A Victorian Christmas

 

As Christmas comes around, I began wondering how the Victorian families living in the Orchard area might have celebrated the season. If you remember, the first 'census' story we published told how in 1841 there were over 30 people living in six households on our site. They ranged in age from young children like little Ellen Howlett aged 5, up to her elderly next-door neighbour Mary Gomme aged 85 who was living with her married daughter. Ellen lived in a small cottage with her six older sisters, parents and a brother, so there were lots of hungry mouths to feed. Like most of the working men her father was an agricultural labourer, the poorest paid workers in the whole country. They lived in what was still an almost feudal village, paying rent to their landlord John Allnut. Without a doubt they would be finding it hard to make ends meet.

In the wider world there was a new Queen on the throne, just a young woman and perhaps no-one knew how things were going to turn out. At that time Christmas had almost fallen out of fashion, gone was the old celebration of 'Twelve days of Christmas' with feasting and merriment. It hardly got a mention in the newspapers, and customs such as May Day and Harvest Home were much more celebrated. At this time it could not be taken for granted that you would get Christmas Day off work, much less the extended period we have now. The factories and mines kept going every day of the year but perhaps it was a bit better in the countryside. However, the men received no paid holiday, no state pension, and if there had been wet days in November and December when they couldn't work, very likely no wages at all.

Winters were colder than they are now, over Christmas 1837 snow had blown into Emmington Church preventing the Sunday service. The winter of 1840/41 was a very severe one with ice on the Thames, and through all the winter months there were temperatures considerably below average. Then in 1841, from July into November it was very wet with local flooding later in the year. Not very good years for agricultural workers. Luckily several of the women in our families were lace-makers, and this did give them an extra income which would have made all the difference to the family budget during those bad-weather years.

So how might they have made Christmas special? Read more...

Archaeology at the Orchard

Would you like to help open a ‘window on the past’?

Would you like to find out how an excavation is carried out?

This is an opportunity for you, your friends, family and neighbours to help us find out more about the people and history of the Donkey Lane Community Orchard site.

Working with South Oxfordshire Archaeology Group (SOAG) we will be digging out a series of test pits at the Orchard in December.

All volunteers will be guided through each stage so everyone can learn how an excavation is carried out and your test pit is dug to professional standards.

Even if you don’t dig, there are plenty of other essential roles that can be done whilst sitting and/or in short bursts and without getting too dirty! Anyone can join in; children are most welcome (accompanied by a parent or guardian).

The test pits will be excavated over 2 days Saturday 3rd and Sunday 4th December 10am – 3:30pm. Numbers are limited so if you're interested in getting involved, please email Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com.

In the case of inclement weather, Saturday 10th and Sunday 11th will be a backup date.

"Come and Hear My Story!

Presentation and talk on the impact of WW1 on the families at Donkey Lane Community Orchard

8th November 2022. 7:30 pm at Chinnor Community Pavilion
Tickets £5 to cover costs.

Anyone who has attended the Chinnor Remembrance Day ceremony will be familiar with the Roll of Honour.

As part of the continuing social history research of Donkey Lane Community Orchard, we have tracked down the poignant stories of the sons of two families; the Howletts, Alfred and Aubrey who lived in one of the Orchard cottages and Frank Eggleton, the son of the owner of the land where the cottages stood, who, along with many other young men, left their village to serve their Country in the Great War and did not return.

On Tuesday 8th November, we would like to share these stories with you. Delving deep into war diaries and other War Office records we have discovered some of the key battles and lives of the soldiers on the Front.

Perhaps like us you are baffled by some of the language used in the descriptions of the war or maybe thought ‘how did they do that?’ We will try to answer a few of these things. For example; how did they transport 700 horses to Alexandria in 1914?

Ticket are £5 per person to cover costs, available at the Parish Office or by calling 07973 788339 or 07764 452777. Cash only please. Alternatively you can book tickets at Eventbrite. Please note booking fee applies.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - INHABITANTS CENSUS 1861 – read all about it!!!

In 1861 it appears that only 4 of the Cottages in the Donkey Lane “Orchard” were occupied and the name of the Lane, in the Census, had reverted from “Guntrip Lane” back to “Hollans Lane”. One of the families missing was the Guntrips themselves which may be the reason why the lane changed its name back to “Hollans or Hollands”. John Guntrip had died in 1854 leaving wife Elizabeth. She was residing there in 1859 Tithe Amendment records but died that year and was buried on the 22nd February 1859. The Stratford family had vacated and also the Wades but the Howlett family had returned to the Lane.

