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Written Records

February 2002

The village is wet! It seems as though it has been grey, overcast or raining for several months now but maybe that's just my perceptions. Anyway, the weather is currently miserable, which is also a good way to describe my state of mind. Apart from a very successful 'Websites presentation' to the A&H the other Friday night the month of Jan is best forgotten. Needless to say, absolutely nothing got done on any of the sites for which I most humbly apologise - my New Year's resolution is already broken!

February, on the other hand, has started well. The bike riding teenagers of the village, my son amongst them, have spent the last two days building a 'trials' course from wooden pallets and 20 tonnes of mud, kindly donated by British Sugar, on the playing field. Now, as Parish Chairman, I await the complaints! But at least the Council is doing something for the teenagers and is not 'asleep', as it was recently accused of being by the Countryside Agency. I'm sure that the 'trail' will give many happy hours of fun to generations of bike riding Feltwellians to come. Perhaps a photo will eventually appear on one of the Feltwell sites.

Talking of photographs, if you visit Susan's site you should find a photograph of the new gargoyle for St Mary's Tower. The work is still ongoing, having passed its initial deadline by several weeks already.

The Lions Club Christmas collection around Feltwell raised £513 for local organisations.

For those who know the village well, the bungalow on High Street opposite the garage, has now been demolished to make way for, I think, 4 new properties. In addition the new Golf Club is coming on apace and is now visible from Wilton Road. When complete I hope to get a photograph of it up on Site 3.

Emails to note that were received last month came from Paul and Helen Perriman and Stephen Haxby. Paul was one of the stalwarts of the cricket club and Helen used to a regular column in the village magazine until they moved down to a little place called Crediton near Exeter. I'm very glad that they are back in touch and enrolled. Stephen Haxby, on the other hand, has absolutely nothing to do with Feltwell whatsoever so why am I mentioning him? I'll let Stephen tell the tale - "The picture called www.feltwellnorfolk.freeserve.co.uk/images/airbase_wellington_crew_small.gif is of interest since it features my father. (It is, as correctly captioned if not named, of course a Lancaster crew).

Details of this crew are as follows:

L to R (as per my scan! For avoidance of doubt, Baker is the tall chap).

Dickie Bird

Peter Haxby (Rear Gunner)

? Gibson

Jack Wade (Wireless Operator)

Les Baker (Skipper)

Jock Robertson (Bomb Aimer)

Johnny Gunn (Flight Engineer)

These as recalled by my father. There may be some details on the reverse of the photos but we are slightly reluctant to unseal them from the frames.

My father was rather surprised that the photo had turned up, as he said it was not an official thing, just something they wanted done."

And there was I not even certain that the photo had been taken at Feltwell! Isn't the web wonderful?

Family history details this month are being sought on the Coleman, Vincent and Willett families. Email me if you can help. And the history officer at RAF Lakenheath would like to locate any original documentation pertaining to RAF Feltwell for copying as, of course, would I. If you have any please let me know.

Oh, one final thing, Chris Cock has kindly lent me all of the new additions to his postcard collection and I'll be putting them up over half-term (wk. beg. 11/2/02). Also a small article about ‘The Black Hoods’.