IT took Michael Morpurgo’s tear- jerker of a book, and the subsequent Steven Spielberg film and stunning stage version of War Horse, to convey the carnage suffered by horses drafted into service in World War One. Eight million horses and countless mules and donkeys died overall. Britain alone lost over 484,000, one for every two men. One-quarter of all deaths …
PERHAPS not the ‘sweet smell of success’ more ‘ a pong of perfection ’. Either way, Maroilles cheese can craftily worm its way on to your plate irrespective of the time of day. And it’s not the only one dating back to the Middle Ages when French cheese-making became the domain of the monasteries. Another regional contender, Vieux Lille – …
WHAT sets the Boulonnais, little known in Britain, apart from other draught horses ? Two words: Their ancestry. Originally descended from horses imported by Julius Caesar’s legions to Pas de Calais, France, ready to invade the British coast, it was left to the Crusades and the Spanish occupation of Flanders to introduce a considerable amount of Oriental and Andalusian …
TALK about giving a dog a bad name … in this case two of ‘em – Kent and its cross Channel counterpart Nord- Pas de Calais which, along with Aisne, Oise and the Somme form part of Hauts de France. In much the same way the South East Tourist Board includes not just Kent but Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, East Sussex, Hampshire, …
ON September 7, 1914, Herbert John Ruler, an eager young reservist, from Barming, Kent, joined the British Forces in France. He died, aged 18, on October the 26th in a field hospital after a shell fractured his skull six days earlier. If it had not been for a strange coincidence, I would never of known he even existed. I do …
WELL I wondered, as I gazed at the grey, grim remnants of the Blockhaus, Eperlecques, was it from here that a life-threatening rocket was fired in my direction ? Apparently not, for this fearsome fortress, in Northern France, bombed by the British and Americans was rendered useless for rocket launching in August 27, 1943. And the only V2 that exploded …
HISTORIAN and hotelier Philippe Gorcynski is a man in love with a tank called Dorothy. Not any old tank but a rusting relic from World War One which I first saw one freezing February morning tucked away in an old barn in the village of Flesquières in Le Nord region of France close to Cambrai. And Philippe was desperate …
IT took a fluffy wide-eyed white charmer called Marvin not only to fulfil Julie Smith’s wish to own a puppy but convince her to form Adorabuddies selling hand-crafted pom pom and felt collectables based on the heads of pet lovers’ cats and dogs. ‘ I never thought I could have a dog because I have allergies until I discovered that …
FOR years its solitary northwest tower has remained virtually unknown, forlornly hidden from public gaze in wooded parkland off the main road to Sevenoaks. Now at long last the future of Otford Palace, forerunner even to Hampton Court, which it matched in size – if not bigger– lies in the hands of the Archbishop’s Palace Conservation Trust. Formed in 2017, …
‘To be or not to be’ behind – or even written – Shakespeare’s works, as some claim. That is the question!. Either way, Canterbury’s ‘Rash Boy’, Christopher Marlowe, has certainly led the literati a merry dance as rumours still swirl around not simply his rumbustious lifestyle but his equally controversial death – or disappearance – aged 29 at Deptford in …
