Chairman’s Report to April 30, 2022
The Trustees were able to meet twice in the period between October 2021 and April 2022. We have met together a total of 11 times since forming the Charity.
We have also attended all the general committee meetings called to develop our projects of which there have been 25 since inception, but of which there were only 4 in this period as a result of the pandemic. It was not practicable to discuss our projects on zoom given the need to look at our creative projects in 3D
As Trustees, our terms of engagement are either technically over already or were due to come to an end during this period but we all agreed to stay on given the impact of the pandemic.
We continued to develop our projects to:-
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Assist with funding a speaker for Wessex Week 2021
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Erect a statue in Malmesbury town centre.
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Create a sword to present to Athelstan Museum
1. Supported Wessex Week with funding the visit by writer, broadcaster and historian Michael Wood to give a talk in Malmesbury Abbey about ‘The Lost Life of Aethelstan’ during October 2021.
We continued to collaborate with Wessex Week Organisers who have been bringing annual history events associated with
Malmesbury to the town (subject to pandemic). Whilst their events cover Malmesbury’s entire history into the C20th we are able to support those related to the Anglo-Saxon period which in 2021 included Michael Wood’s talk on the Lost Life of Aethelstan. Whilst we accepted that there might be a limited audience attending in person the talk, given the uncertainty around the pandemic we explored the opportunity for live streaming to viewers in their homes from the chosen venue of Malmesbury Abbey. The event proved highly successful in bringing an audience of over 100 people personally into the Abbey - easily spaced out as required by the appropriate precautions at that time - as well as being broadcast into the homes of several more.
We covered the speaker’s travel costs and arranged for him and his wife to be accommodated at The Old Bell, next door to Malmesbury Abbey, whose owners generously gave the overnight stay for nothing. We also bought our guests a meal after the event which again was generously subsidised by The Old Bell.
Wessex Week proved particularly successful in 2021 and the organisers generously voted to support our charity with £6000 from the profits generated by the events which were received during February 2022.
2. Erect a statue to honour King Aethelstan in Malmesbury Town Centre.
Although the Statue Steering Group had not able to meet for a large period of time because of the pandemic, the statue design had been agreed and Pre-App Approval granted, subject to final details. As previously reported the Trustees had decided therefore to use the time to prepare a full planning application. This was submitted to Wiltshire Council in March 2021.
The submission was withdrawn in June when unexpected objections arose from within the community. It had not been possible to engage with the community during the pandemic so our withdrawal was agreed on the basis that we would resubmit once the issues raised had been addressed and we had been able to fully consult within the community.
3 . Present a ‘Sword Fit for King Aethelstan’ to Athelstan Museum
Our project to create the sword was largely completed in the period. We were finally able to film the final processes and set about editing the film that would accompany the sword to the Athelstan Museum.
Blacksmith Hector Cole MBE worked with our film maker Rufus Exton in his forge in creating the sword.
Our chair of Trustees had written the script and executed the voiceover at no cost, with the use of Stroud based MMOUK studio’s generously offered free of charge by the owner, Andrew Longhurst, for the ‘love of history’.
We liaised with Athelstan Museum over the script, placing of the sword, and arrangements for the video display.
A date was set for the Presentation of the sword, to be June 12 2022 and we began to compile a guest list of local and county wide invitees, in conjunction with the Masonic Order of Athelstan who has generously funded the creation of the sword, the making of the film and the acquisition of the audio visual unit. They have similar objectives in highlighting the life and times of King Aethelstan, as we do ourselves so it was with enormous gratitude that we received in October 2021 the sum of £2,388.00 from their Order to cover these costs.
As the period ended we were looking forward with great pleasure to the forthcoming event that would complete our first objective in bringing an artefact directly associated with King Aethelstan into being in Malmesbury.
Report Ends
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