It's a turkey !

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last post 11 DECEMBER '08


Our county flag.

How things happen, ..... if you are not careful !



A chap named Mike Prior runs a printing company and prints and sells flags.

There is an flag, established by custom, for Wiltshire.

The observant will note that the elements of the county arms (granted 1937) are incorporated in the flag, the green and white bars, representing the grass and chalk which defines the geography of the county, and the wyvern which is the symbol of Wessex of which Wiltshire is a large part.

However this chap has developed a great marketing ploy.

Invent your own flag, and con the gullible into giving it official status

Mike Prior, 61, of Ashton Street, wrote to seven of whom he considered the most prominent people in Wiltshire about his design for a county flag, featuring the previously extinct Great Bustard. Mr Prior, managing director of Bath Midway Litho Ltd in Duke Street, received confirmation on Monday that planning permission for him to fly the flag in his garden had been granted. Like many other counties of England, Wiltshire did not have its own flag, until 05/06/07, when the new flag was accepted and raised at County Hall in Trowbridge.

Among the 'prominent people in Wiltshire' quoted on his website are Robert Key, MP for Salisbury and Andrew Murrison MP Shadow Defence Minister. I have contacted these two prominent people and have been assured that their comments are entirely personal. I have contacted a councillor regarding the following ( with my added bold notes) that seems to give official recognition to the flag selling scam. ( I await a reply.)

County flag flies at County Hall

A Wiltshire county flag will be flying high at County Hall next week (June 5) at a special ceremony with Wiltshire County Council's leader and chairman.

Leader Jane Scott and chairman Judy Seager will attend the event at 9am on Tuesday, June 5, along with Mike Prior who came up with the design of the flag.

Flag enthusiast ( and person hoping to make money by selling flags ) Mike Prior of Trowbridge said: "I have always loved flag flying and I thought it would be good to fly something other than the Union Flag or national flags.(he probably loves making money even more)

"I have done my research and found there wasn't a flag for the county so I thought why not design one?" ( didn't even bother with this search in his extensive research or this )

Mr Prior's daughter, Helen Pocock, a graphic designer, came up with a design for the flag using the Great Bustard as the centrepiece. The bird was previously extinct in England, but is now part of a 10-year breeding programme on Salisbury Plain.

The white colouring in the flag is to represent peace, while the green can mean joy, hope or safety. A circle of six rocks is also featured in the centre of the flag, representing both the stone circles of Avebury and Stonehenge and the six counties on to which Wiltshire borders. ( oh for goodness sake stop)

Jane Scott said: "We are pleased that we are able support this project. People in Wiltshire are rightly proud of their beautiful county and this flag will help to reinforce a sense of community identity." ( people in Wiltshire would be pleased to be consulted, Wiltshire people are proud enough of their county and heritage not to have this flag foisted upon them )

Only a handful of counties in England have a flag of their own and Mr Prior hopes the Wiltshire flag could eventually become well used. ( same level of research as previously exhibited )

The flag will be flown at the front of County Hall, Trowbridge, at all times, except on official flag-flying days when the Union Flag will be flown and on days of county council meetings when the council's own flag will fly.


The flag looks like a flag from a banana republic or the 'house flag' of Bernard Matthews

To try to fob it off as a official flag for our historic county is an insult. The intended association with the Bustard, extinct in the county since the 1830s when my most of my great great grandfathers were working on the land on which it roamed, is silly. The bustard is not in the minds of even Wiltshire people and to most the representation of it on the flag would bring to mind turkey twizzlers.
There are icons of Wiltshire that would be recognised worldwide; the White Horses on the rolling downland, the beautiful Salisbury Cathedral, the icon of all icons Stonehenge and the Moonrakers, .....

....as I said, the flag is a turkey. Time to get it removed from any official or semi-official status; it is an abomination and an affront to any true Moonraker.

Update.
A correspondent has reminded me that the Moonraker Legend hinges upon a sharp witted native putting one over officialdom. We don't have the excisemen any more but we do have councillors, who are just as gullible it seems.

The language of Wiltshire

For those who have not heard the dialect spoken........... An example of my native language, an anecdote in the tradition of The Moonraker Story

The Bule

sorry, link no longer works

Teffont again.

Previous photographs show the village of Teffont Evias, these now posted show the other end of the village, Teffont Magna, lying to the north of Teffont Evias.

The small church dating from the late 13th century, like many old places the beauty and symmetry has been ruined by the inept placing of modern street furniture. The stone parapet to the gables hint that the roof was originally of thatch.

A bobbed and fringed cottage looking open mouthed in amazement or surprise.

The house has a plaque built in to the gable end referring to the Fitz family, the house a jumble of additions and alterations over the years.

The Post Office once occupied the utilitarian lean-to extension to the cottage.

The stream runs through the village adding greatly to the charm. Trout lurk in the shade under the bridges.

Tyres from farm carts propped against a tree which must have been but a sapling when they were placed there. Someone shares my enthusiasm for "tidying up".

A cob wall built of rammed layers of locally dug soil bound with the addition of fibrous plant material such as straw, heather, bracken or whatever found locally. A cheap method of walling which can endure for centuries if its head and feet are kept dry.

Graffiti on the walls of the church, a quick look at the 1841 census leads me to believe either a Frederick Mullins or a Frederick Macey should have been "assisting with enquiries".

Compton Chamberlayne

Lying to the west of Salisbury in the Nadder Valley is the tiny village of Compton Chamberlayne. A couple of dozen houses and a church in a wooded coombe to the north of the A30 road that runs from Salisbury to Shaftesbury. During the First World War troops were encamped in the fields nearby to the south east before heading off the the carnage of the trenches. Some from Australia, didn't make it that far but died of illness and were buried in the village graveyard.




