A walk on the Caldon Canal in the Potteries

Gawd, isn't the  start-up of the Brexit Election depressing? Time for a cheery respite and a look back on a very pleasant few days Mrs P and I spent a month or so back with old (chronologically not temporally) friends just outside of Stoke-on-Trent. Because of its industrial past, this area is threaded with canals and it's always a pleasure to do a canal-side walk.  This time we took in a stretch of the Caldon Canal and here are a few photographs to prove it. If you get a chance, do the walk yourself.

The Caldon Canal (or to be precise, the Caldon Branch of the Trent and Mersey Canal) opened in 1779 to carry Peak District limestone from the quarries at Cauldon Low down to the Potteries and the industrial Midlands. Not long after later a short branch was added so that the Caldon connected to the town of Leek and improved water supplies to the main line of the Trent and Mersey (that's something that the casual canal-lover seldom thinks about - where the water comes from and how the levels are maintained).

The full length of the Caldon is 17 miles (27 km) long, has 17 locks, 3 operational lift-bridges and one tunnel and runs from Etruria in central Stoke on Trent to Froghall in Staffordshire.

Our route (just under 7 miles) took us from a pub, the Hollybush, at Denford along the main canal for a couple of miles, thence onto the Leek branch for a spell, up over a hill through a country park and then back along the branch to our starting point. And a delicious pork pie for lunch as a reward at the end.

Typical scenery for most of our route and, unlike our normal walking back home, almost completely flat.

Hazlehurst Lock Bridge (Number 37), with original iron work.

Some more iron work, this time supporting the walkway allowing access to either side of the lock.

Signpost at the Hazelhurst Junction where the Leek branch separates from the main Caldon Canal.

I know, I know - never take a photograph into the sun. But I thought my lens hood would remove the flare, honest. Having said that, I don't think it detracts too much from the overall effect. The infra-red picks up the ripples nicely.

The names given to canal boats are always intriguing. This one probably isn't a comment on the forthcoming General Election but rather a nod to what is probably the best Pink Floyd track of all time. Don't believe me? Take a listen below and I defy you to tell me I'm wrong.

I guess the owner of this one thinks there's nothing better than messing about on a canal boat. I don't agree with them. I can think of many things that I like better. Don't get me wrong, occasional jaunts are fine but to do it full-time? Nah, not for me.

Mr Google tells me that the Grand Union Canal Carrying Company was a freight carrying transport service from 1934 to 1948. We forget how important and extensive canal freight routes were up until fairly recently.

Who was Little Edna? And how little was she? Did she feel flattered at having a boat named after her?

This was an odd one. The dog (inset) was staring out of a porthole at us. No name was on the boat but could it have been called 'Badly Drawn Otter' or 'Even More Badly Drawn Terrier'?

A solitary Grey Heron that refused to look my way. Perhaps it thought that its side-profile was its best side?

Llama (pronounced 'yama') giving a David Bowie impression. Actually, and I mean this in an affectionate way, it reminds me of one of my grandsons.

A nice collection of chimneys at a mill complex.

Seed heads always have an interesting structure. Umbelliferous, that's the word that springs to mind.

In the absence of an adopted flag the banner of the arms of Staffordshire County Council have been used as a symbol of Staffordshire. The arms have a simple chevron and knot - the Staffordshire knot -  and a lion indicating the authority of the council.

It's General Election Time again.

The General Election has been called for December 12th and, without any doubt whatsoever, I'll be putting fingers to keyboard between now and then and voicing my opinion in my usual understated way. Or, with spittle-flecked hyperbole, depending on the mood I'm in or how mischievous I feel. Let's start off with something in the latter category...… 

Many of us have no sympathies for the Tories. Getting away from them and building a politics in which they are permanently a minority party instead of the usual party of government is, in fact, the prime reason why so many of us support others in the first place. We’ve had our fill of their austerity, their greed and selfishness, their lack of compassion and humanity. We’ve had enough of the way in which they blame the poor for the sins of the rich. We’ve reached the end of our tether with the way in which they have normalised foodbanks and the demonisation of migrants. Having sympathy with the political travails of a Conservative is too much like empathising with the mosquito which is killed by the malaria fluke it passes on to a child.

