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IT is said that living in an area full
of trees is very healthy as the groups and rows of trees take in carbon
dioxide and give out oxygen. In that case, Nantwich must be extremely
healthy. We seem to have a great many trees, although I am not claiming to
have carried out a survey.
No, it is just that areas which
offered an open vista when I was a boy are now a woodland view. Perhaps
the most noticeable for me is the bridge over the River Weaver (above)
between High Street and Welsh Row.
At one time you could stand on the
bridge and look upstream to a
multi-storey, brick building, Nantwich Corn Mill - as seen in George
Thompson's painting for Clewlow's the butchers (right*). At least you
could until it burned down one evening in 1970. I remember that I was going past
at the time - off to cover a meeting or other for the paper - and was in a
hurry to get there on time.
As I made my way to the
meeting, I glanced over the river and saw smoke pouring out of the
building. I regretted not having my camera with me to record this moment
in history, but there wasn't time to go back home for it and still be on
time for the meeting. Perhaps the mill might have made a better story, but
I am afraid that the meeting won.
Nowadays, all that the bridge offers
is a claustrophobic view of several willow trees, bounded on one side by
Waterlode, the town's inner ring road, and a dentist's surgery on the
other. I had been vaguely aware of the trees as I
crossed the bridge, but it was only when I wanted to take a photograph of
the bridge from the Waterlode for this website that I realised that I
couldn't see the bridge for the trees.
 The river was, and must be still, very
shallow at this point, and I have childhood memories of a sandbank in the
middle of the
watercourse in the summer with children and adults making
the most of the "beach" revealed as the water level dropped. (See the
painting above). I well
remember hearing of a young constable who was new to the town standing on
the bridge preparing to jump into the river to save a child who had got
out of his depth in the deeper water under the bridge. Luckily, a passer-by stopped him or he would have broken
his neck in his heroic rescue
bid.
That's one thing about trees - they
grow and change the view. When some trees have to be felled because they
have become diseased, saplings are immediately planted and these, too,
flourish - even though some people seem to have a desire to snap them off
soon after planting . . .
lPictured
left is a more open view of the river towards the former mill site -
that's Waterlode on the left - in early March (2007) when the willow
trees are less intrusive.
*The picture of
Nantwich Mill is used with the kind permission of H.Clewlow, the Pepper
Street butchers, who commissioned the work for their 2003 calendar. Click here to visit the Clewlow's
website.
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