From Flanders Fields

The Louise-Marie, a Karel Doorman-class frigate of the Belgian Navy, arrived in London on Friday 29th November with seventy sandbags filled with soil from the battlefields of Flanders. The ‘sacred soil’ was gathered from 70 battlefields and cemeteries in Flanders and will be used in the new Flanders Fields memorial garden which is under construction at Wellington Barracks in London.

The procession makes its way through the city

The gun carriage with 70 sandbags of ‘sacred soil’

It seemed strangely appropriate that sunrise a day later should deliver a short-lived spread of clouds, glowing red in the morning sky, with their reflection turning the Thames red. A couple of hours later the sandbags were piped off HMS Belfast and onto a waiting gun carriage which was to be hauled by the King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery, with the Household Cavalry Mounted Regiment providing an escort.

The Belgian warship’s stay in London was to be short, with departure scheduled for high tide on the morning of Monday 2nd December.

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Fifty years of hiding behind the sofa

Fifty years ago today the first episode of Doctor Who aired on the BBC, beginning a story that few could have imagined would endure in quite the way it has.

I first came across Doctor Who at the age of seven, in 1979, so it is perhaps no surprise that I identify the doctor with Tom Baker most strongly. The first story I have any distinct memory of is City of Death, featuring an alien plot to steal the Mona Lisa. Although it didn’t send me cowering behind the sofa, it still felt incredibly scary from a child’s perspective. Inevitably, I was hooked from that point on and the programme became a staple of our family viewing until the series was cancelled in 1989.

My childhood was all the richer for the inclusion of Doctor Who, even if it did give me the occasional nightmare about Daleks! It is rather strange to think that a generation of children have grown up between 1989 and 2005 without the delights of following our quintessentially British hero on his travels through time and space.

Terror of the sink plunger

One of my most striking memories is, rather ironically, of not watching Doctor Who. In 1984 the series was broadcast on weekday evenings and this unfortunately meant a clash with the Cub Scout group I went to with my brother each week – absolute catastrophe! Not having a video recorder at this time, my mother dutifully made an audio recording on tape recorder so that we could catch up afterwards. Let me tell you, Resurrection of the Daleks is a pretty hard story to fathom from just the audio track…

It is impossible to miss the news of today’s anniversary which will culminate in the broadcast of a special episode on television and at over 400 cinema screens across the world. I will be at a cinema in Shepherd’s Bush and this seems appropriate, given that this was the original home of Doctor Who (at the long since demolished Lime Grove Studios). I am sure it will be a great night but more than anything, I hope it is just one small marker in a much longer history that has many years still to run.

Unsurprisingly, there have been a number of bloggers marking the date. It’s worth checking out the post from Diamond Geezer on Doctor Who’s 50th Anniversary and IanVisits on Dr Who and the Curse of the London Underground. On top of that, the delight that is Adventures with the Wife in Space (the blog from a fan who persuaded his wife to watch every episode…) had a rather enjoyable post on first memories of Doctor Who a month ago which is worth revisiting.

Autumn steam

The prospect of good weather tempted us out into the countryside today, in the hope of making the most of the autumnal colours before the cold blast forecast for next week. It was easy to forget that winter could be almost upon us as we headed out to a perfect day of blue skies, gloriously golden leaves and unstinting sunshine.

Our short circular walk began at Kingscote in Sussex, one stop away from East Grinstead on the Bluebell Railway. I haven’t previously used this location as a jumping off point for a walk, so this was really a recce for next year (there are a number of walks around this area on the Bluebell Railway Walks website that look worth attempting).

SECR C-class No. 592 hauls a mid-afternoon train to East Grinstead

The route we followed today took us through the fringes of autumnal woodland as far as Birch Farm foot crossing before we circled back to Kingscote. We were never far from the railway line, catching glimpses of it throughout our walk. The woods were rich in wildlife and we were startled to see a stag galloping across the path in front of us at one point (we were later to see more deer racing across the fields, presumably startled by the trains).

At the foot crossing we were treated to the sight of South Eastern & Chatham Railway C-class No.592 hauling the beautiful Metropolitan Railway stock towards East Grinstead. The carriages were as much the stars of this consist as the locomotive and it is staggering to think that some of these were languishing as unloved bungalows not so many years ago! The Carriage & Wagon Department at the Bluebell Railway really has done a fine job here.

