'29 TO RAILS' END WILFRID
GEORGE
The Suffolk Naturalists' Society started in 1929, but the County's gain in that year was counterbalanced by a sad loss. The narrow gauge railway from Haiesworth to Southwold ceased operating, and the little steam trains were to be seen no more. A far smaller 1929 event - my own birth - occurred a hundred miles away. There I had only the limited nature-study of a West London suburb for my first ten years. Almost every butterfly was white except in the school library books. Now there was this blรถke, Hitler. Somehow, through his activities, I became an evacuee. First I spent autumn in Beccles, where I picked blackberries in Murderer's Lane. Then winter, snowbound in Haddiscoe, Norfolk - and still no butterflies. But when the family settled in Haiesworth in the spring of 19401 was able to Start my insect collection at last. Our garden on the Holton Road produced several species, but nearby, alongside the marshes, ran a fine collecting site. The narrow rail-track still existed, amongst a mass of wild flowers and young bushes that had established over the last eleven years. Wall Brown butterflies darted across the stony turf of this superb sun-trap. Beside one marshy section the Yellow Iris rose above lesser herbage, and all across the marshes showed the golden patches of Marsh Marigolds, for drainage was not so efficient in those days. Young oaks had arisen along the track, often festooned with marble galls. It was a magic place, far superior to East Acton in W.3. But I moved on again when a lucky exam-pass got me into Framlingham, free. For the first time I met other butterfly-collectors such as Alasdair Aston and John Renouf with their experiences from Stowmarket. They had benefited from knowing their local enthusiast, Mr. Chipperfield, and he was a member of the Suffolk Naturalists' Society. A visit in school holidays meant 'going round to see Chips' to discuss our catches. And to compare our finds in Framlingham with his in Barking Woods. We had found the Silver Washed Fritillary in Lodge Wood, towards Dennington, and then Roger Burness took a White Admiral there. Roger came from Helmingham, and when 'Dair Aston took some Graylings near Lodge W o o d , Roger commented, 'Oh, they're ever so common on the heaths at Dunwich.' So on day one of the holidays I set off from Haiesworth to our nearest heath, Wenhaston Mill Heath. Immediately I found plenty of Graylings, and lots of funny little blue butterflies. I had found a colony of the Silver Studded Blue. I know that collecting butterflies is frowned upon by many today. Some of these insects have vanished from these localities, but I see no likelihood that our few captures could have anything to do with this. More likely that our records and specimens remain as proof of the recent environmental damage, and so will convince us all that something needs to be done about it. By the end of the fifties, the old Southwold Railway had become so overgrown that sections were almost impassable. I ran a shop in Haiesworth,
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and spent my dinner-hours on the marshes. I heard that the Southwold Railway Company was to be wound up. T h e local council purchased 'Bird's Folly' where the railway-land included an old gravel-pit (grid ref. TM392774) for use as a public open space, and I managed to buy another 300 metres of the track eastwards to TM396772. Recently I have negotiated public access on foot down f r o m the Holton R o a d , and so any naturalist that lives along there can continue to observe the wildlife that I have enjoyed for so long, under the sixty-year-old oak trees of 'Rails' E n d ' . Wilfrid G e o r g e , 43 Linden R o a d , Aldeburgh, Suffolk, IP15 5JH
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