Hilary's Diaries - Hilary Townsend President of Stalbridge History Society
August 2021 Hilary Townsend
This month I feel the wild and violent weather that afflicts Stalbridge needs a chapter to itself. As I write the sun shines brightly, the sky then goes black, the wind howls and violent rain lashing the windows pours down Silk House Barton.
I remember such storms being a feature of my childhood and my father telling me that if there was lighting in a thunder storm I must never take shelter under a tree in case the tree was struck. Shortly after he said this, a cow standing under a tree below Sandhills was killed because the tree was struck by lightning. Snowstorms in Stalbridge have become less heavy in recent years. My aunt Mrs Aish who lived at Cook’s Farm in the 1880s told me that her brothers could not go to school sometimes because the snow came in over the tops of their boots and they were stuck in the snow. Heavy snow early in 1947 caught us out here. Some enterprising citizen found a snowplough, its date was 1912 but it cleared the roads to the point where our school bus could get to Gillingham through huge banks of snow. The landscape looked absolutely beautiful and when the snow began to thaw it was even lovelier because icicles dropped off the tips of the branches of the trees and then froze. That thaw in 1947 was followed by the most glorious summer with day after day of haymaking weather. The clocks had been put forward by 2 hours then as a form of daylight saving, so I suppose we all adapted to it and got the haymaking and harvesting done. I can’t help wondering what extremes of weather lie ahead of us in Stalbridge now. © Hilary Townsend
August 2021 |
Discover Dorset – Blackmore Vale Dovecote Press 2004
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Blackmore Vale Childhood Dovecote Press 2006
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One Woman’s Fight for Architectural Heritage 2012
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Stalbridge to Siberia and other places - Silk Hay Books 2018
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Titles by Hilary Townsend
Hilary, from a family of yeoman farmers, grew up in Dorset. As a personnel manager in industry, and later lecturer in management subjects, she wrote magazine and newspaper features for UK and North American markets.
Hilary, from a family of yeoman farmers, grew up in Dorset. As a personnel manager in industry, and later lecturer in management subjects, she wrote magazine and newspaper features for UK and North American markets.
