12 November 2020

Belton

All Saints Church, Belton

Clint and I were in Belton, North Lincolnshire today. I parked safely by All Saints Church and set off on an eight mile circular walk that I had worked out on Wednesday night. 

It was a lovely day for mid-November. Plenty of good light for photography. I didn't even need to wear a coat - the temperature was so balmy and there was hardly a breath of wind. 

East of Belton an obelisk was marked on the Ordnance Survey map. It was half-hidden by spindly trees. I ventured into the little wood to investigate. Though there are no inscriptions on the stonework, I later discovered that the thirty foot tower was constructed under the instructions of a Mr William Johnson in 1787.

Apparently it was built as a memorial to Johnson's favourite horse - Sir Solomon that had been euthanised following a serious hunting accident. Weirdly, it is said that Johnson shot his two favourite hounds so that they could be buried with the horse.

The Johnsons lived in a grand house called Temple Belwood that is no more. I understand that it was finally demolished when the M180 motorway was constructed in the nineteen seventies. That house took many historical secrets with it though it had been crumbling away when it received its final  coup de grâce.

Anyway, to give you a flavour of my walk I am posting five photos and the last one is of the obelisk in the woods. I wonder if Mr Johnson was as generous to his tenant farmers as he was to himself when bewailing Sir Solomon's death. Doubt it somehow.

Disused railway viaduct over South Engine Drain

Under the M180 Motorway

Doorway in  Westgate
The Obelisk

35 comments:

  1. A new art, river graffiti: Be Happy ... Flow.
    All Saints Church is where we would all like to sit for an hour, alone.

    The disused railway viaduct drew my eye: Victorian engineering needs to be Listed.

    In 1983 I read a Penguin (first) novel, The Viaduct, by David Wheldon. It was praised by Graham Greene and William Trevor. Last year I found a hardback copy for £1.
    The author is a doctor whose research online has taken him into Multiple Sclerosis and Chlamydophilia pneumoniae.
    His novel is about an unnamed European country (England and not England) which has torn itself apart: echoes of post-Trump America. Droves of vagrant men wander the countryside, walking along the disused viaduct of the title.
    Written in spare prose, with echoes of Kafka and Beckett, the story leaves enough space for the reader to think about and live inside. And there is wit and a strange gnomic wisdom. Recommended.

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    1. That novel sounds right for me. My kind of thing.

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    2. I ordered a copy of *Prosper's Demon* by K.J. Parker from my local bookseller in Hyndland Road. This novella of 100 pages was published in New York.
      I was charged just £8.99. The paperback is worth it for the cover art alone.

      Parker is an English novelist who is developing a cult following. His book was reviewed on YouTube by a young American woman, Rachel, who signs in as Kalanadi. She is very clever and charming and reads a ton.

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    3. YouTube.
      *Weekly Wrap-Up/ February 23, 2020.*
      Kalanadi.

      Rachel reviewed *Prosper's Demon: It was the cover illustration that grabbed me.
      I still remember Ray Hawkey's Penguin cover of *Funeral in Berlin* which I read as a schoolboy. I still have the hardback of Deighton's *Bomber* which has a detail of the full moon by Turner. Len's best novel by far, and to think he is still alive and living in California.

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  2. YouTube: *London Viaduct Tavern Haunted.*
    AmysCrypt. August 22, 2018.

    The Viaduct Tavern is where the Ghost Club meets regularly.
    The pub is part of Holburn viaduct, another example of Victorian engineering, and like many London theatres, is said to be home to the Undead as well as the living. There's an online article about the Ghost Club's findings.

    I love ghost stories.
    As Mandy Rice-Davies famously remarked, *Well he would, wouldn't he?*

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    1. I don't love ghost stories but I love sausage rolls.

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    2. My sister once lived near Malmesbury in Wiltshire. She and her late husband loved the sausages in one of the town pubs. My parents went down and thought these sausages as good as any they had tasted from the best butchers in Scotland. My mother never drank, but my father liked his English bitter, which he judged superior to the gassy beer of Scotland. Now we have real ales.

