2021

TF0621 : The death of a Prince

taken 3 years ago, near to Edenham, Lincolnshire, England

The death of a Prince
The death of a Prince
Yesterday a man died. Not just any man, but "His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth, Baron Greenwich, Royal Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, Extra Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, Member of the Order of Merit, Grand Master and First and Principal Knight Grand Cross of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Knight of the Order of Australia, Additional Member of the Order of New Zealand, Extra Companion of the Queen’s Service Order, Royal Chief of the Order of Logohu, Extraordinary Companion of the Order of Canada, Extraordinary Commander of the Order of Military Merit, Lord of Her Majesty’s Most Honourable Privy Council, Privy Councillor of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada, Personal Aide-de-Camp to Her Majesty, Lord High Admiral of the United Kingdom."

Or, more simply, The Queen's Husband. Prince Philip had been unwell for some time and passed away aged 99 after 73 years as consort to Elizabeth II. There are those who do not hold the Monarchy in high regard, but for the moment they need to still their voice.

It is commonly said at such moments that "we will not see his like again", but I suspect no-one will bear that heavy hand of history so well as the late Duke of Edinburgh, whose good deeds and simple likeability will long outlast him. War hero, ironical conservationist, a man who gave opportunities to the young on every continent to be the best they could be. And whose refreshing candour and unwillingness to tolerate fools is the stuff of Legend, and now perhaps of Myth.

The flag at St Michael's is at half mast in remembrance. I would have hung it a little lower.
St Michael's church, Edenham

Grade I listed
The church retains some Anglo Saxon work and stands on a man-made plateau.
It has a western tower, clerestoried nave, aisles, chancel and south porch. Tower is 16th C., aisle and nave roofs are 15th Century with angel carvings (and green dragons!),
13th C chancel arch, restored in 1808. There is a 12th C doorway bought from a chapel of ease at Scottlethorpe in 1967.
There is a Romanesque font from 12th C. although it may be recut or of a more recent date.
There are 2 14th C effigies, a civilian and a Knight, also monuments to the Heathcote family from Normanton, before it was flooded to create Rutland Water.
Also monuments to the Willoughby and Bertie families.
Externally there are some fine gargoyles and grotesques.
The churchyard contains several old cedar trees.

Constrained by a pandemic TF0820 :: TF0820

Beginning in early February, even before the official requirement to stay at home during the Covid-19 shutdown, I was self-isolating at home. Because it seemed a responsible thing for a couple in less than youthful condition to do. That has somewhat altered my opportunities for photography.

Geograph has a category for pictures of the impact of current events, but these pictures do not fit into that category (I have also added a few there). Instead I shall flag them as those I have taken within my much reduced range of operations. These, then, generally are not photographs OF the pandemic, merely normal ones taken DURING it.

By the end of April I was also making audio recordings of birdsong at some of the photograph locations, exploiting the unusual absence of background traffic noise and the splendour of the birdsong in bright sunny weather. The audio recordings are saved in the Wikimedia Commons system, where a built-in playback device appears on the page for each. I have linked to the individual recordings in the photograph description, and the whole set can be viewed at LinkExternal link

I am lucky to live at the edge of town, adjacent to Bourne Woods, where I can walk my dogs and take the occasional picture of nature and the like. I could, of course, walk further than this, but not if I combine it with exercising the dogs. One of our dogs is arthritic, and cannot cope with more than about 40 minutes of exercise.

By the time we had reached early May, the poor creature was even less tolerant of lengthy excursions, and the rising undergrowth was making novel and informative photography less straightforward, so the odd trip without the dog was added.

By June national restrictions had been somewhat lifted, but I was in no rush to re-join the throngs braving infection. But by Mid-June I was finding the effort to sustain large numbers of daily posts exhausting, and I decided to cut back activity in that regard.

By now I was wondering if this collection should be closed, as I was breaking my isolation once a week for food shopping, and taking my camera with me. But I remained convinced that precautions were still required, and thus continued my defiance of the circumstances.

In August the public (me excluded) were acting as though it was all over, and the disease came roaring back with the start of the academic year, and steadily worsened after that.

Things worsened. By November Wales was in a 'firebreak' lockdown, and England followed suit until the start of December, supposedly to 'save Christmas'. A 5 day relaxation of the rules was promised for that festival.

But by mid December the upward disease trajectory was resumed, and markedly so. Restrictions remained, and I continued this micro-project beyond 1500 images. Spring and summer were a succession of botanical illustrations, in Autumn I documented the seasonal colours, and in winter was left with just the weather to illustrate. But in England that is of infinite variation.

So, the winter of 2020 and 2021 wore on, and my daily record sustained me through those frustrating months. I managed to find new things to see, and say, despite the dormancy around me, and the arrival of the first flush of spring was accompanied by a government instruction to shield for the month of March. But nothing changed here: we were effectively doing that as much as we could. My daily exercise with the dogs did not break the rules, and did not involve anything but the most distant of human encounters.

The infection wore away as those months progressed. By the beginning of April the extra restriction on our household was gone; the infections in the general population were closer to being under control, and the much awaited vaccinations were being more successful than we ever hoped. But the restrictions on leaving home were still in place then, and the plan was to allow Pubs and Restaurants to open in the middle of the month but only for the outdoor trade. This pandemic has a long way to run. When it all started, I imagined at least a two year restriction on life, and writing here 14 months on I see no reason to modify that prediciton.

In Mid April the end came for my older dog, Inca, who could no longer tolerate the pain of movement. I had nursed her through the winter, and she sustained me too with continual affection and enthusiasm. But all good things must come to an end, and as we spotted some sort of end to the fell plague around her, she met her own far less deserved end. She will be sorely missed. Inca has featured in some of these images, and reviewing them will always be both a solace and a sorrow. For that is the Human condition, and the Canine one too.

April saw, too, some relaxation of the constraints on us that have slowed the spread of the disease. I did allow myself some occasional visits to nearby villages with no chance of meeting folk. They don't appear here.

As spring turned into summer, I took slightly more of these lonely expeditions to places of interest, and by June was planning work visits to customer sites, all of which were cancelled by outbreaks of the disease. But I was starting the question the validity of this collection nevertheless.

Toward the end of the second July, with most of the extended family vaccinated, including the older teenagers, we made a trip two hours across the fens to attend a family get-together, the first such gathering since Christmas 2019. And I have decided that will mark the end of my complete isolation, and to close this collection with that trip. The last images to be flagged as "constrained by the pandemic" are those in July 2021.


Creative Commons Licence [Some Rights Reserved]   © Copyright Bob Harvey and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.
Geographical Context: Lowlands Village, Rural settlement Place: Edenham Primary Subject: Flag other tags: Flags at Half Mast St Georges Cross Church Tower Click a tag, to view other nearby images.
This photo is linked from: Other Photos: · A flag at half mast ·
1:50,000 Modern Day Landranger(TM) Map © Crown Copyright
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TF0621, 159 images   (more nearby 🔍)
Photographer
Bob Harvey   (more nearby)
Date Taken
Saturday, 10 April, 2021   (more nearby)
Submitted
Saturday, 10 April, 2021
Subject Location
OSGB36: geotagged! TF 0619 2182 [10m precision]
WGS84: 52:47.0114N 0:25.6187W
Camera Location
OSGB36: geotagged! TF 0615 2183
View Direction
EAST (about 90 degrees)
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Image Type (about): close look 
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