The Rye Group of Parishes will be saying goodbye at the end of this month to the Rev. James Gladstone, who joined the staff three years ago as curate at St. Mary's and has been Team Vicar based at Camber since Stephen Seamer left two years ago. At the beginning of August James takes up a three-year appointment as chaplain to a mission school in Papua New Guinea; he expects to find himself doing some teaching, and tells us that the previous chaplain also acted as farm manager - though nothing official has been said to him about this so far! The school is 150 miles from Port Moresby, and its name - the Martyrs Memorial School at Popon-detta - commemorates not our Tudor martyrs but Papuans who died during the present century, many during the Japanese occupation in WW2.
For some time James had been thinking about getting a job in a Third World country, particularly after his visit to India last year; but this one came his way as a 'esult of the casual loan of a magazine from a Hastings priest who had himself worked in Papua for ten years. The good wishes of the whole town will go with James, though we shall all be sorry to lose someone who has made so many friends in such a short time.
Camilla Pearce came home to be married on Saturday, to the town where she was born and the church where she was christened and confirmed. Camilla is the younger daughter of Harold and Brenda Pearce of Udimore Road (and until recently of Thomas Peacocke School and Woolworths respectively), and she is now the wife of Peter White, whose family come from Cheshire.They will be living in Hayes, Middlesex, where Peter works on the financial staff of London Transport and Camilla will continue with her nursing job in Ealing.
Camilla's white Victorian-style dress was set off beautifully by the shades of blue worn by the rest of the wedding party - matched by the clear skies above St. Mary's as the photographs were taken after the service. She was attended by the daughter of a friend - 11-year-old Rachel Jones - and by her godson Scott Edwards, almost 4, elder son of her sister Elizabeth. The reception was held at the -Mermaid, and the honeymoon is being spent in the West Country.
Rye had a Page Three girl last Wednesday!Admittedly, it was on page 3 of The Times that Linda King appeared, photographed admiring a statue in this year's Royal Academy exhibition - and it is a pity it could not have been in colour, since artist and designer Linda from Paygate Cottage is the girl whose rainbow hair is one of Rye's small pleasures.
Representing the town in more permanent fashion in the exhibition are two young Rye artists.David Crew, of Military Road, had two drawings accepted for the Academy last year but not hung; this year, his picture was not only hung but also sold at the private view, so we shall not be seeing it when he shows at the Rye Society of Artists' exhibition later this year. The other Rye man who has been fortunate enough to have work hung is Stuart Jabbit, who recently moved to Fishmarket Road and works part-time at the Standard Inn. Stuart, who is 25, spent part of his boyhood in Iden, where his parents had Pettit's Stores, and was a pupil at Thomas Peacocke School. He went on to take a foundation course in art at Hastings College and then to study graphic design at Maidstone. Since then he has had various jobs, and his Academy picture - the first he has sent there - was painted in America; although, he says, it may look like an abstract canvas it is in fact a study of buildings reflected in glass.We hope to see some of Stuart's work on show locally before too long.
Mrs. Barbara Maundrell, the wife of our Rector, died suddenly at her home on 30 May after months of illness borne with courage, cheerfulness and dignity. The funeral takes place today (Wednesda) at 2.30 at St. Mary's. We shall have a full obituary notice next week.
Mrs. Rachel King, of the Mint and formerly of Watchbell Street, died in hospital on 27 May; she leaves a son and a daughter. There was a service at St. Mary's yesterday.
Lady Alexandra Smith, of The Loke, 0ckman's Lane, died very suddenly at her home on 28 May. A grandmother, she leaves two daughters and a son. Lady Alex was in her sixties, and had not been in good health recently.She came to Rye some years ago from Houghton Green, but had travelled widely earlier in her life. She was the local secretary of the East Sussex Association for the Disabled, and one of the organisers of the Alexandra Rose Day collection; a WRVS member, she had been a most willing mate and sometimes driver for the Meals on Wheels service until ill-health prevented her. The funeral takes place at St. Antony's on. Monday, 10 June, at 11.
