I rounded a bend just north of Pickworth in Rutland, and passed a wide off-road area in front of a gated field. Picnic gold for this motorcyclist! I U-turned to the spot, pulled in, dropped the side stand, removed my helmet and threw my jacket over the saddle. Seat bag unzipped and coffee flask out, I commenced a meal in peace and glorious solitude.

Accidentally, I had found myself at the gate to Robert’s Field, a small meadow of restored limestone grassland managed by the the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust. In the warmth of early Autumn sunshine, I passed through the gate to take a gentle stroll around the two clearly maintained fields that are sandwiched between Holywell Wood to the West and Newell Wood to the East. Too short and slow to be considered as bodily exercise, I nevertheless less felt soulfully invigorated by that walk.

Riding away from Robert’s Field in the direction of Pickworth, I immediately passed through Lincolnshire Gate, just a name on the Ordnance Survey Map, nothing visible, but which recognises that the Rutland-Lincolnshire border crosses the lane just south of Robert’s Field.

On the grass verge in front of the church at Pickworth is an information board. Needless to say I was enticed to pull up.

The verge itself was part of the wide droving road called The Drift, that passed through Pickworth. During the golden age of droving between 1700 and 1850, today’s quiet lane would have been, occasionally, packed solid with beasts of all kind, principally cattle but also pigs, geese, turkeys and more, as they were driven to and from markets. Why The Drift? As it was important that the stock ended the journey in good condition, beasts were ‘drifted’ at only 12-15 miles a day.

Looking at the Ordnance Survey Map it is possible to see how The Drift connects with lanes and bridleways that run in a broadly West-East direction. My personal assessment is that the livestock passing through Pickworth would have been ‘drifted’ from the markets in Melton Mowbray and the Midlands more generally, on a route eastwards to Downham Market and beyond to Norwich, Kings Lynn and other population centres.

And Pickworth’s church? I had a look inside. A small affair reflecting the shrunken size of the village. A bigger church once served a larger village here in the Middle Ages. That fell into ruin with the depopulation of the village, but serving to inspire a poem of social commentary by John Clare. Here are the first four verses of a longer poem entitled

ELEGY ON THE RUINS OF PICKWORTH, RUTLANDSHIRE.
HASTlLY COMPOSED, AND WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL ON
THE SPOT.

These buried ruins, now in dust forgot,
These heaps of stone the only remnants seen,—
" The Old Foundations" still they call the spot,
Which plainly tells inquiry what has been—

A time was once, though now the nettle grows
In triumph o'er each heap that swells the ground,
When they, in buildings pil'd, a village rose,
With here a cot, and there a garden crown'd.

And here while grandeur, with unequal share,
Perhaps maintain'd its idleness and pride.
Industry's cottage rose contented there,
With scarce so much as wants of life supplied.

Mysterious cause ! still more mysterious planned,
(Although undoubtedly the will of Heaven :)
To think what careless and unequal hand
Metes out each portion that to man is given.

© John Dunn.

You may also like to see my YouTube Channel, called Highways and Byways.

https://www.youtube.com/@drjohndunn2898

Cycling up the hill through the pretty village of Gumley, I was struck by the sight of an Italianate campanile type tower at the top of the hill. It vies for attention with the steeple of the nearby church and wins easily. Later research revealed this to be a highly embellished water tower set above the stables to Gumley Hall (demolished in 1964). The tower held water for the horses stabled below.

I took the lane towards Saddington, which passes over a ridge of 540 feet at the trig point by the lane-side, just above Holloway Spinney.

I pulled up at a laneside gateway on the steep descent from the ridge alongside Holloway Spinney, and contemplated how the field full of very pronounced ridge and furrow across the lane, now full of sheep, would once have been full of hardworking peasants cultivating their individual strips of land in vast open fields, before enclosure, hedgerows and sheep revolutionised the landscape laid out before me. The field stood out from the others, which have long since had their ancient ridge and furrow ploughed out.

The top of the field which coincides with the top of the ridge, has a heath-like feel about it. It is rough, wild, scrub, unfarmed. There is I think gorse amongst it all at the highest point. Why unfarmed? There’s probably a rocky outcrop below it all.

Looking out in the direction of Fleckney and Newton Harcourt, I could see hills on the horizon, in the distant haze. Were they beyond Leicester? Yes I think so. Likely Charnwood Forest or the Leicestershire Wolds.

© John Dunn.

You may also like to see my YouTube Channel, called Highways and Byways.

https://www.youtube.com/@drjohndunn2898

Cycling along the quiet lane from Clipston to Sibbertoft, I was drawn to a halt by my curiosity when I saw an information board, erected in a field just before Lowes Farm.

I was surprised to see that it had been erected by the Woodlands Trust; surprised because there is no woodland in the immediate area.

Nevertheless, The Woodlands Trust informed me that in the field beyond were the remains of a medieval settlement called Nobold (a name supposedly derived over time from New Build), remains which lie underground.

An agricultural community once scratched out a living here, before the place was abandoned in the 14th century.

It had already been abandoned 200 years previously when the Royalist Army commanded by Charles I and Prince Rupert tramped past here, on their way to meet their fate on the battlefield of nearby Naseby in 1645.

And it was after passing through Naseby that I cycle down the quiet, narrow and delightfully rural lane to Thornby, a village straddling the old turnpike connecting Leicester and Northampton.

Soon after crossing the main road, I pulled up at a T junction in the lanes, whilst riding towards Guilsborough. I noticed a grand looking house over the fields ahead. The Ordnance Survey map told me this was Thornby Grange, and post ride research revealed that King George VI, before becoming king and as the Duke of York, and his wife Queen Elizabeth (The Queen Mother) leased Thornby Grange for two hunting seasons in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

For I stood at the heart of fox hunting country, home to the Pytchley Hunt, across the rolling hills where Northamptonshire meets Leicestershire, a region of picturesque villages, undulating landscapes, and grand country houses, rather like Thornby Grange.

Written and read by John Dunn.

© John Dunn.

You may also like to see my YouTube Channel, called Highways and Byways.

https://www.youtube.com/@drjohndunn2898