Now writing under her married name, Susan has published this book through The History Press. It is available from online and bricks-and-mortar bookshops.

The first man to step onto British soil found himself in Kent, which makes this the oldest inhabited land in the country. For hundreds of thousands of years, man has lived, worked, loved and played on the slopes of the chalky downs, in the rich forest and on the salt-flecked beaches. He has had time to reflect upon the nature of existence, come to terms with his mortality and look to the future. In doing so, the Men of Kent and the Kentish Man (and Maids!) have created a rich history, in legend and in fact.

We look to the future with our power stations and wind farms, but we also cling to many of our ancient customs and create new ones as we go.

These are just a few of the odd and fantastic stories about people and places in the county, reminding us that there are many, many things that cannot, and might never be, explained.

Now writing under her married name, Susan has published this book through The History Press. It is available from online and bricks-and-mortar bookshops.

 

For the vast majority of visitors to The United Kingdom, Kent is the first place they see, as it was for the hunter gatherers who travelled from Africa. The people of Kent have not only lived under the rule of Romans, Saxons and Normans – they have seen these invaders come and go from their very shores, and resisted many more. Spanish, Dutch and German invaders have been repelled while refugees from persecution in France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands have been welcomed and offered sanctuary.

The county is wrapped in a 350-mile coastline, which offers a range of habitats and landscapes. Marshes and wetlands, shingle and beaches, woodlands, chalk uplands, wide fertile plains, rolling hills and valleys are all part of the Kentish landscape, along with 250 miles of inland waterways. The county is much like a human palm, criss-crossed with pathways; the chalky ridge of The North Downs shows on a map as the love line and The Greensand Way describes the lifeline. The industrial areas in the north are echoed in the development at Dungeness.

This is the story of a front-line county, with tales of invasion, rebellion, resistance and a surprising number of elephants. Enjoy the journey and come and visit us soon.

The Little History of Kent is published by The History Press and is available from online and bricks-and-mortar bookshops.

The History of Shalmsford, nr Chartham, Kent

If you wake up with the sunrise, the sound of the dawn chorus echoing in your ears and look out of an upstairs window in Mersham Villas (91-93 Shalmsford Street), the view will be almost the same as that seen by the people living in Shalmsford during the reign of Queen Victoria. With the notable exception of the railway line, the countryside around the hamlet has changed remarkably little over the past 180 years.

There are more houses, and the occasional car, but in the very early morning, it is easy to feel the ghosts of those who lived, worked and died in the village still reluctant to leave. The field boundaries remain much the same, stretching out on either side of you towards the comforting bulk of the hills which surround the floodplain of the River Stour, and the village retains its separate identity as a rural hamlet, cut off from other villages, including Chartham, by field and river.

Shalmsford would have been a sleepy village, were it not for the fact that it lies on the main toll road from Ashford to Canterbury. The River Stour was a huge impediment to horse-drawn carts, wagons and carriages, with its wide margin of water meadows, so the main road from Ashford to Canterbury crossed the river at Shalmsford, travelled uphill away from the mud and then turned down Cockering Road, before winding through Larkey Valley down into Wincheap, missing the nearby village of Chartham altogether. All the traffic between Ashford and Canterbury therefore passed through Shalmsford, bringing goods, mail and a regular supply of gossip. The mail coach passed through at least once each day, manned by an armed guard carrying a custlass, a brace of pistols and a blunderbuss. Tolls were collected at Shalmsford Bridge Cottage, the last house in the parish of Chilham.

When the railway was built in the late 1840s, the A28 Ashford to Canterbury Road was built and Shalmsford lost a part of itself. Travel became easier, jobs were to be found in the city instead of locally, and the tight-knit community spirit of the village loosened.

However, Shalmsford still retains its own identity, distinct from Chartham, and villagers are proud to call it their home. The road sign on the A28 shows ‘Shalmsford Street’ as a separate destination from Chartham, the area had its own pub until very recently, and although the chapel and the Salvation Army Hall have now closed, leaving St Mary’s in Chartham as the main centre of religion, Shalmsford has kept the area Post Office. Both the school and the two doctor’s surgeries also fall outside Chartham village, but within that of Shalmsford. Even the Parish Design Statement recognises that Shalmsford Street is a distinct settlement, along with Mystole, Chartham Hatch and St Augustine’s.

The rapid growth of rural communities during the Victorian period was staggering, and the tiny hamlet of Shalmsford is a perfect example of how working class villages in Kent responded to this growth.

