a mindfulness practice. Mindfulness simply means bringing one’s attention into the present moment, noticing one’s thoughts and feelings with an attitude of acceptance. It’s a simple concept. Most of us, however, spend a good deal of time either re-hashing the past or worrying about the future. Children of all ages can benefit from learning mindfulness. It teaches them to be present for the good things in life, helps them to be more resilient and to cope with stress and difficulty, particularly difficult thoughts and emotions. It fosters

greater self-knowledge, promotes calm and facilitates focus. It enables children to respond to life’s challenges with greater wisdom and flexibility. Fortunately, a crossparty government report has recently promoted the many advantages of mindfulness-teaching in schools.

The evidence suggests that, where it is available, pupils benefit enormously, both personally and academically.

Schools are getting onboard and are beginning to see these benefits play out in the classroom.

As both a mother and a mindfulness teacher, working with individuals and schools, it is hugely rewarding to see children develop their self-knowledge and confidence as they learn to bring mindfulness into their lives. Children are endlessly creative and open to new ideas and learning. Mindfulness is taught in a fun and age-appropriate way, with a strong emphasis on experiential learning. For 7-11-year-olds, the aim is to develop an invaluable life skill. With teens and young adults, mindfulness is taught in a way that is relevant to the sort of life issues with which they are dealing.

We can’t wave a magic wand to protect our young from the natural ups and downs that life brings. We can, however, help them to develop the resources that enable them to meet stresses head on and deal with life from a position of strength. I find it hugely heartening that the nurturing of children’s mental health is finally being recognised as part of providing an optimal educational environment. mindfulnessherborne.com @mindfulness_sherborne

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 43

Family

FREE ON-LINE COUNSELLING SESSIONS FOR PARENTS

W

Jess Thompson

ith schools and nurseries closed, families are more in need than ever of therapeutic support, and DorPIP – the Dorset charity which helps nurture family bonds - is determined to carry on providing it. The charity is offering free thirty-minute video or telephone support sessions to help combat the effects of increasing social isolation.

‘Extraordinary times require extraordinary measures,’ says Viv Allen, who founded DorPIP in 2017. ‘At this point I’m unsure of how long we’ll be able to keep the service free, however we felt as a charity that we wanted to offer something. In light of the Government’s advice to self-isolate - it is vital to ensure that parents-to-be and those with young children feel as fully supported as possible. It’s a known fact that socialising as a parent with new-borns and young infants is beneficial to the health and wellbeing of the whole family.

‘Going out, enjoying fresh air, meeting with others and sharing experiences all help to encourage good mental health and sustain joyful feelings. However, this life-line is now severely restricted. We have been delighted to see how communities are reaching out to support each other.

We can add to this the offer of an on-line therapy session, so that parents have a safe, confidential space to talk about their concerns.’

The charity, which has a number of qualified and expert parent-infant counsellors available, is urging fathers and mothers with children under the age of two and women who are currently pregnant to reach out to them for support. As Viv explains, ‘If you feel you need a space to safely express your thoughts and feelings, especially as pressure and stress builds within the family home during this uncertain period, please get in touch.’

DorPIP (the Dorset Parent-Infant Partnership) was established with the aim of supporting families across the county. The charity was born out of Viv’s realisation that there was no one point of contact for families who were struggling with issues such as post-natal depression and increasing strain between parents, or those simply needing someone with whom they could safely express their concerns. Through offering specialised parent-infant counselling, the charity aims to help parents form secure and nurturing relationships with their infants. To find out more about the free sessions, visit the website.

DorPIP receives no statutory funding and relies solely on charitable grants and donations. If you would like more information on how to help support the charity, please visit the website. dorpip.org.uk 44 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Maria Evseyeva/Shutterstock

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 45

Family

PLAYING HOST

E

Laura Gough, Pippa’s Guardians

very year (under normal circumstances) children from all over the world come to England to attend our boarding schools and experience the benefits of an English education. This is a wonderful but hugely daunting experience for these children, who are sometimes as young as nine or ten, up to older aged students in the 6th form, and often come here alone from as far away as China or Japan. It is our job as a guardianship company to look after them during their time here. Pippa’s Guardians was established in 1997 when Pippa Hughes, Registrar at Cheltenham College and a mother herself, noticed the need to support these students and indeed, realised how rewarding it could be to do so.

More than 20 years later, we are still dedicated to the mission of looking after these children.

Pippa’s Guardians looks after students in schools all over the country but in Sherborne, we are lucky enough to look after a number of children who attend all the Sherborne Schools including Sherborne Boys, Sherborne Prep, Sherborne Girls and Sherborne International. As our student numbers grow, we are always looking for new host families locally, who can provide a welcoming and caring environment for our students, usually just for exeat weekends (up to six a year) and half-terms, and, in the case of some Japanese 6th form students, for longer Xmas, Easter and summer holidays.

Hosting an international student is a great opportunity to introduce your family to other cultures and languages. Sharing your traditions and family life with an overseas student and knowing that you are helping them during their time in the UK can be very gratifying. Long-term friendships often develop, and many host families keep in touch with the students and their families long after they return home.

The families we look for are welcoming and interested in other cultures.

Having children of a similar age can help, but it is certainly not vital indeed we have many successful host families who have no children, or indeed older children who have left home. We find that our students benefit enormously from being part of an English family. Experiencing day-to-day family life during their breaks from school adds an important dimension to our students’ experience in the UK, and gives them a deeper understanding of English culture, as well as playing a part in improving their English language.

For further information about becoming a host family please contact laura@pippasguardians.co.uk or visit pippasguardians.co.uk

46 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Pond Saksit/Shutterstock

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 47

Family

LIVING IN THE MOMENT Heidi Berry, Head of Pre-Prep, Sherbone Prep School

S

o much has changed in the last few weeks. We have reached spring but the optimism and joy this usually brings is overshadowed by uncertainty and anxiety about the future. Older children would have been gearing up for exams and younger children looking forward to more time outside and dreaming of summer holidays. Suddenly all of this is in question.

Schools have been working hard to prepare for remote teaching and those of us who teach the very young have been scratching our heads about how to bring the ‘awe and wonder’ element of education into the virtual classroom. Working with young children is a bit like being in spring all the time. Like seedlings, their young roots need careful attention, good soil. Like lambs, they are playful and curious to learn more about the world and what it offers.

School in spring is usually such a fun place to be – we are able to go outside more, early flowers are braving the elements, we start to grow vegetables, squirrels reappear.

A favourite project of the spring months is chickhatching; there are so many opportunities for ‘awe and wonder’ through experiencing what the natural world offers at this time of year.

Early Years education is about existing with the children in the present moment; there is no requirement to be thinking about preparing children for something more. Young children have little concept of time – they are always ‘in the moment’ and that is how we should educate them. If they find a snail in the garden, we want to have the time to encounter the wonder of it, to find out about it, to build it a home. In normal times, we strive to be flexible in our school day in order to allow the freedom to explore. This is something we will try and deliver remotely if required. Nature will not be aware of our human crisis; the daffodils will bloom as always.

48 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

'Like seedlings, young children's roots need careful attention and good soil.'

Zurijeta/Shutterstock

The environment is a great teacher and many of us are fortunate to have gardens or outside spaces, even if we are confined to our homes.

We all know that children learn best when they are engaged, and children’s involvement is rarely as high as when they initiate a topic for themselves. At The Prep, our Early Years staff will be setting activities inspired by events as they occur and reacting to the children’s interests in the same way as we do in school.

When a child asks a question, they listen attentively to the answer. They ask because they really want to know. Curiosity enables learning. Some children only achieve the highest levels of engagement when they are

outside; therefore, it is important for us all to provide opportunities for them to choose to learn outside.

Unlike spring, childhood does not come around year after year. There is only one chance at childhood; we want our youngest children to be curious and adventurous, and to take time to explore - even in these unusual times. So, as this spring unfolds, we will find new ways to provide the education they need and to minimise their present worries. That way, when their summer comes and their worlds return to normal, they will be in full bloom. sherborneprep.org sherbornetimes.co.uk | 49

Family

THE LIFE OF A CHORAL SCHOLAR Hector Fiennes, Aged 19, Choral Scholar at Sherborne School

Image: Josie Sturgess-Mills

M

y journey at Sherborne started before attending the school, when I sang with the Sherborne Abbey Choir. Each year there were a handful of boys who would go on to Sherborne School and they all enjoyed it very much. Living locally and with a passion for music, I felt that the new and excellent music department was a calling! I discovered the extensive co-curricular opportunities and the many staff who give up so much of their time to help boys 50 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

pursue their aspirations in music and I knew that this was somewhere I wanted to be. My family liked the location of the school and the opportunity for boys to interact in ‘the real world’ and enjoy a sense of community outside the school itself.

Having started at the school, I auditioned for the Choir and Chamber Choir as well as starting piano and singing lessons under the expertise of visiting music teachers, which I enjoyed very much.

Furthermore, at the end of my Fifth Form, an opportunity arose. I was part of a music trip travelling to Tuscany for members of the choir and Radio Orchestra (an all-boys orchestra in the Trinity term that performs BBC-style light music). The trip, however, was found to be lacking a percussionist!

After being asked if I was interested just hours before the concert, I agreed and this was the first time I ever played orchestral percussion. It was certainly an incredible experience! Daily concerts in other amazing venues followed and, having discovered a real enjoyment for percussion and that I was ‘acceptably good’ at it, I joined the Wind Band and Symphony Orchestra for my Sixth Form years.

Inspired to challenge myself musically, and having pondered for a few months prior, I also took up the organ in the Sixth Form and, grateful for the high standard of teaching and support, I was proud to achieve my Grade 8 with Distinction in my last term.

Life as a Choral Scholar

Each year Sherborne School appoint an Organ Scholar and two or three Choral Scholars into the Music School. This year, I joined the team as a Choral Scholar and, while being a busy job, it is very enjoyable and rewarding, a real insight into the working life of a thriving department. We help with the day-to-day smooth-running of the department and have ‘desk duty’ as per a roster, which includes logging boys for their music lessons, helping out visiting music teachers, greeting touring parents, and keeping the department tidy, as well as being ‘on-call’ for the daily additional requests that pop up from the Director of Music, Jamie Henderson.

However, this is only half the story! There is no such thing as an ordinary week in the Music Department.

To give an idea, when not on ‘desk-duty’, we might be setting up the Tindall Hall for a rehearsal of the 80-strong Wind Band, the Joint Schools’ Symphony Orchestra, or the Chamber Orchestra; preparing a recording studio for pupil-led RocSoc groups; putting out chairs for one of the many smaller instrumental ensembles; preparing amps and microphones for the Swing Band, and then, of course, tidying all these away again in order to allow the two Choirs for Tenors and Basses, or the 25-chorister Treble-Alto-Tenor-Bass Chamber Choir to rehearse later on.

As part of our role, we join the larger of the two choirs, consisting of 104 choristers, and the Chamber

Choir. These are an important part of the musicmaking in the school’s twice-weekly services in Sherborne Abbey. Our duties also extend a few steps beyond the school to the Abbey where we are part of the town’s Sunday Eucharist and Evensong, following a rehearsal on Friday evening. The school Music Department is kept open at the weekend, under the watch of a scholar, so the pupils can come in to practise or compose outside of the bustle of the working week.

The boys’ playing can sometimes be heard if you are walking down Hospital Lane so next time you walk that way, do keep an ear out!

We really enjoy the public interaction that comes with our role, especially during the school’s weekly Friday Lunchtime Recitals in Cheap Street Church which boast high-quality solo and ensemble performances from the pupils in all years, and which are free of charge for the public and extremely wellattended. The termly ‘Dinner and Jazz’ concerts given by the Swing Band are great fun and we host visiting professional soloists and groups who play as part of the school’s Tindall Recital Series six times each year.

As part of our Scholarship programme, the music department can support us to further our musical education and qualifications. In this way, this year’s other Choral Scholar and I are working towards our LTCL Diploma for singing, and this year’s Organ Scholar has been able to achieve his ARCO qualification.

Looking to the future

I would like to become a teacher of academic music and wanted to pursue a choral scholarship in a school to experience working within a school environment. There are not many choral scholarships available with both a religious building and a school, so Sherborne seemed like a good option. My interest increased on learning of the added benefits of rent-free accommodation and school meals during term-time, which seemed like the perfect halfway-house before University!

I have thoroughly enjoyed my time at Sherborne School as a Choral Scholar. It has given me far more of an insight into the rich and varied world of music, as well as into the inner workings of a school as a member of staff. I would strongly recommend the position to anyone considering a step into teaching or who is simply looking for a gap-year job and enjoys music. sherborne.org sherbornetimes.co.uk | 51

Wild Dorset

THE BLACK-TAILED GODWITS OF BROWNSEA ISLAND

Footage: Wildlife World

Sally Welbourn, Dorset Wildlife Trust

T

he wet and windy weather in early 2020 led to some great wildlife highlights in Dorset, one of the most noticeable being the arrival of the black-tailed godwits in record-breaking numbers on the Brownsea Island Lagoon in Poole Harbour. Sightings started building up in November 2019 and peaked at almost 4,000 in February - in previous years the numbers have been nearer to the average of 800 birds during winter. Conservationists at Dorset Wildlife Trust suspect that the reason they appeared in such huge numbers is that flooding made their usual feeding grounds in East Anglia, Kent and north-west England inaccessible.

The black-tailed godwit is a rare breeding bird in the UK and has suffered from dramatic decline. Due to this, it has many levels of protection, including under the Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981. It is a tall, elegant wading bird which forms large flocks when feeding, digging in the mud with its long bill, hunting for invertebrates.

Due to careful management of the Brownsea Island Lagoon, it is a hub of activity all year round, with bird 52 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

numbers peaking in winter. Other birds sighted on the lagoon this winter include dunlin, which are near to 2,000 in number, and waterfowl such as teal, shoveler, gadwall and wigeon. The long-tailed duck has also been spotted off the shores of Brownsea – a real rarity for Poole harbour.

