The Last Enemy

The Air Forces Memorial, Runnymede

Earth, Air, Fire, Water.

They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea........  (Isaiah, 11:9)

Something is not quite right, down by the river.  The footpath has disappeared by Old Windsor, and garden cherry trees in Wraysbury emerge from the waters like mangroves.

Looking across the Thames, we can make out Heathrow airport, just beyond the King George VI reservoir and the Perry Oaks Sewage Works.

Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a......

Closer in, the houses of Hythe End appear to be surrounded by waters, at least.....

And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, 
shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: 
And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; 
and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

But one fine House of  Windsor (the home of the once Saxe-Coburg-Gotha family) sits above the hurly burly of the river flows, for the moment....

I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, 
and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.  (Luke 6:46-49)

Though if I were Queen, I would probably do something about the flight path overhead, with its score of merlin decibels chinkering my Meissen every thirty seconds.....

Anyway, I sense ironies about the place.  The place where King John sealed the Magna Carta is flooded.  King John was also famous for losing his treasure in the Wash.  Perhaps not a king for stability. But then next year the American Bar Association will revisit their memorial here to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the signing of the Great Paper, which subsequently formed the basis of the American Constitution. Not, note, the English, British or United Kingdom Constitution (for we do not have one) [which might perhaps have presented something of an obstacle to Alex Salmond?]

There is another little irony here in the Lutyens Lodges, which guard the north-western approach to the meadows. These were designed as memorials to Urban H Broughton, MP, in 1929.  Notice the lack of gutters - a design feature allowing rainwater to cascade straight off the roof to soak away through slits in the paving below.

As can be seen.....

[I gather they are taking the roof off Castle Drogo because of rain water too!]

Anyway, that is an aside.  The main concern here is with the elements, and we've seen enough of water for the moment. So, climbing up the National Trust earth of Cooper's Hill, we come to the sky, the air, and soaring above is an Astral Crown in blue and gold, topped by a single star that pierces the heavens.

This is the Air Forces Memorial, Runnymede, designed by Sir Edward Maufe (who also designed Guildford Cathedral), opened by the Queen in 1953, on land donated by Sir Eugen and Lady Effie Millington-Drake, and, despite all that, it is a most moving monument.

It is perhaps another irony that we now take for granted the conquest of the air, while we flay ourselves and each other, gnashing teeth and wailing, when river waters rise a few inches above lawns down by the banks.....

But those magnificent men in their flying machines did not all have it easy, and this great shrine is to some of the 116,000 men and women of the Air Forces of the Commonwealth who gave their lives in service in the Second World War, many of whom were lost without trace.

This place of reserve and quiet commemorates over twenty thousand of these who were lost in operations from bases in the United Kingdom and North and Western Europe.  Most of them, 15,462 in fact, served in the Royal Air Force, but there were many from the Royal Canadian, Australian, New Zealand and Indian Air Forces, the South African Air Force, as well as from the Women's Auxiliary Air Force and the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC).  

Their names are engraved on the walls, reveals and mullions of the windows, grouped according to the year of death, in alphabetical order.

And relatives and friends still visit to leave mementoes to show their love and respect:

And wreaths record more formal tributes in the shadows:

The building itself, in keeping with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission's style (Sir Edward Maufe was their principal architect in the years following the Second World War), is cool and sober.  The great north window of the shrine is engraved with words from the 139th Psalm, sometimes called the Airman's Psalm:

If I ascend into heaven, You are there;

If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there.

If I take the wings of the morning,

And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,

Even there Your hand shall lead me,

And Your right hand shall hold me. 

If I say, “Surely the darkness shall fall on me,” 

Even the night shall be light about me; 

Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You, 

But the night shines as the day; 

The darkness and the light are both alike to You

And these words are flanked by angels and vapour trails, copied (the vapour trails that is) from photographs taken during the Battle of Britain. Above is a gallery, with another engraved window.  This poem was composed by Paul H Scott, a student, soon after the memorial was completed.

We shall see the memorial still, and over it
The crown and single star.  And we shall pray
As the mists rise up and the air grows dark
That we may wear
As brave a heart as they.

