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By Hook or by Crook

Not a million miles away lie the two villages of Maplestead. When William the Conqueror invaded England ‘Mapulderstede’ was recorded as one settlement. Two centuries later it was split up. The name is derived from the Anglo-Saxon ‘ a place where maples grew’. The name, variously spelt, was also acquired by those who moved away denoting whence they came. These written references surely emphasised the importance of those Essex maples. But then a millennium later, with momentum in landscape painting gathering pace, it became the turn of artists to record trees.

Field maples, once used for their hard timber, still thrive in East Anglia and yet often remain rather elusive, hidden in hedgerows. Today we see woods and trees as part of a picturesque landscape, but two centuries ago they were a vital commodity and often represented a landowner’s ‘bank’ balance. It was at this time that the Norwich School evolved under John Crome and Robert Ladbrooke. Through it, and through Gainsborough’s and Constable’s eyes, we can now look back on observations of historical interest. The painting by Ladbrooke’s son, John Berney, (fig 1), shows a roadside maple, dead centre, in full reddish autumn foliage, so ‘terracotta’ in fact that it matches the pantiles of the cottage. Yet, not untypically, the maple is shadowed and shrouded by an ash yet to turn colour. Those colours are true and timely, for the painter has chosen to render the changing countryside on a bright and sunny autumn morning. If it were not for the quaint children and the cart-rutted road it could be a fading glimpse of deep Essex even today.

Fig. 1, Autumn arriving, terracotta maple (centre), by John Berney Ladbrooke, c 1830

The Norwich Society of Artists was formed in 1803. Crome began working life, aged twelve, as an errant errand boy for Dr Rigby, an eminent physician, but overdid his devilish pranks by swapping labels around on medicine bottles. He was next apprenticed to a sign writer but was taken aback one day when asked to paint ‘The Shoulder of Mutton’. Crome acquired a joint from a butcher and shortly presented the new sign to the innkeeper. Horrified, the publican stated he wanted it roasted, not pearly white. Later, whilst engaged in painting small landscapes in the 1790s in a hired garret, to help earn a crust or two, Crome’s work came to the attention of a wealthy Mr Harvey. Invited to his house Crome was introduced to works of Cuyp, Hobbema and Gainsborough. This was all that was required to inspire the young artist. Managing, now, to sell more paintings Crome had no further need to chase the landlord’s cat, to snip new brushes from its tail!

Artists first devoted their attention to locations around their ancient city. In rolling country of valleys, woods, and meadows, much resting upon sand and flint from the Ice Age, the painted lanes took on rich golden hues peopled as they were by travellers, drovers, shepherds and animals. The Broads and rivers provided glimpses of recreational pastimes, besides working wherries and windmills. Vast skies were reflected in these waters creating ‘blue’ Broads and silvery rivers in watercolour, oil and pastel. The painters, stepping off the traditional platform of portraits, on which Norwich had rested its laurels for centuries, relished the chance to learn landscapes. Pictures by earlier 18th century artists recording the Grand Tour, alongside the growth of large country estates (proud owners were now looking for artists to record these), had catalysed the change. By the 1820s, facing such challenges with fresh pigments becoming available, these artists would become important colourists – a fact often unrecognised. If John Crome cleverly renewed the Golden Age connection then John Sell Cotman, a few years later, brought about a colour revolution. It is these facts, together with occurrences elsewhere – witness Turner’s extravagant use of pigments – that made the Norwich School so aware of colour as a recording material, finding its way into characteristic leafy foliage.

Closer to home, Constable painted the partly wooded Wivenhoe Park, where Essex University stands today, in 1816. By 1820 he had completed Stratford Mill and, like John Crome, was at the forefront of tree painting. The idea of painting a large portrait of a tree, just one oak, half a century earlier might not have been very acceptable. Gainsborough’s view of Cornard Wood (1748), painted when he was eighteen, with a good dozen oaks, was the desirable Ruisdael method, with safety in numbers. However, by the second decade of the 19th century Crome proudly presented the single Poringland Oak to the world. It says much of his abilities that he could so successfully place this great tree in undulating countryside with children bathing in late afternoon light – under a cluster of sun-edged ‘Cuyp’ clouds. He had pulled one tree out of a famous Gainsborough landscape, as it were, and enhanced it to magnificence. This was as good an emphasis, tree-wise, as any that Norwich School painters could look to.