The sorrows of Conservatives still makes those of us with a functioning ability to feel compassion say “ha ha, what goes around, comes around”.   However something has changed within the Conservatives of late which, while it might not make us feel any sympathy for anyone who sought a political career in the Tories, ought to make us worry about our own futures. Former One Nation Tories are leaving the party in their droves. These are the people considered moderate by Conservative standards, the ones who’d give a child on crutches a modest head start before attempting to run them over. The One Nation Tories were the last vestige of upper class Conservative patronage, the Victorian belief that those who had wealth and privilege ought to provide a modicum for the poor, even if it were only to offer their children employment as chimney cleaners.

In the past few weeks and months we’ve seen the resignation of Ruth Davidson, a woman whose fantasy future as the next first minister is behind her. She has been followed out of politics by Ken Clarke, Rory Stewart, David Liddington, Philip Hammond, Oliver Letwin, Amber Rudd, Nicky Morgan, and some two dozen more. Others have fled the Conservatives for the Lib Dems or Change UK.  We can expect their places to be taken by hard faced closed minded right wing Brexiteers who will strengthen the ranks of the European Research Group and push the Tories even further to the right.

But let's not be beguiled into thinking that those who have left Conservative politics are cuddly liberals. These are politicians who were quite comfortable with the spread of food banks, tax cuts for the rich and blaming the poor for the sins of the bankers who caused the financial crash. They were quite content to preside over the destruction of financial security for the disabled, the bedroom tax, the rape clause and the privatisation of anything that wasn’t nailed down. But they’re leaving politics or have joined other parties because the Conservative party has now become the preserve of right wing ideologues, chancers, opportunists and British nationalist extremists, people who are beyond the pale even for them. They’ve gone because even they, with their barely functioning capacity for compassion, fear what’s coming down the line and don’t want to taint themselves with it. They’ve gone because even though the harsh and cruel policies that they were responsible for were acceptable to them, what’s approaching is an order of magnitude worse. If they’re afraid, we should be terrified. It’s one thing to hear a warning about the devil from a saint, it’s quite another to hear it from a demon.

The Tories are now the party of English nationalism. They’re the party of Brexit, of opportunistic hard right wing populism. They’re a party which, and I don’t use this term lightly, are heading for fascism. They’re a party which is hell bent on destroying the post-war British consensus which gave us the NHS, state pensions and a comprehensive social security system. They’re ultras in pinstripes. If you want to protect those social gains, the only way you can do so is by supporting other parties in the forthcoming General Election. They, the social gains, are already tattered and battered, they won’t last much longer in Tory Ukania.

There is no place left in the Conservatives for compromise or for negotiation. All there is is the philosophy of winner takes all and to Hell with everyone else. The party which considers itself the natural party of British government now believes that reaching out is a weakness and empathy a mental illness. This is the new nature of things, a harsh faced cruelty, a smear of tweets and the sneer of Daily Mail editorials as British national policy. But they’ll stick a few union flags on things and, if we object, we’ll be unpatriotic traitors.

The Tories tell us that they don’t want another referendum because it would be divisive. But they’re creating the greatest social divisions of all as they take a crowbar to the gap between rich and poor and lever it ever wider. They’re no longer even pretending that they’re doing it for the good of the country. Now they’re going to places where even Thatcher didn’t dare to tread.

