I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will. Bantering bachelor Benedick’s “merry war” of words with witty Beatrice seems fated to keep them apart, provoking their scheming friends to plot a happy ending for the quarrelsome couple.
Meanwhile bashful young Claudio loves sweet, naïve Hero and is loved in return. Nothing, it seems, can prevent their marriage. But the path of true love never runs smooth. Foul play is afoot as devious Don John plots to split the young lovers asunder.
Putney Theatre Company On Tour brings Shakespeare’s dazzling comedy of romance, deceit and self-discovery for an open-air vperformance on Sunday 10th August @ 3pm–St Mary’s the Virgin Church, Mortlake
This picture is from 25th June 1983, and shows the very last Routemaster bus to make a scheduled journey over a level crossing anywhere in London, which was the one by our own dear Mortlake Station. (Other buses have gone across – and more importantly waited at – level crossings since for various reasons. But this was the last one to do it on a regular, scheduled route.)
It is a number 33 making its journey to Avondale Road bus garage in Mortlake. The garage closed that day, and was knocked down later that year. It had been acquired by the London General Omnibus Company in 1900, in the days when the building needed stabling for the horses who pulled the omnibi. The garage is fondly remembered by the bus staff, who had their recreation rooms – with a snooker table – upstairs, and by those locals who would sneak in to use the canteen downstairs. The main part of the building was, of course, used for the maintenance, upkeep and repair of buses. There is still a turning circle where buses stop and drivers rest, but the main part of the garage is now where Dovecote Gardens has been built.
Now that I am grown up, Putney seems very near indeed, but as a child I would catch the 33 or the 37 bus with my 2 pence in my hot little hand and ask the conductor for a child’s fare to that far-off metropolis.
Looking at the picture brings another memory from those days which seems even more unlikely now is that there was a little gate on the right of the level crossing as you look at the photo which an impatient pedestrian could open and cross the tracks. People in these Health and Safety-conscious days can’t believe it. As you stood on the pavement waiting for yet another train to pass, looking up and down the tracks and tutting with your fellow-pedestrians (not deigning to use the stairs over the bridge, of course), the temptation to open a little gate and scurry (or stroll) across must have been overwhelming. Yet more evidence that things were Very Different in the Olden Days. Or that the Olden Days are more recent than you think.
The Richmond Council handling of the termination of a 21 year lease to the Pensford Field Environmental Trust (PFET) and the grant of a ten year to Dose of Nature has been explored in EastSheenMatters previously on 3 and 11 July 2025. The latter drew attention to the requirement for the Council to respond to the Trust’s warning of an intention to start judicial review proceedings. That response has now been published on the PFET website at https://www.pensfordfield.co.uk/news/councilresponse
EastSheenMatters has focussed on the process rather than the merits of the case, mired as it is in incomprehensible secrecy. Not surprisingly given its conduct so far, the Council has resisted any attempt to open up its files.
One interesting though rather legalistic aspect of the case is the Council’s argument that the case is not subject to judicial review because there is no ‘public law element’. It might be thought this is somewhat disingenuous, argued simply to provide opposition in the knowledge that the Trust does not have the funds to mount expensive judicial review proceedings. An objective observer might think that the secrecy with which the simple termination and grant of a lease has been handled lends a distinct public law element.
There were two meetings in July 2024. The Council’s Directors’ Board considered a report on the matter. It proposed that if there was no room for compromise with PFET, their lease would be terminated. It is a matter of dispute as to whether the Council has made any attempt to find a compromise.
At a later meeting the Council’s Service (Committee) Chairs considered the same report. On both occasions it was agreed that officers should implement the actions under delegated powers. On 6 September 2024 an Assistant Director, taking account of the views of those meetings, acted under delegated authority formally determined to terminate the Lease. Why delegate?
The Council’s Response quotes from the report that went to the July 2024 meetings. Both these meetings were referred to in the decision to terminate the PFET lease taken by a Council officer on 6 September 2024 who stated that both boards agreed that the decision should be implemented under delegated powers. PFET has been offered a copy of the report but on condition that “this will be disclosed strictly on a confidential basis, solely for the purpose of the intended judicial review proceedings…..”. Knowing full well that those proceedings are unlikely to occur.
So what is in that report that the Council wants to keep secret? We may never know.
