My Golden
Milestones
7.
Highfield, Little Kimble, Aylesbury, Bucks.
Rosalie
outside the front door
Little Kimble is situated on the edge of the Chiltern
Hills, where they join the Vale of Aylesbury. It is a “green belt” area, not
far from the Prime Minister’s country residence at Chequers. John Bunyan, in
the “Pilgrim’s Progress”, writes about the Delectable Mountains, and we are
told that the Chiltern Hills were his “model”. They are certainly very
beautiful, especially in spring and autumn. The area is also associated with
John Hampden, who 
resisted
the “ship money” tax that Charles I tried to impose, and held a meeting
at Great Kimble parish church to organise the resistance among local people.
Our house was again a manse, but semi-detached and
smaller than our homes at Rawdon and Coleford, but
with quite a large garden to maintain. It was well built, we think between the
wars, with three bedrooms and two living rooms. Shopping needed to be done at
Princes Risborough or Aylesbury.
The church was built in 1922, and one of its
foundation stones was laid by Miss Megan Lloyd-George[1],
on behalf of her mother. We are told that after the stone laying (or the
opening) the distinguished visitors retired to Chequers for the evening. The
building stands on its own in a field, and consists of a small church, with
schoolroom and kitchen adjoining; it is always well maintained, and appreciated
by visitors. The village is very small, with no shops and only one street lamp;
there is no large community to draw upon, and it is unlikely that it will ever
produce a thriving cause. But we were very happy there, among the faithful ones
who maintain it.
In 1976
Marguerite announced her engagement to Jonathan Clatworthy,
a theological student and son of a Church of England vicar. So the wedding was
arranged for July 31st, in the parish church at Great Kimble, with a reception
afterwards in the hall of the Princes Risborough Baptist Church. Bernard played
for the service[2],
Rosalie came home from Zaire for the occasion, and we were able to invite
(among other guests) my cousins Lillian and Nora, who were in this country on a
visit. Other Canadian visitors during these years were Ron, Margaret and Aunt
Olive in 1977, at the time of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee; and Mabel, Philip and
Nora in 1979.
One day
there came a knock at the door, and the caller introduced himself as the
grandson of my senior deacon at Soham. He was
Christopher Stell, an architect, living at Chorley Wood,
and he invited us (and Winifred who was staying with us) to go over to Chorley
Wood to meet his mother and his family.
When Ron and Margaret were with us in 1977, we talked
about the possibility of visiting Canada, and they helped us to sort out our
ideas, and told us what was possible. One of our concerns was my Aunt Em, now in advancing years and living alone in Stony
Stratford, and seemingly dependent on our frequent visits. In the spring of
1978 she was able to go into a newly built home in Stony Stratford, and this
eased our minds concerning her. So we went to Canada for four weeks in the
early summer. Ron and Margaret (on the
photo on the left) met us at Vancouver airport, and took charge of us. It
was a delightful “holiday of a lifetime”. They took us to Victoria, to visit
Aunt Olive for a long weekend, and we slept at the home of Florence Hayes, a
cousin of Phyllis’s. The other and longer expedition lasted 10 days, travelling
north as far as Prince George (to meet a sister of Ron’s), then east through
the Rocky Mountains to Edmonton (to meet Aunt Flossie and her family), then
south to Calgary, then through the mountains again, including Lake Louise, to
Vernon (to meet Miriam and her family), and finally back to Ron and Margaret’s
home in Maple Ridge. We stayed at motels when not visiting relatives. We
enjoyed the climate, and the people and their way of life. During our absence
we invited Stanley and Clara Pemberton (from Guiseley) to occupy the manse, and he took the Sunday services.
On Feb.
2nd, 1979 our first granddaughter arrived - Joanna Clatworthy,
and shortly afterwards Phyllis went up to Bolton to help Marguerite look after
her (pictured right, at 2 weeks old).
Later that year a family holiday was arranged at Hawes in Wensleydale.
Rosalie was home from Zaire, to join with Bernard, Katie and the boys, and
Jonathan and Marguerite, with their baby carried mostly on their backs, for
ease of walking. It was a great idea to have this holiday all together, and we
were so thankful afterwards that we had done so. (picture left)
For in the autumn Phyllis became ill. She seemed to
have had some sort of very slight seizure. But the puzzling feature, to us at
least, was that her disability came on gradually, rather than suddenly.
Eventually she was taken into Churchill Hospital, Oxford, where all the tests
(including a biopsy at the Radcliffe, Oxford) proved negative. So she came home
early in December, to return to the Radcliffe on Jan. 10th for another scan.
This must have proved positive, for not long afterwards the doctor prescribed
steroids, which worked wonders for a time, and she began to feel the sense of
release. But we faced up to the fact that the effect could not last forever.
After some weeks the disability increased, and on March 27th she reached the
point where I could no longer cope, and the doctor arranged for her to go into
Stoke Mandeville hospital. On the same day Aunt Em
died at Stony Stratford. And the B.M.S. arranged for Rosalie to come home
within a couple of days.
At some point during this winter it became clear to
me that Phyllis might not recover from her illness, and my mind went to the
experience of Ezekiel: “So I spake unto the people in
the morning, and at even my wife died”. And so indeed it happened. She had been
in hospital for seven weeks, and I had been able to visit her each afternoon
and evening. The last time I saw her was on the afternoon of Sunday, May 18th,
and when I returned after evening service she had gone. Throughout her illness,
we both felt that we were being carried along by the prayers of a great number
of friends in many places. And I now felt sustained by those prayers in the
experience of bereavement. The funeral was at our Little Kimble Free Church, on
Friday May 23rd 1980, conducted by our area superintendent, Rev. Hugh Logan,
and afterwards at the Chilterns Crematorium at Amersham.
It was, I think, good for me that I had the Church to
look after, and my home and large garden, at this time of adjustment. Then
Bernard and Katie most kindly invited me to make my home with them[3]. I
took a long time to weigh up the pros and cons, but eventually accepted. And
then we agreed that it would make sense to look for a suitable house in the
Reading area, where Bernard was working. We found one in Woodley; they moved
from Beaconsfield on Dec. 8th, 1981, and I joined them on March 2nd, 1982,
after 6½ years there, and a total of 45 years in five successive pastorates.
God had graciously sustained me through all these years, with very little
illness. So now I was retiring fully, or retiring for the second time.
Before I end this chapter, I must not forget to
record the birth of my second granddaughter, Rebecca, on August 27th, 1981, at
Ashton-under-Lyne.
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