Skip to content

British history, travel, and culture

History

The Anglo-File

British Heritage · · 4 min read

Tips and tidbits for travel and for fun

A Room of One’s Own

The Fleece, Cirencester

DANA HUNTLEY
Cirencester’s street market fills the marketplace in front of the Fleece on Mondays and Fridays.

With its old beams, log fires and lots of nooks and crannies, the Fleece Hotel has been providing hospitality on the Market Place in Cirencester for more than 300 years. Perfectly located for exploring “The Capital of the Cotswolds” and the rolling landscapes of the surrounding countryside, the Fleece is staffed with friendly, caring people, serves up a great English breakfast and offers all the amenities you would expect from a three-star hotel. Pick up a pint or a cup of tea in the lounge bar and watch the people go by through the mullioned windows. This is one of those old inns that you just hate to leave.

Sites for the Savvy


The Fleece Hotel

Market Place

Cirencester, Gloucestershire GL7 2NZ

Tel: 01285 658507

www.fleecehotel.co.uk

The British Heritage

PUZZLER

Last issue we queried: “I sit on the fens crowned by the Stump. In the 13th century, I rivaled London as a port. When my people and my name crossed the sea, it contributed to my economic decline. Where am I?”

The estuary of the River Witham has long since silted up, and the Lincolnshire market town of Boston ceased to be a port. Few English towns have its close connections to America, however. St. Botolph’s Church, the “Boston Stump,” was the parish church of John Cotton, whose Puritan preaching inspired the exodus led by John Winthrop to settle the “city on the hill” that became Boston, Massachusetts.

Now, this is puzzling. The second son of a duke, I raised a regiment to fight the Jacobites, but made my name as a spectacular cavalry general later on the Continent. I am remembered all across the country with pubs and inns bearing my name. Who am I?

Yes, by all means, play the Puzzler and email your answer to [email protected]. All entries are acknowledged, of course.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
Even in the time of this turn-of-the-20th-century print, Boston was a mecca for American visitors seeking their colonial roots at St. Botolphs.

From the British Heritage Post

This is my 44th year of teaching English at Bonner Springs H.S., and we’re in the middle of the description of the pilgrims in The Canterbury Tales, so I enjoyed the blurb about Canterbury on page 48. Then, your Puzzler took me back to 1963, Wilson College, Chambersburg, Pa., to the English history course where Prof. Nutting peered over her spectacles and said pointedly, something like this: “William Rufus’ death changed the course of history, and it was likely not an accident.” Thanks for a wonderful magazine which takes me to England often!

Chris Wood

Edwardsville, Kansas

The apartments Jennie Dorn suggested, Nell Gwynn, were very nice, close to Sloan Square, comfortable, clean, quiet, well appointed. I looked at a couple of other apartments, but after NG, the others seemed shabby!

Susan Brooks

Winston-Salem, N.C.

I am a WW11 WAAF veteran of the RAF. In February 1943, I was commissioned and posted to Bletchley Park, working in the brick Hut 3, Luftwaffe und Wehrmacht. In Hut 3, four WAAF officers worked in shifts around the clock, and, in that Top Secret holy of holys, over our door was a huge sign–TOP SECRET. KEEP OUT. We were at the end of the chain of events that started in Hut 6 and elsewhere, and we translated messages that were passed directly to Churchill and six other important war figures.

Naturally, the article on Bletchley Park in this month’s issue, was of great interest to me. Many WRENS worked in the Park and were billeted in Woburn Abbey, on the Duke of Bedford’s estate. Everyone signed the Official Secrets Act document before being allowed beyond the pale, and for 29 years nobody broke the code of silence. Although I had worked there for 2 1/2 years, it was so secret, that I never knew what went on before I arrived.

Barbara Saks

Colorado Springs, CO

Coming Up in British Heritage

  • The Uprising of English Wines

  • Aberdeenshire: Where Life is Good

  • Two Coasts of the Isle of Thanet

  • The Queen’s Golden Age

  • Britain’s Quirky World Championships

<

English wines gain honors and acreage

Kiss Me Kate Beer

Nottingham

RUI VIEIRA/PA WIRE
Who wouldn’t want to toast the happy couple with Kiss Me Kate? Not to be outdone by Castle Rock Brewery’s commemorative beer, another celebration brew has been called “Windsor Knot.”