Tower and Town, July 2017

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Editorial: Discoveries

Discoveries – we’ve all made them, we’ve all enjoyed them, whether they be first hand or via others’ disclosures. In this edition, we cover many and varied types of discoveries – the scope for such a term is endless.

Michael Gray, curator at The Merchant’s House, kicks us off with a selection of some of the fascinating finds on the walls of the House as they have over time stripped back the layers. Rachel Maurice tells us about the origins of the Old Boathouse, now home of the Mustard Seed book and coffee shop. Next we need to dust off our walking boots and follow John Osborne on an interesting and varied journey to “Bedwyn and Beyond” via bus or train and ‘shank’s pony’! It all sounds delightful and one or two mentions of a pub is undoubtedly meant to keep us going!

I seem to learn something new each time I visit St Peter’s church, and in this edition David du Croz gives us a detailed account of the life of Sir Nicholas Hyde and talks about one of the memorials in St Peter’s, which records the deaths of three of Sir Nicholas’ children. David Sherratt lets us in on a “Secret Society” from Marlborough’s history, and for something completely different, Tim Balmer shares with us what he has discovered about the history of the Marlborough railways.

Hugh de Saram certainly gives us something to think about with the article of his own ‘Theory of Relativity’. And finally, Patrick Titman comments on a very topical subject, ‘Forced Migration’.

I hope you enjoy reading about our contributors’ ‘discoveries’. Hopefully some, if not all, will be discoveries for you.

As always, my thanks go to all the contributors, and to Hugh de Saram for the amazing front cover photo.

Sue Pells