Mrs. Cissie Sherwood's name will long be linked in Rye with two causes. In 1936 she helped to found the Women's Section of the British Legion here; she was its-, secretary, and two years ago was proud to be a guest of honour when new standard, for both men and women were dedicated in St. Mary's at the splendid ceremony attended by Legion branches from all over the south of England. After the war, she founded the League of Friends of Hill House Hospital, and she and her husband Frank worked very hard over the ensuing years for the welfare of the patients, arranging parties for them and through the WRVS running the hospital shop. Mrs. Sherwood was a Brighton girl, and she and Frank were married in St. Mary's in 1919 - he had served in the Royal Sussex Regiment during WW1, and returned to the town after it to work as a butcher. The family then lived in Wish Street, and there were three sons - Stanley and Ralph, who survive their mother, and Percy, who was Rye's Town Sergeant and Town Crier for some years until his death (Mrs. Sherwood also leaves grandchildren and great-grandchildren).Frank died in 1975, and four years ago Mrs. Sherwood gave up her home in West Undercliff and moved to a British Legion flat near Winchester, where members of her family visited her regularly; she was very happy there until illness overtook her some six months before her death in April at the age of 88. The Sherwood family were much touched at the number of local people who attended the memorial service in St. Mary's on Friday, and greatly regret that there was no opportunity to speak to everyone personally; they would like to thank all those who were there, meeting to remember one of Rye's great ladies.
Vickie Piper now has a letter giving details of the minibus which the Variety Club of Great Britain has offered to provide, subject to a local contribution of £3,000, for the use of the local Mencap group jointly with Hill House School. Even though they have not yet raised the money, the group will get the bus anyway at a ceremony at the Classic Cinema in Hastings on 20 June, when 12 local mentally handicapped children (and Vickie hopes that her son Andrew will be among them) will be given lunch after a special cartoon show. The bus will be handed over in the presence of Variety Club vice-president John Hogarth and also John Hayward on whose recommendation the gift is being made. The 15-seater minibus will cost £10,000, and will replace the one given to the school some years ago by Round Table, which is now becoming expensive to maintain; it will have a wheelchair tail-lift which, says Vickie, will be invaluable.The very latest news will doubtless be given to the group's AGM next Wednesday at 7.30 at the George.
Barry Samuel, headmaster at Hill House, tells us that they already have some cash in hand to contribute to the £3,000 - indeed, £250 was raised at a recent jumble sale in Icklesham.ESCC will pay the tax on the minibus, and probably also contribute toward the insurance costs, in view of the school's share in the vehicle. Mr. Samuel is, it goes without saying, absolutely delighted.
3.
Earlier this year one of the walls which divide the pretty gardens at the back of Bridge Place fell down, weakened by the Weather - and rather suddenly, narrowly missing the dustmen! When its owner Mr. Harry Tuckwell came to clear away the debris he realised that it had simply been build on the bare earth, with no proper foundations; so he started the rebuilding work by digging out a good deep trench.
Imagine his surprise when, about 2' down, he came upon the remains of a gun! The 38" barrel and external firing mechanism are intact, though the wooden butt is very decayed.Mr. Tuckwell and his builder Derek Boreham are agreed that it must have been in the ground for at least a century, since Mr. Boreham estimates that as the age of the wall built on top of it; indeed, it could have been there even longer, quite unknown to the original wall-builder.
Mr. Tuckwell admits to knowing very little about guns, and would appreciate help from anyone more expert who can help him date it. He is not on the phone, but a note to Bridge Place will find him. Could this interesting discovery be a relic of Rye's smuggling past?
