Wythenshawe Hall. (2023, December 3). In Wikipedia By Dave Smethurst, CC BY-SA 2.0, image here The Tatton family had a deer park in Wythenshawe, then Cheshire, as far back as 1297. However, the present Hall dates to about 1540 when Robert Tatton was the head of the family. The Tattons were relatively minor Cheshire gentry.… Continue reading Wythenshawe Hall
Tag: railways
Buckden Bishop’s Palace
A few years back I wrote about Buckden Towers in Cambridgeshire, the old palace of the Bishops of Lincoln. Finally, with the pandemic receding, I was able to visit the site in its small village (once a thriving place in coaching times and earlier but much diminished with the advent of the railways.) Here Richard… Continue reading Buckden Bishop’s Palace
The Maldon Embroidery
The first thing to notice about this is that is an embroidery not a tapestry, although the “Bayeux Tapestry” is also an embroidery ie hand-stitched. It was constructed to mark the millennium of the 991 Battle of Maldon, at which Vikings, possibly under Olaf Tryggvason, defeated and killed the Saxon Earldorman Brythnoth. It is displayed… Continue reading The Maldon Embroidery
Model Railways and Britain from Above….
On the BBC news channel recently there was an item about Pete Waterman (of Stock Aitkin and Waterman fame) and his beloved model railway, which is spectacular and will feature in an upcoming showing of Timeshift on BBC 4. The episode in question is in Series 12, episode 7 of 10, entitled “The… Continue reading Model Railways and Britain from Above….
Rob Bell explains …
“Walking Britain’s Lost Railways” is back, for a fourth series, starting in Yorkshire. As well as walking the former York to Hull route, Bell explains why the East Coast Main Line, as it now is, passes through York and not Leeds, although the latter is now more than four times larger. This situation, in which… Continue reading Rob Bell explains …
The HS2 Murder Mystery
Just as the construction Crossrail exposed human burial grounds, so has HS2. Here, in Wendover, Buckinghamshire we have an Iron Age burial that is likely to have followed a murder, possibly a ritual murder, or an execution. An Iron Age man was discovered, face down, his unusual position indicating that he was most likely bound… Continue reading The HS2 Murder Mystery
London: 2000 years of history (channel 5)
Who let Dan Jones out? At least, as in his last outing, he is accompanied both by a historian (Suzannah Lipscomb) and an engineer (Rob Bell), narrating and illustrating almost two millennia of the city’s past. In the first episode, we were taken through the walled city of “Londinium” being built and rebuilt after Boudicca’s… Continue reading London: 2000 years of history (channel 5)
Today Flinders; who might it be tomorrow….?
Who else might be waiting to be discovered? Which great figures from the past, thought to be lost forever, are just lying there impatiently, wondering when we’ll get around to them? How many tombs, destroyed by Henry VIII’s love life, might yet be retrieved…? Oh, we hardly dare wish! Richard III was found, and just… Continue reading Today Flinders; who might it be tomorrow….?
A very busy presenter
Rob Bell seems to be on television a lot at the moment. Although he is an engineer and not quite a historian, many of his programmes go back in time as structures were built. Walking Britain’s Lost Railways, for instance, goes back under two centuries because of the subject matter, but Great British Ships (both Channel… Continue reading A very busy presenter
Feuding and fighting.
I am currently reading a book about the reconstruction of the Welsh Highland Railway. For those who don’t know, this was a narrow gauge line that lay completely derelict (all track lifted) for more than 70 years. Eventually, after a hideously complex and titanic struggle against the odds, it was rebuilt and you can now… Continue reading Feuding and fighting.
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