Brangwin Family Newsletter: March 2003
Welcome to the March 2003 edition of our family newsletter.
February saw the addition of another family member. My niece Peita and her husband Brad Morris welcomed Lilly Grace on February 10. I'm sure that you all join with me in extending hearty congratulations to all concerned.
During January, my local area was hit by bushfires. This is not an uncommon occurrence in Australia although the severity was unusual. This month we look at an event that took place twenty years ago, on Ash Wednesday, February 16, 1983, which had tragic consequences for a part of our family.
In researching the Byles family for this months feature part of the family I came across a strange relationship. I have become quite used to cousin marriages but this was a bit different. I'm not sure how one terms a marriage between a women and her half sister's son. Admittedly, Ken was born before Mab but even so this is certainly an odd relationship. Just imagine the complex relationships their daughter had to deal with. Her grandfather was also her great grandfather and some of her aunts and uncles were also cousins.
Other things this month are:
February has been a hectic month for me. As a consequence, this months newsletter is later than normal. Hopefully life will return to normal shortly.
I hope you enjoy learning more about your extended family.
Contributions to the Newsletter are most welcome. If you find something that you would like to share please send it to me so that it can be included. My email address is lwuth@hups.net
Lorraine Wuth
Editor
Ash Wednesday Bushfire
On Saturday, February 8, 2003, the Herald Sun, a Melbourne daily, ran a story entitled "FROM THE ASHES". The articles stated:
"Twenty years ago, 72 Australians died in the Ash Wednesday fires. But the lessons learned in 1983, and at Linton in 1998, are saving lives now.
On Australia Day [January 26], 18 firefighters in six trucks were caught in a firestorm in Victoria's high country.
With flames leaping 20m [66 feet] and choking smoke turning day into night, they hunkered down in their tankers and went into "self-protection" mode for 30 fearful minutes. Incredibly, they survived.
The Cobungra "burn-over" was a terrifying echo of that 40C [104F] day on February 16, 1983 when 12 CFA [Country Fire Authority = volunteers] from Panton Hill and Narre Warren brigades were trapped in the Dandenongs.
Two teams were sent to control the eastern flank of a fire racing towards Upper Beaconsfield.
But as they converged on a steep, wooded corner of bushland, the wind changed and both tankers were swallowed by the inferno. No one survived."
The headlines on the front page of the first edition of The Sun, as the Herald Sun was called in 1983, of Thursday February 17 read:
|
ASH WEDNESDAY
At least 22 people - including a family of five trapped in a car - were killed as bushfires raged through Victoria and South Australia yesterday. South Australia's toll was 18 dead and more than 100 houses destroyed after the worst day of fires in the state's history. Victoria's known toll is four dead and 100 houses destroyed. Hundreds of people were evacuated from their homes as fires burned on other fronts - one as close as the outer Melbourne suburb of Belgrave Heights. |
The next edition had updated the death toll to 29, with 11 confirmed deaths in Victoria and 130 houses lost.
The next edition had updated the toll to 34: 12 in Victoria and 22 in South Australia. Victorian deaths were reported from Warrnambool in the west, Cockatoo, Upper Beaconsfield, Dean's Marsh and Airey's Inlet.
On Friday, The Sun reported the death toll for Victoria as 43. 27 people had died in the Cocatoo/Belgrave area, 6 at Macedon, 7 at Flamlingham and 3 in the Otways. "HELL" is the only word for the fire that exploded the Dandenongs on Ash Wednesday, according to Cockatoo resident Alan Webb.
"It was a fiery wall - you couldn't imagine anything so vicious, so mindless," he said yesterday as the death tally in the area hit 27.
"It roared down the hill like a jumbo jet. If you told me the winds were up to 100 miles an hour, I'd believe you.
"We watched houses going up, poof, poof, poof. They didn't catch fire and burn. They went all at once."
Cockatoo and Beaconsfield Upper were hardest hit.
The people of nearby Panton Hill knew they had lost five of their sons long before police or CFA officials arrived with the tragic news.
The town knew when the bus carrying the volunteer firemen had not arrived home by 8a.m. - five hours after their shift was to have finished.
It seems that they drove into the heart of a fireball, where the 1000-degree heat would have killed them as quickly as a bullet.