Last week we forwarned readers about the congestion of events on Saturday of next week (15th).The NSPCC Summer Fair, always a large and popular affair, takes place at the FE Centre from 10.30 to 3.30. The Rye Boat Auction held annually by Vidler & Co will be occupying the Cattle Market from 10 - and included in it as well as boats are all sorts of bits and pieces of chandlery which could be of interest to those who have never set foot off dry land. The Ambulance Social Club's Boot Fair opens on the Salts (Rother Ironworks end) at 10, running until 4; this is only the Club'ssecond venture, and they hope for plenty of support from sellers and buyers. A jumble sale at the Community Centre at 11 is being held to raise funds for a playscheme during the summer holidays - we have failed so far to discover any details about this, but hope to be more helpful nearer the time - and as we said last week, jumble can be offered to Rye 226922 (day) or 222296. In addition to all these calls on the community pocket, that Saturday also sees the flag-day in Rye for Multiple Sclerosis.
Three treats for music-lovers come up shortly, two of them on the same evening but at conveniently different times. On Sunday, 16 June, the choir of Northbourne Park School, Kent, will be singing at Evensong in St. Mary's at 6.30; this will be followed at 8 at the Methodist Church by music with Ryesingers and Madrigalia, the culmination of the weekend workshop with Stephen Wilkinson of the BBC Northern _Singers.Four days later (Thursday, 20th) an American choir from the First Congre-eational Church at Palo Alto, California, will sing evensong at St. Mary's at 6.
On Thursday, 20 June, there will be an informal evening at the Methodist Church at 7.30 with Bishop Peter; the theme will be "What does the Eucharist mean to us?". On Sunday, 23 June, the gardens at Lamb House and 18 Church Square will be open in the afternoon in aid of the National Gardens Scheme - always a pleasant visit.
Welcome back to Doodle in the High Street, twice its old size after just a month of hectic rebuilding on the corner of Nrkot Road. Tony and Anne Wills were kept working late last week to carry its stock back across the road from the store-rooms above Serendipity, but they had announced that it would be open on Saturday and it was. Basically, the new shop carries the same kind of goods as the old, but there is of course a wider range, including a poster display rack, boxes of canvas espadrilles (for those who have come to Rye in unsuitable shoes?), Sussex rock (Rye rock promised for next year) and other traditional sugar-sticks, collectors' postcards (as opposed to the local-view variety) - and what Tony Wills describes wi th a twinkle as "horrible dirty jokes".Marilyn Monroe fans should also be sure to call in.Outside, the rebuilt Market Road window catches the eye, and the finished High Street frontage will undoubtedly add to the attractions of the town; but we don't doubt that the staff - four full-time and twelve part-time in the two shops - will be glad to see the builders go!
There are nine candidates for the election due to take place on 27 June as a result of the resignation recently, for reasons of ill-health, of Mr. Alex Buchan. We give below a few notes on each of them, in alphabetical order, and are grateful to them for their help over this.
(The remaining three candidates appear on page 5. We have just room here to remind readers about the Town Council's Annual Meeting next Tuesday at 7.30 at the Town Hall - the agenda is now on the notice-board in the Town Hall foyer.)
5.
Filming proceeds this week. Some of the people with garages at the bottom of Watchbell Street were considerably inconvenienced by the film-makers last week, but we passed on to Peter Hall the mutterings which reached the GAZETTE, and doubtless matters will have improved by now.The official arrangement is that cars can reasonably be asked to wait while a "take" is actually in progress, perhaps for as much as ten minutes - but not longer, and certainly not at all in a real emergency.
This week the action has moved to Market Street. Sue Warren in the Freight Express office opposite the Town Hall could have sold several times over some of the splendid Thirties furniture which appeared to be on sale in the firm's windows at truly astonishing bargain prices; desperate tourists rattled at a locked door on the Saturday. On Monday the street was busy with men laying down mats over the double yellow lines, sticking "Sale!" notices over the lettering on shop windows, and presenting Market Street with a hairdresser's, a fish shop, a flower stall and a dental surgery as oomparions for Ye Olde Tuck Shsppe (playing itself), he Adams' shop (playing itself, but under an assumed name) and "Shore Brothers, established 1902 - drapers, milliners, furniture, household goods" (shades of Delves, which really did sell millinery and haberdashery there when Benson was writing).