Expect the ever creeping privatisation of the NHS. Expect the cost of drugs to rise. Expect more tax cuts for the rich while the government preaches the need for austerity. Expect to see disability payments slashed. Expect to see even more homeless people begging on the streets. Expect an erosion of maternity leave and workers’ rights. Expect even more low paying gig economy jobs offering no security. Expect the loss of what is left of social housing. Expect to see more Tory MPs grinning for a photo op as a new food bank opens in their constituency. Expect despair. Expect weeping. Expect desperation. Expect the flickering flame of hope to be extinguished as more and more people flee into the harmful and destructive self-medication of drugs and alcohol. Expect the Tories to be Tories. That’s the British future we’re being promised. The future isn’t bright, it’s red eyed with tears.

We can only save ourselves. The death of One Nation Conservatism is the death of the UK. Don't vote them in.

November 1st 1944: Operation Infatuate and the assault on Walcheren.

Royal Marine Derrick Parsons

In an earlier post I have mentioned my father's experiences during the D-Day Landings on 6th June 1944 and actions in and around the Normandy beaches thereafter. His unit gradually moved eastwards to secure crossings over the Seine and then northwards through France towards the Belgian port of Ostend.It was from there that Dad became part of Operation Infatuate.

As the Allied forces advanced deeper and deeper into Europe, the need for port facilities north of Normandy grew acute. Allied supply lines were moving farther and farther away from Normandy, where most of their supplies were landing in Europe, resulting in very long supply runs by truck to the Allied armies. Antwerp had fallen with intact port facilities in September 1944, however, the waterway leading to Antwerp, the Scheldt Estuary, was lined with German forces, and in particular heavy coastal batteries on Walcheren Island prevented any Allied supply ships from approaching the Scheldt in order to land supplies in Antwerp.

A schematic of the Battle of the Scheldt, of which Operation Infatuate, to capture and secure Walcheren, was a key part.

The task of capturing and securing Walcheren was given to the combined forces of Canadian and British troops and was spear-headed by an amphibious assault (Operation Infatuate) from the west by Royal Marine forces. Dad was part of this force, the Close Support Squadron, and was on LCF 38, one of the heavily armed landing crafts which were part of the first wave. In fact, LCF 38 was the lead attack vessel in their particular sector and, as such, was in the thick of the action right from the start. This amphibious assault at Westkapelle – the last such enterprise in the European War – was difficult and dramatic. Especially hard hit was the Support Squadron Eastern Flank, of which LCF was a key part. Twenty of its twenty-seven vessels sunk or were put out of action and their complements of about one thousand men suffered 192 killed or missing, 126 severely wounded and many others slightly wounded. Here's a quote I've taken from a book about Operation Infatuate and it gives a flavour of its difficulty: "For ‘Operation Infatuate’ Landings, only experienced Officers, Sailors, Marines and Soldiers were required for this last, extremely difficult and operationally essential landing in Europe. This had to be during daylight hours because of the prevailing tidal conditions. The officers commanding the assault and landing craft knew each other well and all had high regard for each other and their crews. They knew that success was not guaranteed, but heavy casualties were. Their tremendous professionalism, dedication to duty and heroism under extreme fighting conditions is not duly recognized. When the odds were stacked against them, all the crews of the ‘Operation Infatuate’ assault craft did not let the side down and ensured the success of the ‘Landings’. They all answered ‘The Call’."

This is a photograph of LCF 32. Dad's LCF 38 would have been essentially identical. Landing Craft Flak (LCF) were landing crafts armed with a variety of guns, designed to attack shore batteries and provide cover for landing troops. Because of their shallow drafts, they were able to get extremely close to their targets and, as a consequence, were very vulnerable. Dad would have manned one of these guns.

Luckily, I've been able to locate a copy of the report of LCF's exploits written by its commander, Lieutenant Alfred George Whittington Wilks. It makes for harrowing reading, particularly if you are related to one of the men on board! The original record is quite difficult to read, in parts, so I've included the transcription below.

REPORT ON OPERATION INFATUATE 1^ST NOVEMBER 1944

LCF 38

At Ostend Roads weighed and proceeded to form up at 0245 on LCGs with LCH 98 as guide.