For its size, Brownsea Island is one of the most biodiverse sites in England. There are 334 plant species, 238 bird species, almost 1,000 beetle species and 900 moth species present on the island. It is also one of the last strongholds in southern England for the iconic red squirrel. A new National Heritage Lottery Fund project, Wild Brownsea, will see Dorset Wildlife Trust and The National Trust working in partnership to deliver new access, wildlife observation and learning facilities plus a 3-year programme of activities to enable people of all backgrounds and abilities to learn about and enjoy wildlife on the island. nationaltrust.org.uk/brownseaisland dorsetwildlifetrust.org.uk/brownsea-island

Keep Dorset Buzzing Do something this spring to help insects in your garden.

Visit: www.dorsetwildlifetrust.org.uk/action-insects

DORSET WILDLIFE TRUST Photos © Hamish Murray, Tony Bates MBE, Ken Dolbear MBE, Katharine Davies.

Wild Dorset

SHERBORNE DWT

Chiffchaff footage: Wildlife World

Gillian M. Constable, Dorset Wildlife Trust Sherborne Group Committee Member

T

hree weeks ago I was writing about Sherborne DWT’s April meeting; how life has changed since then. The April and May meetings have been cancelled, however the speakers are being invited to speak to the group in 2021. The committee, like everyone, hopes life will be more normal in September when Christopher Legrand will be speaking about Botswana and Namibia.

He gave an excellent talk to us two years ago.

At the time of writing we have received emails from most of the wildlife societies we belong to informing us that their reserves, if not all facilities, are remaining open.

Now is your chance to get to know the DWT reserves.

The DWT website carries information about them. You could even do some online owl-watching as, once again, there is a webcam on a Lorton Meadows Reserve barn owl nest; so far there are no eggs but the pair has been in occupation for several weeks. Perhaps by the time the owlets are fledging we shall be clear of the virus.

Signs of spring are uplifting. The primroses and lesser celandines seem to be wonderfully bold this year. The Portland Observatory is commenting on significant numbers of wheatears and chiffchaffs arriving and even the first few swallows. We are told how good it is for us 54 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

to get out in the countryside; we are so fortunate living in such a beautiful area. Perhaps now is the time to start walking, recording and photographing your local patch or even just your garden. Two friends have spotted relatively rare birds in their gardens and photographed them from the kitchen window. I know just wandering up a local lane and recording the wildflowers gives us pleasure.

DWT’s website has news about life at the Brownsea Island reserve. You will be pleased to learn that neither storms Ciara nor Dennis caused significant damage at the reserve: all special trees are still standing proudly.

Sadly for those planning a visit to the reserve it was closed during the storms. They will have missed an opportunity to see some of the vast number of black-tailed godwits wintering on the Lagoon: 3,700 in December 2019 and over 2,000 in January. Also dunlin numbers have been high, nearly 2000, and good numbers of other waterfowl have been recorded. It seems that Brownsea lagoon has provided a sheltered retreat for birds during the storms. dorsetwildlifetrust.org.uk nationaltrust.org.uk/brownsea-island

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 55

Environment

LEARNING FROM THE BEES

I

Paula Carnell

am writing this from a self-imposed semilockdown, even though my usual way of life is mainly working alone at home or with bees. I know that we are very blessed here in the countryside; most of us have gardens and access to fields and coastline that we can escape to for fresh air and exercise. With talks and events cancelled, many of us are having to adapt and remain calm during these uncertain times.

I have already been asked what the bees are doing 56 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

whilst we panic, and I have been thinking about what they have done to successfully survive for 150 million years. The key difference between bees and humans is that every decision that a bee makes is for the good of the colony and, ultimately, the species. Not many humans could admit to the same ideology. Even the most generous of human beings make most of their decisions based on their own survival, and then that of their nearest and dearest. I wonder if this stems from an ultimate fear

of death. Believing that we can stave off the inevitable, we will go to whatever lengths it takes to remain young and live as long as we can, no matter what the cost to the world around us. If we as a species were to believe that death was not the end but merely a stage of the circle of life, how would our choices differ? Is this what bees know already? Their own part in the bigger scheme of things, making the individual less important than the whole?

In times of crisis, many humans do come together and support each other and I am delighted to be seeing this in our current COVID-19 situation.

Inside the hive, a loving nurturing queen ensures that all are fed and watered, supplies are shared equally, and each bee takes turns to be on the outside of a cluster during the winter months or in a swarm. The colony as a whole works together to survive, knowing that many of the individuals won’t. If bees were to live more selfishly, then they wouldn’t have made it to the 21st century.

They have had threats to their survival from all kinds of tragedies - weather, animals, birds, other insects, natural disasters pests and disease - and yet by far the biggest threat is humans. In a bizarre twist of fate, humans are also the reason that honey bees have survived the past 50 years. The industrialisation of our agriculture, removing hedgerows, meadows and ‘weeds’ as well as drenching the land with a cocktail of chemicals, has wiped out and disabled so many of our other pollinators and insects.

Honeybees have been protected by the beekeepers, firstly for their honey and, more recently, the business of hiring out hives to farmers to pollinate their crops. In Dorset we still have more than most in the way of a beefriendly landscape but many parts of the world with vast monocultures have lost their native pollinators. The need for honeybees is therefore greater, or we would have to use our own hands to pollinate our food crops. Many of the diseases and pests that honeybees have had to cope with are a result of human intervention, interfering with what nature has taken millennia to perfect.

So, what now? What can we learn from the bees in this, OUR time of crisis? In a hive, the colony protect and feed one another, nurturing their young, and share all the chores. All tasks within the efficient running of the colony are divided up; if one task needs more help, the bees help each other. For instance, if wax comb needs building, the bees stop doing other less urgent tasks and work together to build the wax needed as quickly as possible. The sick and dying is a sensitive subject when we compare with bees. The male bees die on mating with a queen. We have no way of knowing if they are

'The key difference between bees and humans is that every decision that a bee makes is for the good of the colony and, ultimately, the species.' conscious of this happening or not. Some research finds that male bees remove the embedded phallus of the previous mate as he has fallen to the ground, separated from his crown jewels. Any males remaining unmated at the end of the summer are refused entry back into the hive, left to an inevitable death, outside the hive. For the colony to survive a winter, large hungry males are an unnecessary drain on resources. Female bees living around 6 weeks during the summer, and 6 months over winter, die from exhaustion as their wings become tattered and frail after thousands of miles of flying. As a bee ages, she either decides to leave the hive for the last time, quietly taking her last breath on a flower or in the grass near the hive, or she is refused entry. Should a bee ever become separated from the colony, she cannot survive, yet the colony can survive losing a single bee.

The queen lives for 2-5 years, replaced by the colony, or a beekeeper! A naturally reared queen could be killed by her sisters, eaten by a bird on a mating flight, or will fade exhausted with old age within the hive.

If we are to learn from the bees how would we be facing COVID-19? Should we be thinking of survival of the individual, our ‘colony’, or humans as a species? Each goal has a different influence on all our decisions. I like to think that we can think of ourselves more as colonies, working together to ensure that we survive; like bees, the individual cannot survive for long without the colony.

Within the hive everyone is cared for, understanding that the nurse is as important as the builder, the forager, the eggs and the queen - without each other none would survive. I have been relieved to see many local communities understanding the need to work together: food deliveries, self-isolating, not just for the good of the individual but for those we don’t even know, around us. The best advice I have seen, which I am following is, ‘Imagine you’re well, but carrying a lethal virus; act as if you wouldn’t want to give it to someone less strong’. As an individual in the ‘higher risk’ group of our colony, I do hope that others are also taking this advice. paulacarnell.com sherbornetimes.co.uk | 57

History

THE COACH HORSES Cindy Chant, Blue Badge Guide

Duncan1890/iStock

Up hill urge me not, Down hill hurry me not, Along the level spare me not, And in the stable forget me not

Please note: Some people may find parts of this article upsetting.

B

y the 1830s there were more than 3,000 stagecoaches operating day and night, of which 700 were Royal Mail coaches. Most of the fast ones averaged ten miles an hour but some did considerably more.

To keep their fast pace, good quality horses were always 58 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

needed, so supply and care of the horses was a business similar to that of the motor trade today: second-hand animals were offered for sale just like second-hand cars and were sold through dealers and newspaper advertisements.

The best horses were those that came on regular boatloads from Holland. The far-sighted Dutchmen had an eye for the English Cleveland Bays and bought up

most of the mares, transporting them from Yorkshire back to Holland where they were crossed with a good Dutch stallion. The strain was jealously guarded by exporting only the geldings to England. These big bay horses proved some of the best for carriage work.

When they came to England as four-year-olds, they were already as quiet as lambs, having been working on Dutch farms since the age of two. If they were lucky, they did about 10 years of carriage work, though most of them only lasted four years. When they became too slow for carriage work there were still farmers prepared to buy them for slower work on the farm, although many farmers were not too keen on having a gelding. They preferred mares, which might produce a foal each year for use on the farm.

The coaches did not just use Dutch horses. Horses that gave trouble to their owners - biters, jibbers, kickers and roamers for example - were offered to the coach proprietors, since it was thought that in this more disciplined work their vices did not matter. Provided a horse was sound in wind and limb, any vicious habits were soon controlled in hauling the coaches, with the result that some of doubtful origin were bought very cheaply.

The cost of horses was around £25-30. As mentioned above, because they were used so brutally, 3–4 years was their average maximum working life, although later on 4–5 years became more usual. In general, a horse was expected to draw his stage every day, excepting every fourth day when he was rested.

The distance of the stage varied according to weather conditions but was usually about 10 miles. Care was taken to ensure that the horses looked well, particularly during daylight hours, but many sick and lame horses were put into the night runs when the horrors could not be seen. The hazards of night travel sprang from the dishonesty of the contractors or job masters, who supplied the night coaches with unsound and vicious horses which they dare not show in daylight. Similarly, at night they could get away with faulty harnesses that were too old to be safe, and the coachmen too were more likely to be drunk.

‘Hit them as can work,’ advised one old veteran driver, ‘it’s no use hitting them as can’t.’ As the coaches had to run on time, the whip was used to achieve this; the horses meant nothing to the drivers. The RSPCA was founded in 1824 but most coachmen had never heard of it or bothered about it.

The term ‘to die in harness’ comes from these times. In 1821, twenty horses dropped dead on one

mail coach route alone. On one occasion, one hugely overloaded coach was put on the weighbridge and, to the amazement of all, it totalled four and a half tons!

Very often the coachmen liked to drink and chat at the change stops, and then had to make up for lost time at the expense of the unfortunate horses, with coachmen spurring their horses on to go even faster. Some drivers used a whip similar to the cat of nine tails. Most coach owners had strict rules that any coach driver using this instrument of torture would be dismissed at once but, of course, there were always some who broke the rules.

Most horses on the road had had their tails docked, an operation in which a portion of the tail was amputated with a docking knife and the bleeding stopped with a hot iron. There were some side effects such as blood poisoning. This unpleasant operation was for purely practical reasons and sensible, as it stopped the lead horse from swishing its tail over the rein. If this happened the horse would often clamp his tail down firmly on the rein, thus making control difficult. The practice of docking was forbidden in most countries but continued in England until the passing of the Docking and Nicking Act in 1949.

Coach horses always had a good supply of clean drinking water, a salt lick, oats and beans by the bushel, bran by the sack, meadow hay by the hundredweight and bedding straw. In season this was supplemented by marigolds, swedes and other green food. Naturally they suffered illnesses, several of which could be viral: influenza, heat-stroke, strained back, tendons, lameness, plant poisoning, parasitic mange, ring bone, fever in the hoof, sweet itch, lice, cracked hoof, shivering fits, ringworm, eczema, colic, broken wind, infection of the gum, garrett (a form of mastitis) and other bacterial infections. If one of the horses caught an infection then the stable had to be broken up, the walls lime washed and the whole place disinfected.

The skills required in the stable yard were very varied: grooms, ostlers, feeders, mucker-outers, blacksmiths, shoe-smiths, harness repairers, corn- and bean-crusher operators, sweepers, night-watchmen and wheelwrights.

By 1850, the era of coaching was nearing its end, its golden age being a short twenty-five years. It did not stop the shocking cruelty that I have described; that took many more years. Before I leave these sad but true tales of coaching days, next month I will give some details of the many accidents that were reported. sherbornewalks.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 59

History OBJECT OF THE MONTH

THE EEL SPEAR Elisabeth Bletsoe, Curator, Sherborne Museum

T

his intriguing object, donated

by Mrs Taylor of Middlemarsh, is a five-pronged eel-spear, an artefact which brings us directly into contact with our prehistoric ancestors.

Eel catching has been practised for millennia, with archaeology revealing physical evidence of spears with wooden prongs and bone points dating back from the mid-Neolithic period. Later oral and written records show this type of fishing was widespread among a great majority of people living off the land in Europe and North America’s Atlantic coast, albeit often small scale and aimed at local markets; there are those who still remember the pleasure of a day’s outing and the delicate flavour of the eel’s flesh.

Technical modifications enabled a more intensive and coherent approach from the mid1800s, from which time there was a marked increase in eel exploitation. This was particularly so in Britain around the time of the Second World War. The design follows a fairly standard pattern; it is shaped like a large fork with a pointed centre blade and symmetrically placed tines to either side. The base of the fork forms a socket to which a wooden pole was secured, long enough to reach down to the muddy bottom of a stream where over-wintering eels burrow in a semi-dormant state. The spears were often locally made and differed slightly in size, weight and design.

Ours appears to have been robustly crafted from iron by a blacksmith and is in excellent condition, although we also possess a more weathered three-pronged version found buried in a field on the Castleton side of Oborne. Some spears have backwards-pointing barbs to prevent the eel slipping off once caught.

