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In the dark ages my
distant ancestors, an unruly border clan, fought battles for a piece of
Northumbria, but because they were scattered to the four winds by some long
forgotten king, by great good fortune I have made Wiltshire my home.
Although I cannot claim to be a Wiltshireman, after twenty-one years, my
disparate, largely dysfunctional family might just accept that I am now a
man of Wiltshire.
The call of Wiltshire's 'Great Plain' first came some fifty-nine years ago
when as a young Royal Engineer on detachment and 'posted to my trade', I
fell amongst an alien species call 'gunners' at the Larkhill School of
Artillery.
As the School's photographer, exposed to the hazards of gunnery
demonstrations and ordinance development, conscription was another way of
describing animated inertia. However, London born, I found the sweeping
contours of the Plain, the Pewsey Vale and beyond to be addictive; just like
my dreams of world travel and success in my chosen profession.
That brief love affair with Wiltshire's open spaces ended with an
ill-fitting civilian suit, a paper bag for personal effects and a one way
rail ticket to battered, post-war London.
Soon, by some twist of fate, travel to distant lands and professional
recognition was mine. In time my personal life, as imperfect as those of my
Fleet Street contemporaries, thrust Wiltshire to the outer reaches of memory
until, decades later, life began again in Salisbury.
Strange, but fortunate in its timing, I had dined with a lady, one dark
winter's evening, in a quiet restaurant astride the River Avon. For widely
differing reasons, it was an emotional experience for us both. Suffice to
say, as a result, I eventually returned to Wiltshire.
Escaping London to live in a city no longer garrisoned by rude soldiery,
little by little my affection for Wiltshire came floating back. The lady, a
fellow 'escapee' from London, had breathed the Wiltshire air for some years
earlier.
We married when we could and for a few happy years rejoiced in the tradition
and beauty of Salisbury Cathedral. Tolerating the churchmen and caring for
the Christians, we made many kindly acquaintances and a few lasting
friendships.
As we walked together in Wiltshire's eternal hills and along its ancient
drove roads, we would often stand silently where pre-history still creates
vibrations in the soul.
In time, tired of tourist-bound Salisbury, we shook its dust and clatter
from our feet. Traversing the Plain, we eventually settled amongst family
and friends in Devizes.
At the epicentre of the county, Devizes might once have become the county
town. Had it embraced that misfortune, its character, like its inhabitants
would have suffered. Instead, it has a real sense of community and was, in
many ways, the novelist's vision of an English market town, but now, cohorts
of profit-hungry developers are having their wicked way!
No longer 'incomers', we can still feel the pulse of centuries as citizens
of this time-honoured crossroads as we greet, friends and acquaintances on
market day.
Looking on, benignly, alongside the real Wiltshire folk at the pretentious
weekenders, 'right-to-rule' landowners and the disorientated young, we know
that all have their place in the pattern of life in our down-to-earth
version of 'Shangri-La'.
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