Registered Charity No 1000447
News February 2013
The society’s ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING will take place on April 16th at Church Cottage, which has good links for public transport. It will be at 7.30 and our speaker will be John Holmes.
His talk will be on ‘Basingstoke – 1950 – 1970’.
John’s father, who worked for H N Edwards, photographed streets as they looked before the bulldozers moved in.
So come along and remember or find out what the town used to look like! Parking is free at Church Cottage after 7pm but there is also the car park in Churchill Way, which is very close. Do bring a friend.
Free for members, guests £2. Refreshments.
Unveiling the Major Howard Plaque – 11 November 2012
“The officers’ mess was in The Wheatsheaf”
On 11 November we unveiled the Major Howard plaque on The Wheatsheaf and to our delight veteran Jim Beasant (centre) came along and at the last minute it seemed right that he should unveil the plaque. Jim served in the 13th Parachute Battalion in Normandy, the Ardennes, the Rhine Crossing and the Far East. He was awarded the Legion d’Honneur at the French Embassy in 2004. The Mayor of Basingstoke and Deane, Councillor Martin Biermann praised the society for celebrating local history. David Robotham, Head of the Kings School spoke about Major Howard and his brief stay in our town at the very beginning of what became an amazing military operation. (Also in the photo is Ian Williams, society chairman).
We have not got anywhere trying to discover the ‘large Victorian building’ where the 1st Airlanding Brigade was based. A suggestion that it might be Kings Furlong house needs further research, but might fit well, not being far from both The Wheatsheaf and Ashley Lodge, where Howard was billeted with Dr Williams and his family. Interestingly, Kings Furlong House was the home from at least 1928 until 1935 of Brigadier General W B Lesslie, who was born in Kingston, Ontario in 1868, became an officer in the British Army and served with the Australian and New Zealand forces in WW1. He died in 1942.
This is one of 3 interpretation panels which have gone in to the cemetery at South View.
There is one at each entrance – Burgess Road, Chapel Hill and the railway end. They are all different and tell the fascinating story of this site from 1208 to WW2! If you haven’t been to see them, then as soon as it warms up a bit, then do go. They were funded by a Heritage Lottery Grant, sought by the Hampshire Museums and Galleries Trust but the wording and images were all done by the society. The design was done by Andy Thomsen. Explaining and interpreting this site is really worth doing.
Also funded were leaflets which the South View Conservation Group have produced – so far about the Commonwealth War graves and the history of the ruins. These leaflets can be downloaded from the group’s website or found in the Willis Museum or Discovery Centre.
http://holyghostcemetery-
The developers invited a group of committee members to see how the work is going on to convert these handsome houses into flats. Over the years they have been offices with an extension at the back which has now gone (see photo left from 1966 ).
Many features have survived inside the houses, including shutters and a fine fireplace,
which will end 
up in a bathroom! Some research shows that they were almost certainly
more modest houses, given a makeover in the early 19th century. We were asked to
suggest a name for the flats and have done. We wait to see if that will be the name
they end up with. It’s good to see these buildings cared for again after some years
of neglect. Small details like the detail on this door case have been carefully cleaned
of years of overpainting.
Other matters:
Barchester Healthcare will be celebrating 10 years at St Thomas’s care home in Darlington Road and contacted for help with the history of this site. In 1874 John Burgess Soper sold the land for £250 per acre and it became St Thomas’s Home for the Friendless and Fallen.
Sentinel Housing are proposing around 500 homes on the Chapel Hill site, known
to us as the Lilly site. They are sensitive to the difficulties caused by Lemon Land’s
application and we have talked to them about the site -
The Local and Family History Day at the Discovery Centre on 28th October was well-
36 Vyne Road – yet another application to build at the rear of this property which is falling into disrepair. This is the most modest proposal and we have not opposed it as it should lead to the restoration of no. 36 (divided into two flats), which we got locally listed. It is unfortunately just on the edge of the South View Conservation area, so does not benefit from that.
The Local List -
Top of the Town – ongoing discussion about this area and a report has gone to the council. Planning consent was granted for another betting shop in Market Place ... further closures of Censo Bar (The Hop Leaf to you and me) and the Italian deli just next door seem to be about high rents. It is a struggle to keep this area looking good ..
Town Trail is out of print! As we provide it to the Discovery Centre, the Willis Museum and Milestones as well as the Apollo Hotel who say it is very popular with their guests, we are trying to inject some urgency into the council who have generously agreed to do a reprint.
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Jane Austen – definitely in the news as it’s
the 200th anniversary since Pride and
Prejudice was published. But a recent book which looks at her life through objects
notes that her writing slope, now held in the British Library was purchased by her
father from John Ring of Basingstoke (where he bought a lot of household necessaries).
Barbara Applin in Going Down Church Street locates John Ring’s likely premises and
home as the handsome house at the most northerly end of the surviving row of houses
before you reach Chute House. (Office Angels). It is the one we noted in the town
trail because it has interesting brickwork on the north elevation. The little ‘pie-
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