This spear will feature in this year’s exhibition which concerns the River Yeo and its relevance to the town in 60 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

various industries and crafts. We know that the configuration of the streams was crucial to the eventual development of the monastery and also how important fish were in the medieval diet. The Coombe stream, which flows into the Yeo, turned the monks’ mill-wheels and replenished the Abbot’s fish-pond near the Abbey; in the C12th Bishop Roger of Caen, who built the Old Castle, also constructed a chain of ‘stew-ponds’ for eels and other fish along the Yeo Valley between Castleton and what is now the railway station. In order to do so, he deprived the monks of two of their mills but in return he granted them St. Andrew’s mill, which stood just north of the current level crossing. Roger graciously allowed the monks permission to fish in his ponds on the four annual festivals of Our Lady: the Feasts of Purification, The Annunciation, The Assumption and The Nativity. Within the rules of hospitality, he also permitted any guest of the Abbot to fish in one of the lakes ‘for two hauls only and with one net.’

While more recently, since the 1970s, eels have become critically endangered, it is encouraging to know that, in the last few years, the River Parrett and the Yeo, which is one of its major tributaries, have become an ‘eel super-highway’ for over a million elvers taking advantage of the position of the Gulf Stream, spring tides and the full moon. Conservationists are on standby to catch and transport them carefully around flood defences and weirs so they can make their way upstream to mature in safety.

Sherborne Museum is closed to the public due to the current health crisis. We hope all of you remain safe and well. Follow our Facebook page for interesting & unusual finds from our collections sherbornemuseum.co.uk

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Antiques

1965 Triumph Bonneville TT120C

SEEING IS BELIEVING

T

Richard Bromell, ASFAV, Charterhouse Auctioneers

he internet (that great British invention) has revolutionised the way most of us live, work and play. I say most of us as there is a minority of people who are either ‘off-grid’ or do not possess a computer, rather like my dear mother. From a business perspective, however, the internet can be a doubleedged sword.

On our website you can submit items for valuation by attaching a short description and a couple of photographs. The most memorable items submitted for value in this way were a pair of Second World War medals comprising a Distinguished Flying Medal and a Distinguished Flying Cross. Awarded to the owner’s late father, it transpired he flew in Lancasters and was Guy Gibson’s rear gunner on the Dambusters Raid.

If you look online to value similar medals then you would probably assume they could be worth anywhere from £2,000 to £5,000. However, with such provenance 62 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

and history, I valued them at £60,000. Consigned for auction, they went on to sell for £142,000 setting a world record price for this medal combination.

This sadly, is not the norm. More often than not, clients look online before they contact us and see a similar item for sale, or possibly sold. The worrying word here is ‘similar’. Last year a lady wanted to sell a walnut chest of drawers. She had seen similar 18th century chests online available for several thousands of pounds. When she brought the chest in for sale, she was disappointed to learn her chest was under 100 years old and worth a fraction of what she assumed it was worth.

Recently however, a client contacted us to auction a collection of Triumph motorcycles. For the past 20 years we have been holding specialist classic and vintage car and motorcycles auctions and, as you would expect, we have sold a large number of Triumph motorcycles during this time, both ancient and modern. The collection of

Triumphs dated from the 1960s and 1970s. They all looked like regular Triumphs of those times, the likes of which are produced today as ‘retro’ bikes. The owner collected Triumphs and knew his bikes inside out.

Had he not emailed photos we would have missed one hugely important point with his Triumph Bonneville TT120. Whilst it looked like a normal TT120, stamped on the engine, it also had the letter ‘C’ on the casing. With the letters ‘TT’ standing for Tourist Trophy and the letter ‘C’ standing for Competition, this turns this beautiful Bonneville from an £8,000 bike to a £16,000 rarity. It is now fully catalogued and entered into our next classic and vintage motorcycle auction.

So when looking to have your items valued, it is not a bad idea to look online for comparable pieces, however nothing beats seeing and handling the items in real life.

The Charterhouse classic and vintage motorcycle auction will take place at The Haynes International Museum, Sparkford, on Wednesday 6th May. charterhouse-auction.com

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 63

elizabethwatsonillustration.com 64 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

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elizabethwatsonillustration.com 70 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

#PeatFreeApril

SAY NO TO COMPOST FROM PEATLANDS

Castle Gardens is proud to be supporting #PeatFreeApril, a month-long campaign to raise awareness about the environmental impact of using peat in the garden.

Speak with one of our team of indoor and outdoor plant enthusiasts to discuss how you can successfully incorporate peat free alternatives into your garden.

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 71

Gardening

FOR PEAT’S SAKE

Mike Burks, Managing Director of The Gardens Group

D

uring April we will be supporting PeatfreeApril, a month-long campaign of action to raise awareness about the environmental impact of using peat in the garden.

Peat is important for three reasons. Firstly, peat bogs are sinks for carbon; extracting it re-releases that carbon back into the atmosphere. Secondly, peatland habitats are environmentally sensitive and are home to a unique population of plants and animals. Thirdly, with flooding a hot issue at the moment, and probably for many years to come, peatlands slow the flow of water off the moors, helping to reduce flooding downstream.

Most gardeners take an interest in the environment and many are committed to actively promoting the environmental benefits of gardening, but some won’t 72 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

be aware that they are using peat and others will want to stop after using it for many years. There are some good alternatives but they require different skills and techniques, which we will be sharing throughout April and beyond.

In my opinion, though, a total and immediate ban on peat may have a detrimental impact on the environment.

I liken it to heroin users being cut off from their drug in ‘cold turkey’ fashion; many just won’t make it. A peat ban could stop many gardening as a result, which would be worse for the environment. What is needed is a steady weaning off the hard stuff and onto the alternatives.

Peat usage in gardens is a relatively new phenomena, having arrived in a big way since the Second World War. Gardening has changed though

We are committed to supporting the PeatfreeApril campaign and beyond. Firstly, we’ll be talking about potting composts. There is no need to use peat as a soil improver, mulch or a planting compost as there are lots of excellent peat-free alternatives which we'll be talking about over the coming weeks. To encourage gardeners to try these alternatives, we’ll have multi-buy offers as well as advice sheets and samples for gardeners to try.

Having trialled various alternatives in previous years, we are also going peat-free in our own nursery and several of our growers are already growing for us in peat-free composts. So, keep an eye out for peat-free compost, it’s coming your way whether you like it or not so why not be positive about it! Ask for help and guidance, continue to keep your own patch looking good and, at the same time, do an extra little bit for the environment as a whole. thegardensgroup.co.uk Free delivery service back up and running Since closing our telephone order line for garden centre deliveries last month, we were overwhelmed by pleas

from the community to resume this service, as people turn to their gardens for sanctuary and solace during

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continue to review the situation and may need to

and many of us now garden in pots and containers as we don’t have the luxury of a large space in which to garden. Modern housing density means that gardens are much smaller than they used to be and so growing in containers and the potting compost we use is much more important than it was.

But we’ve done this before. I’m of a vintage where I remember customers saying that they couldn’t bear peat-based composts and found that the John Innes composts (loam or soil-based) that they had been brought up on were so much easier to use. There aren’t many of those gardeners left and they eventually did learn to use peat-based compost so I am confident that we’ll all be able to get to the brave new world, but we may need a little bit of help.

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 73

Gardening

DIARY OF A FLOWER FARMER Paul Stickland, Black Shed Flowers

I

’m having to completely rewrite my April column in light of the extraordinary changes that have swept the world in these few short weeks. I was going to tell you about our excitement at providing our wonderful spring flowers for the first weddings of the year, of our new programme of workshops and events, our charity garden open days, our fun flower club for adults and children. In a matter of days all that has flown out of the window. All our weddings have, very sensibly, been postponed until safer times, events and workshops have been put on hold. Our business can no longer function in the way planned, so we’re having to reinvent ourselves and, as things rapidly change, reinvent again.

We appreciate that we are profoundly lucky and privileged to be able to work in the outdoors, to be surrounded by nature and the sheer extraordinary power of spring. No mere virus will stop that and, as the weeks progress, our beds will fill and flower with an even greater abundance than last year. Small seedlings will grow into magnificent drifts regardless of any mere virus.

Hopefully we’ll be able to tend and care for our farm, nurturing it for a time when things are calmer and safer.

Spring will not wait though, and to witness and be immersed in that is the essence of hope and that’s something we all need - now more than ever. So we have to find a way to share that with you, our town and beyond. Local will be a key word for the foreseeable future. We’ve come to rely on an ever-more sophisticated and complex supply chain in these last decades. Flowers have been shipped at huge environmental cost across the world, chasing minute profit margins with everincreasing scale; perhaps now is the time for the local economy to come to the fore.

Within days of the crisis developing, incredible community-based initiatives had sprung up. Sherborne Viral Kindness, our wonderful butchers and bakers and many other businesses have joined forces to offer a new way to buy food and drink. We want to be part of that: flowers have always brought joy and now more than ever, with so many self-isolating, we want to find ways to bring those to you.

74 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

As long as we can, we will offer our flowers, either for collection from the farm or, if restrictions allow, delivery.

We are happy to take phone orders or contactless card payments. One lovely idea is to give a gift voucher which can be redeemed at any time to suit the recipient. Please contact us for more details.

We may have seen the worst of people in the last few weeks but we have also seen the best. Small gestures, smiles, offers of help and simple kindness have been such a comfort whilst everything we know has been thrown to the wind. If there’s anything we can do to help or if you have a bright idea, please let us know. We love a brilliant idea!

So, on to the most important part of all this unexpected change. Black Shed is to start growing vegetables! We grow a pretty mean flower and we reckon we can grow a pretty mean bean! Tabitha and Helen have already started sowing peas, french beans, broad beans, spinach, tomatoes, beetroot, chillies, peppers, carrots, herbs, a huge range of squashes and even melons, and are planting rows of onions and potatoes too. Soon our polytunnel and beds should be bursting with delicious produce. Like our flower farming journey, this too will be a steep learning curve but the rich soil of Blackmarsh Farm has been our ally in our previous adventure so we’ll see how we get on with this new chapter! We hope to grow for our community; if anyone wants to share their wisdom or simply just help, I think that together we can make a difference to the health and wellbeing of our muchloved town. Quite how this will all fit in with the restrictions that are being placed on us, we simply have no idea. However, just three years ago we had no idea how to create a flower farm from scratch or how to build up the business! We’re just going to do it. As many of you already know, we’re awfully determined and love a challenge. Let’s see what happens!

Good luck to you all, stay safe and well. blackshedflowers.blogspot.co.uk @paulstickland_

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 75

76 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

ANNA STILES

S

Words Jo Denbury Photography Katharine Davies

ome of you will know Anna Stiles from her pottery stall at Sherborne’s Thursday market.

As a passer-by, funnelling along the pavement past Kafé Fontana and the kind-eyed Red Cross volunteer, it’s almost impossible not to stop and smile at Anna’s beautiful work. Colourful pots, plates, jugs and the like lay proudly on an unassuming covered bench as Anna – sporting a beaming smile – chats away to customers, locals and her fellow stallholders.

What some of you might not know is that away from the market stalls, Anna is busy sharing her knowledge, teaching others in her regular pottery classes. >

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We visit Anna’s workshop, just a mile or so north of Sherborne and join a small group of aspiring potters.

It’s another chilly day and the idea of thumping unwilling lumps of cold clay and washing my hands in a colder still bucket of murky water did not appeal to a total beginner like me. Anna, however, thinks of everything: she has warmed the water (hurrah) and soon we are taking small balls of clay and kneading them into willing dollops ready for the potter’s wheel.

I chat with Anna as other members of the class climb into clay-smeared boiler suits and take to the wheels.

‘I grew up in Winterbourne Whitechurch,’ she begins. ‘My father was an environmental officer and a professional singer,’ she adds, ‘and my mother was an “Enid Blyton” mum who stayed at home and taught us everything. I learned all my skills from her. I was one of five children and it was my mother who taught me pottery at home. I literally threw my first pot when I was five years old and got my first wheel in 1971.’ She still has it. ‘But I went into grain trading which was very stressful; it was then that I began to use pottery as my way of relaxing.’

In 2006, as her own family grew, Anna could no longer work full-time in trading and took up pottery

in earnest. Unfortunately, during this period, Anna also became a victim of domestic abuse. ‘Pottery is what kept me going,’ she explains of that time in her marriage.

‘It was the saving grace, so now I am passionate about giving that opportunity to others.’

Much has been written about the importance of creativity to help us externalise and process difficult events. Pottery has even been used as a therapeutic treatment for those suffering PTSD. It stimulates the ‘feel good’ neurotransmitters and triggers something on the effort-driven reward circuit. In other words the creativity we apply and the effort we put in will give us something positive in return. ‘It is so important to do something creative,’ agrees Anna. As I was about to find out — far from the modern day insistence on instant gratification — at the potter’s wheel you can’t rush it.

A regular member of the class, Octavia Bromell, is a 25-year-old illustrator who has herself suffered from anxiety and depression. She enjoys Anna’s pottery sessions because Anna lets her students go at their own pace; ‘I find it engrossing; the process of trying to centre the clay on the wheel takes a lot of concentration and you simply can’t think about anything else when you are doing it.’ Octavia suffered a nervous breakdown > sherbornetimes.co.uk | 79

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four years ago and her anxiety is an ongoing struggle.

‘I am a keen advocate for the creative arts as a way to manage it,’ she says. ‘It’s a great distraction and absorbing; it takes you away from life’s stresses but also you come away with something you have made - a pot.’

Alan White, a fellow student at the class, agrees.

He is visually-impaired and recently his eyesight has deteriorated, leaving him with only peripheral vision.

His wife, Clare, had bought him a voucher for the class and Alan admits that he was slightly anxious about the experience. ‘It is more enjoyable than I anticipated,’ he says. ‘Because you are actually making something, you feel you are achieving something. It is hard for me to do that with a lot of things because my eyesight is becoming worse.’ He adds. ‘I am going to keep coming because it is such a rewarding experience; you are with people. Anna is very encouraging and nice and the feel of the clay in my hands is very relaxing.’