The driver was found still gripping the steering wheel, another fire-fighter propped on the seat beside him, and the others still on the back of the truck.
"We heard there had been lives lost at Cockatoo and when the bus was so late the whole town knew what had happened," postmistress Elain Berry said.
On Saturday February 19, The Sun published a list of those killed in the fires. Included in the list were Allison Medwin, 40 [sic], and her daughter Kerry, 17, of Carpenters Road, Upper Beaconsfield.
On the Sunday, 1200 people gathered for the service at St. John's Church of England, Upper Beaconsfield. The usual congregation would have been about 50. But the service was a special one. It was a devastated community's way of giving thanks - to firefighters, police and emergency workers. It was held on two tennis courts behind the public hall. The church had been destroyed in the fires.
The Rev. Roger Rich, who conducted the service, held the mis-shapen cross from the burnt out church high over his head as he tried to instill some hope of a happy future in the residents who had lost family, friends, homes and belongings.
On Monday February 21, the following death notices were published in The Sun:
MEDWIN - Alison May of Upper Beaconsfield on Feb. 16. Dearly loved wife of Barry. Loving mother of Michael, Colin and Kerry.
Loved daughter of Ivy and Fred Dyall, sister of John.
In God's loving care.
Kerry Frances on Feb. 16. Dearly loved daughter of Barry and Allison, loving
sister of Michael and Colin, loving grand-daughter of Fred and Ivy.
A gift from God.
Rest in peace
For funeral arrangements see later papers.
MEDWIN - Alison
MEDWIN - Kerry
Perished in Upper Beaconsfield fires. Loved nieces and cousins of Harold and
Millie Gibson and family.
The treasures we loved and lost can never be regained. All that is left is
sorrow, grief and pain. The strength we are given to carry on comes from the treasures
from beyond.
Deepest sympathy to Barry, Michael and Colin.
MEDWIN - Alison and her daughter Kerry (tragically) taken. We will always
love and remember you both. Deepest sympathy to their families.
- Uncle Jack, Aunty Myra, Laurie, Valerie, Jim, John, Norman, Lindsay, Faye
and families.
MEDWIN - On Feb. 16 (result of bushfire), Alison and Kerry, loved cousins of
Cheryl, Ron, Donna and Ross.
In God's care.
MEDWIN - Kerry on Feb. 16 (tragically in bush fire). Your happy smile will always
be with us. You will be loved and remembered always by your friends in the HSC
Class at Berwick High.
... and still more notices in later papers:
MEDWIN - Alison and Kerry (Perished in Upper Beaconsfield fires). Loved daughter and granddaughter of Fred and Ivy Dyall of Hastings, loved sister and niece of John and Margaret and loved aunt and cousin of Helen, Graeme and Yvonne. Our love always. We will never forget you.
MEDWIN - On Feb. 16 (results of bush fire), Alison and daughter Kerry. Loved niece and cousin - The Dyall family, Tyabb. Remembered always.
MEDWIN - Our best mate Kerry, on Feb. 16 (tragically) in bushfires.
A special friend has gone away,Loved friend of Heather, Sue, Kim, Bindy, Jo, Dallas, Deig, Liz, Kay, Kris and Julie.
But you will always be in our memories to stay.
The happy times we spent together,
Are the memories that will last forever.
And when we're down and feeling bue,
We'll close our eyes to be with you.
You'll always be in our hearts, Kez.
Alison and Kerry were buried at the Pakenham Cemetery on Monday February 28 following a service at St. James Anglican Church, Pakenham. In lieu of flowers, donations to St John's Rebuilding Fund.
Alison was the daughter of Ivy May Gibson and Frederick James Dyall. She was born on December 12, 1937 at the Hastings Bush Nursing Hospital. She married Barry Medwin and had three children: Michael, Colin and Kerry.
Alison was the great, great granddaughter of Daniel Barnett and Elizabeth Dreweatt and Henry Hewett and Letitia Barnett. Daniel and Letitia were children of George Barnett and Mary Brangwin.