When Queen Victoria came to the throne in 1837, Shalmsford was still very much a separate settlement from Chartham Village, but by the end of her reign in 1901, is had, administratively at least,  become part of Chartham Village as a it is today.

For the purposes of this study, I shall be looking at the district of Shalmsford, which falls into the second census enumeration category. This area varied slightly during the seven censuses that were taken by the Victorians (1841-1901), but it generally encompassed Bolts Hill, Shalmsford Street, Pickleden, Mystole, Upperdown and Thruxted.

In the early Victorian period, the housing on Shalmsford Street petered out at Bolts Hill, where the homes followed the road down the hill towards Chartham Green.  The upper end of the street wasn’t developed until the late Victorian period, following the building of the Asylum in 1875. At the bottom of the hill a large area of water meadow skirts a tributary of The Stour, passing The Deanery and its associated outbuildings. This is the end of the hamlet of Shalmsford.

The Ashford to Canterbury Railway, built through Chilham and Chartham to avoid the North Downs, passes through the very centre of the village and was opened in 1846, although the people of Chartham voted not to have a railway station at this time. Their link to the railway was been limited to complaining about the noise and the soot while the children waved at the passing trains and played too near the lines. There would also have been complaints about the behaviour of the ‘navvies’ while the railroad was being built. Multiple accounts record their poor behaviour and the way they were often found drunk and fighting after work. However, landlords Thomas Newington at ‘The Cross Keys’ and Jesse Hukins at ‘The George’ may have been glad of the business.

The railway company extracted gravel from the Gravel Pit opposite numbers 65-81 Shalmsford Street, and it is still a low-lying are, prone to flooding but home to some threatened wildlife such as the cuckoo and certain toads.

Information about the daily lives of these families has been lost in time, but I found ‘How to be a Victorian’ by Ruth Goodman to be an excellent indicator of the lives of ordinary people.

Shalmsford is still the home of ordinary people, and as you read this study, I think you will find that our lives are not that different from those of the people who came before us.

I hope you enjoy getting to know the people who went before as much as I did.

Susan

The History of Shalmsford is available online from www.amazon.co.uk or through bricks and mortar bookshops, priced £8.99, and is an excellent family history resource, detailing the people who lived in Shalmsford 1841-1891 and showing who they were related to and giving you a flavour of their daily lived - how they dressed, what work they did and how they might have been affected by the events of the day.

The Stourton Chronicles - Chick Lit at its best!

Introducing Susan Hibberd's first adult novel.

 

Set in the fictional town of Stourton, lying on the east coast of Kent on the River Stour, the series will follow the lives of some of the women (and possibly men!) who live there.

 

The first novel is 'The Black Cat Gallery', and describes the was Eleanor Stratton gives up her job in London to open The Black Cat gallery in the sleepy medieval town of Stourton. She makes friends, finds a cat and falls in love.

 

Set against the background of the Kentish country side, this heartwarming novel is the ideal summer read. Get to know Kent at the same time as Eleanor does and perhaps you too will find that your own dreams come true.

 

 

Future novels will include the stories of Rosie the potter, who is married to an architect and lives in a house called 'Pots and Plans', and Audrey, an older lady who has buried four husbands and now fallen in love with the local vet. Lots of cats, lots of drama and a warm feeling in your heart at the end.



Things your Kids can Make for Christmas

Christmas cards

 Use coloured card, and decorate with pictures from magazines or old Christmas cards, glitter and gel pens.

Gingerbread cookies

Use the recipe at the end of this post to make the biscuits, then decorate with icing and sweeties

 

Decorated candles

Glue ivy leaves, cloves, lace, sequins, pressed flowers, dried fruit and cinnamon sticks round the candles.

Place markers for the dinner table

 Cut rectangles from card and decorate the same as for the cards

Wreath for the front door

 Wreaths can be as simple or as difficult as you want. Bend an old coathanger into shape and tie on bits of greenery and small tree decorations. Finish with a big red bow or a tartan ribbon.

Christmas cake

Make a cake from scratch, or decorate a shop-bought one. Stick on decorations with blobs of icing, or draw a Christmas scene with icing pens. Colour-in a wide paper border and use a pin to secure it round the cake.

Dough-craft decorations for the tree

2 cups plain flour, 1 cup salt, .75 cup water, 10ml cooking oil. Use cookie cutters to make shapes, and bake at 80ºC (175º) overnight or microwave on LOW for 10 seconds at a time until dry.  Paint and varnish.