As well as practising her own work, Anna is focused on developing her therapeutic classes and will soon be qualified to run classes for children who wish to learn pottery as part of their Arts Award (an alternative but equivalent qualification to the GCSE).

You don’t have to work at the wheel, Anna teaches hand-building techniques too. Generally the classes work on a rota: week one — throwing or building the pots, week two — ‘turning the bottoms’, taking out

the extra weight at the base of the pot then bisque firing, and week three — glazing.

It was my turn. The first pot went okay but the second took on a life of its own and was soon headed for the floor. Thankfully Anna, all calm smiles and laughter, was on hand to rein it back into the centrifugal force.

Some say that this is the new yoga (minus the Lycra and physical exertion): a mindful practice that brings you into the present and liberates your mind from stressful rumination. Holding on to tension whilst creating a pot inevitably results in your clay hurling off the wheel and landing in an undignified lump on the workshop floor.

It was certainly a most enjoyable two hours, relaxing and inspiring, and I can safely say I am hooked.

Anna’s classes are so calming and fun that I can’t help but feel envious of her regular students. I will be sure to visit again once the postponed Dorset Arts Week is rescheduled, when Anna will be showing her work along with fellow artists. In the meantime, her desire to teach and inspire others remains strong. ‘We need people in society who can make things,’ she says. ‘We need people who are creative; if we lose everything at least we will still have people who can make a pot. Something to eat out of.’ I know I’m proud of mine, wonky bits and all. annastilespottery.com artsaward.org.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 85

elizabethwatsonillustration.com 86 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

FROM FIELD

TO TABLE Order our homegrown Tamworth produce from the fields outside Sherborne Buy Local!

The finest Tamworth quality and flavour, a taste of the past!

DELIVERED TO YOUR DOORSTEP Free-range Tamworth pork, prime cuts, sausages, hams and cured bacon Please contact James and Charlotte Tel 07802 443905 | info@thestorypig.co.uk The Story Pig, Sandford Orcas, Sherborne See more at www.thestorypig.co.uk

Food and Drink

THE CAKE WHISPERER Val Stones

SWEET AND SAVOURY WAFFLES Image: Katharine Davies

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s a treat on high days and holidays we have waffles for brunch. They are easy to make and, if you don’t want to make fillings, you can just drizzle them with maple syrup or spread with your favourite jam or chocolate spread.

My sister and her family have been living near New York for almost twelve years and my twice-yearly visits widened my ideas regarding different recipes, both sweet and savoury. Sunday brunch was provided by my nephew and his dad, who would drive to a local bakery in the morning. This was a magical experience for me; shoppers were allowed into the factory and could take bagels straight from the baking belt, still hot! There were other delicious breads from Challahs to bloomers that could be picked up warm from the ovens and taken to be paid for.

By the time we got home my nephew had made waffle batter and my sister had set the table with dishes of smoked salmon, waffle toppings, my homemade jams (I always take some over or make some if I’m over there in the summer). The family would sit and enjoy a leisurely meal together, taking time to enjoy each other’s company.

I have two waffle makers, one creates heart-shaped waffles and the other traditional square waffles. Waffles aren’t something I would eat every day, although they really are delicious, like soft fluffy pancakes. You could 88 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

perhaps ask for a waffle-maker as a birthday, Mother’s Day or Christmas present or just treat yourself. If you don’t want to own a waffle maker, you can make up the batter and spoon the mixture into a frying pan, flip them over after two minutes and cook until golden.

Sweet Waffles (makes 8 square waffles) What you will need

An electric waffle maker or a large frying pan. Handheld electric mixer. A jug for pouring the batter.

Ingredients

180g plain flour 1 rounded tablespoon caster sugar 1 rounded tablespoon baking powder 1 level teaspoon fine sea salt 300ml whole milk 80g unsalted butter, melted 2 medium eggs, lightly beaten ½ teaspoon vanilla extract Vegetable oil for greasing the waffle plates Method

1 Pre-heat the oven to 140C/130C fan-assisted/275F/

Gas Mark 1.

2 Place the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt into a bowl.

3 In a jug, combine the milk, butter, vanilla extract and eggs. Add this to the dry ingredients and stir well until blended then beat for a minute using the electric mixer.

4 Set the mixture aside to rest for 5 minutes. This is really important as it gives the chemical reaction of the baking powder time to work, ensuring the waffles rise well.

5 Pre-heat the waffle maker whilst the batter is resting.

Set on medium heat. Using a little oil on a piece of kitchen roll grease the plates or frying pan, do this too in between each pour of batter.

6 When the green light shows, pour about 100ml of batter onto each waffle plate, ease the batter to the edges with a spatula, close the lid and allow to cook for 4 minutes.

7 Open the lid and check whether they are cooked they should be golden. Carefully remove the waffles and if, you aren’t going to eat them straightaway, place them on a wire rack and keep them warm in the oven.

8 Repeat with the remaining batter.

Sweet Orange Filling (sufficient for 8 waffles)

Juice of 6 oranges Zest of 4 oranges Juice and zest of 1 lemon 50g caster sugar 50g unsalted butter 1 heaped tablespoon cornflour Few drops of vanilla extract 2 tablespoons sweet marmalade 2 tablespoons orange liqueur, optional Method

9 Remove the zest from 4 of the oranges and set aside.

10 Juice the oranges and place the juice in a pan.

11 Add the sugar, butter, zest, and juice of the lemon to the pan, bring gently to simmering point and allow to simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

12 Place the cornflour in a small bowl and add a little water to make it liquid. Gently pour it into the orange mixture, stirring continuously. The mixture will thicken slightly.

13 Allow to cool for a few minutes then stir in the vanilla, marmalade and orange liqueur.

14 Spoon over warm waffles.

15 You can make the filling the day before and keep in

the fridge until needed; it can be warmed through in a pan before pouring onto the waffles.

Pancetta, spinach and cheddar topping (sufficient for 4 waffles)

80g pancetta ½ red onion, finely diced 2 shallots, finely diced 60g spinach 60g cheddar cheese, grated 90g plain flour ½ tablespoon caster sugar ½ tablespoon baking powder ½ teaspoon fine sea salt 150ml whole milk 40g unsalted butter, melted 1 medium egg, lightly beaten Vegetable oil for greasing the waffle plates To serve: maple syrup/tomato sauce Method

16 Pre-heat the oven to 140C/130C fan-assisted/275F/ Gas Mark 1.

17 In a small frying pan, fry the pancetta on medium heat for 2-4 minutes until it begins to crisp around the edges. Add the onions and shallots and continue to cook for a few minutes until the onions are softened. Set aside.

18 Wilt the spinach by placing in a colander and pouring boiling water over it. Allow to cool for a while then squeeze out the excess water.

19 Add the spinach to the pancetta mixture and stir in the grated cheese. Set aside.

20 Place the flour, sugar, salt and baking powder in a bowl and mix well.

21 In a separate bowl combine the milk, butter and egg.

Add this to the dry mixture.

22 Gently combine the pancetta mixture into the waffle batter and leave to rest for 5 minutes.

23 Pre-heat the waffle maker and grease the waffle plates.

24 When the green light comes on, pour about 90ml of mixture onto each plate, close the lid and cook for 5 minutes.

25 Open the lid and check whether they are cooked; they should be golden. Remove them and keep warm in the oven or serve straight away with a drizzle of maple syrup or a splash of tomato sauce. bakerval.com sherbornetimes.co.uk | 89

AT HOME! Week one of just the family here at the Farm.

We want to make sure that all our customers are still able to enjoy their coffee, so we have set up an area for you to safely collect, outside the office or we can post it to you if you prefer.

Ordering is easy via the website or call Charlotte on 01935 481010. Keep well and we look forward to welcoming you at the Roastery once this is all over.

Thank you for supporting local businesses!

www.readscoffee.co.uk 01935 481010

Coffee Break CafĂŠ Pineapple The High Street, Milborne Port DT9 5FB cafepineapple 01963 250726 The Cross Keys 88 Cheap Street, Sherborne DT9 3BJ crosskeyssherb crosskeyssherborne 01935 508130 thecrosskeyssherborne.com 90 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Old School Gallery Boyle’s Old School, High Street Yetminster, DT9 6LF @yetminstergalle 01935 872761 yetminstergallery.co.uk The Three Wishes 78 Cheap Street, Sherborne DT9 3BJ 01935 817777 thethreewishes.co.uk

THE CROSS KEYS CA CO ECT DE ER MENU

Our dishes are cooked to order using ingredients from local and artisan producers SAMPLE MAIN DISHES - £10.00 each Pie of the day, mashed potato and greens. Sherborne sausages, mashed potato, and greens. Smoked Haddock Salmon Fishcake, chips and side salad.

Halloumi and sweet chilli burger, chips and side salad.

DESSERT - Cake of the day - 4 ALCOHOL - 3.5 a bottle Beer and Cider a)ailable - Cerne Abbas Brewery, Cornish Orchards, Fuller’s Frontier, Piddle, Estrella 0%. Draft is a)ailable but please bring your own containers.  Call 01935 508130 or email:info@thecrosskeyssherborne.com to order A)ailable lunchtime and dinner. Please gi)e as much notice as possible.

Pre-pay o)er the phone. Collection or deli)ery within walking distance.

Sherborne's historic pub on the Parade with welcoming bar, restaurant and luxury rooms.

88 CHEAP STREET SHERBORNE DORSET DT9 3BJ t: 01935 508130Â email:Â info@thecrosskeyssherborne.com www.thecrosskeyssherborne.com

Food and Drink

PASCHA X.B. Sasha Matkevitch, The Green

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his is my version of this well-known, rich and festive dish. Traditionally it is made in a pyramid shape using special wooden moulds with the imprint of X.B. or an Orthodox cross. Similarshaped yoghurt pots with small knife holes usually work very well. You will need 8-10 pots for this recipe.

Ingredients

200g best quality candied fruit, diced 60g raisins, chopped 1 large lemon, finely grated and juiced ½ tsp bourbon vanilla paste 600g Westcombe ricotta 30g unsalted butter 100g clotted cream 70g caster sugar 50g toasted ground almonds 50g honey Clear honey, candied rhubarb and toasted flaked almonds to decorate

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Method

1 Soak the candied fruit, raisins, lemon zest and vanilla paste in lemon juice for at least one hour.

2 Meanwhile, line the plastic pots with a cheese cloth or double layer of muslin, allowing the edges to overhang the moulds.

3 Put the ricotta, butter, clotted cream and sugar in a mixer. Using the whisk, beat until well blended.

Add the soaked fruits, ground almonds and honey.

Mix well then spoon the mixture into the lined pots, over-filling slightly. Fold the edges of the muslin into the centre of each pot.

4 Place the pots on a large tray or a plate and cover with another tray or suitable chopping board, creating a press. Refrigerate for 24 hours.

5 Unfold the muslin and turn the mini paskhas out onto serving plates, then gently remove the muslin cloth.

6 Decorate with toasted almonds, rhubarb and drizzle of honey. greenrestaurant.co.uk

A MONTH ON THE PIG FARM James Hull, The Story Pig

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s I woke up this morning there was a split second when everything seemed ok, normal, and then it all came flooding back, the terrible situation we are all living through. The full impact on all of us is still only just beginning to sink in. I’m guessing that very few of us, if any, have experienced a time like this before.

As a grown man, crying doesn’t come easily but the enormity of the situation ahead of us and the realisation of how it is affecting all of us left me crying uncontrollably for an hour or more, sobbing, letting the shock out, maybe it’s good for all of us, I am certainly not ashamed to tell you.

At Lavender Keepers, here on the farm, you could be forgiven for thinking everything is as it should be, spring has sprung. After the continuous rain of five months I really think I might have given in with all this if it had carried on. It’s been a hell of a winter to have pigs outside - don’t get me wrong, they don’t mind, but the mental pressure on Charlotte and I has been intense and left us drained. Every job made ten times harder, some jobs almost impossible.

I love spring. In normal times I hunt hopefully for every little sign of its arrival - a longer evening a minute at a time, the unfurling of our beloved spring flowers. Listen, the birds have come to life, the animals are happier too. This year, 2020 (we won’t forget you), spring seems to have a filter over the lens, it’s all a bit foggy and I can’t quite see it.

We too are having to redesign our farming business on the hoof. We have lost all the pubs and cafes that we supply, all our beloved farmers’ markets and there will be no hog roasts for the foreseeable.

Luckily we do sell a product that is needed, we are luckier than many, as a food producer we are classed as key workers and can continue to supply our customers.

So in these unprecedented times we are setting up a

mobile shop for all our local villages. We will obviously supply our own meat, but also you will be able to buy fresh vegetables, milk, eggs, bread and all the other staples. Charlotte is going to cook and bake as well, and deliver directly to our local residents in need in the coming months.

Please support us if you can, so that we can support you, our community. For more information on this please go to our website www.thestorypig.co.uk or follow us on Instagram and Facebook, @thestorypig.

Here on the farm, the pigs are now in bone dry paddocks. With the recent winds the mud has dried like concrete, the dust has returned, I found myself just thinking we could do with a little rain to soften the ground so it could dry more slowly – this was a fleeting thought!

Luckily we have our garden, our solace, this year maybe more than any other we will need it. We have planted many more potatoes, peas are in, small seeds to come, less emphasis on my beloved flowers this year, although we have ordered 1000 lavender plants to plant in our field, for the future. We have now built our own on farm butchery, this will make our work much easier in the future. Our Castlemilk Moorit sheep are about to pop out their lambs. That’s the thing, farming has no concept of a pandemic, it carries on like the seasons, our animals are unaware, our lovely dog Blue still bounds out every morning, the sunsets still fill me with wonder. Life will go on, it’s different, it’s not good for many of us, we must keep strong and carry on.