The Byles of Bradford
In the newsletter of May 2001 we looked at the Dreweatt connection. The following was written about Jane Dreweatt Brangwin:
Jane Dreweatt Brangwin was the third and youngest child of Abraham Brangwin and Jane Knowles Dreweatt. She was born on September 13, 1824 at Harpsden, OXF and baptised on January 16, 1825 at the Rotherfield Greys Independent Meeting House. She married William Byles in 1848 in Henley, OXF. He was the son of John Byles and Bridget Beuzeville. He was born 1807 in Rotherfield, OXF and baptised on August 10, 1807 at the Rotherfield Greys Independent Meeting House. He died in 1891.
In 1881 Jane and William were living at 13 Ashfield, Horton in Bradfield, Yorkshire. His occupation was given as newspaper proprietor & publisher & general printer. William had learned the printing trade at Oxford. He moved to Bradford in 1833 and began the newspaper for the town, "Liberal & Nonconformist", with the first issue being printed in February 1834. The family maintained it for 57 years. Jane Dreweatt Brangwin was his second wife. Three sons joined him on the paper. His eldest son, William, entered Parliament, represented Shipley & North Salford and was knighted in 1911. His second son, Alfred, became a congregational minister. Another son entered medicine.
Children of William and Jane:
- Harriott Byles, born about 1855 in Bradford. Unmarried in 1881 and a teacher of mathematics.
- Ellen Margaret Byles, born about 1860
- Mary Anna Byles, born about 1865
- Arthur Rowland Byles
- Anna Byles
- Frederick Glyde Byles
- Edith Jane Byles
This month we look at the Byles of Bradford in more detail.
William Byles was the son of John Curtis Byles and Bridgit Beuzeville. He was born on July 19, 1807 at Rotherfield, OXF, a short distance from Henley-on-Thames, and baptised at the Rotherfield Greys Independent Chapel on August 10 of that year.
William learned the printing trade at Oxford before moving to Bradford in Yorkshire (YKS) in 1833 where he began a newspaper, the "Liberal & Nonconformist", for the town. The first issue appeared in February 1834 and the paper was maintained by the family for 57 years.
On March 16, 1837 William married Anna Holden in Halifax, YKS. They had 4 children:
In 1848, William married Jane Dreweatt Brangwin in Henley, OXF. She was the daughter of Abraham Brangwin and Jane Dreweatt. [See above for more details about Jane]. Jane and William had 7 children:
At the time of the 1881 census, William and Jane were living at 13 Ashfield, Horton in Bradford, YKS. William's occupation was listed as newspaper proprietor & publisher & general printer and he was 73 years old. Three sons had joined him on the paper. His eldest son, William, entered Parliament, represented Shipley & North Salford; his second son, Alfred, became a congregational minister and another son entered medicine.
William died on June 17, 1891 in Ashfield, WRY. Probate was granted on August 26, 1891 at Wakefield to William Pollard Byles of 10 Picadilly Bradford, newspaper proprietor and printer, and the Rev Alfred Holden Byles of Hanley, Staffordshire, Congregational Minister, the sons, William Maynard of Vicar-lane Bradford, merchant [a son in law], Frederick Glyde Byles of 10 Picadilly, newspaper proprietor and printer, the son, and Harriett Byles of Ashfield spinster the daughter the executors. Personal estate £17,303 18s 10d.
Jane died on January 3, 1907, aged 82. The Pobate index provided the following:
Jane Dreweatt Byles of 8 Melbourne-place, Bradford widow died 3 January 1907. Probate Wakefield 3 May 1907 to Arthur Rowland Byles newspaper proprietor and Harriett Byles spinster. Effects £1076 10s 9d.
Generation 2
Mary Beuzeville Byles was the first child of William Byles and Anna Holden. She was born on January 8, 1838 in Bradford, WRY. She married William Maynard on October 7, 1859. William was the son of Joseph Maynard and Mary Soundy. He had been born on April 30, 1833 in Henley, OXF, and died July 16, 1907 in Henley, OXF.
Mary died on January 4, 1864.
Mary and William had 3 children:
Alfred Holden Byles was the third child of William Byles and Anna Holden. He was born on December 27, 1840 in Bradford, WRY. He married Louisa Bridget Davids on March 5, 1869 in Colchester, ESS. She was born about 1841 in Colchester, ESS, and died some time before April 1901 as Alfred was listed as a widower at the time of the 1901 census. Alfred was a congregational minister.
