From Our Files: Lyndhurst condemned... Christian march... ‘gut full’ of homeless
75 YEARS AGO
THERE was a record attendance at the annual meeting of the New Forest and Christchurch Conservative Association held in the Morant Hall, Brockenhurst, on Saturday.
The Countess of Malmesbury, CBE, presiding, remarked that it was a very auspicious occasion as it was the first annual meeting of the amalgamated association of the men’s and women’s sections. She added that there had been a tremendous amount of work to do, and the majority of it had been done by the women.
Something would have to be done about this, for if they did not work very hard the country, apart from the people who lived on dividends, would quickly be ruined by the unnecessary extravagances of the Government.
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THE question of providing a sports ground for New Milton was thoroughly debated at Monday’s meeting of the New Milton Ratepayers’ Association, but it was felt that as it was not possible to buy ground these days and the Borough Council are trying to get Ashley Sports Ground returned, nothing much could be done as yet.
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AS the result of protests made by members regarding the absence of private building licences, the Borough Council at their meeting on Wednesday decided to take the matter up through the Association of Municipal Corporations and the Non-County Boroughs Association.
The matter was raised by Ald. E. H. Marshall, who said that he noted in a special report of the Housing Committee it was stressed that the need for further work for the builders was very pressing.
50 YEARS AGO
THE junction of Stanley Road, with Lymington Road, Highcliffe, was already a “nightmare”, said Coun. Mrs I. A. Stevenson, when she expressed fears at Tuesday’s Christchurch Council meeting at the proposal to go ahead with the use of two acres of Chewton Common as a car park for up to 350 vehicles.
Despite her doubts on the road safety aspect, however, and strong objections from some other members, the Council decided to go ahead with the scheme utilising Stanley Road, instead of following up a Highcliffe Chamber of Trade proposal that land on the east side of Gordon Road should be used.
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“PET nothing and persecute nothing” was the gospel preached by W. H. Hudson, the famous author and naturalist, whose book “Hampshire Days” has just appeared in a new edition.
Hampshire was Hudson’s cherished county, and he extols the New Forest, with mentions of Lymington and Brockenhurst.
But Lyndhurst comes in for harsher treatment. He describes the village as “the spot on which London vomits out its annual crowd of collectors, who fill its numerous and ever-increasing brand-new red-brick lodging-houses, and who swarm through all the adjacent woods and heaths, men, women, and children (hateful little prigs!) with their vasculum’s, beer and treacle pots, green and blue butterfly nets, killing bottles, and all the detestable paraphernalia of what they would probably call ‘Nature Study’”.
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DOCTOR Sarah Margaret Elizabeth Keane, the daughter of Lymington solicitor Mr C. H. S. Blatch, fell 200 feet to her death in Southern Ireland when a section of the cliff from which she was photographing the sunset collapsed into the sea on Monday.
25 YEARS AGO
BRAVING Good Friday’s bitter cold and rain, local processions of Christian witness commemorated the Easter story. This A&T picture shows the marchers at Lymington, where the various denominations first met for a service in the Baptist Church.
URC minister the Rev. Jane Weedon led the proceedings, whilst the address was given by the Rev. Chris Lee, for whom Lymington Baptist was his first church after ordination, and who is now chaplain to the Royal Marsden Hospital in London.
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ASHLEY was becoming a dumping ground for the single homeless, and villagers have had a “gut full”, it was said last week when New Milton town councillors slammed latest moves to provide more bedsits there.
Council vice-chairman Tink Snudden said at last Thursday’s Planning Committee meeting: “They have had enough. Why do they keep poking it on to Ashley. They seem to congregate them down there”.
The councillors agreed to strongly oppose plans by the Hyde Housing Association Ltd, to convert 2 Ashley Common Road, an empty house, into six bedsit units for people on New Forest District Council’s homeless list.
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THERE’S great cause for celebration in Brockenhurst this weekend, with the announcement on Thursday that the village school has been successful in gaining a Government grant for £450,000 to replace the dilapidated “temporary” classrooms – by far the largest amount of the 44 successful bids by Hampshire schools.