I want to mention the Sherborne Times. Thank you to all of you at our beautiful magazine, we are lucky to have you, many people who are not local read the Sherborne Times and comment on how lucky we are, so thank you for working so hard to adapt too. thestorypig.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 93

Food and Drink

A DROP OF THE IRISH David Copp

W

ith St Patrick’s Day just passed I think of my Irish friends who are not shy of reminding me that whiskey was first distilled in Ireland rather than Scotland. Indeed, St Patrick himself, not content with banishing snakes from Ireland and bringing in Christianity, is said to have brought the art of distillation across the Irish Sea. This is not such a wild idea because monks were the information superhighway of the early centuries of our recorded history. Distillation was an art developed

by Arab alchemists who first used it to produce perfumes before they recognised its medicinal qualities.

Distillation also served as an anaesthetic and it was not too long before it was realised they were helpful in fortifying troops about to engage in bloody battle.

Normally made from boiling up surplus crops of wheat, vegetables and fruit such as apples, pears, cherries, the vapours were passed through a still and condensed.

In Ireland, wheat and malted barley were most commonly used from the start and distillates have placed a powerful role in Celtic psyche, more so since they 94 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

often acted as a form of currency among impoverished peasant farmers. No wonder the art spread so quickly to the Western isles.

In the nineteenth century Irish whiskey became the most popular and biggest selling spirit in the western world. But as God gives so he can take away. The failure of grain (and potato) harvests in the nineteenth century brought production to a halt and led to mass migration to North America.

There was a further drop in sales when the Irish won Independence, and Britain and the Commonwealth stopped buying Irish and started their love affair with Scotch. Two World Wars and an economic depression in between at the same time as Prohibition in the United States, did not help matters.

However, when economic conditions returned to normal the millions of Irish who had decamped to America raised the flag for their native spirit and Irish Whiskey became popular worldwide. I learned about Irish Whiskey in the 1970s when Greenalls acted as the UK sales agents for Tullamore Dew. The dew was

Maeching chaiwongwatthana/Shutterstock

not that lovely, gentle moisture we hope will enliven our lawns and plants, but the initials of the founder of the company, David E Williams who was so proud of this product that the signed off every batch with his initials DEW, Tullamore in County Offaly.

I like the gentleness and charm of his whiskies distilled at Tullamore in County Offaly after the rather more assertive pure Islay pearl malts of my previous employer at Morrison’s Bowmore. Interestingly, both whiskies now have a massive worldwide audience which goes to show that there are imbibers of both ends of the taste spectrum.

In my day there were only a four or five well known Irish whiskey distilleries – Jamesons, Bushmills, Power and Tullamore are all I can remember. Now there are 25 whiskey distilleries with several more due open this year. Their offerings range form basic blends to sophisticated aged malts matured in old Bourbon barrels or oloroso sherry casks. There is much more refinement in the ageing of whiskies and if you are an enthusiast it is worth having a chat with your preferred

wine merchant about some new offerings available which are both intriguing and beguiling.

All the four brands I know have developed interesting variations on the theme, Bushmill Black for example is a blend of malt with a sweet, batch-distilled grain whiskey which has a deep, intense character.

Jameson Caskmates is an intriguing whiskey matured in stout casks which has some unusual flavours with hints of orchard fruit and hay, subtle hops and chocolate. Another enticing new flavour to me is the Redbreast twelve year old single pot still whiskey matured in oloroso sherry wood that offers delicious dried fig and pear notes.

Tullamore has a brand new distillery but still uses the old triple distillation methods. If you want to celebrate the great man’s day with something unusual and very special from the heart of Ireland then ask for a Tullamore Dew on the rocks or with a splash of sparkling water. A former neighbour once told me he used it to power his motor mower because the grass came up half cut. sherbornetimes.co.uk | 95

Pet, Equine & Farm Animals

• Operating theatres • Digital x-ray • Nurse clinics • Separate dog and cat wards • Laboratory Kingston House Veterinary Clinic Long Street, Sherborne, Dorset DT9 3DB

Grove Dene Veterinary Clinic The Forum, Abbey Manor Park, Yeovil, Somerset BA21 3TL

Tel: 01935 813288 (24 hours) Email: sherborne@kingstonvets.co.uk

Tel: 01935 421177 (24 hours) Email: yeovil@kingstonvets.co.uk

Mon-Fri 9.00-10.30, 16.30-18.00 Sat 9.00-10.30

Mon-Fri 8.30-12.00, 14.00-18.30 Sat 9.00-12.00

kingstonvets.co.uk

Free registration appointment for new clients when accompanied by this advertisement

Independent veterinary services for livestock in Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire Collection points for livestock medicines and supplies at Sherborne, Sturminster Newton, Blandford and Shaftesbury Please call the office on 01258 472314

www.friarsmoorvets.co.uk 96 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Poorly pet collection service for self-isolating clients

Sherborne Surgery Swan House Lower Acreman Street 01935 816228

Yeovil Surgery 142 Preston Road 01935 474415

www.newtonclarkevet.com

Animal Care

OUT OF HARM’S WAY

Footage: biguniak andriy

Mark Newton-Clarke, MA VetMB PhD MRCVS Newton Clarke Veterinary Surgeons

P

redictions are tricky things. My words in March’s edition regarding the coronavirus epidemic in China and the hope that by now the infection would be under control now seem so naive. But here we are, facing a medical, economic and social challenge that none of us expected to see in our lifetimes. I will only observe that the strategy adopted by Governments around the world to control the spread of the disease is, we are told, based on the best scientific evidence. But is it based on the best science available? Are we using the technology developed over the last 50 years to detect and survive? Have we faced this global challenge with a global response? Maybe next time. I cannot but help feel most of the world has been using the medieval strategy of isolationism as a last resort, not as a first response. However, now is clearly not the time to ask the questions but to do what’s necessary to protect the vulnerable members of our society.

At our clinics in Sherborne and Yeovil, both of which are still open, our staff have been split into four separate teams working 3 days on, 3 days off to provide urgent and emergency treatment for the animals under our care. In order to

98 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

minimise numbers, there is only a skeleton staff at each clinic. Routine and nonurgent enquiries will therefore be processed after more acute or urgent cases, so please bear this in mind.

We are trying hard to minimise the potential for spread of Covid-19 and our protocol for this is on our website and Facebook pages. In essence, only animals are permitted into the buildings and all communication with owners will be conducted over the phone or via a video consultation platform. We will continue to treat all severe cases face-face and others can be prescribed medications based on a telephone or video consult. The link to the video consult facility is being sent to all clients via email or text message but of course we realise many people will not be able to access this, so simply call the clinics for advice as normal and a nurse will triage your enquiry.

The system for dropping off and collecting patients, along with ordered prescriptions, involves a separate isolation room that allows only one person in at a time. Strict bio security procedures will be employed and we ask everyone to use the anti-viral wipes on the door handle before and after use. For all visits to the clinics, for whatever reason, we ask clients to phone us in advance to explain the nature of the enquiry and again on arrival, so that waiting times in the car park are minimised. Keeping safe distance goes without saying (I hope!) and with patience and understanding, we can reduce the risk of infection to our staff and our clients.

Last month I briefly touched on the non-lethal effects of Covid-19 by mentioning the economic and social cost that the virus will cause. It will also put our animals at risk, as we have been advised by our governing body, the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, that we should not perform routine vaccination of pet animals. Although we will abide by this guidance for now, we hope that vaccinations will be permitted if the lock-down continues into the summer, as an epidemic of a different nature will become more likely, caused by the infectious organisms that threaten our family pets. Until we can resume puppy, kitten and adult vaccines, our advice is this: keep kittens indoors and continue to interact with them to allow play and good social habits. Puppies can be exercised in your garden but stay away from ditches, streams and muddy areas as this is where leptospirosis and parvovirus can lurk. The same goes for adult dogs. Although the dry weather we have enjoyed in the latter half of March helps to kill off viral infections (of all types) it cannot be relied upon.

What will be the tone and content of my next article in a month’s time, I wonder? I think it unwise to pass comment. All I can say now to all readers is stay safe, stay strong and stay together (mentally and spiritually, that is). newtonclarkevet.com

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 99

Animal Care

FARMER EDUCATION

John Walsh, BVSc Cert AVP DBR MRCVS, Friars Moors Vet

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t Friars Moor Livestock Health, we have lots of different farmer focus groups. The aim of these groups is to provide a framework for farmers to learn about the most recent areas of innovation and research that can help to drive their businesses forward.

They are also great ways of getting like-minded farmers together so they can learn from each other about their 100 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

individual experiences and what changes they have made to help improve animal welfare and productivity on their farms. Examples of these include our youngstock group, high yielders group, beef suckler group, calf rearer’s group, sheep group and block calving group.

I often get involved organising and running meetings for several of these groups and I thought I would give

you an insight into what these meetings entail. The last meeting we held was for dairy producers, entitled, ‘Transition Cow Management’. For those of you who do not know much about dairy cows, here’s an explanation of what this term means and why it is the one of the most important periods in a dairy cow’s production cycle.

Dairy cows need to give birth to a calf to start producing milk and then once a year after this to maintain their milk production. A cow’s year can be split into several sections based on how they are managed: lactating period (the time from calving when she is producing milk, usually about 10 months) and dry period (cows are not milked for the last 2 months before they give birth - I like to think of it as a cow holiday). The transition period covers the 3 weeks before she gives birth to the 3 weeks after giving birth.

Management of this group of cows is of the upmost importance; if we get it right, it ensures the cows start their next lactation with the best possible health and productivity. Our aim is to make sure the cows get pampered during this time, with minimal stress and access to as much feed as possible, akin to a summer holiday in an all-inclusive resort! The cow’s demand for energy goes up dramatically after calving as she starts producing milk. To meet the increasing energy demand from milk production, the cow needs to be able to eat as much as possible after calving. The whole focus for vets and farmers when dealing with transition cows is to ensure they can eat enough after calving to meet this increasing demand for energy. We also add other special goodies to their feed, including immuneboosting vitamins and minerals such as vitamin E and selenium. This helps to reduce the chances of these cows getting what are called transition diseases. You might have heard of some of these.

This practical meeting was held at a local dairy farm. Farmers from the Sherborne area arrived for tea and coffee and a catch up. They were then split into groups so they could assess the farm’s transition cow management. We also had the farm’s nutritionist there to cover all aspects of feeding the transition cow. The farmers were tasked with focusing on areas that could be improved to help the farm achieve the best feed intakes at this critical time. They then had to report back to the rest of the group with what changes they would make to help the farm improve. Facilitating meetings in this way is very rewarding as you can help farmers work through problems that can be taken back to make improvements on their own farms. The best way to progress is to learn from each other through shared experiences.

If you are interested in joining a focus group, please contact the practice for more details. friarsmoorvets.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 101

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BALFOUR EST.1979

THREE T R E AT M E N T S for

£60

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S WA N YA R D , S H E R B O R N E , D T 9 3 A X 0 1 9 3 5 8 1 6 1 7 7 W W W. M A R G A R E T B A L F O U R . C O . U K

Cycling

CYBER BIKE DEVELOPMENTS

THE MARCH OF TECHNOLOGY Mike Riley, Riley’s Cycles

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eries 12 of Doctor Who reprised, in my opinion, the most chilling baddies in the Whoniverse: Cybermen. They’re frightening, not because they are powerful but because they have suppressed emotion, have no soul and no physical weakness. Every time they return they have evolved a new capability, such as sending heads scouting as drones. I am not decrying technology development; the benefits of cyber technology for people with impairments are wonderful.

Exosuits are being developed for exploration and we take for granted powered devices which help us in daily 104 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

life such as electric toothbrushes.

Electric bicycles have been around for a while and, like Cybermen, are continually evolving. They may be considered as another consumer electrical product and sometimes are sold by people with no experience of bicycles.

Among cyclists there can be snobbery about what bike people ride. I appreciate a nice bike but, to me, the real priority is that car journeys are displaced with bike journeys or walking - the more folk who get on a bike, the better for their wellbeing and the planet. For some

consumers bikes are a commodity purchase, much like a washing machine: they are not excited by the bike but by how it enhances their life. However, passionate cyclists value more than just performance and cost, looking for pedigree, style and that elusive ‘soul’. The good news is that, even if your body is not as fit as an elite rider, you can still have an ebike that assists you and has style.

Elegant design

As an engineer I appreciate elegant design, where the essence of a need has been drilled down to.

Consequently the product achieves its purpose with minimum material and energy but exceeds expectation of performance, often with pleasing ergonomics and aesthetics as a bonus. A recent trend I am pleased to see applying this approach is the lightweight electric road and mountain bike. These models are hard to distinguish from conventional bikes and retain the style that some care about. The designers have grasped the essence which is to keep the bike light and provide only enough assistance, with a smaller battery and motor and intelligent power delivery.

Power vs sophistication

I was talking to a cyclist recently who adapted his bike to an ebike. He had fitted a 750-watt crank drive kit (3 times the power of a road legal ebike). It was mentioned that his motor is bigger and heavier than required, needing a bigger, heavier battery and a stronger, heavier bike. He might be able to go fast but not for long, and the handling and braking is compromised. He will be breaking the law if he goes over 15mph assisted on roads and, when I pointed out the legislation says ebikes should be 250-watt, he said he only used it on the low-power settings, so what was the point of lugging all that weight about? It failed all tests of elegant design.

Some eRoad bikes fit the brief for power but fail on the aesthetic front, Giant road ebikes are a case in point.

They remind me of the mythological Centaur, a man grafted to a horse; they just look wrong.

Assistance not power: Rise of the cyber bikes

In the MTB world, specialist downhill racing bikes are beefed up like they’re on steroids, which is what you need going downhill fast but not when you want to ride to the top. When producers started putting electric-assist on MTBs, it became an arms race to see who could fit the most powerful motor, and downhill

bikes became even heavier. This works when you use the motor like a ski lift to get you to the top of the run but often the route up is technical and that surplus power is a disadvantage if not applied effectively.

What is needed for a cyclist wanting a bit of help is enough assistance, with a usable power delivery to let you climb a hill without overexerting yourself, but not excess power. To compare with my fictional cyber baddies, a cyber bike without the personality bypass.

Specialised bikes’ designers have recognised this and introduced eMTBS which are as light as possible.