Alfred and Louisa had 7 children. Unless otherwise stated, the children were born in Headingly, WRY:
Henry Byles was the fourth child of William Byles and Anna Holden. He was born on May 30, 1843 in Bradford, WRY. He married Marian Jackson on February 3, 1869. He general practitioner according to the 1881 census. Henry died on October 24, 1890 in Bradford, WRY.
Henry and Marian had 2 children:
Arthur Rowland Byles was the first child of William Byles and Jane Dreweatt Brangwin. He was born on April 26, 1849 in Bradford, WRY. He married Fanny Gillam Holden on December 12, 1876. What Fanny's relationship was to his fathers first wife, Anna Holden, is unknown. Arthur followed his father into the newspaper and priting business. He died on December 11, 1921 in Bradford, WRY.
Arthur and Fanny had 6 children:
Ellen Margaret Byles was the fifth child born to Jane Freweatt Brangwin and William Byles. She was born in Bradford on January 3, 1860. She married local Bradford lad, Cahrles Wade, on April 16, 1884. They had 2 children:
Edith Jane Byles was the sixth child of Jane Dreweatt Brangwin and William Byles. She was born at Bradford on October 2, 1862. She married Arthur Binns. They had 4 children:
Mary Anna Byles was known as "Mab". She was the seventh and final child of Jane Dreweatt Brangwin and William Byles. She was born on September 26, 1864 in Bradford. It would appear that Mary was named after her older half sister, Mary Beuzeville, who had died ealier in the year she was born. She married Alfred Kenyon Maynard, known as Ken and the son of William Maynard and her half sister Mary, on April 15, 1893.
Mab died on March 4, 1944. Ken, who had been born on December 5, 1863, died on June 30, 1924.
Mab and Ken had one child, a daughter Frieda Byles Maynard who was born in 1894. She did not marry. According to the probate index, she was of Kentons 42 Hillway Highgate London N6 and died on August 2, 1940 at 12 Hornsey-lane Highgate. Probate granted at Llandudne on October 23, 1940 to her cousin James Brangwin Binns congregational minister. Effects: £4110 10s 1d.
Yorkshire has been divided into three areas, known as "Ridings": north, east and west. Bradford is found in the West Riding.
Bradford - (West Riding) Yorkshire Parish
"BRADFORD, a market and parish-town, in Morley-division of Agbrigg and Morley, liberty of Pontefract; 6 miles from Bingley, 8 from Halifax, 10 from Leeds, Keighley, and Otley, 14 from Huddersfield, 15 from Wakefield, 34 from York, 196 from London. Market, Thursday. Fairs, March 3, June 17 and 18, December 9 and 10, for horned cattle, horses, pigs, &c. Bankers, Messrs. Peckover, Harris, and Co. draw on Messrs. Sir James Esdaile, and Co. 21, Lombard Street. Principal Inns, the Sun, and the Talbot. Pop. 13,064. The Church is a vicarage, dedicated to St. Peter, in the deanry of Pontefract, value, £20. Patron, Richard Fawcett, Esq. Here is also a Chapel of ease, called Christ's Church, in Darley Street, built by subscription, and consecrated in 1815.
This Manor belonged to John of Gaunt, who granted to John Northorp Manningham and his heirs, an adjoining village, three messuages and six bovates of land, to come to Bradford, on the blowing of a horn, on St. Martins Day, in Winter, and wait on him and his heirs, in their way from Blackburnshire, with a lance and hunting dog for thirty days, and for going with the receiver or bailiff to conduct him safe to the castle of Pontefract. A descendant of Northorp afterwards granted land in Horton to Rushworth, of Horton, another adjoining village, to hold the hound while Northorp's man blew the horn. These are called Hornmen or Hornblower Lands, and the custom is still kept up; a man coming into the market place with a horn, halbert, and dog, is met by the owner of the lands in Horton. After proclamation is made, the former calls out aloud, "Heirs of Rushworth, come hold my hound whilst I blow three blasts of my horn, to pay the rent due to our Sovereign Lord the King." He then delivers the string to the man from Horton, and winds his horn thrice. The original horn, resembling that of Tutbury, in Staffordshire, is still preserved, though stripped of its silver ornaments. --Blount's Anc. Tenures. --Gough's Camden.