LMS Stanier Black 5 No. 45231 at Kingscote

We returned to East Grinstead on the 3.15pm train from Kingscote, hauled by LMS Stanier Black 5 No. 45231 ‘The Sherwood Forester’. The privately owned locomotive arrived at the Bluebell Railway on 22nd October 2013 and will be staying to bolster the home fleet until it returns to main-line duties in March 2014.

It may not have been the most ambitious of days out, but the trip was proof that the re-connection of the line to East Grinstead now offers the perfect combination of a pub lunch in East Grinstead followed by an afternoon of exercise in the countryside to work it off!

Bluebell explorers

One of the delightful side-effects of the Bluebell Railway’s re-connection to the mainline has been the emergence of Sheffield Park as a destination for charter trains. In the year to date there have been three steam-hauled charters, starting with Tornado’s visit on 10th September 2013. I missed that occasion but managed to catch the next two charters en-route to the Bluebell Railway.

The next charter to the Bluebell Railway was hauled by BR Britannia Class no. 70013 Oliver Cromwell, which blasted through Bletchley rather magnificently at 11:01am on 2nd November 2013. The tour was pretty neat in design, as it ran from one preserved railway to another (having started at Bridgnorth on the Severn Valley Railway). Unfortunately, the weather was rather dreadful by the time it arrived at the Bluebell Railway.

Oliver Cromwell hauls the Bluebell Explorer through Bletchley on 2nd November 2013

The third charter stuck to southern metals, running from London Victoria to Sheffield Park, followed by a run to Uckfield and then back to London Victoria. Unusually, this charter was topped and tailed by steam locomotives – BR rebuilt Light Pacific 4-6-2 no. 34046 ‘Braunton’ on the front and LMS Class 5MT 4-6-0 no. 44932 on the back.

Braunton hauls the Bluebell Explorer through South Croydon on 9th November 2013 around 9.21am

Typically, the light was beautiful in the lead up but the clouds had crept in by the time the railtour passed through my chosen spot at South Croydon. Nevertheless, this was still better than conditions on the Bluebell Railway itself which was once again quite wet.

A Southern class 455 electric multiple unit passes through South Croydon about 40 minutes earlier, with significantly better light

It will be good fun catching other railtours as they pass through the area in the coming years. It’s a great stretch of line with some interesting places to watch and photograph a steam locomotive working.

Bletchley Park

I have been meaning to make the short journey north of London to Bletchley Park for some time now, but only got around to it today – spurred on by a recent visit by a colleague.

The sprawling estate of Bletchley Park and its opulent mansion house was the home of a wealthy stockbroker in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. It might have remained in relative obscurity but for its transformation into a remarkable code-breaking hub during the Second World War.

A griffin guards the entrance to the Mansion

The peaceful surroundings that visitors see today make it hard to imagine the industrial nature of the place in wartime, served by around 10,000 staff at its peak, with hut after hut reverberating to the terrific noise of the decryption devices (bombes) that would have been in near continuous operation.

The site was almost lost when proposals were made to demolish the surviving buildings in 1992, prompting a campaign that led to the preservation of the site for the nation and its subsequent restoration. The extent of the site today is impressive and there are more spaces/displays than can be easily visited in one go, but as the tickets are valid for a year you can easily split a visit between two trips.

The cottages

I had heard some of the stories to have emerged in recent years, but I had only a limited understanding of the incredible breakthroughs achieved. For example, I had a sketchy idea of the Enigma story but knew nothing of the breaking of the Lorenz cipher, nor the stories of the breaking of the Italian and Japanese cypher systems. I wanted to absorb all the detail as we wandered around the place, discovering just how lacking my knowledge of this hidden period of history was.

One of the highlights of our visit was the newly re-opened Hut 11A. This hut was built in March 1942 as an additional space to house the Bombe machines that were used to search for the Enigma cypher keys. The machines created a hot and noisy environment for the Wrens who operated them, complete with smells of oil and grease. Today, a little of this is captured using compelling audio-visuals of two actresses who describe what is going on in the room that they work in.

Unrestored section of D Block

At the time of our visit work was underway to renovate Block C, which will be opened as the new visitor centre in mid-2014. Huts 3 and 6 were also being restored to their wartime condition and are also due to re-open in mid-2014. Even with this work complete there will still be areas of the complex that remain in a derelict condition, such as Block D. The Bletchley Park Trust has long term plans to restore and re-open this block too.

There are so many stories that have to be told, from the incredible work of codebreakers Alan Turing and Dilly Knox through to the day to day lives of the remarkable men and women who kept this place operational twenty-four hours a day. It is all credit to the trust that this story is now being told and will not be forgotten.

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