The Howletts had rejoined the families who were there a decade earlier: the Marriotts, the Bishops and the Folleys.

In 1859 a Lucy Biggs had been residing but she had moved out before 1861 and had moved to live with a Jonah Britnell as a housekeeper in his house at Crowell Hill.

The returning Howletts were now represented by Maria Howlett, 3 children and a lodger Ann Styles. Two decades earlier she had lived in the Lane with her husband Edward, moving thence to a lower part of Chinnor and then to Wainhill. Edward died in 1858 and the widowed Maria moved back into Hollands Lane with her two daughters, Maria junior and Ruth along with grandchild Jane Maria. The girls are recorded as lacemakers but Maria, without a husband’s income, is designated a pauper claiming on the parish for support. A small amount of income would have been received as rental from lodger Ann Styles, also a lacemaker. The household was reduced in 1861 when daughter Ruth moved out upon marriage to James Smith a labourer from Longwick. Three years later they had a baby who they named Maria. The household was further reduced, in the same year, when granddaughter Jane Maria married James Munday. Some mystery surrounds who was Jane Maria’s mother. Born in 1842 she was not baptised until 1855 by her grandparents, Edward and Maria. Interestingly when Jane Maria married the Church Register revealed that her father was stated to be a Richard Jones, labourer.

Tragedy struck a year later in 1862 when Maria junior died aged a mere 45 and poor widowed Maria herself passed away in 1865, aged 73, leaving an empty cottage inviting new residents. READ MORE...

Apple Pressing at the Orchard

Come along on Saturday 8th October 2022 for an enjoyable afternoon pressing and drinking apple juice. Remember your clean empty bottles.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - Apple Pressing Afternoon

Where: Donkey Lane Community Orchard, Keens Lane, Chinnor 

When:    Saturday 8th October 2022 2 pm - 4pm

Price:    Free - donations welcome

Do you have a bumper crop of apples this year?

What do you do with yours?

Why not save your good apples (not the ones with bruises and maggots) and bring them to the Community Orchard on the 8th October along with some clean screw-top glass bottles and we will help make some lovely apple juice from the apples together with our own orchard apples.

As well as apple pressing, we will have refreshments including freshly pressed apple juice and be holding guided tours of the orchard.

Come and find out about the lives of those who lived at the orchard; the story of the fruit trees and the amazing varieties of plant life we’ve discovered and how you can get involved.

This is a free event and donations (cash only please) towards the orchard would be most welcome.

Please note that all the apples will be mixed for pressing.

To find the orchard, head up Keen's Lane, Chinnor, cross the railway crossing and the orchard is directly on the right hand side

Apple Identification Workshop

Date:    Tuesday 4th October 2022

Time:    10.00 am to 4.00 pm
Venue:   Chinnor Village Hall, Church Road, Chinnor, OX39 4PQ.

We still have a few places available on the above workshop at a subsidized cost of £25 pp. If you are interested in joining us, please contact: Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com / 07973 788339

Join Greening Chinnor and Mid Shire’s Orchard Groups Andy Howard for a day’s training course, to learn all the skills you need to help identify the apples and other top fruit you may be growing.

The workshop will cover:

• different parts that make up an apple
• how to categorise an apple's shape, size and other distinguishing features
• Cavities and basins - discover the differences between and among them
• Not just apples! Find out how to identify other top fruit
• books and other reference resources, including online help and support
• tips and tricks and unique identification traits
• identification pitfalls and how to avoid them
• long term fruit identification - "Forensic pomology!"

As well as practising the theory on fruit samples, to test out your new-found skills and gain the confidence to apply them to your own fruit

Working Party Changes

 Please note the following changes to the latest Donkey Lane Community Orchard working parties

CANCELLED Saturday 20th August 2022 | Working party at the Orchard | 1 pm - 3 pm. Tools and gloves supplied. Please wear suitable working clothes and footwear.  All welcome.

NEW DATE Tuesday 6th September now Tuesday 13th September 2022 | Working party at the Orchard | 10 am - 12 pm. Tools and gloves supplied. Please wear suitable working clothes and footwear.  All welcome.

