Leaving A Mark On The Landscape

A Memory of Imber.

It was 1966 myself and 2 colleagues were bouncing across the downs in a Landrover when I first saw Imber. What a beautiful little village nestled in the bottom of the valley. It's red brick manor house next to the church and the houses clustered around them, from the top of the downs it looked typical of 100's of English villages. It was only as a tank shell whistled overhead [we had been assured there'd be no firing that day] that we hurried down to the road and through the village to get off the range. What a difference. Every house pock marked and partially destroyed buygun fire. The Manor and Church barricaded off and not nearly so damaged but looking forlorn.
We had been tasked with setting out some large plantations on the ranges. The insurrection in Borneo was in full swing and it had been decided that the troops needed trees for jungle training. We were sent out with a large metal spike to dig the holes in the chalk and a number of fence posts to mark the corners of the plantations. We weren't sure who had ordered this or whether they'd considered that the problem in Borneo may be over before the trees grew or that there may be a problem getting the trees to grow at all in the thin soil. We didn't care it was a day out of the office for us.
There were six plantations to mark and by the time we went out to mark the last, the bomb disposal guys were clearing the first. These men worked in long lines. The first carefully crawling forward with a metal detector and marking finds. The next about 10 feet back would dig out the find. A third would collect it place it in a heap with others for disposal and so each line of guys worked slowly across the down.
I will never forget the amount of stuff they'd found or their friendliness offering us tea -- half a pound of loose tea, two tins of condensed milk and water boiled up in a galvanised bucket over an open fire. It was like soup but really hit the spot. These teams were all ex prisoners' of war from countries then behind the Irion Curtain that couldn't be repatriated.
The amount of shells mortars etc they found was horrifying and we'd been driving round standing on the front bumper of the Landrover digging holes with a six foot iron spike, then driving in fence posts with a massive mallet!! I made out my first will that day; I hadn't much but I wanted at least my stamp collection to go to my friend.
What a privilaged time it was. Hardly anybody got to see Imber in those days unless you were in the military. Even the houses you have in the your archive are all purpose built after the ones I remember. I hope all the ex-residents and their descendants are happily settled in their new homes though I still think Imber is a lovely Witshire location.