Guest Posted 14 April , 2011 Share Posted 14 April , 2011 Further to my earlier post, from Google earth I believe the station was located at: 51deg 32' 22" N and 1deg 15' 21" W. Many thanks (and to Adrian too). I think I have it. Bizarrely I was in Blewbury last weekend at a birthday party. I am interested in the Derbyshire Yeomanry, Sherwood Rangers, South Notts Hussars, 3rd (Notts & Derby) Mtd Bde, 2nd Mtd Div and then all Yeomanry in WWI in that general order. My grandfather (see Avatar) was an SSM with the DY, won the MM and Croix de Guerre was MiD Gallipoli and Salonika. A pre War territorial (joined July 1908) and continued to serve after the War. He was based near Churn in Sep/Oct when the 2nd Mtd Div was there and paraded before HM King George V on 8th October 1914, hence my interest. I am retracing his steps. I started researching him, then the DY. I have rebuilt the DY nominal roll and tracked down 1,800 names of which I have over 400 who have pension records and service records. Doing the same with the other units in the Bde and the Div so on.... have transcribed dozens of diaries and unit histories so that I can read them all in parallel on a huge spreadsheet, and added well over 20 personal diaries. My campaign focus is Gallipoli and Suvla Bay and specifically the 14 Yeomanry regiments who fought (dismounted) at Scimitar Hill. I have a massive amount of data on them and plan to write a book on the episode but it has started to morph into a book on the 2 weeks at Suvla (6th-21st Aug) where an Army Corps was destroyed. I have transcribed the diaries and unit histories of the 11th, 13th and 29th Inf Divs too as they were in the same phase of Suvla Bay. Big big diary spreadsheet that allows me to read well over a hundred different accounts of the same event on any chosen day. I have read something about the Oxfordshire Hussars and the unit diaries of the 2nd Mtd Div are full of envy that the Oxfordshire Hussars were sent off before everyone else. I believe the Dorset Yeo were brought into the 2nd (South Midland) Mtd Bde to replace the Oxfordshire Hussars. I recall that the Oxfordshire Hussars were the one of the very first TF units to serve overseas and they have a very fine War history, and Winston Churchill was once in their ranks. The DY had instead the infamous Sir Oswald Mosley, not widely known. MG Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmaasz Posted 14 April , 2011 Share Posted 14 April , 2011 Martin: Many thanks for taking the trouble to post a comprehensive summary of your interests. You are correct about the Oxfordshire Hussars: on 16th September Marshal Joffre had asked Churchill for some marines to co-operate with French troops near Dunkirk. Churchill agreed provided he could send some yeomanry as support cavalry. Thus he sent his own regiment, QOOH. They were not quite the first Territorials to land in France, but were the first to see action. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 14 April , 2011 Share Posted 14 April , 2011 Martin: Many thanks for taking the trouble to post a comprehensive summary of your interests. You are correct about the Oxfordshire Hussars: on 16th September Marshal Joffre had asked Churchill for some marines to co-operate with French troops near Dunkirk. Churchill agreed provided he could send some yeomanry as support cavalry. Thus he sent his own regiment, QOOH. They were not quite the first Territorials to land in France, but were the first to see action. I am working on the Hussars 1914-15 Star Medal Roll... Here is your Uncle on the original roll that the MIC will refer to......2768 Pte Clarence W Maasz QOOH MG Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 14 April , 2011 Share Posted 14 April , 2011 I have located it.... I have tried to recreate the view of the Parade on the Fair Mile in October 1914 when the 2nd Mtd Div paraded for HM King George V with Google Earth.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J T Gray Posted 14 April , 2011 Share Posted 14 April , 2011 I have located it.... I have tried to recreate the view of the Parade on the Fair Mile in October 1914 when the 2nd Mtd Div paraded for HM King George V with Google Earth.... That looks a pretty good fit, Martin. I THINK the buildings to the far left may be a farm that is still there today - Roden Farm, so the map says. Interesting - the parade has come well past the Fair Mile, which the trackway heading towards the LH horizon on your GE image goes to and then heads down a spur toward Moulsford to the ENE. If you go over the ridge, the Fair Mile proper should stick out a mile on GE, being wide straight and err... mile-like! Adrian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 14 April , 2011 Share Posted 14 April , 2011 That looks a pretty good fit, Martin. I THINK the buildings to the far left may be a farm that is still there today - Roden Farm, so the map says. Interesting - the parade has come well past the Fair Mile, which the trackway heading towards the LH horizon on your GE image goes to and then heads down a spur toward Moulsford to the ENE. If you go over the ridge, the Fair Mile proper should stick out a mile on GE, being wide straight and err... mile-like! Adrian I spent this evening with 2 friends who are residents of Blewbury who also ride. They think I have the angle wrong and it is not a photo from the Fair Mile but slightly further towards Blewbury.... so perhaps the photo is of the Yeomanry on their way to the Fair Mile. Either way it is pretty close. MG Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmaasz Posted 15 April , 2011 Share Posted 15 April , 2011 Martin: Many thanks for the Medal Roll picture! I am very grateful. Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J T Gray Posted 15 April , 2011 Share Posted 15 April , 2011 Martin, If I remember correctly - it's while since I lived that way - the Ridgeway marks the parish boundary, so the left-hand edge of the photo, past the trackway, is Blewbury while most of the action is going on in Compton parish. If you friends know where the ploughing match was last year, the troops are riding up the field it was held in. As they are heading towards the camera, they'll have conme from the Fair Mile rather than heading towards it. Great find, whichever way they are heading! Adrian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skoyen89 Posted 22 May , 2012 Share Posted 22 May , 2012 I have a World War II dated OS map marked up with the sites that the Americans used for training between Wantage and Henley. It shows Churn ranges were still in use by both the Home Guard and the US Army. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OlBeIps Posted 1 August , 2017 Share Posted 1 August , 2017 On 25/11/2007 at 17:50, J T Gray said: Churn... Well well well! I used to live in Compton and walk out on the Downs, and it took me a while in those pre-internet (at least in my lab...) days to find out why on earth there was a railway platform out in the middle of nowhere. I have a book on the history of Compton - I'll dig it out and see what it says. Incidentally, there was an awful lot of junk left behind - when the village had its Millenium exhibition I had a poke round in the upcast from the rabbit holes in the hedge and found a healthy collection of spent .303 cases and a Staybrite cap badge. Adrian Is this a good place to find items from the war because I was planning to take my son here to show him you can find this stuff in Britain. If it is may I ask for the location as I'm not 100% sure of where it is. Kind Regards, Ollie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moonraker Posted 1 August , 2017 Author Share Posted 1 August , 2017 Sadly there's nothing to see there at all relating directly to the Great War or the army. One can see the bed of the old railway line and I suppose the Churn Halt platform may still be there covered by undergrowth, though I walk nearby once or twice a year and I can't recall noticing it. I guess that a century ago there might have been a building or two to house firing-range equipment and an open-sided cook house (as was the case on Salisbury Plain) but it was only a camping-site, that is with tents erected for summer training camps. Moonraker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J T Gray Posted 1 August , 2017 Share Posted 1 August , 2017 It's years since I was up there now - you really need to know where the old platform is to find it as it's very overgrown and the brick facings are breaking up - if you find an OS map, it's just north of where the disused railway line is crossed by the Ridgeway. I think I was fossicking round in the rabbit holes near the range hut, which is across the next field. I believe there's a footpath from the Ridgeway that runs past it. Adrian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moonraker Posted 2 August , 2017 Author Share Posted 2 August , 2017 (edited) OS 1913-14 map: Note "Rifle Range" and "Targets" at top right - which I didn't until after I'd posted. Moonraker Edited 2 August , 2017 by Moonraker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moonraker Posted 2 August , 2017 Author Share Posted 2 August , 2017 Another section of the same map showing "OId Rifle Range" and "Store". I presume that the 100, 200 etc show the distances from the targets. I'm not at all sure about the accuracy of this, which seems to relate to a site very close to Blewbury. Moonraker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Wood Posted 2 August , 2017 Share Posted 2 August , 2017 On 11/23/2007 at 18:36, Moonraker said: From time to time, I walk past the site of Churn Camp, five miles south of Didcot, which was served by a lonely halt on the Didcot-Newbury railway line and which was well supplied with rifle ranges (now race-horse gallops), said to have been used in both world wars and certainly before 1914. It was only ever a camping-site, and on the outbreak of the Great War hosted "the mounted division" which George V inspected there on October 8. A search of the Forum suggests that this was the 2nd Mounted Division and that some soldiers enlisted there. On the outbreak of war, university members of the Officers Training Corps were camped there. Only half of the 2nd Mtd Div were based there in 1914 - the others (Warks, Worcs & Gloucs Yeomanry) were based at Newbury Racecourse. Needless to say they all went up to Churn for the King's visit. The Berks Territorials (4th Bn) had just arrived at Churn for their summer camp when war was declared so it was about turn and back home to await the call to mobilise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Wood Posted 2 August , 2017 Share Posted 2 August , 2017 9 hours ago, Moonraker said: OS 1913-14 map: Note "Rifle Range" and "Targets" at top right - which I didn't until after I'd posted. Moonraker Better quality maps without the annoying 'watermarks' at NLS - http://maps.nls.uk/view/104196571 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moonraker Posted 26 July , 2022 Author Share Posted 26 July , 2022 I still walk in this area, and a couple of years ago checked out the remains of Churn station. Much overgrown and the brickwork is crumbling away. There are at least two video clips of it on YouTube. Main reason for posting is that I've just discovered that the poet Charles Hamilton Sorley (mentioned in other GWF threads) spent time at the OTC camp at Churn, His is the first entry in Poets of the Great War by Toni and Valmai Holt, who note Sorley was gazetted as a "Temp. 2nd Lieut" in the 7th (Service Battalion) Suffolk Regiment on August 25, then was at Churn before joining his regiment at Shorncliffe on September 18. It's possible that, if he had had the time, he would have appreciated the Berkshire Downs as much as he did the Marlborough Downs during his school-days. I think that the late summer weather that year was good, and he would have arrived at Shorncliffe a month before it broke, leading to a very wet winter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moonraker Posted 26 July , 2022 Author Share Posted 26 July , 2022 Just come across the full text of "The letters of Charles Sorley, with a chapter of biography" including some written from Churn. The bio notes that 'he had orders to join a training camp at Churn on the Berkshire downs "first cousins to the Wiltshire downs," as he called them.' Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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