And then above this is the roof terrace, beneath the crown, with views across the gardens, and also down over the Thames.

One name that is not found here is that of Richard Hillary, a young airman who was not lost without trace.  His ordeal was by fire, when, on September 3rd, 1940,  just below me and to my left, I saw what I had been praying for - a Messerschmitt climbing and away from the sun. I closed in to 200 yards, and from slightly to one side gave him a two-second burst: fabric ripped off the wing and black smoke poured from the engine, but he did not go down. Like a fool, I did not break away, but put in another three-second burst. Red flames shot upwards and he spiralled out of sight. At that moment, I felt a terrific explosion which knocked the control stick from my hand, and the whole machine quivered like a stricken animal. In a second, the cockpit was a mass of flames: instinctively, I reached up to open the hood. It would not move. I tore off my straps and managed to force it back; but this took time, and when I dropped back into the seat and reached for the stick in an effort to turn the plane on its back, the heat was so intense that I could feel myself going. I remember a second of sharp agony, remember thinking "So this is it!" and putting both hands to my eyes. Then I passed out.

He was thrown from the cockpit and parachuted into the sea, some miles off Margate, whose lifeboat picked him up many hours later.

He had extensive burns to the face and hands (he, like many other Spitfire pilots, refused to wear goggles or gloves) and suffered months of agony undergoing revolutionary plastic surgery.

He never regained complete fitness, but, having recorded his experiences in The Last Enemy, he returned to flying. He was killed on the night of January 7th 1943.  Hillary, on a training flight with his navigator, Walter Fison, died instantly when his Bristol Blenheim crashed in a field near RAF Charterhall.  

His charred remains, weighted with sand in his coffin, were returned to his parents, together with his cigarette case, and his will, in which he had written:  

I want no one to go into mourning for me.  As to whether I am buried or cremated, it is immaterial to me, but, as the flames have had one try, I suggest they might get their man in the end.

Richard Hillary was 23 when he died.  

1 Corinthians 15:26

The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death

Richard's story is one of the best known accounts of a fighter pilot's experience in the Second World War. It is now in print again, with an introduction by Sebastian Faulks, who also wrote about Hillary in The Fatal Englishman.  The isolation and almost medieval duelling of airmen is perhaps best expressed by W B Yeats, however, in his poem An Irish Airman foresees his Death, written in 1918, for Major Robert Gregory, the only son of Yeats's friend, Lady Gregory.

I know that I shall meet my fate 

Somewhere among the clouds above; 

.....

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight, 

Nor public man, nor cheering crowds, 

A lonely impulse of delight 

Drove to this tumult in the clouds; 

I balanced all, brought all to mind, 

The years to come seemed waste of breath, 

A waste of breath the years behind 

In balance with this life, this death

It is a final irony that the names, carved into stone, outlive these men and women.  But as Richard Hillary wrote in his will:  I want no one to feel sorry for me.....  In my life I had a few friends, I learnt a little wisdom and a little patience. What more could a man ask for?

It is too late to feel sorry, but it is never too late to remember. And even when our memories have gone, others will be reminded of those who gave their lives.  

On the earth, in the water, in the air, and in the fire.

.

London 8 - Bright Lights, Big City

A night on the "Town"

Why, Sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford.

So said the great Samuel Johnson in conversation with his biographer, James Boswell, on September 20th, 1777.

A few years later, William Wordsworth stood on Westminster Bridge and wrote that:

Earth has not anything to show more fair.....

Of course the fires that plumed up through the myriad chimneys of houses and workshops, factories and trains, no longer cloud the skies with thick sooty smoke, but the air is not fresh, and the exhaust fumes of traffic, especially diesels, blur the potential pleasure of the views.

However, the sense that Wordsworth conveyed that the city has a mighty heart, and that anthropomorphically it may sleep, is not difficult to understand.  London's greatness, as ascertained by Johnson, transcends the ages, and is constantly renewed, now with the towers and domes that rise unimaginably high with extraordinary engineering techniques, and with lighting that creates another world once the sun has fallen beyond the M25.  And it was with this in mind that I recently took a stroll into the night......