So it’s their landscapes that we search for evidence of past times. Just as Crome and Cotman still painted Mousehold Heath, north east of Norwich, as wide open land in spite of the Enclosures Acts, so there was romanticising of wooded lanes and reeded rivers in the Gainsborough and contemporary Constable fashion. It is little realised now that up to three-quarters of the tree population was then pollarded. The bare evidence of this ancient habit, ensuring longevity, is today best seen in winter: pollards, often straddling hedgerows, still stand majestic against the skyline. Many of these hedgerow boundaries were present when Romans carved their straight road system from Colchester to Bishops Stortford and Ipswich to Norwich, for aerial views reveal that fields had had corners amputated. The importance of wood for winter warmth meant regular pollarding. The whole nation depended on trees, Nelson’s ships being a prime example. The internal structure of buildings, of country houses and factories alike, required vast quantities. Along the East Anglian coast the need for shipbuilding remained strong. The great herring fleets out of Yarmouth and Lowestoft, in their heyday, depended on wooden luggers weighing thirty or forty tons. Darby’s timber yard at Beccles was just one port of call where trunks, some loaded on barges, journeyed to shipyards perhaps (fig 2). Rarely recorded, this scene was once commonplace.

Fig. 2, Barges at Darby’s timber yard, Beccles, by Alfred George Stannard, c 1850.

Pollarding trees required they be trimmed above animal head height. If trunks belonged to landlords then pollards belonged to peasants, by hook or by crook, the likely origin of the expression. Crome’s son, John Berney, followed in his father’s footsteps painting oaks and willows. One of John Crome’s most famous oil paintings is ‘Road with Pollards’. Its location had until now not been established. However, a chance discovery of a drawing, signed by his son, of a road with pollarded willows, reveals its location. It is inscribed ‘at Lakenham, near Norwich 1816’ (fig 3). Those who travel the A140 may well pass along here a mile or so before dipping into the city. There is plenty of foliage that could be pollarded as this drawing shows, which is more than can be said of Crome’s oil. When this painting was first illustrated, a century ago, it had exhibited nearly as much growth as the pencil drawing. But an overzealous cleaner partially pollarded Crome’s willows – they show a drastic reduction in bush – as, simultaneously, greater Norwich had wiped away Lakenham’s identity too. The odd lone leaf can just be spotted aloft, bereft of stalk, heading skywards!

Fig. 3, Pollards at Lakenham near Norwich, by John Berney Crome, 1816.

Both Hatfield and Epping Forests provided ideal places for studying ancient trees where hornbeams continue to grow in what was once part of a great forest that spread from Epping to Chelmsford and Southend. It was also known as Essex Forest or Great Waltham Forest. Waltham means ‘woodhome’ – from the Saxon ‘walt’ for wood, and ‘ham’ for home. James Stark, who painted oaks in Windsor Great Forest in the 1840s, instructed his son Arthur James. A.J. Stark’s view (fig 4), probably an Essex forest ride, portrays a shepherd under a hornbeam with its magnificent girth of centuries. Today, Epping Forest is the largest woodland area in Greater London, still covering 6,000 acres from Manor Park to Epping.

Fig. 4, Ancient hornbeams in an Essex forest, by Arthur James Stark, c 1870.

Trees, in open spots, had little problem growing lichens on sun-exposed bark. This resulted in silvery green tree trunks, as recorded by Norwich artists, unlike the dark hornbeams in Stark’s heavily shaded forest. The rise in industry and pollution would certainly have affected the county with its close proximity to London and a prevailing SW wind. Indeed, air pollution at Sibton’s measuring station in East Suffolk is consistently higher than in London, where the weighty pollutants have first arisen only to fall back to earth 100 miles distant. The sulphur in the air came to rob the trees of their lichens and even now their abundance has not returned to the growth formerly painted in East Anglia – so clearly demonstrated by Obadiah Short (fig 5). But, on cloudy days, direction finding in forests is still helped by locating clearings. Looking for trunks with lichens, and even leaves more loaded with seasonal colour, point the way south.