Proceeded along swept channel to position AA off Westkapelle, Walcheren Island.

From AA proceeded to position BB with LCH 98 as guide in Order 1. The tide had a definite southerly set and big alterations of course were necessary to maintain correct bearing.

At BB with LCH 98 as guide quarter line to port was assumed. At approx. 0915 shelling of the Red Flank by shore batteries began. At approx. 0920 signal from 98 to carry out previous instructions. F38 became guide of Ps and proceeded at half speed as Landing Craft were behind time and the circumstances it was felt that it was best that they should be coming through while while the Ps were still able to engage the enemy batteries.

At approx. 0935 while about 2000yds from the beach salvos of rockets from our own rocketships began to fall about 1 ½ cables from our port quarter. With wheel hard astarboard and emergency full ahead we drew away from the line of fall. Bringing F38 back onto her course emergency full ahead was maintained for some minutes. Reducing to full we closed the beach. With F36 and F42 acting independently a slightly zig-zag course was maintained to enable port and starboard batteries to fire in turn. At about 1500 yds from the beach the port batteries opened up on the enemy positions. At approx. 1000 yds from the beach we straightened up and headed for the mound on the lefthand side of the gap. At approx. 0945 the shore batteries began registering hits on both sides of the ship. Between 800 and 1000 yds from the beach a 90 degree turn to port was made to engage enemy machine gun nests and batteries south of the G(M) now beached. Fire was maintained until dangerous to the G (M) but re-opened when she was out of line.

By this time we had been hit by about ten heavy shells. The magazine flood was smashed, the magazine on fire, the forward mess deck a foot under water, the wheelhouse a shambles, the steering jammed, one engine gone, about five gun positions smashed and the ward room on fire. Still all available armament maintained constant fire on the enemy. Asking the Flotilla Officer to take over on the bridge I went below to try to rig up some sort of steering. By disconnecting the port rudder (damaged by hit) steering was obtained on the starboard rudder. Being now a danger to incoming craft F36 was requested to take us in tow. Cease fire was ordered and at approx. 1015 F36 came alongside and took us in tow, still under heavy and accurate shell fire. Hoses were at once rigged to the magazine from F36 but it was well ablaze and ammunition began to explode, despite the use of hoses and foam. F36 was hit below the water-line on the starboard side by a heavy shell. F38 received two more direct hits on the port side. With the presence of F38 endangering the F36 and being no longer a useful fighting unit it was decided to anchor her and then abandoned F38. Removing wounded and one dead, leaving one dead aboard, dumping the CB chest overboard and removing the vital parts of the QH to F36, F38 was abandoned at anchor at approx. 1035.

Wounded were transferred to LCT 428 and the survivors sailed back to Ostend on F36.

The last report on F38 was she had blown up, her tanks had caught fire and she was well ablaze.

Through the whole of the action, the ship’s company bore itself in a manner fully in keeping with the highest traditions of both services. The guns were firing until the last possible moment, the gunnery especially under the circumstances was excellent and I believe effective. It is indeed very difficult to single out any man were worthy of praise than another. Excellent discipline was maintained at all times. Fire control was beyond criticism. The whole ship’s company fought with characteristic determination. Some died at their posts.

The SBA’s Drummond and Watkins did sterling work throughout.

AB Crothers with the wheelhouse a shambles freed the wheel from the dead and took over.

Corporal Miller performed excellent work throughout and after the action.

OCRM Lieut Clifford was very calm and decisive during the entire action. The amazing steadiness and brilliant efficiency of the Royal Marines was undoubtedly due to their training and his presence.

Lieut Hewitt RM directed fire by manning the after oerlikons and did fine and accurate work, until his gun was blown up, his crew killed and he was severely wounded.

Sub/lt Maclean after but one week as First Leutenant showed a veteran’s poise and performed his multitudinous duties with great skill and perseverance.

I am indebted greatly to Lieut-Commander Lammert RNVR and Lieut D. Thomas RNVR for their services rendered to F38.