Bradford, pleasantly situated on one of the tributary streams of the river Aire, formerly belonging to the great family of Lacy, Earls of Lincoln, who had here a Manor House, where previously had been a castle, the site of which is not at this time known. This place, like many other manufacturing towns, espoused the cause of parliament, in the great contest between that body and Charles I. was garrisoned, and maintained a siege against the royalists. Sir Thomas Fairfax came to the assistance of the garrison with 800 foot and 60 horse, which brought down upon them the powerful army, commanded by the Duke of Newcastle, who invested the town, and attempted to storm it in several places. Sir Thomas Fairfax made a vigorous defence, but having exhausted his ammunition, he offered to capitulate; the enemy, however, refusing to grant the conditions he, with 50 horses, cut his way through their lines, and made good his retreat. A full account of the siege of Bradford is affixed to the memoirs of Sir Thomas Fairfax.
Bradford is situated in the very heart of a manufacturing county, and possesses every advantage for trade; it is in the neighbourhood of coal and iron ore, and has the convenience of a navigable Canal, which is cut from the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, near the village of Shipley, and penetrates into the heart of the town. It has several manufactories of the finest broad and narrow cloths &c. There are large iron works near the town, where the most ponderous work is executed. The town is tolerably well built, chiefly of stone, and has probably increased in size more than any other town in the county; the soil is dry, and the air is keen and salubrious.
Here is a Free Grammar School founded as early as Edward VI. and was incorporated by King Charles II. in the 14th year of his reign, by letters patent, dated the 10th of Oct. 1653. It is open to boys of the parish free of expence; who are admitted, when qualified to begin the Latin accidence. It is entitled to send a candidate for the exhibitions of Lady Elizabeth Hastings. --Carlisle's Gram. Schools.
A new School has been lately erected, with a dwelling house for the master, in an airy part of this town; to which is attached a library, and porters lodge. Amongst the eminent men educated at this school, was the learned and worthy prelate Dr. John Sharp, who was born here in 1644. His amiable disposition and unshaken integrity, his distinguished learning and extensive charity, will transmit his name to latest ages, as one of the greatest ornaments of his country. His Sermons, in 7 vols. 8vo. have always been admired, as written with clearness, and they were delivered with grace and justness. He died at Bath, February 2, 1713/14, and was buried in his Cathedral at York, where a handsome monument is erected to his memory, a plate of which is given in Drake's Eboracum. --Chalmer's Biog. Dict. --Nichol's Anecdotes.
In Bradford also was born, in 1622, David Clarkson, a divine, and educated at Clarehall, Cambridge, of which society he became Fellow, and had Mr, afterwards Archbishop, Tillotson, for his pupil. He held the living of Mortlake, in Surrey, but was dispossessed of it in 1662, for non conformity. He then officiated to an Independent congregation in London, and died in 1686 He wrote some controversial pieces; and a volume of Sermons was printed in folio, after his death. --Calamy."
The following article was published in the Sydney Morning Herald on November 14, 1974. It was part of an occassional series on twentieth century women.
While Marie Byles is not directly related to us, she is related our Byles so I have used a bit of licence to include this article in our newsletter. Who knows, when we research a little further she may just be directly related after all!
Mountaineer, explorer, author, Marie Byles has just celebrated the 50th Anniversary of her becoming a Lawyer ... NSW’s first woman solicitor
Leading the way with law ... and conservation
She is shielded from the world at Ahimsa.
She looks' down on tree-tops rising from a valley of still natural bushland in suburban Cheltenham.
Marie Beuzeville Byles, Sydney’s first woman solicitor, has lived in this setting for 37 years.
And with a million or so intellectual thoughts and words behind her, she still lives as unpretentiously and modestly as she started - in a simple weatherboard home of two rooms and wide veranda where she spends most of her time.
She has created her own environment, the whole place sparkles with sun, the smell of bush and the sounds of birds singing.
A Burmese temple bell is hanging from the veranda and, when she taps it with a soft mallet, it rings with a drawn out resonance that lingers in the ear and in the mind as it calls the birds.