Donkey Lane Dwellers - Recollections of Local Residents

According to a history of Chinnor compiled by members of the WI in the late 1940s Keanes (sic) Lane was named after the Keane family who for 300 years occupied Hill Farm beside the lane. There were cottages with mud walls on the lane close to the railway crossing. These were inhabited by men who carted flints, for road making down from the hills using donkeys. The carters' donkeys grazed in the grassy lane and so Keane's Lane became Donkey Lane. They also carried wood for chairmaking. 'Donkey Jimmy' is remembered as the last and proud owner of four donkeys.

Recollections of the late Mabel Howlett

 
“Chinnor has always been my home and I have never wanted to live anywhere else. In 1952 I married my second husband who worked for the Eggleston’s at Hill Farm and we went to live in a cottage in Keens Lane dating back to the 1600s. The cottages were on the left when walking up the lane [before the railway crossing and is now a field]. We always knew Keens Lane as Donkey Lane. There were two cottages, the other was occupied by Syd Heybourne, his wife Doris and daughters Jean and Joan. Syd looked after the pigs and farm gardens and tennis courts.

 
Rent for the cottage was one shilling a week and the rates ninepence [together roughly 10p in today’s money]. There were no drains of any kind, just an earth lavatory at the top of the garden and a tin bath kept hanging on the shed wall and fetched in for bath nights. We washed our dishes and prepared vegetables etc at the kitchen table and drew water from the well in buckets. Someone asked me how many buckets I drew on a wash day (Monday). I wasn't sure so the next week I counted them and it was thirty.

People tried to keep the houses nice on the inside, but decorating a room was a major operation. First, we had to borrow the book of wallpaper patterns from Mr. Johnson’s shop in the High Street (today a private house: ‘Dillamores’), then once the whole family had agreed on a paper, it had to be ordered. By the time it had arrived we had whitewashed the ceiling with chalk and water with a blue bag added to make it white. The painting had been done (usually dark brown) with paint from Mr Arnold. Mabel then goes into great detail about the hanging of the wallpaper with paste made from flour and hot water that needed endless stirring to remove the lumps. Quite an undertaking. (Ed)

One day when I went to draw water from the well, I heard a cat meowing. My neighbour then drew a bucket but she couldn’t hear it. Mr Keen, who was a cowman at the farm, came up the lane so I called him over but he couldn’t hear the cat either. He said he would sit by the well while I drew a bucket. I always gave the handle a pull and then let it go by itself. Everyone heard the cat then. Syd came up from the farm and attached a basket to the rope. He let it down carefully and the kitten clung on to it. The kitten was nearly at the top when it fell off again and landed back in the same crevice. Eventually someone had to make a trip to Potters in Thame to borrow a long rope ladder which they attached to a wooden ladder. Syd then went down and brought the kitten up. Joan, Syd’s daughter put a hot water bottle in her doll’s pram, tucked the kitten up in it and within half an hour it was running around none the worse for its adventures.

Mr Eggleton did all he could to get the cottages modernised but in the end he built two new cottages for us on the opposite side of the lane. Piped water had come to the village so there was a smart bathroom and a copper for boiling water and washing. After we had moved into the new cottages my husband was asked to tie a rope to the chimney of the old cottages and pull them down with the tractor, which he sadly did.” READ MORE...

News from the Repair Cafe 6th July 2022

Huge thank you to all the fixers and helpers at the Repair Cafe on Saturday 6th July; considering we were competing with Formula 1, I think it went well. It was a bit slow, perhaps due to Formula 1 or being a Saturday afternoon but we did have a steady stream of customers.

My thanks to Jeanne, Becky and Elizabeth who stepped in at the call for help. Which enabled Maureen, Christine and I (along with Maureen’s amazing cakes) to support the Repair Cafe and ensure it all went smoothly.

Also, a shout out to the sewing team, Cathy, Wendy and Jackie who, as well as helping fix textile items, took on the task of making 35 metres of beautiful bunting for the Donkey Lane Community Orchard.

And who can forget our regular fixers, Ted, Jeremy, Keith and Eamonn who did a tremendous job of fixing once again – a variety of objects. And to Alan and David for triaging and PAT testing items.

Here’s the stats!

We had 8 fixers, 6 support and 38 visitors. There were 22 items logged in of which 17 were fixed (52 kilos), 2 given advice (2.5 kilos) and 3 being unfixable (4 kilos). Not a bad turnaround 😊.