I suppose if you are to die, a grave in this peaceful part of Wiltshire, your grave site flanked by a traditional cottage must be preferable to anonymity of a grave among thousands near the battlefield. Troops carved an outline of their homeland in the turf of the downland on the other side of the A30 and can be seen here



The village church nestles on the side of a slope next to 'the big house' of the village; it was constructed during the 13th century, at about the same as the cathedral at Salisbury.



Grave stones lean as if tired of their hundreds of years standing under the yew. They have not yet suffered the indignity of being reset and tidied by the health and safety crowd.



If you head north towards Baverstock, along a valley laid out as parkland, you will come to an old bridge over the Nadder, the river, coloured by recent rains and well stocked with fat trout, heading off to join the Avon at Salisbury.


The old bridge with its 'kickstone', so shaped and positioned to 'kick' the wheel of a cart over away from the parapet of the wall so that the capping stones are not displaced and knocked ito the river

Ansty, A Spring Day.

Ansty is a village to the west of Salisbury and south of Tisbury.The Knights Hospitaller settled in Ansty in 1211 and built the church which was finished in 1230. They also built a preceptory adjacent to the church, the building there now is 'modern', dating from only 1596.
The village is well worth a visit, it is surely one of the most beautiful in England with thatched cottages, stream and woodland.

Ansty is one of the few villages in England to have a permanent maypole. The present maypole is not as tall as formerly, due no doubt to Health and Safety regulations. I can remember seeing the erection of an earlier maypole as a child; it was all achieved by stout locals with ropes and not a member of the H & S Executive in sight. Not a single injury but I expect some sore heads the next day from the ensuing celebrations in the adjacent pub.

The pond, which dates from the same era as the church.

If you wish for a house in the country, this is one to aspire to.

The Church of St James, my eldest son was christened here, the latest in a long line of my family christened, married and buried here.

The modern replacement building for the 13th century preceptory.

I can remember seeing the blacksmith that used this building as a forge in the fifties put a red hot iron tyre on a cartwheel outside these doors amid clouds of smoke and steam; there was a large round metal dish in the ground to assist the operation. It has now gone, a victim of the passion to 'tidy up', and in so doing destroying a part of our history and heritage.

Opposite the building shown above is a modern house built in the nineteen sixties, a garage has been added since then, it is a fine example of how to build new in an old village. Behind is a lane which I remember using to collect thatching spars from the coppice to the left. The thatcher lived in the village and as a service used to cut the hair of the village men and boys.

Mere, Castle Hill.

A look at Mere:

Castle Hill, in glorious February sunshine

Celandines enjoying the sun after an earlier frost.

Looking west on the climb up.

Looking north west, Zeals Knoll in the distance.

Sunshine and shadow, looking north.


The A303, empty... unlike on summer weekends

Looking north east.

On the way back down, but still higher than St Michael's Church.

Someone fitter than me climbs the hill to raise and lower the flag.

The Wessex Division memorial

Burton near Mere.

The Mill Pool, Burton

A quiet amble along the footpath from Burton to Mere.
Ashfield Water flowing into the Mill Pool above an old mill.

Mill Wheel Burton

The iron water wheel, stationary and allowing free energy to flow away.

The outflow from the mill.

Old bridge over the mill outflow

shallows downstream from the mill

Crystal clear spring water on its way to join Shreen Water then to the River Stour and the sea at Christchurch.

Teffont, not famous....

First primroses, late January.

The first primroses of the year push through the dead leaves to add to the landscape. It is difficult to state anything famous about Teffont, it's a pretty place though, perhaps that is fame enough.

Chalk stream shallow and clean

Enjoy while you can; no doubt within a decade the open space on the stream bank will be built on, another fake old house for another fake old countryman newcomer perhaps.

Grotesque hedge, Teffont Evias

In the stream are native brown trout, small but fighting fit. Make a quiet approach and you may spot one lying doggo alongside a drift of weed, more likely you will catch a flash of movement as it dashes upstream.

Fonthill Park.

Spring is on the way, snowdrops at Fonthill

Fonthill Park was laid out by the Beckfords, a lake was formed by creating a dam across a feeder stream to the River Nadder. This area was landscaped, planted and laid out to give the classical 'English Landscape'

To the north of the lake as you approach Fonthill Bishop there is a gatehouse to the park in the form of an arch. The arch is still a dwelling and must be one of the most desirable properties in England.



The lake is for the most part fringed with trees, mature beech trees dip their branches into the water and provide nesting sites for water birds such as the Coot or Moorhen. As a child in the 'hungry fifties' when most working class kids never seemed to have enough to eat, there was a good meal available at the risk of a wetting. The trick is to climb the tree, shin down the branch, take some eggs and return trying all the time to avoid falling in or breaking the eggs. They standard method of preventing breakage was to carry the egg in the mouth. The eggs were boiled in water dipped from the lake in an old OXO tin; delicious, flavoursome and nutritious free-range fare for growing lads and lasses. More adventurous types were known to supplement the meal with a fish course of grilled fresh trout ( perhaps that should read poached trout).

Fonthill Park has a more recent history as a military camp area during WWII, American troops were stationed here and many beech trees in the area bore the initials of these temporary visitors carved into their bark.
All road junctions near the park were paved with granite cobbles or concrete to withstand the slewing of the tank tracks as the tanks turned; the evidence of this is under the modern road surface and will give future archaeologists something to ponder. An area at the top of the lane from the lake at its junction with the Hindon-Tisbury road is extensively paved, now almost obscured by the encroachment of nature and is known locally as Tank Park.
Anyone researching their family history in this area will find transcripts of census returns and marriages from 1625 to 1837 here.

For other local and Wiltshire parishes follow links on the Parish Directory of The Wiltshire OPC Project