This is Somerset --
Only three of the more than 300 or so villages in the county of Gloucestershire are on a curious list of so-called Thankful Villages.
All of them are in the Cotswolds and they're among 51 UK villages (mostly English, but with a few Welsh) from which soldiers left to fight in the First World War and all returned.
Harder to dwell on is the implication that most of England's 16,000 villages didn't qualify, as did only one of France's 32,000.
This term was used in the 1930s by Arthur Mee in his King's England counties guide and I came across the list online, put there by researchers Norman Thorpe, Rod Morris and Tom Morgan who keep their interest in compiling it fairly private.
Perhaps they are old soldiers or children of old soldiers?
The list is touching because it's so short.
Little Sodbury sent six men, Upper Slaughter 25, and Coln Rogers 25 men and one woman (Doris Barton of the Voluntary Aid Detachment). Of Somerset's 440-odd villages Woolley (13 men) was one of nine "thankful villages", while Wiltshire had none at all.
Browsing Wikipedia, I came across an interesting tradition: "Every year in February and March, Charlcombe Lane is closed by the local council to enable frogs and toads to cross the road in safety.
"During this period local residents and volunteers go out at dusk, the time of greatest movement, collecting them in buckets and depositing them on the other side of the road, allowing them to continue their journey safely towards a lake in Charlcombe Valley on a tributary of the Lam Brook."
And how lovingly Wikipedia worded it.
This stuff would bring a smile to any soldier, returning or not; and it goes on at dusk, which means that volunteers are giving up EastEnders to do this.
Even Jane Austen put in her two bob's worth describing Charlcombe in letters as "sweetly situated in a little green valley, as a village with such a name ought to be".
What traditions did other 'thankful villages' keep going to have made the conflict worthwhile?
"We splashed through a ford to reach Upper Slaughter," wrote Beryl Bainbridge in English Journey, after which "we passed a notice saying the ford was unsuitable for cars", suggesting its parish council prefers cars to approach the village from the other direction.
It shouldn't be confused with its sister parish council at Lower Slaughter, which is all of 300 metres away and where so much goes on they need a separate parish council, where they made the national headlines in May for trying to stop someone selling ice creams.
Perhaps he should operate in Upper Slaughter where someone may be related to those 25 brave souls from the Great War who does remember the kind of freedom they fought in the tenches for.
Still, perhaps Lower Slaughter has military traditions too, despite Bainbridge finding it "almost empty".
She means apart from the person behind curtains with binoculars who saw the tricyclist approach singing a happy song: no doubt a ruse to confuse the enemy and catch the attention of the "delivery boy on a bike" Bainbridge spotted "racing down the little path beside the pond and over the bridge" who must have heard the ice creams coming.
A quick call to HQ on the field telephone would alert the concealed council officers at other vantage points (church tower, inside water wheel, pretending to be tree) to keep an eye on the girl on horse Bainbridge saw "standing motionless in the middle of the village pond."
Clearly, the threatened ice cream ban threw her into a trance but tree guy was ready for a flanking move, in case she broke cover and galloped for a "99".
I will leave the last word to wicked Beryl's theory about where all the residents of Lower Slaughter's had really gone.
"Perhaps they came out at a certain time, corduroy trousers tied picturesquely at the knee, sucking on straws, waiting to be photographed, like those sad Sioux Indians in the reservation villages on the tourist route through the Badlands, squinting inscrutably into the camera, gold wrist watches flashing in the sun." Reported by This is 22 hours ago.
Only three of the more than 300 or so villages in the county of Gloucestershire are on a curious list of so-called Thankful Villages.
All of them are in the Cotswolds and they're among 51 UK villages (mostly English, but with a few Welsh) from which soldiers left to fight in the First World War and all returned.
Harder to dwell on is the implication that most of England's 16,000 villages didn't qualify, as did only one of France's 32,000.
This term was used in the 1930s by Arthur Mee in his King's England counties guide and I came across the list online, put there by researchers Norman Thorpe, Rod Morris and Tom Morgan who keep their interest in compiling it fairly private.
Perhaps they are old soldiers or children of old soldiers?
The list is touching because it's so short.
Little Sodbury sent six men, Upper Slaughter 25, and Coln Rogers 25 men and one woman (Doris Barton of the Voluntary Aid Detachment). Of Somerset's 440-odd villages Woolley (13 men) was one of nine "thankful villages", while Wiltshire had none at all.
Browsing Wikipedia, I came across an interesting tradition: "Every year in February and March, Charlcombe Lane is closed by the local council to enable frogs and toads to cross the road in safety.
"During this period local residents and volunteers go out at dusk, the time of greatest movement, collecting them in buckets and depositing them on the other side of the road, allowing them to continue their journey safely towards a lake in Charlcombe Valley on a tributary of the Lam Brook."
And how lovingly Wikipedia worded it.
This stuff would bring a smile to any soldier, returning or not; and it goes on at dusk, which means that volunteers are giving up EastEnders to do this.
Even Jane Austen put in her two bob's worth describing Charlcombe in letters as "sweetly situated in a little green valley, as a village with such a name ought to be".
What traditions did other 'thankful villages' keep going to have made the conflict worthwhile?
"We splashed through a ford to reach Upper Slaughter," wrote Beryl Bainbridge in English Journey, after which "we passed a notice saying the ford was unsuitable for cars", suggesting its parish council prefers cars to approach the village from the other direction.
It shouldn't be confused with its sister parish council at Lower Slaughter, which is all of 300 metres away and where so much goes on they need a separate parish council, where they made the national headlines in May for trying to stop someone selling ice creams.
Perhaps he should operate in Upper Slaughter where someone may be related to those 25 brave souls from the Great War who does remember the kind of freedom they fought in the tenches for.
Still, perhaps Lower Slaughter has military traditions too, despite Bainbridge finding it "almost empty".
She means apart from the person behind curtains with binoculars who saw the tricyclist approach singing a happy song: no doubt a ruse to confuse the enemy and catch the attention of the "delivery boy on a bike" Bainbridge spotted "racing down the little path beside the pond and over the bridge" who must have heard the ice creams coming.
A quick call to HQ on the field telephone would alert the concealed council officers at other vantage points (church tower, inside water wheel, pretending to be tree) to keep an eye on the girl on horse Bainbridge saw "standing motionless in the middle of the village pond."
Clearly, the threatened ice cream ban threw her into a trance but tree guy was ready for a flanking move, in case she broke cover and galloped for a "99".
I will leave the last word to wicked Beryl's theory about where all the residents of Lower Slaughter's had really gone.
"Perhaps they came out at a certain time, corduroy trousers tied picturesquely at the knee, sucking on straws, waiting to be photographed, like those sad Sioux Indians in the reservation villages on the tourist route through the Badlands, squinting inscrutably into the camera, gold wrist watches flashing in the sun." Reported by This is 22 hours ago.
