Littlebredy

A week or so an expedition to Littlebredy, a village a little to the east of Dorchester. Very near the headwaters of the River Bride, which flows west to the sea at Burton Bradstock, the place that was home to a stranded container ship full of crates of brand new BMW motorcycles and stuff like that a few years back. Not to be confused with the River Brit which flows to the sea at Bridport.

On the way we passed a field containing cows with very extravagant and very sharp looking horns. Which, we were told, made them a pain for agricultural purposes, but very well suited to acting as extras in costume dramas based on things like the novels of Jane Austen. Directors just love them.

Parked by the side of the road, a little way along from the bus shelter. Or perhaps it is just a higher grade public bench. Very much in keeping with the tied village, below to the left, mostly rebuilt in chocolate box style, with thatch and all the trimmings in the middle of the nineteenth century, by the Williams family, a banking family involved in the bank once known as William Deacons, a bank swallowed up by RBS in a fire sale in 1929. For a fuller story see reference 1. But it was a real village before the Williams family got there, so not so much of a fake as the nearby Poundbury (out of HRH the Prince of Wales, that is to say the Windsor family). Nothing like as big either.

With the house in the middle being a different phase of the rebuild than the rest, the thatch being omitted for some reason. The house just visible on the left used to be the house for the under-gardener. The over-gardener had a slightly larger house, next to the walled garden a little to the west, once the kitchen garden for the big house. For which see reference 2.

And so down to the lake for our picnic, as advertised at the end of reference 3. Quite possibly complete with picnic blanket and picnic knife. Tesco did us well. And it was a first-class spot for a family picnic.

On the way down we passed what I call an umbrella tree, that is to say a tree with a modest central trunk but with lots of suckers growing up, upside down umbrella fashion, around the central hub. Some from branches which dropped down, some from roots which pushed up. There had been a lot trees of this sort at Stourhead, noticed at reference 4, thought to be western [red] cedars. On a quick look, the only clue is the vaguely umbrella like branch offered by Wikipedia. So not convinced. And not convinced that this one was the same either.

But then we had a diversion. Did we have the scales of a Wellingtonia, despite the unusual, not to say unique, habit of the tree? How do they compare with the pictures at references 6 and 7, all of trees with labels. Not convinced, and eventually worked my way to reference 8, which offered the snap below of the cones of a Japanese cedar, a tree often mistaken for a Wellingtonia.

So for the present, I settle for that. But there was the tree already noticed at reference 5, as a consolation prize.

Next stop, back up the hill to the church where we found a novel form of memorial in the graveyard. A memorial to a daughter to the Williams family, a teenager known to family and friends as 'Plum'.

That is to say, a modest bronze tablet set in a wooden frame, with the frame set onto a pair of metal rods, possibly also bronze, set into concrete below. What impressed me was the legibility of the text after near 100 years. Don't know that lettering in stone would last that long, without being touched up.

Another novelty was a then newfangled way of bringing control of the bells down to a frame in a cupboard at the foot of the tower, so doing away with the need for bell ringers and a bell ringing chamber. The frame had a special name, but I forget now what it was.

The last novelty noticed here was the stone pulpit, unusual in this country, in country churches, but common enough in northern Italy, where I remember them as being the size and shape of a sarcophagus, with elaborately carved side panels, set on legs and in which the preacher could march up and down as he preached. Perhaps the architect had gone on the Grand Tour with his patron.

But I close with part of what I think is called the Creed, done in an early form of Arts & Crafts, a style to become much more elaborate as the nineteenth century wore on.

Bridehead, the big house, noticed at reference 9, was discretely screened, so there was not much to be seen from either the lake or the road, but Bing turns up various pictures, just the same. So above we have the house from the road, a picture owned by one Mike Searle, whom I thank for the use of it. When we were there, two ladies emerged from having walked around the lake, which must have involved trespass on the land reserved to the owners. Just the sort of thing to infuriate the chatelaine, should she have happened to be in residence and looking out of her windows.

We also have a couple of watercolour offerings of the place from one Henry Moule, 1825-1904, also the inventor of Dorset County Museum, which probably now houses them.

And so, picnic completed and candidate Wellingtonias inspected, off to a neighbouring hill fort and then to Toller Porcorum.

PS 1: we wondered whether Evelyn Waugh, a notable wangler of invitations to house parties, had visited the place and taken the name for his 'Brideshead Revisited'.

PS 2: next time the Valley of Stones. A site which might have been of comparable importance to Stonehenge, had the stone age inhabitants thought to build a henge. Bottom right on the opening snap.

References 

Reference 1: http://www.weymouth-dorset.co.uk/little-bredy.html.

Reference 2: http://wgw.org.uk/littlebredy.com/gardens.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/08/axminster.html.

Reference 4: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/search?q=stb. I might say that so far I have not got very far with either of the two volumes of the memoirs of the Comtesse de Boigne.  A lady who was mainly French but in whom there was an Irish connection. But I still own them, so maybe one day.

Reference 5: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/08/wellingtonia-41.html.

Reference 6: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/01/a-stake-in-ground.html.

Reference 7: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/07/identification-of-wellingtonia-closed.html.

Reference 8: http://www.redwoodworld.co.uk/redwood_types.htm.

Reference 9: https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1000712. It might not be open to the public, but it does do television drama and historic England do know about it.

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