Some of the items that turned up were:

Radios, hand bags and shopping bags, lamp, sewing machines, karcher washer, hand mixer, fragrancer, clock, vax hoover, strimmers, ride on toy cars, soft toys, skirt, elephant and my favourite – a unicorn!

Unfortunately, donations were down and we didn’t cover the cost of the event, but I think it’s not only about making money.

I know that everyone who took part enjoyed the afternoon as much as I did and feel the service we all provide is invaluable, not just in terms of fixing items but as an opportunity for people to come in and enjoy the friendly atmosphere as well as the refreshments on offer. 

Many asked when the next Repair Cafe would be and if it will be a regular event? For my part – I would like to say yes to both questions, however, we're in a ‘catch-22’ situation. We need to schedule more Repair Cafes to generate more interest and customers but to do so we need to have co-ordinator/s that can run the cafe. The Repair Cafe is one of my favourite projects. However, my time is very much taken with other Greening Chinnor projects and in particular the Orchard (as well of course, trying to have a life 😊) which is why we need help.

The co-ordinator/s do/does most of the preparatory work. They usually make arrangements with local venues, maintain contact with everyone, recruit volunteers, make sure the right paperwork is up to date and available and generally keep an eye on everything that has been done and that still needs doing ensuring the smooth ‘flow’ at the Repair Cafe.

Questions

• Would Chinnor like to have 3 or 4 repair cafés a year? 
• Do we know anyone who would like to learn to be a co-ordinator?
• Would we be able to get a grant to cover the cost of say 3 or 4 repair cafés so we don’t have to rely on donations?

Any suggestions and thoughts would be welcome and much appreciated. If you would like to find out how you can support our local Repair Cafe email Linda at greeningchinnor@gmail.com.

Next Repair Cafe 6th July 2022

Who will be at the Repair Cafe? We have a team of sewing repairers, electrical and mechanical repairers, leather repairer, general DIY repairers and wood work repairers. Could any of them help you?

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - Bird found in and around the Orchard

There is a very diverse range of wildlife and plant life in and around the orchard site. The area sits to the North-East edge of the village of Chinnor, over the railway lines, adjacent to agricultural land all the way up to the Ridgeway Path but below the designated Green Belt Area on the Chilterns and particularly Chinnor Hill. The Ridgeway path runs NE to SW which is a part of the Chiltern Escarpment and runs along the foot of Chinnor Hill. The Chilterns are part of the layer of chalk covering most of East and South East of England. Many species of flora and fauna favour chalky soil.

One of the most plentiful inhabitants of the orchard are birds. Over the years there will have been a huge range of birds but owing to a vast array of changes in human occupation, agricultural methods, introduction of non native species and not to mention climate change there will have been massive changes in the bird population in and around the orchard. Over the last 35 years some 38 or more species have been observed coming and going.

The chalky soil supports many plants favoured by our local bird population. Our recently planted boundary hedge features Cornelian Cherry, Dogwood, Guelder Rose and Hawthorn, all bearing tasty berries in the autumn. In addition, there are many brambles in the perimeter which not only provide berries for birds and other wildlife to eat but also robins, wrens, thrush, blackbirds, warblers and finches will nest in it as it provides protection from predators. We are working hard to build safe habitats in the orchard, particularly in the perimeter of the plot.

There were obvious habitat changes in the orchard since it was inhabited going from wild to domestic. It is also most likely that the occupants of the cottages had a few chickens, ducks or geese for their own use. After the houses had gone, we know that Derek Howlett kept chickens there in the 1950-60s. In time the area became very overgrown and choked and gradually a plethora of wild birds took over. 

Green woodpecker regularly nest in a hole in one of the heritage fruit trees. They are seen regularly in the gardens foraging for ants and on the bird feeders. They can also be regularly heard flying across the fields. The greater spotted woodpeckers seem more numerous and are very much in evidence flying in and out of the orchard. Both varieties bring their young to feed in the gardens when they fledge. They are quite large birds 31- 33cms, the size of a pigeon. Both male and females have a red cap but the male also has a red moustache and a mark each side of its face just below the eye. 

