Kent Libraries

ALT About the talk: On Saturday 3rd June 1922 the lone isolated house of Kettlebender, situated high in the remote wooded hinterland of the East Kent Downs, became the centre of attention of a crime that was remarkable not least for the longest police pursuit of a three wheeled pram in history. Two journeymen labourers, tracked down eventually to Shottenden, were charged with the theft of a double-barrelled gun, a quantity of ammunition, pillow slips, sheets, scissors, a pair of boots and a cycle cape. Journeymen labourers living itinerant lifestyles, stealing from a house that would become a ruin, on the forgotten hinterlands of a parish boundary marked only by communal memory, crossing a Nailbourne stream that endures only through disappearance. The countryside is defined by impermanence, a land forever on the edge of change. Dan Tuson (Natural England) will explore the ephemeral features, places, traditions and rituals of the East Kent Downs that have shaped its history.