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Authors: Rosie Boycott
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politely beside Bramble to have her head scratched.
In recent weeks, Babe has always thundered up to the gate, hurling herself upwards, feet balanced on the top row of wire,
lungeing forward to grab anything she can - a proffered vegetable or my sleeve. Today the mood is much more restrained, with
all the pigs standing in line, waiting for a stroke. Bramble makes sure she is at the head of the queue, gently sniffing my
hand, reminiscent of a dog ascertaining whether you are friend or foe.
One of the gardeners from Dillington House, Adrian, has been helping out on Mondays with the vegetables. This week, the last
in November, he'd walked into the pig pen while David was putting down fresh straw in the hut. The pigs love this moment:
they kick at the clean dry straw, tossing it into the air with their noses and burying themselves in the soft piles. Bramble
heard Adrian coming and rushed out of the shelter, her head on one side (which for a pig is the position they need to adopt
if they are preparing to bite) and charged up to Adrian, emitting loud squeals. He didn't wait to discover her intent and
beat a quick retreat to the gate. David told me that he reckoned Bramble was defending the house, and possibly him, against
a stranger that she didn't know.
David and Adrian have cleared up much of the wood in the last few days and we light a bonfire with the debris. The pigs cluster
round, sitting incredibly close to the flames, their bottoms almost in the burning embers. Bramble is so close that I think
that her long sandy eyelashes will start to burn. They love the heat and the sight of the flames seems to mesmerise them.
When the fire dies down the pigs lie on the hot ashes, their thick hairy coats starting to singe in the heat. When I tell
Charlie about this later on in the day, he makes a joke about the crackling we're soon going to be eating. He's not as sentimental
as I am about the pigs, but then as a lawyer who has spent so many years of his life working in the field of child abuse,
sentiment is not an emotion he can easily afford.
A few days later, I'm in Hay-on-Wye for the winter book festival and I find myself sitting next to gardening guru Monty Don
at dinner, telling him about the pigs and the bonfire. Monty has recently set up a small farm where people from Hereford with
serious drug problems come for two days a week to learn how to grow vegetables and care for animals. Monty is a great believer
in the therapeutic powers of nature, as a cure for depression and as a way to help restore confidence and a will to live in
anyone prepared to open themselves a little to the process. They'd also had a bonfire and his pigs, four Tamworth siblings,
had behaved in exactly the same way.
While I am in Hay, there is an attempt to steal the pigs. Two things happen over the night of Friday, 2 December 2005. First,
a gate that shuts off the road through Dillington Park is rammed sometime between one and seven o'clock in the morning. Second,
when David arrives to feed the pigs just after eight on Saturday, he finds the male pigs locked into their small shelter.
When he'd left them the night before, they were still outside the corrugated iron structure, rootling around in the incredibly
muddy ground. Who had locked them in? We can only assume that someone had rammed the gate, driven down through the park towards
the walled garden and then, for whatever reason, changed their minds about actually nicking the seven little pigs. David reckons
it is the local gypsies, but Charlie and I are reluctant to buy automatically into the prevalent Somerset belief. Everything,
we are always told, is the fault of the gypsies. Over in Charlton Mackrell, the village where Charlie spent his early childhood,
a dog was recently kidnapped from the rich new owners of the biggest house in the area and a ransom note for £1,000 posted
through their letter-box. Negotiations through intermediaries in
In recent weeks, Babe has always thundered up to the gate, hurling herself upwards, feet balanced on the top row of wire,
lungeing forward to grab anything she can - a proffered vegetable or my sleeve. Today the mood is much more restrained, with
all the pigs standing in line, waiting for a stroke. Bramble makes sure she is at the head of the queue, gently sniffing my
hand, reminiscent of a dog ascertaining whether you are friend or foe.
One of the gardeners from Dillington House, Adrian, has been helping out on Mondays with the vegetables. This week, the last
in November, he'd walked into the pig pen while David was putting down fresh straw in the hut. The pigs love this moment:
they kick at the clean dry straw, tossing it into the air with their noses and burying themselves in the soft piles. Bramble
heard Adrian coming and rushed out of the shelter, her head on one side (which for a pig is the position they need to adopt
if they are preparing to bite) and charged up to Adrian, emitting loud squeals. He didn't wait to discover her intent and
beat a quick retreat to the gate. David told me that he reckoned Bramble was defending the house, and possibly him, against
a stranger that she didn't know.
David and Adrian have cleared up much of the wood in the last few days and we light a bonfire with the debris. The pigs cluster
round, sitting incredibly close to the flames, their bottoms almost in the burning embers. Bramble is so close that I think
that her long sandy eyelashes will start to burn. They love the heat and the sight of the flames seems to mesmerise them.
When the fire dies down the pigs lie on the hot ashes, their thick hairy coats starting to singe in the heat. When I tell
Charlie about this later on in the day, he makes a joke about the crackling we're soon going to be eating. He's not as sentimental
as I am about the pigs, but then as a lawyer who has spent so many years of his life working in the field of child abuse,
sentiment is not an emotion he can easily afford.
A few days later, I'm in Hay-on-Wye for the winter book festival and I find myself sitting next to gardening guru Monty Don
at dinner, telling him about the pigs and the bonfire. Monty has recently set up a small farm where people from Hereford with
serious drug problems come for two days a week to learn how to grow vegetables and care for animals. Monty is a great believer
in the therapeutic powers of nature, as a cure for depression and as a way to help restore confidence and a will to live in
anyone prepared to open themselves a little to the process. They'd also had a bonfire and his pigs, four Tamworth siblings,
had behaved in exactly the same way.
While I am in Hay, there is an attempt to steal the pigs. Two things happen over the night of Friday, 2 December 2005. First,
a gate that shuts off the road through Dillington Park is rammed sometime between one and seven o'clock in the morning. Second,
when David arrives to feed the pigs just after eight on Saturday, he finds the male pigs locked into their small shelter.
When he'd left them the night before, they were still outside the corrugated iron structure, rootling around in the incredibly
muddy ground. Who had locked them in? We can only assume that someone had rammed the gate, driven down through the park towards
the walled garden and then, for whatever reason, changed their minds about actually nicking the seven little pigs. David reckons
it is the local gypsies, but Charlie and I are reluctant to buy automatically into the prevalent Somerset belief. Everything,
we are always told, is the fault of the gypsies. Over in Charlton Mackrell, the village where Charlie spent his early childhood,
a dog was recently kidnapped from the rich new owners of the biggest house in the area and a ransom note for £1,000 posted
through their letter-box. Negotiations through intermediaries in
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