Green Woodpecker

The photograph on the left was taken in early 2019 from an adjacent garden this woodpecker is a female, without the red moustache, and was perching just above the hole in the tree where it was nesting. The photograph on the right taken a month or two later is a male and may be the from the same family, it is looking for insects on the adjacent electricity pole but also seen on the same day sitting on a shed roof feeding insects to two fledglings. They are commonly seen in early morning raiding lawns for ants.   Read more...

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - Plants growing in the Orchard

Some five years ago, if you went for a walk up Donkey Lane and crossed the railway line, you would have noticed a wild scrubby patch of land on your right. A quick glance would have shown thick brambles and ivy growing around some struggling trees, and dense undergrowth dominated by nettles. In April there was a scattering of blossom to see, and then in autumn glimpses of apples in the higher branches, revealing that someone once planted apple trees there.

Since Greening Chinnor began to selectively clear the area in 2019, it has been a revelation to see just how many species of plants have sprung up from seeds which have been resting in the dark soil. Seeds can lie dormant for many decades until the ground is disturbed and light is let in. It is very likely that at least some of the plants we find there today, are descendants of plants which were growing there when people lived on the site.

We carried out monthly surveys of the flowering plants between May and September last year, 2021. A flowering plant does not have to be in flower to be counted but it is one which will flower at some time. The following article will give you an idea of the range of plant species that we counted, which added up to 75 in all. In addition, a different survey had been made earlier in March, just looking at the non-flowering plants. This revealed some 34 species, which were mosses, lichens, fungi and one liverwort. So overall the flora found so far comprises more than 100 species, a quite astounding number.

Firstly, the trees and shrubs. Besides some 20 Apples and a Plum, we have ... Read more

Notice of AGM - Reschedule Date

 As our planned AGM scheduled for Tuesday 26th April clashes with the Chinnor Parish Assembly, it has been decide to postpone the AGM to Tuesday 24th May.

Notice of AGM

 

Blossom & Open Day at Donkey Lane Community Orchard

 

Notice of AGM

 

Blossom & Open Day at the Orchard 2022

 

Spring Community Litter Pick

Excellent turnout at our Spring Community Litter Pick this morning. 12 bags of rubbish, assorted metal work and a cone cleared! Thank you and well done to all that turned up to enjoy the glorious sunshine and to have a good 'old chat' this morning. 

Great working with the #chinnorwombles 👏👏

Spring Community Litter Pick

 

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - The Inhabitants of Guntrip's Lane 1851

Drawing courtesy of Bernard Braun 

Donkey Lane Community Orchard – The Inhabitants of Guntrip’s Lane – 1851

1. John & Sarah Guntrip

In 1851 all three cottages in the Donkey Lane “Orchard”, containing the six households, were occupied. The lane, branching off as it does from the present “High Street”, not yet severed off from the village by the railway line, and stretching uphill over the fields to the Upper Icknield Way, had seen a change of name since 1841 when it was enumerated, or certainly the lower part which led from Hill Farm and past the cottages, as Holland Lane. Now in 1851 it is described as “Guntrip’s Lane”. One family living in the lane bears the surname of Guntrip and it would appear that the Lane took its new name from this fact.

Ten years earlier, in 1841, John and Sarah Guntrip, along with Sarah’s widowed mother, Mary Gomme were living there. Mary had passed away in 1842 leaving John and Sarah as the only occupants of the cottage. John Guntrip, of Thame, had married a Sarah Gomm/Gumm on the 7th December 1818 when John would have been about 37 years of age and Sarah about 36 - indicating that they had married quite late in life. No details of any children have been found so perhaps the marriage was childless. We do not know when they moved into the cottage in Holland’s Lane but this cottage formed their matrimonial home during the latter stages of their life together.

John, although now aged 73, had not retired and was still working as a “dealer in wood” who, we assume, would therefore have been purchasing timber from the local woods either by bidding at auction or buying certain areas of trees in the wood, arranging felling and taking the huge tree trunks back to the village. He probably stored the trees in the garden of his cottage or in a yard somewhere in the village and in some cases may have left them several months or years to “season” before being ready for use and sale. He may have cut the trunks down to smaller sizes. The wood and timber would then have been available for sale to local businesses who converted the timber into other smaller, saleable items - the chair maker, the chair turners, if the turners did not have a pitch within the woods themselves, the wheelwright, the cabinet maker, the carpenter and any other artisan who used wood to produce a finished article.