It is dusk, and time to unwind.  The city workers have begun their traipse home, or their social hours.  The geeks start to play in the wi-fi zones, and the nerds stay on for a while in front of their screens.  The count down to tomorrow begins......

As the sky thickens and starlings fall, the sometimes shabby bricks of old-style pubs breathe new life, and the younger set spill from offices to join forces in the joys of the Happy Hour.

Midweek it does not seem so busy, but the shifting sands of humanity fill every crevice in a surreptitious dust storm. Tables fill with anticipation of a rendezvous;  bar stools edge closer with the magnetism of opposites.

Haunts that may have once been familiar to the creeps and bawds of Dickens' time are now chic hangouts of the smart and the cool.  At this moment the revolution is in full tilt, with bar-room cracks giving way to gourmet blackboards.  

Night falls.  The bright lights awake.  The Big City begins to rock and roll, where during the working day a slow discharge of four-letter work slunk through the streets.  Now the spirit awakes, and, looking back, looking forward, looking up, the city calls out to the young at heart.  Awake!  The countdown continues.....

In my head, Jimmy Reed's (1961) words start to jump, in the Eric Burdon version:

Bright lights, big city,

Gone to my baby's head

Bright lights, big city

Gone to my baby's head

This simple refrain was recorded by both the Animals and the Rolling Stones (and Bob Dylan!) in the '60s and has since chugged repetitively around my brain pan when I think of city nights. Recently a different song, entitled Bright Lights Bigger City has been a hit in 2011 for CeeLo (it was number one in Israel....?) The songwriters, Thomas Callaway (aka Ceelo Green), Tony Reyes and Benjamin H Allen III, must have nodded toward the great Jimmy Reed when they wrote:

Bright lights and the big city, it belongs to us tonight

Tonight, tonight, alright

Guess I need it, everybody does

But whichever you choose, there's still a whiff of Wordsworth, or at least Wordsmith, in these sentiments. And underlying them also run the theme of the source of human inspiration created in such a matrix of enterprise.

For some it is now home time. In the glam flats overlooking the Grand Union Canal out the back of the new Guardian building, the corks are popping and the glasses over-fizz, while the aged barges and narrow homes on the still waters below rock to the ripples of waterclocks.

For others, the young at heart perhaps, it is party time,

and in the basement bar of King's Place, for instance, the hip and hip-replacement set are getting ready for the second half of their night.

Then, all too soon, it is over, and the darkness consumes. Lights sparkle and incessantly twitch through red and orange and green. Hurried steps take revellers to their hopes of the undiscovered country beyond the terminus platforms, and the night trains head off to the comfort, or relative quietus, of the bare-bodkin suburbs......

The nearby Filling Station stands closed, illuminated against invasion, an outpost of some strange development under the night sky, though paradoxically quite insignificant by day.

And I direct my steps to the city, to bask in the neon glows of incandescent wealth, though the first light I note is that of a moon, slightly belittled here by man's achievements, but none-the-less smart as a reflector of greater powers.

And then, eventually, I stand in awe of the great towers of silence that rise in some way celebrating the male domination of the business world.  The Lloyd's building rises, glowing blue, its tubes like vasa deferentia pulsing towards its peak.

And then the lights go out.  A nod toward nightly conservation.  The blue splash evaporates and the tubes go limp.

Close by, the so-called gherkin, 30 St Mary Axe, rises 180 metres on its launch pad, glowing in the dark even when the lights are off:

This giant lingam, standing on the site of the Baltic Exchange, devastated by a bomb in 1992, takes its proper name from the church of St Mary Axe, which was demolished in 1561.  The combination of the Virgin Mary and an Axe may have its roots in an inn of the sign of an axe, or it may be related to the Worshipful Company of Skinners, who wielded axes in their trade hard by.  

Or maybe, just maybe, the Axe reverbs into that so twentieth century symbol of Slash and Mark, as bankers and insurance clerks rise up to flay their air guitars against the stars.

Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!

Then to the river, to admire the presumption of the obelisk known as the Shard, Egyptian in its pose, and breathtaking in its daring.  Though despite its shiny promise, its hypodermic charge, it has yet to be filled, and could remain a deep veined dream. 

Just near here, in different times, one David Copperfield Landed in London on a wintry autumn evening, on his return from three years abroad. It was dark and raining, and I saw more fog and mud in a minute than I had seen in a year. I walked from the Custom House to the Monument before I found a coach; and although the very house-fronts, looking on the swollen gutters, were like old friends to me, I could not but admit that they were very dingy friends.

In his most pensive style, Dickens (for it is he, dear reader) continues.....

I have often remarked—I suppose everybody has—that one’s going away from a familiar place, would seem to be the signal for change in it. As I looked out of the coach window, and observed that an old house on Fish Street Hill, which had stood untouched by painter, carpenter, or bricklayer, for a century, had been pulled down in my absence; and that a neighbouring street, of time-honoured insalubrity and inconvenience, was being drained and widened; I half expected to find St. Paul’s Cathedral looking older.

But if anything, this dome, which has stood here since 1708, looks better today than for a very long time, thanks to restoration and cunning lighting.  Although it is only a puny 111 metres high, it rises from the highest point in the city, and so, until 1962, was the tallest landmark in London, certainly the most impressive when David C was at large, though he would most like have been phased by the streaming lights of modern traffic.....

Time unwinds. The stars begin to fade and the countdown reverses to bring in the day.

As Wordsworth stretches, wanders to the bridge, and wonders at the industrial impact on this organic earth, I stumble to my city breakfast, with those who try to rest on the cold paving of the dawn.  Only to find my way barred; society (in the guise of the Carpenters' Arms) unwilling to embrace me in the grey morning light.

As Jimmy sang to Mary 'Mama' Reed, his wife:

Go ahead pretty baby

Oh, honey knock yourself out 

Go ahead pretty baby 

Oh honey knock yourself out

I still love you baby cause you don't know what it's all about

And I start my way back home, a little weary, with just a touch of the delta slide and only the blues to call my own. 

But not weary of life.

Yet!

The lights are going out.....

Slimbridge Wetland Centre

Wildfowl and Wetlands

I am watching you

In these sodden days of argument and misery, of slime and stench, water and more water, what better place for a day out than a Wetland Centre?

A View from the Bridge (The Sloane Observation Tower)

When Peter Scott's father, Captain Robert Falcon Scott, wrote to his wife from his ill-fated Antarctic expedition in 1911, he urged her to make their son, interested in Natural History, if you can; it is better than games......  Peter was only two at the time, but the encouragement worked, eventually.  After developing his talents as an artist, and also winning a bronze medal for dinghy sailing at the Berlin Olympics in 1936, he became an officer in the Royal Navy during the Second World War, during which he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for gallantry.  

Sir Peter Scott 1909 - 1989 (by Jacqueline Shackleton)

He was also a competitive ice-skater, and a gliding champion, but his real claim to fame came when, having seen a Lesser White-fronted Goose in Gloucestershire, he founded the Severn Wildfowl Trust (which became the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust) at Slimbridge, where he bought a cottage and some land and lived for the rest of his life.  This also led to the BBC Natural History Unit making its home in Bristol, and, separately, also inspired Peter to be one of the founders, and the first chairman, of the World Wildlife Fund, in 1961.

A Bird's Eye View

Peter also achieved fame for his wildlife TV programme, Look, which ran from 1955 to 1981, and which was probably one of the reasons I became interested in birds.....  I remember visiting Slimbridge with my parents as a very young thing, and when I returned this week found that although there have been huge developments on the site, there was something very familiar about it, and loved it, despite the rain.

Good to see you back!

It was a good time to visit, as the mild winter (yes it has been mild) has meant that many birds have wintered here when they might have gone further south.  Also, the rain (we have had some it is true) has kept the wetlands wet and the wildfowl happy - after all, it's all just water off a duck's back!