Fig. 5, Silvery lichens on wayside Norfolk oaks, by Obadiah Short, c 1860.

Obadiah Short pursued the Crome idiom. An amateur enthusiast, he walked one day from Norwich to Holkham to meet the Earl of Leicester. Was he pulled by the great estate’s trees? Starting in 1780, two million were planted over the next twenty years covering more than seven hundred acres with forty nine varieties. Perhaps he went to investigate to paint something of this enterprise. Collectively the school was a more detailed recorder of trees than any other, and this helps to define it, especially with Crome’s love of delineating more of trees’ anatomical structures than his contemporaries, Turner and Constable.

All their observations prove invaluable in trying to read the history of landscape. In mediaeval times the harvest festival was known as the Lammas festival. It was celebrated in August when, by coincidence, oak trees, and others, must have produced their second leaf growth, which could be russet, amber or even purple coloured on the sunny side of trees. Thus coloured, the term ‘lammas leaves’ was born. Artists chose to enrich their paintings by enlivening foliage colours, particularly on oaks, usually choosing an amber tint. Yet, today, this interesting colour change, which needs the sun’s rays to develop fully, can be observed in July, revealing evidence of climate change. Constable chose views along the Stour for his famous ‘six-footers’. The most striking and colourful tree in all of these is seen in Stratford Mill, and is now recognised as a black poplar. This sloping specimen, bathed by bright sunlight, and appearing translucent, becomes the focal point of the tree painting. A closer look reveals many a golden touch amongst this brilliant green leaf. In spite of the summertime image of boys fishing for minnows, these colours have long prompted art historians to pronounce that Constable was painting ‘autumn’. However, it might have proved tricky to demonstrate otherwise had it not been for the chance discovery of a hybrid black poplar in a hedgerow on the edge of the Stour valley, with matching colours, on the last day of May 2001 (fig 6). The tree has not repeated this striking phenomenon. Curiously Constable, a great observer of nature, could have muddled the foliage of a real black poplar, with its tendency to slant so conspicuously, with that of the quite similar hybrid variety, which tends to stand upright, as in the photograph. Botany books published as many as one hundred years later, understandably, also confused the two. The conclusion to be drawn is that Constable was recording an unusual natural event using these colours. This also happens to date it firmly to late springtime.

Fig. 6, Striking foliage, hybrid black poplar, near Sudbury, midday, May 31st 2001.

So colour, besides drawing, can be the key to reading more of ‘landscapes’. If you take a clod of clay and bake it, you get a red brick; if you grind it up, an earth pigment; and if you find an autumn maple, with luck, many a red leaf. Which all goes to prove, hook or by crook, the answer lies in the soil.


Peter Kennedy Scott


Peter Kennedy Scott is a retired GP. His interest in the Norwich School developed when he moved to Suffolk in 1967. In those days it was still possible to root out undiscovered Norwich School paintings from the back of antique shops and Peter was highly successful in identifying them. He is now seen as one of the leading experts on the subject, and catalogues for Christies, Sothebys and Bonhams.

2023 - Read about the wonderful new gallery being built in Sudbury for Gainsborough's masterpieces; follow the trail of a tireless local environmental campaigner; get ready for the second EA cultural festival, the Bures music festival and Opera at Layer Marney; discover the beautiful garden of Holm House with its wildflower meadow and lake; travel through the Colne valley along the Gainsborough line; find out where you can get local financial advice; enjoy an illustrated walk in the Stour Valley; and read our Chairman's update on proposed housing developments, solar farms, and the National Grid's Bramford to Twinstead electricity grid reinforcement project. 