 Read more...

Spring Community Litter Pick

 

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - Lace Making

 Lace making in Chinnor and the Donkey Lane Community Orchard.

Chinnor was historically an agricultural area, but by 1851 things began to change. Compared to 1841 almost as many men were now engaged in trade as in agricultural work. This was a direct result of the many resources available to use in the area created by the geographical location and the local soil. The wood on the hills was particularly useful for making furniture and the proximity to High Wycombe, an important location for furniture production, meant that there was a local market for lathe turned chair legs in particular. There was an abundance of flint stone that could be used for building and the chalk provided more opportunities, one being lime wash and latterly cement production.

Lace making was a very popular skill, often providing enough extra income to keep families fed and widows or spinsters out of the workhouse. The skills came to this area from about 1560 when French and Flemish refugees fleeing religious persecution settled in the East Midlands, Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire. Chinnor was part of the Buckinghamshire lace production area, sending most of the lace produced to High Wycombe. These Counties were close enough to the fashion scene in London where lace was a popular commodity used to enhance and add luxury to outfits. In Chinnor as in most of the neighbouring villages, it was a very popular way for the women and girls of all ages to supplement the household income. Poverty statistics are well documented in the history of Chinnor, where agricultural work was poorly paid, seasonal and weather dependent.

The photograph on the left is a local lace maker, Jane Oxlade born Jane Tibbles in about 1849. She married George Oxlade, a woodsman in 1878. It is thought she lived at the top of the High Street just after WW1. She died in 1934 aged 85. The photograph shows very clearly the bobbins on her pillow with a support stick below to help take the weight. She would have had a paper pattern on the pillow which looked like a stencil punched with holes which guided the lace maker to locate her pins into the pillow on which to make her lace. This was often called Bucks Pillow Lace.

Lace making was convenient because it allowed women to earn extra money whilst carrying out all of their fairly heavy, domestic duties and bring up the children. Often lace making earned more money than the agricultural pay and was consistent throughout the year with a slight difference in hours between Summer and Winter because of the daylight hours. Families with a lot of daughters would have multiple lace wages which was very helpful especially if the main breadwinner was an agricultural labourer.

The 1841 census told us that there were 268 lace makers in Chinnor, which was approximately a quarter of the recorded population. At this point 21 of them were recorded as living in the cottages in the Orchard. By the time of the 1851 census the number had reduced to 11.  Read more...

Hedge Planting at the Orchard

Many thanks to all our willing volunteers who turned out on Saturday 12th February 2022 to help plant a new hedge in Donkey Lane Community Orchard along the perimeter of the lane.  370 plants of native species were planted including:

• Hazel
• Field Maple
• Cornelian Cherry
• Hawthorn
• wayfarers
• Cherry plum
• Spindle
• Kentish Cobb
• Buckthorn
• Holly
• Dog rose

To follow:

• Bledlow bullace
• Aylesbury prune

Why not join our volunteers?

Working parties are held twice a month: on the first Tuesday 10:00 am – 12:30 pm and the third Saturday 1:00 pm – 3:30 pm. Why not come along and learn new skills, meet new people, use the time as a green gym and enjoy the outdoors. Equipment supplied and we always stop for tea! 

Or would you like to get involved in monitoring the wildlife, fauna and flora or help to find the old cottages? There are even some ‘back office’ jobs that always have to be done: help with media, plan events, talks, finance, education, website, grants, social history, making cakes, meeting people

We hold a variety of events throughout the year to showcase the Orchard and the work that we are doing.

If you would like to get involved in any of the aspects of the Orchard or just want to find out a little more about this project either speak to one of the volunteers at the working party or email  greeningchinnor@gmail.com or call Linda on 01844 352753 or keep in touch with the orchard and other Greening Chinnor projects by signing up to our occasional newsletter.  

Wassail at the Orchard - This Saturday

Saturday 29th January 2022 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm

Donkey Lane Community Orchard, off Keens Lane, Chinnor, Oxfordshire, OX39 4PF

Wassail at the Orchard!

Greening Chinnor and the Mid Shires Orchard Group invite you and your family to a Winter Wassail for the Donkey Lane Community Orchard! The Anglo-Saxon ‘wes haile!’ or ‘wase hail!’ was a hearty wish for good health and fortune. We shout ‘Wassail!’ to toast our apple trees, that they may be healthy and fruitful for the coming year and bring us good harvest and bounty. We also make lots of noise to ward off bad luck and mischievous spirits, so they stay away and don’t steal the fruit!