A Desert of Lapwings

The whole site covers 120 acres.  There are (at least) twelve hides as well as three observatories.  From the Sloane Observation Tower you can see from the Cotswolds to the Forest of Dean across the Severn, and in the Peng Observatory, you can sit in comfort and watch the birds through glass walls.  Many of the birds come here of their own free will, as part of their migratory life style.  These two Pintail (Anas Acuta) are representatives of one of the commonest ducks in the world (despite recent declines especially in North America), with some 5.4 million individuals covering 11 million square miles across the entire northern hemisphere.  Many winter in the UK, though only about 30 pairs breed here.

A pair of Northern Pintail

In contrast, this Hawaiian Goose is the world's rarest goose, and was on the brink of extinction with only 30 birds left in 1952 when Peter Scott introduced it to Slimbridge. There are now some 2,500 individuals around the world, about half of whom live in the wild.  It is the State Bird of Hawaii.

The Nene, or Hawaiian, Goose

You do not have to be a twitcher to enjoy sighting different species of birds here.  I am no expert, but with the help of a book, and the very helpful posters displayed around the hides, it is not difficult to pick out birds, even though they seem to be happily muddled up together on the lakes.

Common Goldeneye (m)

Once you start getting the hang of it, then you can start to see how different they are.  Some dabble at the surface, some dive.  Some seem to be happy on their own, some paddle about in pairs, and some flock, or spring.

Common Pochard (m)

Their names are fascinating too, as some, like the Goldeneye, are pretty obvious, and some, like the Wigeon, apparently derive onomatopoeically from their call.  The Pochard is so called because it pokes or poaches when it delves for food.

Eurasian Wigeon (m)

But who knows how the Tufted Duck got his name?

Tufted Duck (m)

At the time of my visit, the board recording latest wildlife sightings (i.e. not counting the permanently resident birds and animals) listed 67 species of bird, of which 23 were wildfowl and 12 were waders. The total of these sightings was 24,288, though some of these, such as the solitary Puffin and a similarly lonely Razorbill, were only seen on one day. By far the most numerous was the Lapwing, with 7,655 individuals counted, but there were also thousands of Wigeon, Teal, Mallard, Golden Plover and Dunlin. These numbers vary daily, however, and on February 21st, 2,500 Shoveler were also noted (as opposed to the 332 when I was there).  There were 139 Bewick's Swan, each with his or her completely individual upper beak markings, and 135 Mute Swan, all quite sociably getting along well together.....

A gaggle of swans - Mute on the left and Bewick's on the right, with a cygnet in the middle

And in the air, on the water, and waddling amongst the visitors on the paths, were almost 1000 various geese, of whom 503 were Greylag......

A landing party - a Skein of Greylag Geese whiffling down

For many visitors an additional attraction to the wildlife that abounds at Slimbridge is the collection of exotic species. There are representatives of all six species of Flamingo here and the new Flamingo Lagoon is the best place to view the extraordinary beaked profile of the Greater Flamingo, little changed from fossils of these creatures that are 50 million years old.

Greater Flamingo

While on the other side of the reserve the richly coloured Caribbean variety creates a lively spectacle.

The Caribbean Flamingo dance

As the place is fox-proof and carefully managed, there are plenty of more mundane birds to see as well, from Blue Tits to Blackbirds, Robins to Thrushes.  At this time of year these are starting to sing, adding another dimension to the pleasures of a walk round here.  There are some American River Otters to see as well, and, if you are lucky you might catch a glimpse of a Water Vole, or a Kingfisher.

A Clattering of Jackdaws, happy to be living in the Wetlands

Slimbridge is a fine place for a day out, even if the weather is not clement.  There are eight other Wetland Centres in the UK, however, so have a look at their website for more information:

http://www.wwt.org.uk/

For me Slimbridge is a rather special place, though, as it was probably the first place I saw the magnificence of a swan's take-off, which is something that remains with you, etched on the mind like a tableau of porcelain ducks over a tiled fireplace......

Take off!

http://www.wwt.org.uk/wetland-centres/slimbridge/