Swindon in the Past Lane

I will be conducting a portrait tour of the Ladies of Lydiard at Lydiard House on Saturday, January 23, at 2.30pm. as part of the Behind Closed Doors programme of events. All the events are free but you do need to book. Phone Charlotte Thwaites on 01793 465277 or email CThwaites@swindon.gov.uk. We might even take a passing glance at John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester. John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, died on July 26, 1680, aged 33 years old.  It had been, how can I put it, an eventful life. The son of Anne St John and her second husband Royalist hero Henry, Viscount Wilmot, John was a bit of an embarrassment to his mother. It wasn't just the lewd poems or the bawdy plays, his dismissal from court or the drinking and whoring that upset her.  It wasn't even the attempted abduction of his future, fabulously rich heiress, wife to be Elizabeth Malet that made her raise her eyebrows.  Well actually it was, but what really upset her was that he...

I wrote this blog post two years ago! November 2015 and Swindon Borough Council continue to ensure us that there are no plans to sell off Lydiard House and Park but to lease it out to partners, drawing on the so say success of the recent handover of our leisure centres.  But I feel there are other options we could try first before the local authority makes such a drastic move.  Come along to my talk this evening 'Who Would Live in a House Like This? at Swindon Central Library, November 5, 7.15. Perhaps the St John family could save Lydiard House more than 70 years after they packed up and moved out. September 15, 2013. This week I intended writing an affectionate, whimsical piece – about my little granddaughter and all things Lower Shaw Farm related, about the Mela and the wonderful Dorothy Clarke and how the amazing Bhangra drummers quite alarmingly changed the rhythm to which my heart beat - no seriously. And I was going to write about samos...