Kookaburras, honey-eaters, butcher birds and currawongs seek her out for charity every day.
Law, like conservation and Eastern religions, is a special thing to her. Last month a small group of women lawyers, including two new women judges, Elizabeth Evatt and Mary Gaudron, visited her at Ahimsa to celebrate the 50th anniversary of her becoming a lawyer.
She sits on the couch, waiting, a tiny, upright schoolteacher figure. And thus it is that one stumbles up the stone path past the wild flowers and tree ferns to find this ardent conservationist, this woman who was once mountaineer, explorer, and author while practising as a solicitor.
At 74 she is a person of Quaker-like charm.
Three years ago Miss Byles gave her three and a half acres (in real estate terms then around $150,000) to the National Trust with the fervent wish that no roads marked on maps will ever be put through the bushland reserve which her home overlooks.
As she sits cross legged on her bed on the open veranda. she tells how she found this piece of bushland ("the same today apart from the tracks through it") around, 1936, and of sleeping out in her sleeping bag for a night, “to get the feel of it," before buying.
| A place for quiet and meditation |
High on Ahimsa (an Indian word, meaning non-violence) is the Hut of Happy Omen - a big comfortable hut, with bunks and stone fireplace. It was built by Miss Byles, and her friends as a place where people could find quiet and meditation; which she found herself through the teachings of Buddha. He said that suffering, ill and discord end when we give up our wants, desires and cravings.
Miss Byles was English-born, but Australia has been her country since site was 11.
"Wise parents, no rewards or punishments -'biddable children' we were called," is one of the comments carefully typed on a sheet of paper she has prepared "to make sure all the facts are right," She has said them all before and before you can, explore the territorial instincts of this woman, you must listen to the facts.
"Yes, we were all biddable children in those days," she says, smiling. "Of course we came when we were called. Not like the children of today!”.
Biddable, but not always willing. She remembers on Armistice Day in 1918, begging her father to let her go into the city.
"No, it’s no place for a girl.” he replied, and she stayed home. She was then 18. "It shows how things have changed," she sighs.
Her first memories of her mother are of a keen feminist, refusing to wear her skirts below the ankle to drag in the mud and slush of the north Lancashire winters.
“I suppose mother brought me up that way -- most of her teaching sank, in unconsciously.”
But it was her father who suggested she try for law ("I was good at debating at school and he thought, I’d make a good barrister") when women were admitted in 1918. She won an exhibition to Sydney University and was the only girl with 100 men in Law.
“A lecturer in crime used to take fiendish delight in reading out judgments of Mr Justice Byles (a distant relative, long before my time). The men would stamp their feet till the dust flew!”
Miss Byles was admitted as a solicitor in 1924, with her degree in Law and Arts (with first class honours in History). She and her father were in the news the same day, she as Sydney's first woman solicitor, and her father for inaugurating automatic signals in Sydney’s railway yards.
But before setting up her own practice in Eastwood, she went around the world "for a gorgeous year" by cargo boat, and climbed mountains in Britain, Norway, Canada, and the US. In New Zealand, she climbed Mt Cook and led expeditions to the South Island "and climbed beautiful virgin peaks." She had loved bushwalking, with her family, since she was a child.
| A great adventure and disappointment |
In 1938, after building Ahimsa and leaving her parents in charge, she organised a party of six to climb Mt Sanseto in south-western China. It proved one of her great adventures and disappointments, too.
"The fates ordained otherwise.” she explains. The party, with its team of baggage mules, made it slow trek on foot through jungle, rivers and hilltops up through Burma.
China and Japan were already at war (Kunming had been bombed) but the Chinese were not unfriendly to the travellers.
They climbed within 2,000ft of the peak of Mt Sanseto. “It was utterly impossible to go on with the winds and blizzards, so we climbed back down.
“I sat in the meadows and looked back up and I thought 'Is life worth living?'”
Miss Byles’ expedition came home through what is now North Vietnan. A year later the Japanese had bombed this area.
About this time Miss Byles, who had been brought up in the Unitarian faith, educated at Presbyterian Ladies Colleges but emerged an agnostic and vegetarian began to think, not only of mountains, but of religion and eastern philosophy, particularly the teachings of Buddl1a and Gandhi.