2022 - Read about the wonderful new gallery being built in Sudbury for Gainsborough's masterpieces; follow the trail of a tireless local environmental campaigner; get ready for the second EA cultural festival, the Bures music festival and Opera at Layer Marney; discover the beautiful garden of Holm House with its wildflower meadow and lake; travel through the Colne valley along the Gainsborough line; find out where you can get local financial advice; enjoy an illustrated walk in the Stour Valley; and read our Chairman's update on proposed housing developments, solar farms, and the National Grid's Bramford to Twinstead electricity grid reinforcement project. 

2022 Magazine
Year: 2022
Chairman’s Letter
Year: 2022
Rebel with a cause
Year: 2022
A National Centre for Thomas Gainsborough’s Masterpieces
Year: 2022
EA Festival at Hedingham Castle
Category: Culture
Year: 2022
The Gainsborough Line
Category: Adventure. Travel, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2022
Music, Mischief and Mayhem – Opera at Layer Marney
Year: 2022
Bures Music Festival
Year: 2022
Holm House Gardens in Suffolk
Year: 2022

2020 - Welcome to our 2020 lockdown edition - only published ONLINE. Read about the wonderful Alfred Munnings Exhibition "Behind the Lines"; find out how the beavers have been getting on at the Spains Hall Estate in Finchingfield, introduced back into Essex after an absence of 400 years; explore the link between Ferriers in Bures and the Voyage of the Mayflower, the Salem Witch trials and Wampum belts; read a fascinating interview with Carl Shillingford, talented Michelin chef and keen local forager; and enjoy a celebratory update from Ken Forrester on South African wines and his support for a wonderful local school.  

2020 Magazine
Year: 2020
Chairman’s Letter
Year: 2020
Behind the Lines: Alfred Munnings, War Artist
Category: Art, Culture
Year: 2020
The Foragers Retreat – Michelin chef in Pebmarsh.
Category: Food, Nature
Year: 2020
Dam Good Job – Beavers back in Essex after 400 years.
Category: Explore Colne Stour, Nature
Year: 2020
Ferriers – a Bures house and its connection to the Mayflower.
Category: Adventure. Travel, Architectural Interest, Culture, History
Year: 2020
Three special milestones for Ken Forrester Wines  
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2020

2019 - Read about Tudor living on a grand scale at Alston Court, how Samuel Courtauld & Co. shaped our towns and villages, hear inspiring stories of local vineyards Tuffon Hall and West Street, get an update on the Dedham Vale AONB extension, and take a tour round Polstead Mill, one of East Anglia's beautiful secret gardens. 

Chairman’s Letter
Year: 2019
Dedham Vale AONB extension
Year: 2019
The Tuffon Hall Transformation
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2019
A Hong Kong racehorse in an Essex field
Category: Nature
Year: 2019
Andy Gentle – A chainsaw love affair
Category: Business
Year: 2019
A vivid insight into Tudor living on the grand scale.
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2019
Underground Moats & Zinc Cathedrals
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2019
Secret Gardens of East Anglia – Polstead Mill
Category: Gardens
Year: 2019
Repairing the damage of a supermarket delivery van
Year: 2019
How Samuel Courtauld and Co. shaped our towns and villages
Category: Architectural Interest, Culture, History
Year: 2019
Ken Forrester
Year: 2019
CSCA Photography Competition
Year: 2019
Garden Visits
Category: Gardens
Year: 2019
Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2019

2018 - Read about Hedingham Castle, a new National Centre for Gainsborough in Sudbury, award-winning new Gins from Adnams, aspects of our Industrial Heritage, the Theatre Royal in Bury St Edmunds, the Dedham Vale AONB and Stour Valley Project, and take a look at the proposed new Constitution for CSCA.. 