Round the corner in Lion Street, Artique was transformed into the Post Office - a much less impressive establishment than the real Post Office in the High Street in Benson's day, but complete even to the "for sale" postcards pinned to the door and the blue "You may telephone from here" sign deceptively visible from the High Street.One American. visitor had to be restrained from posting a letter in the GR letter-box.
By Tuesday afternoon a war memorial had sprouted, complete with post-and-chain fence, in the middle of Market Street opposite the Church Square turning. They had been filming since 8 that morning, and the place was littered with vintage vans, a dapple pony drawing a baker's van, enormously deep prams (with plastic babies in them), and assorted push- and motor-bikes. It was not always easy to tell who were "extras" and who tourists, despite the 50-year gap; to which group, we wondered, did a passing nun belong?
LWT had planned to film in Market Street all day Tuesday and Wednesday, but tactfully rearranged their schedule when they heard of the funeral at St. Mary's on Wednesday afternoon.
There were twenty-two planning applications affecting Rye and its immediate vicinity to be considered at Rother's planning meeting last weeks Thirteen were approved: a first-floor extension at Playden Oasts, two signs at the Old Vicarage in Church Square (who also got renewal of their planning permission to do teas), ESCC's new footbridge at the Harbour Road sluice, a kitchen extension at the Ypres Castle Inn, a two-storey extension at the back of 57 Winchelsea Road, a second-floor extension to the Contra Garage, alterations to 92 High Street (the chimney, which Anglia had originally wanted to take down, is to be retained), rearrangement of the sales area at the Tollgate Garage, an extension to a house in South Under-cliff, the incorporation of the roof-space over Baxters in the High Street into the living accommodation of 5 Market Road, the new Civil Aviation Authority radio mast in Leasam Lane, and two signs at Alsfords Wharf.
The question of a riding establishment at Houghton Green was referred to full Council with a recommendation for refusal.An amended plan was required for a new signboard at the Gluepot in Ferry Road.New workshops for R & E Engineers in Rock Channel were approved if there were no objections from the D o T (more bypass spin-off, perhaps?). The plan to demolish the Colebrooke building and replace it with houses was deferred; the applicant was to be informed that conversion of the existing building for commercial or light industrial use would be preferable. (But some time ago planning permission was given, to a differen applicant, to convert the original building into houses.)
There were five straight refusals.Rediffusion cannot have a vehicle access from its yard into Cinque Ports Street (surprise, surprise!).Victoria Wine cannot install an internally illuminated projecting sign in the High Street (ditto). The amended plans for aluminium-framed windows for 31 High Street, Dr. Jeelani's surgery and once (a very long time ago) the Post Office, were turned down. The amended plans for moorings at the junction of Rock Channel and the Pother, this time minus car park and excavated basin, were turned down too.And permission was refused for the conversion of 105 Winchelsea Road into three flats.
The current planning list includes applications for an extension to a house in King's Avenue, and for change of use for Broomhill Lodge at Rye Foreign from a nursing/rest-home to a private hotel, with alterations to the access. There is a proposal to alter a garden wall in the little courtyard behind the Copper Kettle in The Mint; the owners of no. 35a wish to take down a small section of wall giving access to a new garage (for which permission will be sought later), to provide entrance gates, and to rebuild a boundary wall nearby.