Her exploring and mountaineering days ended when a bush-walking mishap close to Sydney injured her feet.
Though her exploring days were over, she turned to conservation before it was fashionable to talk about green bans and the national heritage. With the Federation of Bushwalking Clubs behind her, and a spate of letters to the Herald, she worked for the reservation of Bouddi Natural Park, now the Bouddi State Park (near Gosford).
It was a great victory, she says, smiling. "At first the bushwalkers were very sniffy about conservation. In the end we produced a lot of pressure to get a coastal national park and forestry reserve."
When the rutile sand mining leases are mentioned she shudders: You can't rehabilitate the sand and dunes ... you can't take away a bit without the whole area being destroyed.
| She has a love for people |
Does she think that any of the coast can be regenerated after mining? You can't recreate something that has taken thousands of years to evolve.
The locals calls her Marie, or simply Miss Byles and they are all, it seems, her friends. She has a love for people as well as nature and mountains. She enthusiastically endorses a young neighbour who organizes monthly privet cutting, as it strangles the natural bush along the creek and gullies.
Though her travelling days are over since an attack by an intruder eight years ago at Ahisma, Miss Byles has travelled, through India on a pilgrimage to the Buddha's Sacred Places; has revisited Burma, where she studied meditation and has also visited Japan, where she spent two months as guest of the Ittoen community, near Kyoto.
Physically Miss Byles never fully recovered from her head injuries after the attack but she retains her youthful enthusiasms and surprising physical energy. Above her bed is a notice asking that she be allowed to die at home.
"I earnestly request I be not kept alive by drugs: I be not given painkillers or drugs; I be allowed to die naturally when nature decides."
Nature has not yet decided and Miss Byles lives on with her beloved bush and her books. She has written five books about Buddha and the Eastern religions she has studied. But her sixth book, an auto-biography, has never been published.
First, an editor lost the manuscript, then the publishers decided on more commercial books. “It’s a pity,” says Miss Byles, “it’s the sort of book you’d expect a publisher to jump at.”
For the record, Marie Beuzeville Byles was born on April 8, 1900 at Ashton-upon-Mersey, Cheshire, England, only daughter and eldest child of Cyril Beuzeville Byles and Ida Margaret Unwin. The family arrived in Sydney in 1912. She died on November 21, 1979 at her Cheltenham home. She was a great, grandniece of William Byles, the husband of Jane Dreweatt Brangwin.
Telegraph helps save Baroque church 'gem'
This story was written by Giles Worsley
BRITAIN'S finest intact Baroque church has been saved with the help of The Daily Telegraph revealing its plight.
St. Paul's Church in Deptford, designed by Thomas Archer in 1712, was threatened with closure in November if £250,000 could not be raised by the end of the year.
The church had been damaged by fire 18 months earlier, forcing the congregation to retreat to the crypt. With time running out the article triggered a generous response from readers and in particular alerted Judith Lee of the Historic Churches Preservation Trust.
This independent charitable trust, which receives no Government funding, was so impressed by the importance of the church that it offered its third largest ever grant, £75,000. What inspired the Trust was not only the architectural significance of the church but also its vital role in the local community and the efforts that had already been made to raise the money. The dynamism of uts rector, the Rev Peter Fellows, has helped the congregation to grow during the period it has used the crypt.
The church was also offered £50,000 from the Garfield Weston Foundation, £10,000 from the Manifold Trust and £3,000 from the nearby church of St Margaret's, Lee. It is hoped that work will be completed by Easter next year, though the church still needs a further £75,000. Mr Fellows is convinced that the money can be raised. He said: "It was The Daily Telegraph article that made all the difference. it showed that others cared."
[Thanks to Margaret for supplying this article. A number of early Brangwins were associated with Deptford as well as recent ones being associated with the "nearby church of St Margaret's, Lee.]
If you would like to see more on St Paul's, Deptford, visit http://www.paulsdeptford.freeserve.co.uk/.
I hope you have found this edition of the Brangwin Family Newsletter of interest.
I would like to thank Kevin, Trevor and Margaret for their input and assistance.
That's it for this month.
If you have anything you would like to contribute to the newsletter it would be most welcome.
Until then next month
Lorraine