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Location: West Berkshire
November 2005
Leckhampstead’s tiny community to receive Local Heritage funding to help recreate its history
The tiny hamlet of Leckhampstead, near Newbury in the North Wessex Downs, has banded together to turn the clock back to the days when sheep drovers used to graze their flocks overnight on common land in the village.
More than a quarter of the 250 strong community has become involved in a project, which has now received nearly £23,000 from the Local Heritage Initiative, to restore the area of common land in the village, using local memories and old maps as references.
The project will record local people’s stories of how the common land in the village used to resonate with the sound of sheep and lambs on their way to the sheep fair at East Ilsley. It will also pay for the restoration of the land to its former state by clearance and the laying of 1 mile of hedgerows.
The research by the group led by Leckhampstead Parish Council will involve investigations of an old map produced by the abbots of Abingdon and Sandleford Abbey as well as parish records and will lead to leaflets and guided walks around the North Wessex Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
Angela Sutton, the parish clerk who is working on the project, says: “There are still people in the village whose grandparents remember the drovers driving their sheep through to the fair in the 19th century, but we know its history goes back much further than that. With this funding, we can now delve deep into archives to find out more about what the common was used for. It’ll also allow us to have training in oral history recording, traditional hedge laying, land management and let us develop walks and leaflets to encourage tourists to explore this beautiful area.”
The group is also supported by the local Parish Council, Newbury Museum, Community Action West Berkshire, West Berkshire Unitary Authority Council and the PROW officer and has managed to secure contributions in kind of over £40,000. Volunteers will be helping with such tasks as coppicing, hedgelaying, cutting down dead trees and clearing the brambles and scrub which have spread over the Commons
“This is a perfect example of how several generations can work together to become involved in the history of their area,” says Lorraine Huggett, the Countryside Agency’s Local Heritage Initiative Adviser for the South East Region. “The money will help to fund information boards and exhibitions but one of the most important things is that the community will be involved long term in a management plan and the bio diversity of the site. And we would be pleased to see more LHI projects from this part of the South East,” she adds.
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