Orders had been carried out. Support had been given.

Casualties:

Killed – 4.
Died of wounds – 1.
Wounded (including slightly wounded) – 20 approx.

The survivors were taken back on F36 where they were divided between F36  and F35 and routed back to the UK.

Lt. Alfred George Whittington Wilks
Lieutenant RNVR
Commanding Officer.

Luckily, dad's name appears on the list of survivors and he, and his comrades, were taken on board another landing craft. I can only try and imagine the conditions at the time. Cold, wet, bedraggled, shocked - probably all of these. Being transferred to LCF 36 was not the end of action for the men off LCF 38. As a sailor on LCF 36 wrote: "Our Flotilla Leader, L.C.F. 38, was ahead of us in the firing line. She was hit and set on fire at 10:20, we went alongside and took off survivors. Going back into the firing line, we were eventually hit and holed at 11:15. Dodging more shells, we withdrew and after the survivors of L.C.F 38 had been taken off, we limped back to Oostend".

The message from the operations commander on board HMS Kingsmill, the lead battleship and effective HQ for the operation, to all stations after the Westkapelle attack

Signal from Admiralty to operations commander after beachhead assault at Westkapelle November 1

A personal note sent to all on LCF 38 and who survived the action. It wasn't the style of the officer classes to use Christian names!

Operation Infatuate was a success and played its part in the liberation of the Scheldt and providing the much needed access to the port of Antwerp. As far as my dad's service is concerned, his service record is a bit hazy on the details. However, we do know that he was part of the capitulation of Germany and was spend time with the invading forces on the Rhine. Perhaps we'll be able to find out more as we try and locate further records.

I'll leave the last words of this post to the son of Lieutenant Wilks: "I can only speak about my father’s vessel and her crew, but I am sure that others were the same. LCF 38 as lead attack vessel in that sector, charged in with a thousand horse power thundering in her engine room and all guns blazing, keeping accurate fire with some shells penetrating gun slits. These men were not just doing their job, they were warriors of the highest order in the full knowledge that, for the objective to succeed, it could result in the total loss of the ship and all hands. The document I find particularly moving is the high praise of the actions of the close support flotilla especially the LCF, LCG, and LCS. Knowing my father and his crew were real warriors in the thick of it, and the recognition they got, makes me intensely proud".

Derrick Parsons x2, taken in about 1948, some 4 years after Walcheren. It could have turned out so differently.

Here we go again.

I've pinched the above cartoon of the prorogation ceremony from the internet. Oh sorry, it’s actually a picture.

Anyway, twice in the last month, we’ve had to sit through Black Rod mumbling some antiquated nonsense, and a row of ermine clad ne’er do well toffs doffing their caps, as Boris manages to once again shut down democracy with the connaivance of Elizabeth Saxe Coburg Gotha.

Why they do all this dressing up in strange costumes and taking their hats off (mostly men it seems) heaven only knows. Maybe there is a reason hidden in the mists of time and tradition. Maybe there isn’t and they just like dressing up in strange clothes. Who knows when it comes to the English aristocracy? I was going to say, “who cares?” But I do. All these people, after all, are highly paid and/or on massive expenses and I help pay for them and their costumes which are doubtless expensive too. And what is it all about? Why can’t the Speaker and Lords' Speaker just read off a sheet that parliament is suspended until Monday by order of the Queen and then everyone can go home, or wherever it is they go in London?

Well, of course, what it is for this time is so that on Monday our Toytown Prime Minister can have his party political broadcast read by the queen, who presumably will have had to come back from Balmoral, also at considerable expense (ours), to read his list of promises, from her golden throne, after arriving in procession, accompanied by page boys, ladies in waiting and all manner of pomp.