Much Ado About Nothing in St Mary’s Churchyard: On Sunday, 10 August at 3.00pm, Shakespeare’s well-loved comedy will be presented by Putney Theatre Company. Tickets £16 (£12 concessions) from – http://www.putneyartstheatre.org.uk or on the door. Doors open at 2.00pm. Further information from Perry Kitchen (St Mary’s) email: perrykitchen@btinternet.com
An interesting talk on Wednesday by Dr. Helen Brown, Habitats and Heritage Conservation Officer, focussing on the life and achievements of Lady Isabel Burton (nee Arundell), born 1831 and died 1896.
Like her husband she had been an intrepid traveller, before she married Richard Burton in 1856 when he was Consul in Damascus.
There are many mysteries about their lives and their religions.
He died in Trieste in 1890. She was instrumental in the design of the Mausoleum at St Mary Magdalene’s Churchyard in Mortlake, where he was buried. It is a Grade 2 * listed building. It has been described as a Bedouin Tent but there is debate about this. It is high enough to accommodate a tall, standing Burton. Is it like the tent they used in their travels?
Why did Isabel come to Mortlake? It seems she had friends in the area and of course Portobello House, now replaced by Vernon Road, provided a Catholic Community. But she died in Baker Street.
She used Messrs Dyke, Stonemasons in Kentish Town, who created the sandy effect of the Mausoleum. Can it now be recreated for the purposes of the renovation?
She destroyed some of his original papers. Why?
There are many artefacts inside the Mausoleum which will be interesting to examine.
And an inscription ‘Praying for all those whose faith is known only to God’. Interpret that!
The mausoleum was completed in time for Sir Richard’s funeral at the church on 15 June 1891.[4] It was restored in 1975, and again in 2012–13. It is now maintained by Habitats & Heritage who are currently engaged in further restoration to be completed by November 2025.
Burtons’ mausoleum is carved from sandstone in the shape of the tent that the couple used for expeditions into the Syrian desert.[7] The building is decorated with symbols of both Islam and Christianity, reflecting the Catholicism of Isabel Burton and Burton’s fascination with Middle Eastern philosophy and religion.
According to Mary S. Lovell in her 1998 Burton biography A Rage to Live, the design is neither that of a Bedouin tent (as is commonly stated) nor of a typical Arab tent. It is modeled on a tent Burton had made for his and Isabel’s travels in Syria, whose principal feature was being tall enough for the 5’11” Burton to stand upright. The tomb was executed in Forest of Dean sandstone, a highly prized stone noted for its fine grain and even color, by Messrs Dyke, Stonemasons of Highgate, and rises to a roof peak about thirteen feet high. It was paid for by a public subscription of £668, loosely equivalent to $60-70,000 today. The tomb itself reportedly cost £460, with the balance of the funds raised going towards the funeral costs.
The base ring, 12 feet by 11, is rough-cut York stone, and the interior floor is of white Carrarra marble with an inlaid black design. The door was originally of a style matched to the “tent,” of stone resembling a drop-cloth door and opening on metal hinges. It bore three marble plaques, one styled as an open book and bearing Richard and Isabel’s life dates, a larger tablet containing a sonnet by Justin Huntly McCarthy, and a stone ribbon commemorating the donors who helped pay for the tomb separating the two.
In deference to Burton’s dislike of the dark, the tomb includes on its rear a window, which was once wire-reinforced stained glass. There are conflicting descriptions of this window’s design but it is believed to have represented Burton’s coat of arms, and perhaps a dove with outstretched wings.
As part of the move towards self driving (autonomous) cars, most new vehicles in the last few years have had factory fitted sensors, radar and / or cameras. These vehicles offer e.g. lane assist and automatic braking, examples being Mercedes Benz Pilot, Tesla Autopilot and Ford BlueCruise. Recent Japanese and Korean cars, also most German cars, are equipped with these features which are either embedded, or in some cases can be switched off via a sub menu. In a few years, full driving autonomy will be offered as AI and sophisticated algorithms improve.
At present, many cars have sensors and cameras fitted in vulnerable external positions. They can be stolen and resold on the black market. In East Sheen and South West London more generally there has been an epidemic recently of radar sensors being stolen. They are expensive to replace (£1,500 and upwards) as the sensors have to be recalibrated by a main dealer. Even run of the mill vehicles such as the VWGolf Mk VII, a very popular car, are vulnerable.
Theft is difficult to prevent until these valuable items are factory mounted in areas difficult to access. Some car manufacturers have done this already but many vehicles remain relatively easy to steal from.