Cross the railway crossing and enter the Donkey Lane Community Orchard via the ancient trackway… Appreciate the lovely vista of the historic 19th century apple trees in this rural Chilterns landscape. Enjoy the warm scent of apples as the hodgepodge of windfalls are crushed underfoot. Admire the decorated trees that are the King and Queen of the Orchard, hung with all their finery.

The event is lots of fun and we welcome audience participation. Make a din to scare off mischievous spirits, by banging drums, blowing horns, beating pots and pans and joining in the Wassail song accompanied by the Towersey Village Voices choir. Assembled children (of all ages!) will scatter a festive seed mix, for the wildlife to enjoy

After the main event: Congregate around the Refreshments Stall to enjoy more cider, mulled cider, mulled apple juice, apple juice and cake. Small donations are welcomed in return for refreshments, for the Donkey Lane Community Orchard.

Take a tour of the Donkey Lane Community Orchard

• Take a walk around the Donkey Lane Community Orchard with your hosts
• Visit the historic apple and plum trees and learn more about them
• Discover the site of the old well and the cottages
• Learn how you can help keep this orchard flourishing, join in working parties and enjoy orchard events

You’ve read about Wassails in the Parish Pump; this is your chance to come along and enjoy one for yourself. Bring along some musical instruments, pots, pans and wooden spoons… anything that will make a noise!

Weather and clothing

Check the weather forecast and dress up appropriately. Bring a brolly if needed! Wear wellington boots or stout, waterproof footwear that is suitable for walking around in an orchard environment, in winter weather.

Donkey Lane Community Orchard - The First 3 Months of the Project

 After 18 months of discussions and agreements from the landowner, Mr Nixey, the Parish Council and our funding partner, The Chiltern Conservation Board and with a line-up of very eager volunteers, we were finally ready to embark on the actual ‘hands-on’ restoration of Donkey Lane Community Orchard. 

As the Orchard was hugely overgrown with waist-deep, thick-stemmed brambles, thick ivy overgrowths, general brash and fallen tree trunks, the number of volunteers at the first few working parties had to be restricted. After a health & safety chat and distribution of Personal Protection Equipment (PPE), each person was given some tools and a place at the centre of the small cleared area to start clearing; radiating outwards. The plan – to find the known 20 old apple trees and the Chinnor Plum and with a great sense of purpose and adventure, the work began! 

As well as the trees, and at least 30 years of accumulated rubbish, we knew there was an underground den and treehouse. When the ‘den’ area was cleared and inspected, it was found that some of the supporting timbers had been removed and the roof had collapsed. This would be something we would have to deal with and make safe. A structural survey was carried out on the treehouse and it was found that the floor was rotten and unsafe. Another potential hazard to sort out!

Whilst clearing brambles and ivy from the ground several things, apart from the trees, emerged; glass, this had to be and still is, the biggest find, from old windows, car windscreens, broken beer bottles to some very thick pieces of opaque glass – perhaps from old milk bottles. 

 

There were some ceramic finds of small broken pieces of green, blue and white pottery and two treasures; a 1950s bee ornament and a small metal cast replica of Concord. Could any of this give an indication to the lives of the early inhabitants of the orchard? Maybe; we’re still waiting to find treasure!  

 

 

 

The work in the Orchard in the first three months was phenomenal. We found the 21 fruit trees and more! Some of the trees were totally hidden under a heavy ‘blanket’ of ivy and some of the taller trees had so much ivy on the canopy, they were in danger of toppling over in high winds. Some of the trees had already fallen over and looked dead.

We had to take down the treehouse and infill the ‘den’ and in time, will make use of the wood and other materials to make wildlife habitats throughout the Orchard.

Those first few months were pivotal and the sense of achievement and pride by all was truly felt. The Orchard had gone from being extremely overgrown and almost impossible to get into with the fruit trees hidden and virtually no view of the surrounding area, to most of the fruit trees cleared of ivy and brambles as far up as possible. With the discovery of the fruit trees and, referring back to the 1877 map, it is possible that these could be the trees in the original photographs standing in the garden of the cottages over 150 years ago. Read more ...

2022 Wassail at the Orchard