There are many drive systems available and each has pros and cons. Of the crank drive systems used in MTBs and hybrids, I favour Shimano as they keep weight down and have a well-engineered product at competitive price. There are alternative solutions such as Fazua’s removable drive which can be detached from the frame, and discrete hidden systems such as the Vivax assist with its tiny motor fitted in the frame tube, which some call mechanical doping.

My favoured lightweight eRoad bike is the ebikemotion system fitted to a Wilier lightweight bike. Other manufacturers use this drive, but Wilier have the best, lightest design and it is hard to tell it is an ebike visually. Here’s an illustration. A friend used the brute force approach and built an ebike with 2 motors but was interested to try one of these light ebikes to lift onto his motorhome more easily. The Wilier weighed about 12kg instead of over 20kg for conventional ebikes. He doubted the assistance on hills and range so I asked what test would prove the bike was sufficient. We agreed he would cycle from home, north of Sherborne, to Weymouth and back starting with a full charge. He would have an ice cream at the beach and I was available to collect him in my van if he ran out of power. On the day he found he did not need the full power available to ascend Batcombe and Sherborne hills and he had over 10% battery capacity left when he arrived home - I am confident this is attributable to the bike and not the Ninety-nine ice cream with a flake!

The result of the test? He bought the Wilier ebike and joined Digby Etape cycling club. Although our oldest member, he is one our most regular riders and enjoys cycling so much he has ordered an upgraded bike.

And what of the Cybermen? Doctor Who triumphed, so I can come out from behind the sofa. rileyscycles.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 105

Body and Mind

SCREEN SAVER Sarah Hitch, The Sanctuary Beauty Rooms and The Margaret Balfour Beauty Centre

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f you’re serious about preventing premature ageing, it seems protection from UVA and UVB rays is no longer enough. Evolving research confirms that blue light – emitted from the sun and our digital devices – is also bad for our skin. Dermatologists reveal that they are seeing increasing data on the potential long-term harm of visible light, particularly blue light, on our skin.

With millennials checking their phones an average of 150 times a day and with reports citing that adults clock up more than 10 hours of screen time daily, we’re 106 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

getting significantly more blue light exposure than we used to from the sun alone. Spending four eight-hour workdays in front of a computer exposes you to the same amount of energy as 20 minutes in the mid-day sun. Our digital devices could swiftly be labelled the silent agers of our generation.

Blue light (also referred to as High Energy Visible or HEV light) poses potential harm through stimulating damaging free radical production and inducing oxidative stress in the skin. The additional problem with blue

Tommaso79/Shutterstock

'Blue light compromises our beauty sleep by disrupting our natural circadian rhythm and sleep hormones.'

light is that it penetrates deeper into the skin compared with both UVA and UVB light. This contributes to skin ageing as collagen, elastin and melanin are made here and can be damaged, affecting the density and firmness of our skin as well as inducing pigmentation.

Blue light also compromises our beauty sleep by disrupting our natural circadian rhythm and sleep hormones. If exposed to significant amounts of blue light at night you may find it more difficult to fall asleep (hands up who watched Netflix and scrolled through their phone in bed last night?!). New research also demonstrates that exposure at night impacts the natural circadian rhythm of skin cells themselves.

It throws the cells ‘out-of-sync’, causing them to continue to ‘think’ it is daytime, impacting on their natural night-time repair process.

But is all blue light bad? It’s known that exposure to blue light during the day has some health benefits, such as boosting alertness and elevating mood. Acne sufferers may even receive blue light as a skin treatment, as recommended by many skincare professionals. Research shows that, in small bursts, blue light is an effective therapy for certain skin disorders such as breakouts as it is anti-bacterial, anti-inflammatory and healing.

So, how do you protect your skin from blue light damage? Clearly one needs to take an indoor and outdoor approach, given that both sunlight and our digital devices emit blue light. An easy fix is to buy and cover your phones and computers with a blue light shield as it eliminates the need to worry about skincare or sunglasses when using your phone or tablet. Some smartphones have a setting that disables blue light in favour of yellow light (often called ‘night mode’ or ‘nightshift’), which makes it easier on your eyes and on your skin. If your phone has this feature, use it all the time as an easy anti-ageing and eye-saving method.

When it comes to protection from products, take cover with a non-chemical SPF 30 sunscreen packed with antioxidants. Chemical-free SPFs that use zinc oxides to shield the skin from light protect from blue light as well as UV light. Chemical-free sunscreens are also more suitable for sensitive skins because they block rays rather than neutralise them on the skin’s surface.

Repair the skin with night creams and serums with powerful antioxidants to help promote the skin’s natural renewal process during the night. thesanctuarysherborne.co.uk margaretbalfour.co.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 107

Body & Mind

HOW TO LOOK AFTER YOUR WELLBEING AT HOME Dee Swinton MIA Studio/Shutterstock

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e’re living in unprecedented times.

Due to the outbreak of COVID-19, we’ve seen a huge increase in anxiety and poor mental health in Dorset. The Government has taken steps to enforce isolation and social distancing in the wake of the virus. We’ve witnessed empty supermarket shelves and an uncertainty 108 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

about what our future will hold as the whole country is affected by these measures. It’s normal to feel confused, stressed, scared or angry. However, where possible, try to remain positive and take conscious steps to manage your wellbeing. It will help you get through the next few months. Here are some tips to help you.

Maintain a healthy lifestyle

Self-isolation is challenging, whether we share a house with someone, live with family members, or alone.

Ensure you eat well and drink plenty of water. Try to vary what you eat so you look forward to it. Plan ahead and, where possible, use what you have in your cupboards in order to avoid having to go shopping. The ritual of savouring a hot drink can be comforting when we take the time to enjoy a latte or a tea.

Sleep

It’s more important than ever to get the right amount of sleep. Don’t worry if you’re not getting a full eight hours of sleep, the focus should be on quality not quantity. Try to go to sleep at a regular time each night. Make sure your bedroom is well ventilated and that your phone is not in the room if you can help it! Use an old-fashioned alarm clock if you need to wake at a certain time or ask someone to make sure you are awake.

Exercise

It’s important, whilst following Government or Public Health England’s guidelines, to try to get outside. Daylight is so important for our wellbeing and circadian rhythm. If you don’t have a garden or open space nearby, make sure your windows and blinds are fully open at home – and try to exercise around the house. Use housework, dancing to music, online workouts or seated exercises to keep yourself moving.

It will have a positive effect on your mood.

Routine

When our world is disrupted, it can take a while to get used to a new routine. Don’t compare yourself to others, try to follow your usual routine as closely as possible. Get up and get dressed as you usually would. Take some time to create a timetable or plan, scheduling activities for different days of the week. If you work from home, create a comfortable, well-lit space to work in. Don’t forget to make time for relaxing too – ensure you keep clear boundaries between work and down-time. If you live with other people, respect their privacy and need for space.

Be creative

You can find plenty of things online to help keep yourself busy; consider using this ‘extra’ time to find a new hobby. Why not learn a new language, try a new recipe, make a puzzle or paint a picture? You can read a

book, watch films, Netflix or listen to a podcast. Getting immersed in a hobby that utilises your hands to make something can be very beneficial as you concentrate on what you’re creating. Did you know that knitting is the most mindful pastime?

Keep connected

It’s important to connect only with people whom you trust. There are so many ways of keeping in contact now, although it doesn’t fully replace human contact. Listen to the radio, pick up the phone or use FaceTime or Skype when you need to see someone. If you’re feeling anxious, limit your social interactions to short conversations; your friends and family will understand this if you explain how you feel. Most messages don’t have to be answered immediately; often they don’t require a prompt answer and rushing to answer them can heighten your stress levels.

Meditation and mindfulness

Meditation and mindfulness are two methods we can recommend for dealing with worries. Find a quiet place to sit or lie down. Concentrate on your breathing and push your worries to the back of your mind. Try to let go of things that are not serving you. Acknowledge your thoughts but choose to let them go. If you’re feeling stressed or anxious, meditation can help give you some relief.

Limit your exposure to the news and social media

It’s incredibly easy to distract yourself online and you can waste hours that could be better spent. Remember that not everything we see online is trustworthy. Get the facts – check the source of your information – and limit your on-screen time. We would advise deleting news apps from your phone and turn off notifications to avoid information overload.

It’s normal in times like these for our emotions to be extremely erratic. One day can be completely different from the following one, but it’s worth remembering that difficult times will pass. We will get through this.

Dorset Mind is committed to helping local people with their mental health. The charity believes that no-one in Dorset should face a mental health problem alone or without respect.

That’s why they have replaced their face-to-face support for both adults and young people with online and phone options.

Find out more on their website. dorsetmind.uk sherbornetimes.co.uk | 109

Body and Mind

STRONGER TOGETHER

Image: Stuart Brill

Craig Hardaker, BSc (Hons), Communifit

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s Covid-19 continues to take hold and selfisolation becomes a necessity, the question of how best to keep ourselves healthy and fit becomes even more important. For those with the virus, the only option will be rest and respite whilst they fight it off. For those of us who remain healthy, a need for exercise without social interaction becomes even 110 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

more essential, not only for our physical but also for our psychological well-being, Gardening will, for many, provide an excellent starting-point and I do wonder if, by the end of the summer, the country will have the best garden displays ever, even if no-one else has the opportunity to see them!

Although, quite rightly, the Government is stating

the need for self-isolation, they also fully understand the value of continuing to follow some kind of exercise programme, albeit once a day. Walking and cycling are cited as two very worthwhile possibilities, so look for somewhere to stretch your legs, open your lungs and burn off that excess frustration and stress. The weather is improving (as I write this, it is a warm spring day but it may well be cold and windy by the time you read it – this is England after all!), and this may entice more people to take that all important stroll or cycle ride.

Please choose somewhere that you know has lots of open space where, for the best possible reason, you can avoid others. There have been cases reported of people flocking to a popular destination to find that it is very crowded, full of people with similar good intentions - the National Trust’s positive and generous gesture of opening its gardens and parks free of charge was rescinded due to this very concern. This is not what the Government is advocating.

For others, and even as an alternative to walking and cycling, the need to continue attending fitness class-type activities remains not only desirable but also

possible. When the gardening is done, popular television watched to saturation point, and family and friends contacted electronically, there is still time for the exercise programmes many of you used to undertake (and hopefully will again soon) with Communifit, online.

We will create a series of exercise videos following the structure of those enjoyed in our weekly classes.

These will be delivered electronically to those with access to email and we hope that you will all both support and benefit from this new venture as we aim to overcome the isolating effects of Covid-19. For those without email, or indeed an internet connection, don’t worry as we have a way to support you too and provide you with access to the video content. Please contact us for further information.

In conclusion we are all in this together, even if for now we can’t actually be together!

Stay safe everyone, take exercise if you can, rest when you need to, and I hope to see you all as soon as it safe to do so. communifit.co.uk

Check out our social media and website for home workouts. www.oxleysc.com

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 111

Body & Mind

PRE-MENSTRUAL SYNDROME DOES IT NEED TO SPOIL YOUR LIFE?

Joanna Hazelton MARH RHom

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re-menstrual Syndrome (PMS) is a collection of symptoms, both physical and emotional, which affect many women in the days leading up to their menstrual period, for anything from two to 14 days. Probably the most common symptoms are migraines, engorged and tender breasts, fluid retention, constipation, diarrhoea, cravings, skin breakouts, night sweats and joint pain, but there are others.

As if the above symptoms were not enough, women can also experience irritability, bouts of depression, anxiety and panic attacks, even intense anger. They may experience paranoia, may feel unattractive or experience feelings of not being ‘good enough’, or they may find themselves weeping from the slightest cause.

Like the physical symptoms, the emotional symptoms experienced range in intensity and expression.

PMS symptoms usually occur when hormones become abnormally out of balance so it is worth being aware of some of the factors that contribute to this imbalance: • Stressful life • Poor diet • Sedentary lifestyle • Alcohol, caffeine, sugar consumption • Disturbed intestinal microflora • Hormones in conventional meats and dairy products • Preservatives, chemicals, and pesticides in foods • Environmental pollution Some women are more predisposed to hormonal imbalances. While reducing stress and eating healthily is important, and will contribute to balance, there are gentle therapeutic options that have been found to be effective. In my practice I use Homeopathy and the Bowen Technique, separately or together depending 112 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

upon the individual. They have proved to be very successful in ‘gentling’ my patients’ bodies and psyches back into balance.

Homeopathy has a good track record of helping many thousands of women with PMS worldwide. The holistic nature of homeopathy means each person is treated as a unique individual and their body, mind, spirit and emotions are all considered. Taking all these factors into account, the most appropriate medicine is selected based on the patient’s individual specific symptoms and personal level of health to stimulate their own healing ability. The deeply healing powers of homeopathy can assist in empowering women to break the vicious cycle of PMS. The Bowen Technique is a natural, drug-free, non-invasive therapy which prides itself on being able to trigger the body’s own healing systems and has the capacity to correct the underlying imbalances on a deeper level, and on a more permanent basis. Rather than ‘making’ the body change, Bowen ‘asks’ the body to recognise and make the changes it requires. With primarily fingers and thumbs, small, rolling movements are made over muscles, tendons, ligaments and soft tissue at precise points on the body. Between each set of moves, the body is allowed to rest for a few minutes, allowing it to absorb the information it has received and initiate the healing process. The technique can help a whole range of problems including PMS, other menstrual problems, fertility, muscle and joint pain, sports injuries, back pain, stress, high blood pressure, hay fever, arthritis, MS and migraine. hazeltontherapies.com 56londonroad.co.uk

MAINTAINING DIGNITY

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Vickie Macintosh, Celebrant

eovil Crematorium has made the difficult decision to suspend public services at the moment. This means that Direct Cremation is the only option now. Direct Cremation is when a body is taken for cremation without a service. It goes without saying that losing a loved one is heart-wrenching and we seek solace in the traditions that we have been used to. A funeral is an expected ritual which helps us come to terms with the loss. We are having to think of alternative ways of offering a meaningful goodbye at the moment. For example, I will be conducting a short committal ceremony in the car park for some people, offering a recorded ceremony, a virtual ceremony and the chance for people to have memorial services later on. Without being trite, it is a true privilege to assist families and funeral directors who are working so hard to find ways of saying a dignified farewell in such challenging times. Burials as I write are still going ahead but with severe restrictions on numbers and open caskets are banned as are wakes. Do share a thought for all those working in the funeral sector. Dignity and comfort is our main objective and will continue to be during these time. Funeral directors are working so hard to find ways of conducting funerals in alternative ways that give relatives more than a drop-off service. Challenging times indeed. @vmcelebrant

Yeovil Sherborne & District

Join our team of amazing volunteers Volunteer with us To find out more and apply, visit

samaritans.org/volunteer Call 01935 414 015 Email yeovil@samaritans.org @Yeovilsams2 Samaritans of Yeovil, Sherborne & District is a registered charity.

