Living On Own Means

When the 1841 census was taken my ancestor, Richard Montesquieu Bellew, was living alone in New Burlington Street. His wife had died in 1828, a year after their marriage, and he never re-married.

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Categorised as Family

Highgate Revisited

This is where I lived in August 1976. I had a job but nowhere to live. Fortunately a university friend was away on holiday and I borrowed his flat for my first month in London. I was reminded of this when I walked down Dartmouth Park Hill this week; a Brideshead Revisited moment.

Toby on Tuesday

Today’s post is written by Toby Horton. Toby was the UKIP candidate for Thirsk and Malton in the 2010 and 2015 General Elections and is currently Chairman of UKIP up there on the moors. He writes a weekly blog, Toby on Tuesday, that tries to make sense of the issues facing UKIP and the direction… Continue reading Toby on Tuesday

Max Beerbohm

So many posts start like this, but here I go again – more than forty years ago … I was given as a birthday present a novel, actually the only one he wrote, by Max Beerbohm. The donor was a university friend, we are still friends and I still have Zuleika Dobson.

For the Birds

If Gilbert White could do it so can I. If you visit a nature reserve there are hides for observation. I have got in on the act.

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Categorised as Nature

A Time of Gifts

A sign that I’m getting on a bit came when one of my God-daughters invited me to her daughter’s Christening. I was pleased to be asked, glad that I accepted and toddled along bearing a token gift.

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In Three Words

Charles Moore writing in The Spectator last week drew my attention to an 80th anniversary that had passed me by.

A History Lesson about Brixsi (sic)

King Harold’s brother-in-law was a Saxon thane with a name that shows remarkable prescience: Brixsi. Today the UK has rejected the EU Conquest, in 1066 Brixsi rejected the Norman one and paid for the consequences. The analogy stops here but the history lesson continues.

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Categorised as History

Ban Driven Grouse Shooting

This is the title of a petition made to Parliament. As it has received  more than 100,000 signatures it is eligible to be debated later this year.