Some consternation was caused by a planning notice published last week about a footpath on Conduit Hill. The plans in the Council Office make it quite clear that this is not - repeat NOT - a tarmac path the whole length of one of the town's most planning-sensitive areas: All that is involved is a short path running alongside the wall of Devonport House; the idea is to give more convenient access to the Community Centre for people trying to push wheelchairs, or even pushchairs, up the hill. We rang Ralph Olesen at Bexhill to ask what the surface would look like when it was finished (the planning application had an unnerving reference to sillething called Bitmac and "light coloured chips"). He was very reassuring. ESCC Highways had called in Norman Hutchings of the County Planning Department to advise on the materials, and although there will be a layer of black tarmac on top of the hardcore base, it will in turn be covered with a thin layer of fine crushed beach, rolled in so that the finished path will have the look of gravel without its errant qualities. It will be about 4P wide and be edged with sets on the road side and paving slabs against the wall - and of course the whole point will be lost if people park on it, so please don't!
The Editor recently had an enquiry from Hastings about advertising rates. We don't do paid ads, but we doubt if one in the GAZETTE would have brought in much business for this particular service: our enquirer was a part-time "stripper" - male!
Your crime reporter's heart sank when she saw several pages of assorted sins in the press book this week; however, most of them turn out to have been in Camber. In Rye, £57 was stolen from the staff-room at Duncan Grant's premises in Rock Channel on 24 May; on the night of 24/5 May a petrol generator and other equipment, paint, etc., disappeared from the Hatleys site in Harbour Road; and on the night of 29/30 May someone started up a forklift truck which had been left at Alsfords Wharf with the key in, and did £100 worth of damage there.
Inspector Northern tells us that the police frogmen who spent some time recently searching the bottom of the Tillingham beside Gibbet Marsh were looking for stolen property. They found some, but whether it was what they were actually seeking is not yet certain, as it has still to be identified.
Neighbourhood Watchers should be proud of one Rye shopkeeper who, noticing something missing after a particular couple left her shop recently, locked up and went smartly round to the police station.The police toured her round the town until she spotted the pair, and they were arrested and their loot recovered. The two, girls from London, subsequently pleaded guilty at Rye Magistrates court.
• Devonport House residents - most of whom have lived in the sheltered housing .,lats since the Queen Mother opened the building in 1982 - are sorry to hear that they are about to lose their warden, Mrs. Betty Leggett, who has also been there for just on three years (her predecessor left for family reasons after a few week Mrs. Leggett, whose husband died in December 1982, is retiring, and will be mov to a flat in St. Leonards; she will be sadly missed by her friends at the foot Conduit Hill).
• Rye Young Farmers Club's success at the YFC Show, which we reported briefly last week, is rather more special than we had realised. The award is for success achieved over the whole year, not just at the show's events, and this is the 13th year in succession that Rye has won it!
• Another long-standing farming winner from Rye is Bertie Bull of Leasam House Farm. At the Heathfield Show last week, his pen of Texel lamb crosses won the Championship for the best butcher's lamb for the tenth year running.
• A reader has a compliment for the Southern Water Authority. Infuriated by an inadequately-filled-in trench left across Winchelsea Road by Authority workmen, Pat Bonham wrote to the SWA's Guildford office to complain. His letter was acknowledged by return, and the trench was properly levelled within a matter of days.(We wish we could say the same for the Gas Board, whose contractors seem to be spending a great deal of time digging up the same bits of road over and over and over again!)
The Old Vicarage in Church Square has been painting its face - or, to be accurate, Richard Griffin of Cadborough Cliff has been painting it, and the front is now finished, though work on the back was delayed by repairs after last week's lightning strike.Ernest Thompson had felt that the original pink paint "lost" the pretty mouldings at the side of the bay windows, so these have now been picked out in white and linked with a white band over each window.The little roof above each bay keeps the stone colour stipulated by the planning authorities. And very nice it all looks.
Since last weekend was bright and sunny with a strong offshore wind, we assumed that the lifeboat would have been busy retrieving idiots on rubber mattresses, if nothing worse. We apologise to the owners of rubber mattresses! Mary Lestocq tells us that the lifeboat was not called out at all over the weekend - indeed, it has been a quiet season altogether so far, though a recent exercise held jointly with the Dungeness lifeboat involved one of the Rye Harbour crew as the "victim".