Health Clinic • Acupuncture • Osteopathy • Counselling • Physiotherapy • EMDR Therapy • Shiatsu • Podiatry and Chiropody • Soft Tissue Therapy, Sports

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www.56londonroad.co.uk Email: info@56londonroad.co.uk 56 London Road, Milborne Port, Sherborne DT9 5DW Free Parking and Wheelchair access sherbornetimes.co.uk | 113

Body & Mind

IRRITABLE BOWEL SYNDROME HOW TO HELP

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Dr Tim Robinson MB BS MSc MRCGP DRCOG MFHom GP & Complementary Practitioner

rritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) is an extremely common condition that affects a third of the population to some degree at any one time.

The symptoms of IBS are abdominal bloating and cramps, gurgling of tummy, alternating bowel function between constipation and diarrhoea, often with urgency.

If you suspect you have IBS you should consult your GP in order to exclude other bowel conditions such as diverticulitis, colitis and, most importantly, bowel cancer – blood in the motions and weight loss would be symptoms that would suggest this and must be reported to your GP. Unfortunately the cause of IBS is not known but it can be associated with intolerance of the intestines to specific food materials, food allergy and oversensitive nerves in your gut, as well as stress. As there is no single cause for IBS, there is no single test for it – your GP may want to do a blood test for Coeliac Disease and a stool sample for colitis and infection.

IBS can be managed by medication, diet and lifestyle measures. If your main symptoms are bloating and cramps, try to eat porridge for breakfast, with a tablespoon of linseed sprinkled on top, and avoid foods such as cabbage, broccoli, brussels sprouts and onions as these are difficult to digest. If your main symptom is diarrhoea, cut down on high-fibre foods – whole grain foods such as brown bread and brown rice, nuts and seeds. If constipation is your main problem, increase your fibre intake by eating oats, pulses, carrots and peeled potatoes.

If the above do not improve the symptoms, your GP may prescribe an anti-spasmodic or a drug that calms the nerves of the gut such as Amitriptyline or

114 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Citalopram – these are anti-depressants which the GP will have prescribed for their effect on the gut lining nerves, not because the GP thinks you are depressed.

Studies have shown that IBS symptoms can be relieved with Probiotic supplementation, preferably by delayed-release capsules containing 20 billion Lactobacillus and Bifidobacter. Grapefruit seed extract has been shown to kill off over half of pathogenic bacteria.

To eliminate food intolerance or allergy to specific food triggers as the cause of IBS, simple allergy testing as well as elimination of the foods that trigger those symptoms can be helpful.

Complementary medicine can be helpful in the treatment of IBS. Studies have shown the homeopathic medicines Lycopodium and Aloes to be effective. Herbal remedies such as peppermint oil and artichoke leaf extract can also be helpful, especially for abdominal distension.

As stress can be a cause for IBS, this should be considered and attended to. Counselling can be helpful, particularly CBT. Mind/body techniques such as meditation and mindfulness can help – have a look at www.headspace.com which is an excellent on-line tool for teaching people techniques to help with stress, sleep, anxiety and focus. As I say to many of my patients, exercise is a cheap, easily accessible and effective medicine for all of the above – get out for a run or brisk walk in the country! Hopefully a combination of these medicines, supplements and life-style measures will help those troublesome IBS symptoms. doctorTWRobinson.com glencairnHouse.co.uk

Brister&Son Independent Family Funeral Directors

When your family suffers the loss of a loved one, we are here to support, guide and reassure you – every step of the way Call Daniel on 01935 812647 100 Lenthay Road, Sherborne DT9 6AG Email: daniel@wsbrister.com www.wsbrister.com

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 115

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Legal

COVID-19: SUPPORT FOR THOSE IN LATER LIFE

Harriet Stanley, Later Life Support Team at Mogers Drewett

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he fallout from COVID-19 (coronavirus) is undoubtedly having a huge impact on us all but for those self-isolating who live alone and don't have the support of family or friends, the impact could be more widely felt. We believe now more than ever that we need to pull together to support our neighbours, friends and family members who may be struggling with the loneliness that inevitably comes with self-isolation.

In this article we want to highlight the growing number of services and community groups that have been set up to support local communities, with activities ranging from essential shopping errands to providing a friendly voice at the end of the phone. A list of local groups can be found online, via Covid-19 Mutual Aid, along with advice for those wanting to set up their own support groups to help local people.

Supermarket chains are also responding with services specifically tailored to older communities. For example, Sainsbury’s is providing over-70s and those with a disability priority access to online delivery slots while Iceland is dedicating shopping hours for those at higher risk of infection. Many supermarkets are also offering the option of no hand-to-hand contact for home deliveries, which will be left safely at your door.

Families and carers should meanwhile consider practical ways they can help, such as setting up family group chats, video calls and playing games together online. Picking up shopping or prescriptions will be 120 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

a huge support for any relatives or elderly neighbours unable to leave their homes for extended periods, where bags can be left on doorsteps to avoid the risk of infection. There are also apps such as Nextdoor that can be used to see if neighbours need assistance.

Ensuring plenty of physical activity for those who are stuck at home with reduced movement will be really important too; there are a number of online videos specifically designed for senior exercise or gentle stretching and movement. Getting up and walking about the house regularly will help increase blood flow and mental alertness. Nature is an effective way to lift spirits too: have plants inside the house to water and tend to, and open windows to let fresh air circulate.

For those able to donate to local groups that are supporting vulnerable members of the local community, there are several fundraising sites that are collecting donations, e.g. Age UK. Many local local charities are experiencing a drop-off in donations due to cancelled fundraising events, so financial support is also hugely welcomed to enable them to continue vital services and training of volunteer staff. Such organisations include food banks (also needing donated food), homeless shelters, community kitchens and mental health and social care charities. There has never been a more important time for us all to come together. mogersdrewett.com

EXPERT LAWYERS ON YOUR SIDE, AT YOUR SIDE. Forward-thinking legal advice on your doorstep Sherborne | Bath | Wells | Frome mogersdrewett.com | 01935 813 691

Finance

DON’T PANIC, CAPTAIN MAINWARING!

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Andrew Fort B.A. (Econ.) CFPcm Chartered MCSI APFS, Certified and Chartered Financial Planner, Fort Financial Planning

hese immortal words, from Lance Corporal (to give him his correct rank) Jones in the sitcom Dad’s Army, are very wise words in the world of investing. As I write this article the world is in fear of coronavirus and stock markets across the world are panicking, recording significant falls of the type not seen since the financial crisis in 2008. What should I do, I hear you say? Don’t panic! Corporal Jones spoke very wise words.

Some commentators, ever mindful of a sensational headline, suggest selling out of the market.

Unfortunately, unless you are possessed of accurate foresight (perhaps a fortune teller?), this is seldom sensible as markets are not always rational. While they are a good representation of future earnings prospects in the long term, they are exuberant and irrational in the short term.

Even if you managed to sell before the current crisis (which actually began last year) you then have to make another decision as to when is best to re-enter the markets.

Although we live in a global economy, markets react differently in different places. As an example, the UK market has gone down by around 14% during 2020. It is now roughly the level last seen in 2016. The US markets have only gone down by 10%. The US market is still significantly higher, even after this fall, than in 2016.

Not all investments will fall in value. Bonds, specifically index-linked gilts, have actually gone up in value by around 8% during 2020. A well-thought-out investment portfolio will be diversified across shares and bonds and will also be diversified globally as well.

While markets are extremely volatile from one day to the next, returns over longer periods of time are much more predictable. A relatively adventurous portfolio (60% shares, 40% bonds) would have returned around 9% every year, on average, over the last 31 years. The worst 5-year period over this same timeframe would still have seen an annualised return of just over 1%, not a lot different from cash.

As I have often talked about in this column, those people with a real financial plan are able to take risks that are likely to be rewarded. They will always keep a cash reserve for periods of great uncertainty such as we are currently experiencing. In this way they can wait for markets to recover, as we all hope and expect them to do, without selling their longer-term investments at completely the wrong time.

A real financial planner helps people to identify how much risk they will be comfortable with and, indeed, how high a return they need in the first place. People with a real financial plan will still feel anxiety during market turbulence but they will be better placed to withstand the shocks. ffp.org.uk

122 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 123

Tech

W

e are often asked to resolve email issues, especially where the user wants to use multiple devices such as a PC, laptop, smartphone and tablet. By the time clients get to us they’ve usually managed to tie themselves in knots and we have to start back at the beginning! To help understand the difficulty, let’s take a look at how email works.

Email, just like a text message on a mobile, is a piece of written text, maybe with attachments, that gets bundled up and sent to an email address elsewhere. Your device (PC, laptop etc) sends the message to your SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) server. The email then whooshes off to the intended recipient via the internet, where it arrives at the incoming mail server and drops neatly into the recipient’s mailbox on that server. That’s the easy bit. Now for the more complicated bit.

user. Importantly, this is a one-way transaction and, having been completed, the server is then cleared.

Most ISP-based email (BT, Tiscali, TalkTalk, Virgin) use this method.

3 IMAP Mail – again via a mail client but using IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) which allows multiple connections via multiple devices using two-way transactions. The mail is always stored on the server and each client replicates that information. In this way, if you “read” an email on one device, it shows as having been “read” on another device. Equally, if you send an email from one device, then that sent email is shown in the “sent items” folder of all other devices, ditto for deleted, drafts etc. All WebMail and good ISPs provide this functionality today.

The recipient has basically three ways of getting that email: 1 WebMail – all mail is stored on the server and is viewed as a webpage. Hotmail, Gmail & Yahoo were the pioneers of this technology and are probably still the most common. Most ISPs now provide this functionality with varying degrees of success but nearly all have on-page advertising that can be a real pain!

2 POP Mail – via a mail client such as Outlook, Windows Mail, MAC Mail, Thunderbird etc.

POP (Post Office Protocol) is where the client goes to the incoming mail server and says, “Hello, any mail for me?”. The server then sends any mail to the client and the mail is then viewable by the

This is where the knots usually get tied up: different devices using different protocols, with one PC using POP mail and clearing the server, one smartphone using IMAP and trying to replicate. If you have got yourself tied up in knots, most providers have help documents that describe in detail how to set-up each device properly. Just read carefully and follow the step-by-step instructions.

The choice as always, is yours, but if you think you need advice, you know where to come.

124 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Next month: Tablets - Life Without a PC or Laptop computing-mp.co.uk

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Community

INSPIRATIONAL MENTORING Jackie Foley

P

ROMISEworks provides inspirational and intensive one-to-one mentoring to some of Somerset’s most disadvantaged and vulnerable young people between the ages of 5 and 25. These children/young adults are on the edge of care or have just left the care system. The charity became fully operational at the end of April 2017 and has four, highly experienced paid staff. Above them is an experienced trustee board. The staff are responsible for finding and training mentors, dealing with referrals of children/young adults from other agencies, assigning mentors to mentees and supervising the mentors.

Our large bank of unpaid volunteers from across Somerset, plus a number on the Somerset/ 128 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Dorset border, are from all walks of life and help to build up a young person’s sense of self-worth and confidence. They undergo an intensive, four-day training programme and commit to a minimum of 2 years with their young person, which ensures the best chance of a constant presence and a likelihood of developing trust, stability and calm, in contrast to the mentee’s normal life experience. Experience has shown that many of the relationships that the charity has supported last beyond 2 years. Our non-judgemental emphasis is on developing a mentee’s capabilities and potential, and on developing trust. Experience has shown that these children/young adults are equally as vulnerable as children in care because they either live

in dysfunctional families or are on their own, having recently left care. At the end of 2019, we had 77 of the most disadvantaged children and young people in Somerset in long-term mentoring relationships, with another 75 referrals waiting to be matched. It is expected that the number of mentees will increase steadily to 150 by the end of November 2021.

The average cost of providing the mentoring service is currently budgeted to be only £1,500 per annum per mentee. This compares with costs of £60,000 to £300,000 per annum if a child enters the care system, and up to £150,000 per annum if the child enters the criminal justice system. Recently, Yeo Valley Canteen in Blagdon generously hosted

an event which welcomed over 100 key business people, raising over £10,500 for the charity and, more importantly, spreading the word about the work we do. PROMISEworks is also fortunate to have been a beneficiary of the Sherborne Castle Country Fair for the last 2 years. This generous support has been invaluable to us.

We are always looking for volunteers to become ambassadors, fundraisers and mentors. If you could help in any way please visit our website and get in touch. promiseworks.org.uk Facebook/Twitter @PROMISEworks #helpourpromisework sherbornetimes.co.uk | 129

IN CONVERSATION WITH

JOHN STANFIELD David Birley DB 6th April this year is a very important date for you as it marks your 100th birthday. While this is a remarkable achievement you have also led a remarkable life. Let’s start at the beginning. What was your childhood like?

JS I was born in China where both my parents were missionaries; they were there for forty years interspersed with visits back home. My mother was a teacher and my three sisters and I were taught by her. I had a very good and interesting childhood. My father had a large province to look after; it was the size of the UK and home to sixty million Chinese. There were no roads, just paths. In 1931 I was sent to boarding school at Kingswood in Bath. I was there for eight years and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was good at games and played in the school teams. I left just before war was declared and started a degree in physics and chemistry at Liverpool university.