Chairmans Letter April 2018
Category: Annual, News, Planning Issues
Year: 2018
History of the Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds
Category: Architectural Interest, Art, Culture, History
Year: 2018
Another Suffolk Success Story – Time for a G & T?
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2018
Some more aspects of our Industrial Heritage
Category: Agricultural, Brewing, distilling and wine, History
Year: 2018
An Earl’s Tower
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2018
A Castle Reborn
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2018
Dedham Vale AONB and Stour Valley Project
Category: Explore Colne Stour, Nature, Planning Issues
Year: 2018
A National Centre for Gainsborough set within the town where he was born and the landscape that inspired him
Category: Architectural Interest, Art, History
Year: 2018
Garden Visits
Category: Gardens, History
Year: 2018
Treasurer’s Report
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2018
New Constitution
Year: 2018
Editor’s Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2018

2017 - Read about our local industrial heritage, Paycocke's House history, why heritage matters, the art of Alfred Munnings, a haunted house in Lamarsh, celebrating Gainsborough, the beauty of recreating Cedric Morris's Iris collection and a small wine snippet from Ken Forrester. 

Chairmans Letter April 2017
Category: Annual, News, Planning Issues
Year: 2017
Heritage Matters
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2017
Some aspects of our Industrial Heritage
Category: History
Year: 2017
Paycocke’s House: a witness to history
Category: Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2017
The House of his Dreams: Reimagining The Munnings Art Museum
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2017
‘The Haunted House’ of Lamarsh – Some Early Reflections
Category: History
Year: 2017
Gainsborough’s House: Celebrating the Past and Looking to the Future
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2017
Another, highly unusual, Suffolk Success Story
Category: Gardens, Nature
Year: 2017
Garden Visits 2017
Category: Gardens, Nature
Year: 2017
Dirty Little Secret
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2017
Website
Category: News
Year: 2017
Editor’s Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2017
Treasurer’s Report
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2017

2016 - Interesting articles on medieval graffiti, farming in the Stour Valley, exploring our AONB, early settlers from the Stour Valley to America, the archaeology of a local farm, a wonderful catalogue of British birds, celebrating a Suffolk joinery business, the weather from a South African winery. 

Chairmans Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2016
Medieval Graffiti: the hidden histories…
Category: History
Year: 2016
Stour Valley Farming
Category: Business
Year: 2016
The Godly Kingdom of the Stour Valley
Category: History
Year: 2016
Keeping It Special in the Dedham Vale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) and Stour Valley Project
Category: Nature
Year: 2016
Lodge Farm, Rectory Road, Wyverstone Street, Suffolk
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2016
A Miscellany of Information about British Birds
Category: Nature
Year: 2016
Another Suffolk Success Story
Category: Business
Year: 2016
Garden Visits
Category: Gardens
Year: 2016
Harvest, Fires and Fynbos
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2016
LOOKING FORWARDS, BEFORE I GET LEFT BEHIND….
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2016
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2016
Annual General Meeting and Summer Party
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2016
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2016

2015 - The life and times of a flint knapper. A continuation about the history of the ancient farm at Henny and a visit to the inside of Alston Court, Nayland as well as an insight into The Antiques Roadshow.  

Chairman’s Letter – February 2015
Category: Annual
Year: 2015
Caught Knapping
Category: History
Year: 2015
ALSTON COURT
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2015
ORGANIC MUTTERINGS
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2015
THE STORY OF SPARROW’S FARM, GREAT HENNY – PART 2
Category: History
Year: 2015
ON AND OFF THE ANTIQUES ROADSHOW
Category: Business
Year: 2015
UNLOCKING THE ARTIST WITHIN: FINE ART LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHY
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2015
BADGERS – LOVE’EM, OR HATE’EM?
Category: Nature
Year: 2015
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Gardens
Year: 2015
FORRESTER VINEYARDS, SOUTH AFRICA
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2015
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2015
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2015

2014 - A hair-raising flight from UK to South Africa and an insight into the Wineries of Stellenbosch. An exceptional old mill just outside Bures and a most unusual chapel on the hill behind, as well as a time warp farm at Henny. 

