Dudgeon's Bridge

L Youseman Adrian

Description

English soil, so treasured, hasn't always been a green and pleasant land. The times when life was cheap and governments were proved with butchery and bloodshed, are, in reality, only a few hundred years behind us. The history we take for granted is littered with the prejudices of originating scholars and the editing of the victors from any given age. The 17th century Civil War split families and towns, killing by proportion more English men than WW1 and WW2 combined. History has polished its account to let us believe that somehow it was the birth of our democratic nation, but this was no rite.Dudgeon's Bridge takes you through these times. A boy is born into a town beset by the worst of these troubles and must struggle to make his mark, whilst trying to look after his family. We know too well in today's world that one simple life can change the world we know, but little of those in the past who did. This is the account that's waiting to be told, for the monstrosity of war creates its children and just like so many of them, the truth is so often the first to be orphaned. Book reviews online @ www.publishedbestsellers.com

Sujets

• Historical fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Pneuma Springs Publishing
• Date de parution: 20 juin 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781782283072
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Dudgeon’s Bridge


Adrian L. Youseman
Copyright
First Published in 2013 by Pneuma Springs Publishing
Dudgeon’s Bridge Copyright © 2013 Adrian L. Youseman
Adrian L. Youseman has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this Work
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Mobi eISBN: 9781782283041 ePub eISBN: 9781782283072 PDF eBook eISBN: 9781782283102 Paperback ISBN: 9781782283010
Pneuma Springs Publishing E: [e-mail] W: www.pneumasprings.co.uk
Published in the United Kingdom. All rights reserved under International Copyright Law. Contents and/or cover may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the express written consent of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, save those clearly in the public domain, is purely coincidental.
dŭ´dgeon (dŭ´jon) n.resentment, feeling of
offence; in (high) ~ . [16th c; orig. unkn].
Prologue
Many of the unexplained things in this world, when subjected to scrutiny and science, still remain just that, unexplained. In fact history itself is fraught with anomalies, whereby the accounts we are led to believe aren’t even the most probable from the circumstances. Only when you scratch the surface do you find that there is often little documentation or evidence, and fifty people agree only because forty nine have used one as a reference source. This leaves our history littered with the prejudices of originating scholars, which has been further edited by the victors of the period.
I have been intrigued for some time by the works of the late Professor Ian Stevenson and his research on past life experiences. His referencing and attempts to authenticate claimants’ stories, has a paralleled use in understanding the psychology of written history, especially if we then extend this with modern character profiling techniques. The results, even in today’s world, often mean convictions we have toward our view of past events start to become unsafe. Yet we can’t abandon it all, for our roots are our sanity. It’s easier to mock other theories until some new more certain evidence comes along. Human nature created our history and similarly our instincts will always try to hang onto it.
Investigating these problems, while writing my first book Paradox Lost , I somehow became stuck on such a particular glitch in history. Then, before I knew it, I had someone’s life story in my hands. It sounds strange simply because it was, and the compelling story was stranger still.
1. Pomfret
Every person has a river of life that runs through their being. A power and force beyond any person’s control, generating an unceasing fluid body of events that tumble over and erode our intentions. When turbulent water foams in the pleasure of its destiny, it is so easy to let go and see where it might take us. Certainly, if you choose to let the river take you, then there is a chance you can expect to end up bathing in a sunny brook, but the sirens of false hopes are hidden in its beauty. Far more likely that you’ll be swept out to sea, smashed against rocks or simply drowned, for not heeding its power. We all come to a mortal end, and although some would risk it sooner rather than later, our world is founded upon the stable majority averse to such reckless things. So for most it is an unwritten commonsense which day-by-day wrestles with all that is thrown at us, to keep it all in some order.
So let us consider those like myself who attempt to stand straight and steady in the streaming water, trying to build foundations. Fierce as the water can be, we aren’t there to battle against the river itself, for we carry on in the knowledge that it is to be crossed. Throughout all places, time, cultures and understanding, there has never been a cure for stopping this instinctive nature, to cross this river of life by building a bridge, ready to use when the end of our mortal time comes.
