floods | Life in the English Cotswolds

I think it would be fair to say that the chances of my viewing Earth from the Moon is so improbable that I have never even considered it. That changed when, with an hour to spare en route elsewhere, I decided to explore the Abbey Church of Tewkesbury, little knowing that I would leave having had an out-of-space experience.

The name Tewkesbury Abbey, as it is usually called, is really a misnomer for the church has been the Parish Church of the Gloucestershire town of Tewkesbury for centuries. When, in 1087, Robert Fitzhamon was gifted Tewkesbury by his cousin William the Conqueror, there had already been a monastery on the site for four hundred years. However, in 1102 the building of the present church commenced, its stone coming from Caen in Normandy, France and floated up the River Severn which passes just yards from the door. For the next four hundred years, as part of the Benedictine monastery, it really was Tewkesbury Abbey.

Ancient buildings line the streets that lead to Tewkesbury Abbey

I’ve driven through Tewkesbury dozens of times. It’s an interesting town with some beautiful old buildings and I’d always intended to stop and explore. With limited time, the town would have to wait for another day. I entered the Abbey church expecting to be overawed by it for it for several reasons: it is now almost a thousand years old, it is one of the finest Norman buildings in England, it has the largest Romanesque cross-tower in Europe and contains more medieval monuments than any other church apart from Westminster Abbey in London. I hadn’t however expected to be be confronted, upon entering, by a large, hanging globe – our Planet Earth.

Rotating slowly, the seven metre diameter Earth sculpture is as seen from the Moon. As Luke Jerram, who created this Gaia exhibit states, “man has been gazing at the moon for Millenia but it was only in 1972, with the Apollo 17 mission, that man was able to see our planet floating through space – a sight that changed our perception of Earth forever.” When standing 211 metres away from the globe, viewers see the Earth to scale, exactly as it was viewed from the Moon.

The Abbey, of course, has many wonders of its own to be viewed. For me, an unexpected delight was the chantry chapel built as a memorial to Isabella, Countess of Warwick and her two husbands, Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Worcester and, later, (another) Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick. Erected in 1430, Isabella’s first husband was killed during the Battle of Mieux and she died in 1439. It was her second husband, the Earl of Warwick, that excited me the most. For his first marriage to Elizabeth de Berkeley (who died in 1422) is part of a long line that I can trace back to in my family tree: Richard and Elizabeth were my 15x great-grandparents. Over the generations, the women in my ancestry have often been rebellious and married against their parent’s wishes (see A Rebel in the Family for an example) – hence the fact that I am just a plain old commoner! Grandfather Richard commissioned another, more splendid brass tomb for himself in Warwick – another place on my list of ‘must visits’.

Bronze effigy of Richard Beauchamp who died in 1439 [*Wikipedia: Robin Stevenson*]

So what caused the Abbey Church to become just a Parish Church? It was, of course, due to the desire of Henry VIII to divorce and remarry brought about his separation from the Church of Rome. His subsequent Dissolution of the Monasteries swept away the buildings and created the spectacular ruins that we find dotted around the English countryside today. A similar fate would have happened to the church in Tewkesbury if it had not been for the argument, fortunately won, that to demolish the church would leave town without a place of worship. How fortunate for us today, for the architecture, history and splendour of the building makes it an almost unique example of early Norman ecclesiastical buildings.

The tall Norman arch is unmatched for size in England

Tewkesbury, as has been stated, is built along the banks of the River Severn, England’s longest river which is subject to tidal bores and rapid changes in it’s flow height. As a result, the town is often flooded. Despite being built so close to the river, the floodwaters have only entered the church on two occasions, in 1760 and, more recently, in 2007. It is often shown in news features totally surrounded by the flood waters.

Modern stained glass at Tewkesbury Abbey

The Gaia exhibit has now ended at Tewkesbury. It is being shown as an ongoing exhibition in the UK at UCL, London; International Centre for Life, Newcastle; Dynamic Earth, Scotland. In Ireland: Trinity College, Dublin. In Canada: Canadian Museum of Nature, Ontario. American readers have the opportunity of seeing it in the USA at Houston Museum of Natural Sciences 12-28 April 2024.

To find our more about the Abbey church, its history and other topics in this blog follow the links below:
Tewkesbury Abbey
Gaia / Luke Jerram Isabel, Countess of Warwick Dissolution of the Monasteries

When Irving Berlin wrote the now immortal lines, “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas, just like the ones we used to know” he was pining for colder weather for he was staying in California (or Arizona, for both states lay claim to the fact). The original version of the song actually began with a complaint about warmer climes: “The sun is shining, the grass is green, the orange and palm trees sway…” How, as a child I could relate to that – well almost.

My childhood home was not in the Cotswold Hills but at the foot of the Chiltern Hills, along the banks of the River Thames which thirty or so odd miles downstream flows through London on its way to the sea. The microclimate of the river meant our village had a much milder climate than the higher villages just a few miles away. Although nowhere near warm enough for oranges and palms to survive we very rarely had any snow at all. The village wasn’t renowned (or so it seemed as a child) for its sunshine either and the grass remained obstinately green all year round. Searching through old photos, I can only find one where our garden had turned wintry white and that was only a heavy frost. The winter of 1963 where we had to push a car through a small snowdrift was such a rare event that it is still talked about some 56 years later.

Hawthorne Cottage Xmas 1970 watermark

When the time came to leave home and buy my own house, I moved to the far side of the Chilterns where snow was more common. Within a couple of months of my arrival, I had to learn to master wintry driving conditions that a Canadian or American driver would barely think twice about. For in the UK an inch or two of snow causes major panic, road closures and travel disruption.

Watlington 1982 (3) copyright

Fast forward to 2001 and my move to the Cotswolds. Until then, I had to go for my snowy ‘fix’ overseas to Norway, Switzerland, Austria or Canada. Never a great sportsman it seemed rather bizarre that I had hit upon a sport – Langlaufen or cross-country skiing – that not only did I love and turned out to be rather good at but one that I couldn’t practice easily in my home country. However, the Cotswolds are far snowier than anywhere else I have resided and in 2010 I actually manged to ‘live the dream’ by skiing from the back door of my home and along the secret valley.

Living the dream in Norway

Snow in the secret valley

So why am I, like poor old Bing Crosby, singing that same old dirge? Is it because snow here rarely falls before Christmas and quite often doesn’t fall at all? The only white Christmas I have photographic record of (and I can’t remember any other) is of 2017 and even then, by Christmas Day nearly all of it had melted.

Snow Dec 2017 (10) watermark

Just occasionally, the snow does finally fall deep and crisp and even. When it does, much of Britain hibernates, nervous of venturing out. However, we still have horses and other animals to feed and tend to. And when I’m out in the four-wheel drive I feel rather satisfied that I have mastered the elements, satisfied in a smug way that only the English would understand for those used to snowier climes would wonder what all the fuss is about.

Driving to the horses

Christmas 2019 is proving to be mild and green yet again. It has been a bizarre year weather-wise for we have had the wettest autumn on record and the fields surrounding our cottage are under water once again where the little winding river has burst its banks. In Australia, bush fires are burning out-of-control under fierce, all-stifling temperatures. Friends in America have already had to cope with exceptional winter weather. Perhaps I should, rather than have a little moan about the lack of a white Christmas, be thankful that I live in a country where extremes of weather are unheard of. On the other hand (and trying not to sound to whiny), it would be nice if we could have…