Author Archives: Bertie Wheen

Churches of the Deben: Part 3B

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by Gareth Thomas

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3: From MELTON and from SUTTON to the edge of THE NORTH SEA
*This might be just ten miles of estuary but it is two banks of a wide estuary and includes the ancient maritime town of Woodbridge. Consequently, for the sake of both compilers and readers, Part 3 is presented in two sections: 3A and 3B

Part 3A

Part 3B: From Melton to The North Sea

Back at Melton another St Andrew’s calls. Simon Knott describes it as ‘wayward’. A bit harsh, but I know what he is getting at. So far, we have seen churches struggling, sometimes against the odds, to maintain their medieval fabric on their original sites. In many cases their causes were advanced by Victorian wealth. In Melton, after much debate, that wealth was used to build a mock-up of medieval architecture on a completely new site, with stone not typical of this area, nearer to the developing township. It was completed in 1868. Somehow it lacks that aura of medieval mystery.

The Church of St Andrew, Melton

The interior of St Andrews, Melton. Note the rood screen
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Delightful Deben Walk

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by Jan Harber

My sister Judy and I have been doing walks around the Suffolk coast and rivers for many years. We often remark how, if we do a route at a different time of year or the other way round, it can look so undiscovered.  For this reason we are occasionally convinced that we’d never been that way before. Continue reading →

Churches of the Deben: Part 3A

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By Gareth Thomas

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3: From MELTON and from SUTTON to the edge of THE NORTH SEA

*This might be just ten miles of estuary but it is two banks of a wide estuary and includes the ancient maritime town of Woodbridge. Consequently, for the sake of both compilers and readers, Part 3 will be presented in two sections: 3A and 3B

Part 3A: From Sutton to The North Sea

Welcome back to those readers who have survived the first two parts of this three (now four) – part series. As I explained in part one, I had no idea that there would be so many churches in close approximation to the River Deben, either as it is now or as it was, before the building of the river walls. Conversations with others suggest that I have not been alone in my ignorance; ‘forty-odd ! – that surely cannot be’ they say, but forty-odd it will be by the time we have finished – more than one church per sinuous mile of river.  Continue reading →

The importance of the River Deben for birds

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By Sally Westwood

Common Buzzard

 

Deben Estuary and changing tides

The River Deben is thought to commence west of Ulveston Hall, near Mickfield, alternatively the Deben may stem from the south in Bedingfield1. The river flows along gradually turning into an estuary between Melton and Woodbridge, and enters the North Sea at Harwich Haven, between Bawdsey and Felixstowe Ferry. A significant feature of the Deben Estuary is the changing tides. The tide is described as “the ocean’s response to the gravitational pull of the Moon and the Sun”2 but more specifically, “it is the variation in this pull over the surface of the Earth that makes tides”3. When tide is rising and coming in, the North Sea washes heavy sediment4 into the Deben which forms intertidal flats around the area of the mouth of the estuary at Felixstowe Ferry. This produces sand and shingle beaches. Finer silt is driven along the estuary into the river to form the mudflats we see at the sides of the river near Woodbridge, and more extensively further along the river at Melton, Wilford Bridge and beyond. The tide rises and falls twice a day5. High water on the River Deben occurs at intervals of approximately twelve hours, and the tide starts ebbing to low tide about six hours following high tide. High tide occurs one hour later each day. The height of the tide is affected by both the strength and direction of wind and atmospheric pressure6.

 

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River Deben Swimming and the Elephant in the Room

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By Ruth Leach

This is an extended version of Ruth Leach’s article ‘The Deben Bluetits Swim Group’, published on The Deben #68. It’s written in her capacity as co-founder of the Save the Deben campaign group and contains an update on water quality. This topic is scheduled for panel discussion at the River Deben Association’s forthcoming AGM, April 24th 2024.

During the recent pandemic our lives were deconstructed in so many ways, ‘free time’ – that precious commodity, was suddenly in abundance for many of us. People reconnected with their natural environment and for those fortunate enough to be near a blue space the love affair with nature soon flourished. Continue reading →

Volunteers Running an International Event

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By Alice Thorogood

Credit: Corinne Whitehouse

 

The UK Cadet Class World Championships take place in Plymouth this summer. They are completely volunteer run. Alice Thorogood of Waldringfield Sailing Club explains what’s involved and how you can show your support for these young sailors:

How did we get into this? A personal introduction

My eldest, Gwen, was just eight when she first stepped onboard a Cadet with Waldringfield sailor Hattie Collingridge and disappeared across the Deben. We didn’t plan it, we had never thought about sailing as a hobby for our children; I’m not from a sailing background at all and though it turns out that my husband, Frank, has the water of the Deben in his veins, he too had very little experience of dinghy sailing. That world felt “other” to us, with its strange new language and an elitist image that felt slightly difficult to navigate. However, we were charmed by Hattie and her clear love of the sport, that teamed with the easy welcome of Waldringfield Cadet Squadron and we were as hooked as Gwen clearly seemed to be when she came bouncing up the beach all wide eyed and exuberant from her first taste of Cadet sailing. Continue reading →

Churches of the Deben: Part 1

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By Gareth Thomas

The Church of St Mary of Grace in Aspall

Several months ago (probably almost a year but time flies by so fast!), I was asked by the editor if I would consider writing an article about the Churches of the Deben. With entirely misguided confidence I replied in the affirmative with the proviso that, due to some more immediate commitments, there might be some delay. Continue reading →

Remembrance Sunday 2023: Two Films from Tim Curtis (We Fought Them in Gunboats & Stanley’s War)

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By Julia Jones

Tim Curtis.

On November 12th 2023 the Riverside Cinema Woodbridge will show two wartime documentaries by Woodbridge-based director Tim Curtis. Tim is probably best known to RDA Journal readers for the highly successful Life on the Deben project – 6000 DVDs and Blu Rays sold in the first year, more than 15,000 cinema and festival viewers and over £5000 donations made to Deben good causes. Earlier this year (2023) Tim made a short film ‘How Polluted is the Deben?’ which was shown together with ‘A Surge of Memories’ (not by Tim) commemorating the floods of 1953 and tidal surge of 2013. Continue reading →