(Apologies to several people whose stories were left out this week; we promise faithfully they will appear next Wednesday.)
Christian Lunch Club (Miss Hitchings speaks on her work as a missionary in Zaire), CC, 12 for 12.30
Vidler & Co's monthly auction sale, 10
Rye WI Summer Fair, FEC, 10
Rye Town Council Annual Meeting, TH, 7.30 (GAZETTE no. 152) Thomas Peacocke Lower School - new parents' event
Rye WI, "Flower-arranger's Garden" (Mrs. E.U. Croker), plus Monica Oliver's "Cures from the 19th Century", FEC, 7
Rye Branch of Noncap, AGM, George Hotel (Benson Room), 7.50
• Hearty congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Fred Orford, who will be celebrating their Diamond Wedding on Sunday! Full story next week...
• Congratulations, too, to David Slack of Marley Road, who is 18 today; David is on the staff of James Kimber in the High Street.
• This week sees the Arthritis and Rheumatism Council for Research's house-to-house collection, with the flag-day on Saturday.
• George Shackleton tells us that at last week's Recreation & Leisure committee meeting Rother decided to go ahead with tenders to design and build sports hal for both Rye and Battle, on the lines which we reported last week.
• At the May meeting of Rye WI, Mrs. Blurton, a VCO from Mayfield, took the members through the resolutions to be put to the AGM at the Royal Albert Hall later this month. Mrs. Phyllis Smith then spoke on her visit to Oberammergau in 1934, the 350th anniversary of the Passion Play.
• Congratulations to Mrs. Beryl Rixon of Tillingham Avenue and Mrs. Withers-Green, both members of the Rye Flower Club, whose green-and-white pedestal arrangement came second in its class at a competition held by the Sussex Area of the National Association of Flower Arrangers and contested by clubs from all over Sussex.
• Bowls: Rye played three times last week, against St. Leonards, Staplecross and Northiam, and were, alas, the losers on each occasion.
• Rotary's Country Fayre this year (11 August) will have a new attraction - a Tug o' War contest. Maurice Blackman (Rye 225142) would be very glad to hear from teams wishing to compete for the trophy - local men and those from further afield. He is not promising anything about the big-time champions from the Isle of Oxney, though of course it would be good to see them, but he does make-the point that inexperienced teams will be very welcome to join in the fun.
• There was dancing in two of Rye's churches on Whitsunday. The Pentecost Party at St. Mary's ended with it, after a visit earlier in the festivities from the Morris dancers who were performing in the town; and Bishop Cormac's packed congregation at the Baptist Church in the evening saw the first appearance of a local Baptist liturgical dance group. Bishop Cormac spoke on "Growth in Love and Unity".
• A new sign has just appeared to guide drivers entering Tower Street. "All through traffic" is directed to take the left-hand lane (down the Landgate and round the bottom of the town or over the railway bridge), while the warning "Unsuitable for coaches" follows the right-hand arrow to the town centre. What a pity it can't also say "Unsuitable for lorries".
• One does see some funny things, going round the town on the GAZETTE delivery round: last week, while LWT were busy in Watchbell Street and lots of tourists were wandering round Church Square in the sunshine, there was a WC pan, complete with seat, reposing placidly alone on a front doorstep in thi3 elegant area!
THE RYE GAZETTE is registered as a newspaper with the Post Office, and published by Mrs. Mary Owen l 2 Cyprus Place, Rye (Rye 222303). News items for inclusion are always welcome - deadline Monday afternoon, Tuesday 9 am for emergencies. The GAZETTE costs 25p weekly, and is delivered to subscribers and pick-up points on Wednesday; a few spare copies are available from Squirrels, 9-13 Cinque Ports Street, and back numbers from Cyprus Place. (Copyright Mary Owen 1985)