Articles on a range of topics will be added to this page regularly. Click on the title of a post or the accompanying photograph. Use the search bar on the right to find a specific topic, or select from the list of latest posts.
After the armistace: Return to Kintbury
We know the names of the village men who died in the First World War as they are recorded, quite rightly, on the war memorial and in the church. However, it is much more difficult, at over a hundred years’ distance, to find the names of those who returned to the village in the months…
The man who remembered Jane Austen: Kintbury’s Rev Fulwar Craven Fowle
We have, I believe, just one description of Jane Austen’s appearance, recalled by someone who knew her well all her life – someone who had known her since she was a small child of three. “She was like a doll……certainly pretty – bright and a good deal of colour in her face – like a…
West Woodhay: A downland village in a changing agricultural landscape
This post is in two parts. In the first part, I consider the village of West Woodhay from a changing historical perspective. For the second part, we are delighted to have a contribution from Harry Henderson of West Woodhay Farms in which he describes the recent changes in agricultural practices which have enabled vitally important…
Defending the border? The view from Walbury Hill
At present I am writing this as I look out at my garden on a particularly hot day. I am in Berkshire, or, if you prefer, Royal Berkshire. Less than three miles from my garden fence is Hampshire and I can look out of my bedroom window at Wiltshire. If I were to stand on…
Kin & Kintbury
In this article, Ellen Lock Ireland discusses Jane Auten’s close relationship with friends and extended family in Kintbury. Similarly to the way in which we meet the families in Jane Austen’s novels (the Bennets, Bingleys, Dashwoods, Morlands, Bertrams etc), we can get to know a real life Kintbury family through her letters to her sister.…
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