According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the promises that have been made over the last few weeks, and which will presumably to be included in this Clown Speech from the throne, are utterly unaffordable given the shitstorm of no deal that we are about to enter. Presumably, if she is paying attention to current affairs and/or has half-way decent advisors, Liz will already know that it's a pack of lies, but will, nonetheless, read it out anyway.

So all the nonsense about 40 new hospitals (that, on closer inspection, quickly became 6) and massive spending on infrastructure ....you know the sort of thing… well, we can forget it. Tax increases and spending cuts to pay for this fool’s Brexit are going to be the order of the day. Still, it is comforting to know that, no matter how bad things get, the Brits will always find enough money for ceremony, tricorn hats and weird rituals.

Quo vadis indeed.

 

There’s Dungeon and Dragons, there’s Minecraft and there’s World of Warcraft, but Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson’s favourite game is The Stupid Blame Game. The EU has clearly had enough with the not-so-clever clever tactics of the British Prime Minister, driving Donald Tusk, the Polish politician who is the President of the EU Council, to use some very undiplomatic language in a tweet. He tweeted: “@BorisJohnson, what’s at stake is not winning some stupid blame game. At stake is the future of Europe and the UK as well as the security and interests of our people. You don’t want a deal, you don’t want an extension, you don’t want to revoke, quo vadis?”


Interestingly, and here we go with yet more of the Latin, Donald Tusk finished his quote with the Latin tag quo vadis? Quo vadis is Latin for “Where are you going?” and as such ought to resonate with our famously Classical snob of a Prime Minister. More importantly in this context the phrase was also the title of a very famous Polish novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz, who is one of the giants of Polish literature.

Set during the Roman Empire, the story deals with a meeting between St Peter and the infamously crazed Emperor Nero. The novel’s title comes from the question put to Jesus by St Peter, who appeared to him in a vision as the saint attempted to flee from Rome. St Peter asked “Quo vadis, domine?” "Where are you going Lord?". To which Jesus replied, “If thou desertest my people, I am going to Rome to be crucified a second time” and shamed St Peter into returning to Rome to accept martyrdom.

The question quo vadis doesn’t just ask where a person is going physically, it’s a question about their moral and ethical destination. In the present context, it is a question about the ethics and morals of the British Prime Minister. It’s saying that Johnson is putting himself and his own interests before those of the UK. It’s not so much a question as it is a statement calling him a coward and a hypocrite. Boris Johnson is fleeing from his responsibilities. This reference would be very clear to a Polish audience and that's why Tusk used it. It's a not-so-subtle dig at LBJ.

And it’s not just Donald Tusk who has reached the limits of their patience with the game playing of the British Government. Angela Merkel seems to have had enough too. Until now, the German Chancellor has been one of the strongest voices within the EU calling for patience with the UK, but today we learned that there was apparently a “frank exchange” between her and Johnson in a phone call. A “frank exchange” is diplomatic speak for an argument. According to reports, the German Chancellor told the British Prime Minister that a Brexit deal was looking “esstentially impossible”. Which is pretty much what we’ve all known all along.

This is not a Prime Minister who wants a Brexit deal. He wants the UK to crash out without a deal, in order to shore up the Conservative party’s vote amongst leavers and prevent them from drifting off to Nigel Farage in the General Election that is coming soon. He just wants to ensure that it’s the EU which gets the blame for it. The entire economic and diplomatic future and reputation of the UK is to be sacrificed for the short term electoral interests of Boris Johnson and the Conservative party. Quo vadis, indeed.

What makes this all the more galling is that the British Government is risking all our futures in pursuit of a lie. Crashing out of the EU without a deal is not “getting it done”, it is not “getting it over with”. Crashing out of the EU without a deal means disruption and a frantic process of trying to negotiate some sort of deal with the EU from a position of extreme weakness. Crashing out with no deal guarantees that Brexit and the UK’s relationship with the EU will dominate and toxify British politics for many years to come. Quo vadis, indeed. Usque non gerens paxillum in statione erat cacas, eh Boris? Up shit creek without a paddle. That's where.