DB How did your army career evolve?

JS When I was called up I wanted to join the navy but was told that I would be wasted there and my talents would be much better used in the army in the Royal Signals. I was posted to Catterick and taught how to 130 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

march and salute. I was then selected for OCTU – officer cadet training unit - and after eight months was commissioned Second Lieutenant. I was then promoted to full Lieutenant and trained a wireless operating section of forty men in preparation to go abroad.

We embarked on the Strathaird, a magnificent ship, and set sail not knowing where we were going. After a brief stop in Cape Town we went to Durban to await a convoy for India. On arrival in Bombay we went by train for two days to the north. After a training course at Jhansi I was transferred to GHQ India which was based in Delhi and under the command of Lord Mountbatten.

I was getting rather bored and asked the Postings Officer about possibilities for signals officers going to China as I knew some Chinese. I then met Colonel Jackie Nott, the chief signal officer of Force 136, who said he would see what he could do. Force 136 was SOE. DB What was SOE? JS The letters stand for Special Operations Executive.

It was the forerunner of today’s SAS and carried out covert operations behind enemy lines. Perhaps its best-known action was destroying the Norwegian

heavy water plant which was needed by Germany for producing atomic bombs. This was immortalised in the film Heroes of Telemark. SOE also played a large part in supporting the Normandy landings.

DB What was the next stage?

JS I was promoted to Captain and we travelled eight hundred miles to Calcutta, the hottest place I have ever been with 100% humidity. We were then flown over the “Hump”, the Himalayas, to Kunming and then moved to the forward base in Kweilin. This meant a five-hundredmile journey on Chinese roads and took five days.

You should remember that the Japanese had invaded China in 1937 and their force in China at the time of the surrender was over 700,000 men. The Chinese were our allies, though the situation was complicated as there were both government and communist troops. The war has been called the Asian Holocaust and is estimated to have accounted for between ten and twenty-five million Chinese civilians and over four million Chinese and Japanese military personnel dying from war-related violence, famine and other causes.

The Japanese launched a big offensive, bigger than Burma, and we had to evacuate firstly Kweilin and then Kunming. This caused us signals men a few problems as we had to charge our batteries. We were given steam generators but no fuel to fire them. My boss was recalled to Ceylon and I was now in charge of China signals.

I moved up to Sian, where the terracotta army is. I then set up wireless stations on the Yellow River, opposite the Japanese positions. We were busy planning a guerrilla army to go behind Japanese lines when one night there was a lot of noise outside my billet. I learnt that this was because of the news about the bombing of Hiroshima.

I was at the end of the line, 1,000 miles from my China base in Kunming and 3,000 miles from SOE HQ in Ceylon and so found myself the senior British officer.

I was then flown to Peking where I signed the official surrender of the Japanese forces. This was a tremendous do which took place on the Dragon Pavement in front of the Grand Coronation Palace and was watched by 100,000 Chinese.

I then had the problem of how to get out of China.

Luckily I met Churchill’s representative, General Carton de Wiart, who got me back to Hong Kong. General Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart VC was an extraordinary chap.

He served in the Boer War and both World Wars. He was shot in the face, head, stomach, ankle, hip and ear.

He survived two plane crashes, tunnelled out of a POW camp and tore off his own fingers when a doctor refused to amputate them.

DB What happened after the war?

JS On my return to the UK I went to Trinity College Cambridge to read economics. While there I was accepted into the Methodist ministry and then read theology. I had a great time and played rugger for the college.

When I left I could not go to China as all missionaries had been banned so I was sent to the Gambia. I spent seven years there and became Chairman, the equivalent of bishop. Gambia was a very old mission and home to many different Africans. This was because, after slavery was abolished, the navy repatriated the Africans they found on slave ships to the Gambia and Sierra Leone, hence the name of the capital, Freetown.

On my return to the UK I married and because my wife, who had been teaching in India, had had dysentery very badly I could not go to the tropics. I had a very happy time as minister at various places in the UK. DB What important lessons have you learnt along the way?

JS Man’s inhumanity to man. I saw a lot of cruelty in the Far East.

DB What changes have you seen?

JS So many! While the quality of life has certainly improved there is a lack of community spirit and caring for neighbours. There is too much emphasis on the individual and too little time for each other.

DB Do you have a wish for Sherborne?

JS There is too much of what I would term a socioeconomic divide. The congregation at my church is very different to that of the Abbey. We need to pull together and help each other more. sherbornetimes.co.uk | 131

Short Story

BEHIND BARS Wormwood Scrubs Dear Sis,

Jan Garner, Sherborne Scribblers

Well, another day has gone by and the jury is still out. I don’t know whether that’s a good sign or not, but I am trying to stay positive. It’s ironic, isn’t it, given my job, that I’m now the one behind bars. I’d laugh if it wasn’t so damn serious. You know, I’ve spent 25 years working with dangerous animals but, believe me, the ones in this hell-hole are far scarier. Fortunately, not all the inmates are psychopaths. My cellmate, Macintosh, who’s halfway through a ten-year stretch for forgery, is a real gent and quite a scholar. I can’t help but like him.

He’s given me a crash course in prison etiquette and I’m following his advice and keeping a low profile.

It was quite a surprise when I saw you being interviewed on the six o’clock news last night. I’m sorry; it can’t have been easy defending me in front of that pack of wolves outside the court. But thanks for giving them such a mouthful. I had to smile; I didn’t know you knew such language. There was I thinking I was the fiery one in the family.

Seriously though, the blokes in here don’t think much of my chances of getting off. A few of them have had dealings with that smarmy prosecution barrister before. They reckon he’s the most formidable silk practising today. They took great pleasure in telling me that he hasn’t lost a case in years. That’s cheered me up no end!

I suppose that’s why His Lordship and the board appointed him. But actually, I don’t think His Lordship believes I’m guilty. Did you notice when he was giving his evidence how he emphasised what a good employee I was and how passionate I was about the work at his beloved Safari Park? He didn’t say anything bad about me at all. Not surprising really because I always got on well with him. He’s a decent person.

Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for his wife; she’s the one who calls the shots.

I blame her for all of this. None of it would have happened if I had taken over as planned when Joe retired. After all, he’d trained me to become the head keeper. But Her Ladyship insisted on giving the job to that arrogant nephew of theirs. It didn’t make sense, for goodness sake, he was only was just out of Uni; too wet behind the ears for all that responsibility. Ok, so he had a degree in animal psychology, but that didn’t make him Dr Flipping Doolittle, did it?

Of course, I was upset, furious even. I’d worked hard for that promotion and it didn’t help that I was the one who had to show that idiot Julian the ropes. Yes, I was resentful, tell me who wouldn’t be. But that barrister with his fancy words played on that in his closing statement to the jury. He painted me as a man so bitter at being overlooked that I’d planned my rival’s murder. What was it he said? That I’d acted with malice aforethought? What a load of rubbish.

Like I told the court, that day had started like any other. We had gone down to the lions’ enclosure to check on Bella and her new cubs. After we’d manoeuvred the new mother into the holding pen, Julian went in to check on the babies. I told him not to be too long; Bella was pacing up and down and getting restless.

But, as usual, the cocky devil took no notice of me and wasted time messing around with each cub before shouting for me to open the gate. By then Bella had begun to bang herself against the grill.

I can see what happened next in slow motion; the horror in his eyes as he heard the grating sound of the bolt on the grill as it slid back and the clank of the metal panel going up. He stood like a statue, frozen in time as Bella roared. It was all over in seconds.

The next thing I remember was being questioned by the police, but I couldn’t explain it. I’d opened and closed those electric gates a million times over the years.

But don’t worry about me Sis, I’m optimistic. I still maintain that it was an accident. Pure and simple.

I pressed the wrong button. And that is the only thing they can prove me guilty of.

Love Tomo x 132 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 133

Literature

LITERARY REVIEW Frances Walker

The Lost Pianos of Siberia by Sophy Roberts (Doubleday), RRP: £18.99 Sherborne Times Reader Offer Price of £17.99 from Winstone’s Books

S

ophy Roberts is a travel writer who went to Siberia in March 2016 to track the elusive Siberian tiger. During the previous summer, however, she had been staying with a German friend, Franz-Christoph Giercke, and his family who spent their summers in nomads’ tents out in the remote Mongolian steppe, not far from the Siberian border. Also staying with them was Odgerel Sampilnorov, a Mongolian pianist who gave recitals on 134 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Giercke’s Yamaha baby grand, but Giercke was becoming irritated by the sound of his modern Yamaha. One evening, writes Sophy, he ‘leaned over and whispered in my ear his frustration, “We must find her one of the lost pianos of Siberia”.’

Roberts’ skill as a travel writer captures the reader’s imagination. We can feel the breathtaking cold, be struck by ‘a crab-apple tree, its fruit ruby-red like drops

of blood against the snow’ and despair at the derelict settlements of ‘housing blocks missing their windows, the glass blown out so they resembled skulls with empty eye sockets.’ We criss-cross Siberia, covering remote areas from the Ural Mountains to the Yamal Peninsula in the Polar Circle, from Irkutsk near Lake Baikal to Kamchatka Peninsula on the Pacific Ocean, following the helpful maps at the start of each chapter.

The trail itself is not only an adventure story but a fascinating history of Siberia, incorporating the development of a passion for the piano from the time of Catherine the Great. We read of aristocratic political prisoners after the failed Decembrists’ Revolution of 1825, and the wife of Prince Sergei Volkonsky, for example, who insisted on accompanying her husband into exile, taking her clavichord from Moscow, four thousand miles across the Siberian taiga.

Sophy Roberts discovers harrowing stories of cruelty and hardship but also remarkable courage and resilience.

She encounters dead ends, silences and suspicion as well as survivors with stories to tell. Lydiya, a frail old lady living on sinister Sakhalin Island, fondly recalled her father who had played home-made instruments and

conducted an orchestra and a choir. On Lydiya’s table in her meagre living room was a single fresh narcissus, lit up by a shaft of sunlight. The author had not found the piano she had been searching for, ‘I had found love and humanity instead – in the last house at the end of the last street at the dead end of Russia.’

There is Stanislav Dobrovolskiy, a thin, elderly man who had survived the Siege of Leningrad as a child. He had tuned the Mülbach grand which had belonged to a famous pianist, Vera Shevchenko. Piano tuners proved to be a vital connection to the lost pianos, the three generations of the delightful Lomatchenko family being an important example.

There are poignant descriptions of the lives of political prisoners condemned to live in the gulags, forced to work in mines or construct railways in temperatures as low as minus 40, surviving on meagre rations of frozen bread, and yet still able to keep their music alive by singing or playing instruments.

One is drawn ineluctably into the quest, hoping that Roberts will succeed in her search. I leave you to read this disturbing, moving and fascinating book for yourself to find out the answer.

sherbornetimes.co.uk | 135

TAKE YOUR TIME

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136 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

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sherbornetimes.co.uk | 137

PAUSE FOR THOUGHT Diane Tregale, Chaplain, The Gryphon School

T

here are some events that happen in life that change us forever. The birth of a baby, the death of a loved one, a life-altering illness or injury, an unexpected inheritance. Many of these are completely unplanned and can take us by surprise.

None of us will forget the devastation and fear of 7/7, the bombing of the ‘Twin Towers’, the Ariane Grande concert in Manchester, or the Boxing Day tsunami.

Such momentous events mean that life will never be the same again.

As we welcomed in the New Year, who (apart perhaps from Bill Gates who predicted something like COVID-19 back in 2015) could possibly have imagined that 4 months later a giant pause button would be pressed – not just locally or even nationally, but all around the world? That a virus on the scale of the 1918 flu pandemic would force whole communities into lockdown. That within the space of a few short weeks, everything that was familiar and often taken for granted would change. And we should never be the same again.

This evening I went to a supermarket – to buy as much food as I could to help refill the almost empty shelves of the Sherborne Food Bank. Basic necessities are still harder to come by, but there was an abundance of chocolate eggs and huge portions of turkey – it all seemed rather incongruous. Perhaps this Easter these traditions will take a back seat. Maybe the events of that first Easter will find a greater resonance with our souls.

The remembrance that Jesus was nailed to a Roman cross, facing social humiliation and isolation from God as he died in our place. And the trumpeting message of hope as Jesus was raised to life three days later, defeating death and bringing hope from desolation and suffering.

Fulfilling the promise given to a grieving sister ‘I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die.’

138 | Sherborne Times | April 2020

Easter is a message of hope. Out of the suffering, confusion and pain a new reality was born.

Perhaps the same might be true in our situation.

Perhaps we will never refer to key workers as ‘unskilled’ again. Perhaps we will be generous and protective towards those facing financial, relational or health struggles. There has never been a better time to support the Food Bank, the NHS, Sherborne Viral Kindness and others. In these initiatives, hope shines in a dark situation.

As my teenage son reminded me this evening, after a tragedy beauty often emerges. Many significant advances in aviation safety have followed plane crashes. After the horror and bloodshed of WWII, UNICEF was formed because lessons were learned about the imperative need to understand each other and work together, and the Geneva convention still stands today.

None of us would have wanted this pause button to be pressed. We are battling against circumstances outside of our control. Yet in the midst there are valuable things we can learn. We can reassess our priorities and think about our relationships and how we use our time.

The simple things in life take centre stage – food on the table, a daily walk, the beauty around us. And the humbling and awe-inspiring realisation that we can make a positive difference to people. At the heart of this season is Easter with the message of hope, new life, forgiveness and eternal life. After this crisis has passed, our NHS will still be doing its amazing work, as will the Food Bank. Perhaps the respect and courtesy for each other, the kindness and community spirit, the gratitude for those who produce our food will also endure. Perhaps we will never be quite the same again. stpauls-sherborne.org.uk gryphon.dorset.sch.uk

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