Peppermint Creams

One egg white, 250g icing sugar and a few drops of peppermint essence – yummy!

Mulled wine spices in muslin

 Mix cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and sugar in a bowl. Tie in pieces of muslin or pour into tiny jars. Give as presents.

 

‘Snowy’ fir cones for the tree

 Paint fir cone tips with white paint and glitter. 

Country-style gingham hearts

Use red or green fabric to make tiny hearts. Stuff with off-cuts of material or bits of wool. Add a hanging loop and a bow. Use gingham and string for a country look.

 

Table decorations

Melt the bottom of a candle, and stick it onto a plate or bowl, or use plasticine to keep it secure. Pile oranges, lemons, ivy, holly, nuts and fir cones round the edge. Spray some of the nuts or fruit gold for a really special effect, and add some tiny bits of tinsel.

Use salt dough to make candle holders

Candle holders from fir cones or dough

Use the dough recipe and model tiny fir cones and leaves. Bake as before. Or cut a circle of card and glue cones, leaves, tiny presents etc round. Use red and green for a traditional look, or purple and silver for modern madness!

Advent calendar

A hanging with pockets, a pile of tiny presents, envelopes to open – all make great advent calendars.

Chocolate truffles

225g digestive biscuits(crushed), 115g butter, 1 large tin condensed milk, 4 tablespoons coconut, 4 tablespoons cocoa  powder. Melt the butter, and add the other ingredients. Cool. Shape into balls, and roll in coconut, cocoa, chocolate vermicelli or nuts

Tiny fabric stockings for the tree

Use Christmas fabric if you can find it, or bright red material. Cut out stocking shapes, add a white lacy top, and sew on a hanging loop of red ribbon. If you’ve made it big enough, it will hold a tube of Smarties!

Marzipan fruits for presents

Shape coloured marzipan into fruit shapes and paint with food colouring. Use cloves for stalks. Decorate gift boxes and give as presents.

Christmas puddings

Advanced cooking for the adventurous! Microwave recipes will get the job done in half the time. Don’t add traditional silver coins in case someone chokes.

Painted glass tea-light holders

Use tiny glass jars and paint with glass paints. Draw your design on paper and hold it behind the glass, and trace over it. – simple!

Gingerbread house

Use the gingerbread recipe to make a house. Decorate with icing snow and lots of sweets!

Printed wrapping paper

Use plain brown wrapping paper or jewel coloured tissue. Cut a design from a potato, print leaves, or just use gold/silver gel pens and draw a repeat design on. Little swirls or stars repeated all over look great – or write your own special Christmas message.

Collaged and printed gift tags

Use a template to cut out gift tags from thin card. Glue on pictures from magazines, bits of holly, ivy leaves, gold foil, pieces from old Christmas cards etc. Add a piece of hairy garden twine or some embroidery thread to attach it to the present.

  

Menu for the dinner table

Use your computer to print out the Christmas Day menu, then decorate with glitter and glue.

Knitted Christmas stocking

Look on the internet for a pattern, or go through Granny’s workbooks. No patience for knitting? Sew a huge stocking shape and appliqué Christmas shapes. Don’t forget to add your own name so Santa leaves the right presents.

Painted Christmas plates, bowls and glasses

Use plain white crockery, and paint with ceramic paints from craft shops. Bake in the oven to harden, and use to serve Christmas snacks.  Use glass paint outliner tubes to draw onto little bowls for nuts and nibbles.

Gingerbread Recipe

340 g plain flour

1 teaspoon ground  cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

85g brown sugar

pinch of ground cloves

115g butter

1 egg

4 tablespoons clear honey

Grease a baking sheet, and set the oven to 190ºC. Melt the butter, sugar and honey together. Beat the egg. Sift the dry ingredients together. Mix everything together, and leave for 30 minutes. Roll out, and cut into shapes. Poke holes in the tops for the hanging ribbon to go through.Bake for 15 minutes. Decorate. Hang up with very narrow red ribbon.  

This contains lots of ideas – search the internet or in books for more ideas, and detailed instructions.

A Kentish Hedgerow Harvest

Today we went on a walk around the village of Chartham, in Kent, UK. It is a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, which was quite apparent today ! Susan Hibberd was collecting ingredients for some more recipes taken from her book The Butterfly Book of Kentish Recipes.

available now from www.amazon.co.uk 

We took some bowls with us, as we were on the look-out for blackberries. However, we seem to have jumped the gun a bit, and many of the blackberry bushes are still in flower, or have the fruits just forming. We did find some different fruits, though...