I was born on the near shore, in a house just outside Pontefract, in the year 1634. The blur of those early baby years could not leave me with anything other than an illusion of privilege. How cruel that this naivety should give such delusions of blissfulness, only to be snatched away. Those sunny summer days, laid gurgling on a blanket, the smell of freshly scythed grass, children dancing carefree round the lawn, until I was the toddler chasing round behind them. I had an overwhelming eagerness to grow and join in this mayhem of children. However, the nearer I came to an age of play, the fewer children there were left for me to play with. I soon realised there was an invisible chasm between my brother, sister and self, and the many children of Sir Thomas Ward’s family.
My mother Anna Holinworth was born on the edges of the Lambert family. Though only the poor cousin, she benefited an education better than most girls, from their benevolence. Although blossoming into a wholesome, slightly plump, unassuming young woman, her prospects were torn to shreds the minute her brother married a Catholic girl. My grandparents would not disown their son for such a sin, but the firmly Protestant Lamberts had no qualms about disowning my mother’s entire family line for their ‘betrayal’. Such religious vindictiveness was hardly uncommon, but it was convenient when the Lamberts had lost a fortune in wool and couldn’t confess their nearing impoverishment. They would survive, they had friends, but my mother found herself cast to poverty.
It took me some years to work out that there was more to this story and a reason that I in particular should cause my mother to blaspheme under her breath. As the years progressed, I became aware of how she kept me near but not close. Indifference made obvious whilst never giving me the comfort or familiarity afforded to my sister. This coldness was tempered by a face often distant when looking at me, as if afflicted with some guilt.
But for now this piece of the Lambert family, being so intent on standing loyally together, found itself scattered by necessity. Each had to be placed or seek some living. They had been chipped off the family rock by the force of these events; events that would smash many to dust, and would never let them be made whole again.
My mother was immediately packed off to be the young assistant governess to Sir Thomas Ward’s expanding brood. He was a man whose poor wife Elizabeth’s attempts to bear him a daughter only left them with more sons. The seventh child was a boy called Patience, because Sir Thomas had lost his and vowed the title whatever gender was born. Young, fit, educated and mannerly, my mother was the governess any family could ask for. Her love of children meant it was a God-given vocation and the mere sight or sound of a fresh child would get her excited, relishing the prospect of putting their energy and exuberance into some order. She was not an employee Sir Thomas would want to lose and it soon became clear he had by decree assigned her a marriage. What else could she do or where could she go if she refused his insistence? After all, any illusion or ambition she clung to, toward any return to grandeur, still rested with the restoration of her parents into the greater Lambert family. Each year more news came that quashed such hopes further, making the hand of Sir Thomas’s stoic young gamekeeper an acceptable offer, arresting at least her part of the family decline.
Why Sir Thomas should show such favour to a young gamekeeper was of little importance to a small boy, but once understood it disturbed a young man. Edward Key married my mother on the third of April, 1627 and fathered my older brother John and sister Margaret before me. He was tall and sturdy, and a man of few words with foppish hair ill-befitting a man who laboured. At first glance he would be the last deemed a stickler for correctness, but he was, even to the point of a bludgeoning attitude. No matter how he behaved, my mother defended him loyally. These traits though distanced him, especially from imperfect children, and it is sad to think I only knew the real man by gossip. He was, I found out, the secret Samaritan who planted rabbit and game on the doors of the poor and starving, the man seen so many times talking to the vicar just before such events. Gratitude and need made this a secret duly kept by the poor, who remained always one step away from penury. Then these same poor and lowly servants would curse him, as he was so obstinate on doing all other things by rules that pleased or succoured to his master. His dutiful report of their minor transgressions brought about their due chastisement. Causing bitterness below quarters that earned him the whispered name of ‘bastard son’. Only many years later, watching the worst of young lords at play, thinking every fair maiden was for their pleasure, did I realise that the term was more than derogatory. A resonating statement that lived with me and came to make sense of a Lord’s favouritism, the brusqueness of Lady Elizabeth and the bitterness of some of her children. All the while my father’s loyalty to Sir Thomas never wavered. I was Robert Key, the son of a bastard son.
Under my mother’s wing, I was immune to much of the animosity. Her good nature and diligence allowed her to keep me busy in the room even while she taught and played with the youngest Ward children. When social classes mix, one instinctively enforces its position upon the other, something that bore sorely on my brother. As the firstborn Key, he was a natural easy target, especially when set tasks to earn his keep, which so clearly differentiated his position. Quietly I sat or played, as my mother, when she could, taught me the fir