Chairman’s Letter – February 2014
Category: Annual
Year: 2014
ST. STEPHEN’S CHAPEL, BURES
Category: History
Year: 2014
THE STELLENBOSCH WINE ROUTE – THE PEOPLE AND THE DOGS!
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2014
THE UPS AND DOWNS OF A FLIGHT TO STELLENBOSCH AND BACK
Category: Adventure. Travel
Year: 2014
A SUFFOLK SUCCESS STORY – JIM LAWRENCE LTD
Category: Business
Year: 2014
HOLD FARM, BURES ST MARY; A RARE TUDOR WATERMILL
Category: Architectural Interest
Year: 2014
THE STORY OF SPARROW’S FARM, GREAT HENNY
Category: History
Year: 2014
YOUR COUNTRYSIDE – FIGHT FOR IT NOW! your Britain fight for it now
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2014
TUNBRIDGEWARE
Category: History
Year: 2014
EXTENDING THE DEDHAM VALE AREA OF OUTSTANDING NATURAL BEAUTY (AONB) – UPDATE
Category: News, Planning Issues
Year: 2014
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Annual, Gardens
Year: 2014
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2014
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2014

2013 - Watermills on the Stour. How Constable and Gainsborough would have seen many of the buildings in our area. Let’s protect the Stour Valley by extending the AONB from where we take over from The Dedham Vale at Wormingford towards Sudbury. 

Chairman’s Letter – February 2013
Category: Annual
Year: 2013
THE WATERMILLS OF THE RIVER STOUR
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2013
MANAGING A MASTERPIECE: THE STOUR VALLEY LANDSCAPE PARTNERSHIP
Category: Art, History
Year: 2013
EXTENDING THE DEDHAM VALE AREA OF OUTSTANDING NATURAL BEAUTY (AONB)
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2013
BUILDINGS IN THE EAST ANGLIAN LANDSCAPE – AS SEEN BY JOHN CONSTABLE
Category: Art, History
Year: 2013
THE ROUND CHURCH AT MAPLESTEAD
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2013
THE FINE WINES OF ENGLAND
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2013
PROGRESS AGAINST PYLONS: A ROUNDUP OF RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN THE PYLONS SAGA
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2013
TEA AND THE TEA CADDY A BRIEF STUDY OF THE EARLY HISTORY OF TEA AND ITS CONTAINERS
Category: History
Year: 2013
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Annual, Gardens
Year: 2013
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2013
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2013

2012 - A walk through many of the churches along the River Stour and how the Romans once lived right here in our midst, and how your pint is brewed. Also the ongoing fight to rid the Stour of the blight of Pylons. 

CHAIRMAN’S LETTER – FEBRUARY 2012
Category: Annual
Year: 2012
TREES R US – AN AMATEUR ARBORETUM
Category: Nature
Year: 2012
GLIMPSES INTO SOME STOUR VALLEY CHURCHES
Category: Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2012
THE ART OF BREWING
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2012
PLANNING REFORM
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2012
‘ELF ‘N SAFETY . . . AND ALL THAT
Category: Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2012
BRINGING OUR PAST TO LIFE: GESTINGTHORPE ROMAN VILLA
Category: History
Year: 2012
MINIATURE OR APPRENTICE PIECE?
Category: History
Year: 2012
GAINSBOROUGH’S VIEW
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2012
NEW STOUR VALLEY ENVIRONMENT FUND
Category: News
Year: 2012
TREASURER’S REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2012
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2012
THE COLNE STOUR COUNTRYSIDE ASSOCIATION. MINUTES OF THE 46TH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING HELD AT FERRIERS BARN, BURES ON THURSDAY 12TH MAY 2011
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2012

2011 - The brewers of East Anglia. The gardens of Marks Hall as well as the paintings of Alfred Munnings on display in Sudbury. How a small church became the Cathedral in Bury St Edmunds and all you need to know about antique birdcages. 