Gorgeous ripe elderberries hanging in bunches. The tree is very invasive, and you wouldn't want it in your garden, but the berries are rich in vitamin C and make a great jelly, with or without apples.

Elderberries. You can just see a few rose hips poking through the shiny black of the berries. These will be heated to release the juice, strained, mixed with apple juice and made into jelly.

Sloe bushes have nasty prickles, so be careful how you pick them.

Some gorgeous sloes, just crying out to be mixed with sugar and soaked in gin. These were so ripe they fell off the tree when we shook it.

See how the hop vine uses the hedge to support itself.

Here are some hops that have escaped from the hop fields and set themselves in a hedgerow.

  

Sweet chestnut. When the nut is ripe, it will fall to the floor, splitting the spiny casing. These are quite different from the horse chestnuts that are used as conkers.

Haws from the hawthorn, or may, tree. These can be added to hedegrow jelly, but have lots of pips so are unsuitable for jam.

Gorgeous ripe bullaces with a lovely bloom on them. We shook the tree and they just fell off !

 

Rose hips for jelly.

Rose hips from a different type of rose. These hips are larger. Rose hips have horrible large, hairy seeds that need to be removed,but once boiled and sieved, can be used to make syrup or jelly.

Jars of rosehip syrup ready to add to lemonade or pour over ice cream. A recipe for Rose Hip Jelly appears in The Butterfly Book of Kentish Recipes.

It's been a bad year for blackberries where we live in Kent. Here is a little bunch of blackberries, some ripe and some half ripe. The lack of rain means they are not plump and juicy like they should be at this time of year.

THESE ARE THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT EAT:

Horse chestnuts. The picture on the right shows the chestnuts on the tree, just beginning to split open. the ones on the left must have fallen quite recently, as they are still shiny. They quickly lose their shine once they are exposed to the air. Children tie the dried chestnuts to string and play 'conkers; with them, taking turns to hit each others' nut. The one that doesn't break is the winner. Apparently, soaking them in vinegar makes them harder.These chestnuts are quite different from sweet chestnuts and are poisonous.

A super formation of fungus. I don't know the type Never eat any fungus unless you know what it is.

These holly berries are on a variegated bush, and are quite spectacular. Great for decorating your home, especially at Christmas time, but don't eat them !

A fantastic result! Kentish Red Cherries scrumped from a roadside hedgerow. They are really tart and can't be eaten fresh, however, they are great for sauce or jam.

From late April onwards the foamy clusters of elderflowers dot the hedgerows. These can be used immediately to make fresh elderflower fritters using a light batter, or added to preserves. They make a great addition to gooseberry jam or jelly, giving it a really delicious and different taste.

In an abundant year, the flowers can be used to make elderflower cordial or elderflower wine, an old country favourite.

Check out some recipes that use these great Kentish ingredients in The Butterfly Book of Kentish Recipes. More information on this blog,or on www.amazon.co.uk 

Pastel 1960s Tupperware

Most of these photographs are my own, of items that I have scrounged, sourced, and even purchased. Some of the photos have been shamelessly stolen from ebay users, and I apologise if you spot your own photograph here. Please email us if you would like it removed.

Green and Yellow Wonderlier bowls with the famous Tupperware 'burp' seal.

Two round storage containers and a yellow jug with a flip lid. Each of the early seals had an imprint of a seal on them, which is a good way of telling if a seal is new or vintage. The jugs were also available in pastel blue and came in two sizes, for milk or cream (see below)

Super set of six pastel cereal bowls. So useful for so much more than cereals !

Yellow and blue freezer boxes.

Freezer boxes in a range of pastel colours.

 

Blue and clear containers for the kitchen cupboard.

The classic fridge box, updated many times, but still with the grate in the bottom which stops your veg from sitting in the collected water.

Super set of jug and sugar bowl. The sugar bowl has a narrow opening for use directly onto your food, and a large spout for use while cooking.

The green grated was an innovation, in that the grater sits on top of your bowl so that you can grate directly into it. The newer versions have metal graters.

Super Lettuce bowl, complete with plastic spike in the bottom.

These pastel tumblers have their own lid tidy.

The storage containers came in a range of heights. The flip-lid made it easy to pour out ingredients like sugar.

Dear little individual jelly pots. The base is removable as well as the lid. When serving, removing the base dispels the vacuum and helps the jelly to drop out easily.