      Finally I visited Malmesbury myself, and in the pub garden I had sausages and chips in a basket, with a pint of local brew. As good as any meal I have eaten in Paris or Rome.

      As for ghosts, try BBC2's classic adaption of a story by the great M.R. James, *Whistle and I'll Come to You* directed by Jonathan Miller. It is part of a DVD box set.
      Ideal viewing on St. Stephen's Night, with beer and sausages.

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  3. Looks like you had a bight fall day for your walk. Some of these old guys had far too much money to spend on themselves. Some more of it should have been shared with others.

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    1. They were brilliant at evading taxation and keeping it all for themselves. No wonder so many palatial homes were built on sprawling country estates.

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  4. Looks like a lovely day, no snow, blue skies. You're rubbing my face in it, aren't you:)

    He must have really loved that horse. I gather there isn't another obelisk to honour his wife?

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    1. Women are okay but you can't beat a faithful horse.

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  5. To shoot his two favourite hounds to keep his dead horse company does seem a bit drastic. Still, people do (seemingly, though not necessarily so) strange things when grief stricken.

    As to the Graffiti: I don't particularly like when told to be happy - despite the fact that I am largely happy by nature. Therefore the last thing I'd say to someone who is down in the mouth "be happy". As if anyone would deliberately refuse themselves to be happy.

    However, "flow", yes, now we are talking. Go with it. Don't get caught in the undergrowth. Though occasionally, not least when we are salmon, we need to swim UPstream.

    U

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    1. I was wondering if "Flow" was actually an instruction to the little river below - The River Torne. I know what you mean about "Be Happy". You can't just switch it on.

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  6. This post and the photos have touched me in different ways; this is nor the time nor place to elaborate. Just let me say that I feel very attracted to the disused viaduct; is it open to walk on?

    Your mentioning of "an eight mile circular walk that I had worked out on Wednesday night" made me wonder - how is it that you determin where you want to walk? You have probably told us before, but I have forgotten.

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    1. It's all about the designated paths Meike. I look at Ordnance Survey mapping and see if I can do a big circle. This isn't always possible.

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  7. I particularly like the one of the porch and wreath on the door.

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    1. The way the sun was catching that scene - I just had to line up my camera. The house is called "Thornlea".

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  8. Excellent photos, as always, YP. Something of a sad tale, harking back to the days when a man thought more of his horse than he probably did of the people he employed.

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    1. It must be so nice to have enough money to build a thirty foot obelisk on a whim.

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  9. Interesting the obelisk in the wood to the horse who died as a result of a hunting accident. I suspect that there was a myth in the mind of William Johnson, the horse and dogs hunting in the wilds of heaven ;) Always a story..

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    1. You may be right Thelma but it is hardly a Christian notion.

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  10. Shouldn't he also have shot himself to ride his horse and hunt with his hounds in the wilds of heaven?

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    1. I have just re-read "The Bible" and have found no reference whatsoever to fox hunting in heaven. However, the notion is rather sweet - though not for the heavenly foxes!

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    2. All animals should have credence in the eye of the Lord! Funnily enough round East Yorkshire there are chariot burials from the Iron Age, and in a nearby one, Pocklington, there were two ponies supposedly riding out of the grave buried upright but with heads removed - riding to an Iron Age Valhalla maybe.

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    3. How could they get there without heads? Apart from anything else, that's where a pony's eyes are housed.

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  11. Why didn't Johnson just get in the grave with horse and shoot himself? Would have been a more perfect way to show his grief if you ask me.
    Which no one did.
    Beautiful photos, as always.

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  12. Of course I had to wander off on my own tangent to look at Temple Belwood. I won't make mention that a more appropriate tribute to the death of his house would have been to shoot himself since many people have already pointed it out.

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  13. Replies
    1. I hope you enjoyed delving into that particular rabbit hole Debby.

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  14. Great photos. How many disused railway lines and viaducts must there be.

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  15. Interesting about the obelisk -- but how horrible that he shot the dogs for no good reason!

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