CHAIRMAN’S LETTER – APRIL 2011
Category: Annual
Year: 2011
Pylons
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2011
THE PAINTED CHURCH BECOMES BURY’S CATHEDRAL
Category: History
Year: 2011
MARKS HALL AND THE PHILLIPS PRICE TRUST
Category: History
Year: 2011
BREWING IN EAST ANGLIA
Category: Brewing, distilling and wine
Year: 2011
BURES MILL OVER NINE CENTURIES
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2011
LANDSCAPES BY MUNNINGS EXHIBITION AT GAINSBOROUGH’S HOUSE
Category: Art
Year: 2011
BIRD-CAGES – A FASCINATION
Category: History
Year: 2011
DAWS HALL EVENTS 2011
Category: Annual
Year: 2011
EDITOR’S NOTES
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2011
GARDEN VISITS
Category: Annual, Gardens
Year: 2011
TREASURERS REPORT
Category: Treasurer’s Report
Year: 2011
THE COLNE STOUR COUNTRYSIDE ASSOCIATION. MINUTES OF THE 45TH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING HELD AT FERRIERS BARN, BURES ON THURSDAY 6TH MAY 2010
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2011
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING 2010
Category: A.G.M.
Year: 2011

2010 - An artist who enjoyed his port and a canoe adventure along the Stour. Sudbury’s history and Coggeshall Abbey and a fight to get rid of Pylons from the Stour Valley. 

Chairmans Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2010
A Pint of Port to Paint a Picture
Category: Art, History
Year: 2010
A Walk Round Coggeshall Abbey
Category: Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2010
By Canoe to Cattawade
Category: Adventure. Travel, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2010
Nocturnal Visitors
Category: Nature
Year: 2010
Sudbury New Town – c.1330
Category: History
Year: 2010
A Stay in a Nomad’s Tent
Category: Business
Year: 2010
Freeing our countryside of the blight of pylons
Category: Planning Issues
Year: 2010
Hobbies on the Stour
Category: Nature
Year: 2010
Editor’s Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2010
Website
Category: News
Year: 2010
Annual General Meeting 2009
Category: Annual
Year: 2010

2009 - Norwich School art and the Maplesteads. Ancient wallpapers, and is Long Melford the epitome of a Suffolk village? and don’t throw away a rug before checking what it is. 

Chairmans Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2009
By Hook or by Crook
Category: Art, History
Year: 2009
Unwanted Wildlife – Some Handy Hints
Category: Gardens
Year: 2009
East Ruston Old Vicarage
Category: Gardens
Year: 2009
Squash a Squirrel – Save a Tree
Category: Nature
Year: 2009
Historic Wallpapers and Cole & Son
Category: Business
Year: 2009
Long Melford – ‘Suffolk in a day’
Category: Architectural Interest, Explore Colne Stour, History
Year: 2009
Don’t throw away a fortune!
Category: Business
Year: 2009
Garden Visits. Away Days
Category: Gardens
Year: 2009
Website
Category: Annual
Year: 2009
Editors Notes
Category: Editors notes
Year: 2009
Annual General Meeting 2008
Category: Annual
Year: 2009

2008 - The bell founders of Sudbury and all about a rogue from our area, Sir John Hawkwood, and a Sudbury secret – Gainsborough’s House. 

Member’s Letter
Category: Annual
Year: 2008
Cycling in Suffolk – An Environmental Holiday
Category: Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2008
The Sudbury Bell Founders
Category: History
Year: 2008
The CSCA Website
Category: News
Year: 2008
From Sible Hedingham to Florence. The Remarkable Life of Sir John Hawkwood
Category: History
Year: 2008
‘One of Suffolk’s Best Kept Secrets’- Gainsborough’s House, Sudbury
Category: Art, Explore Colne Stour
Year: 2008
Discovering Historic Wallpaper in East Anglian Houses
Category: History
Year: 2008
The not so humble Mole (Talpa Europaea) and how to catch him
Category: Nature
Year: 2008
Annual Report 2007.
Category: Annual
Year: 2008

2007 - Why a bell had to be chipped to get into the belfry at Lamarsh. Watermills on the Colne and Dragonflies. 

Water Mills on the Upper Colne
Category: Architectural Interest, History
Year: 2007
Dragonflies on the Stour
Category: Nature
Year: 2007
Lamarsh Bell Restoration
Category: Architectural Interest
Year: 2007
The CSCA Website
Category: News
Year: 2007
What is wrong with our Horse Chestnuts?
Category: Nature
Year: 2007

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