There was an interesting programme on BBC 4 the other night with the above title. Two Bristol churches were featured: Holy Trinity,  Westbury on Trym, 13th century, though according to the church website, an 8th century foundation, and All Saints, City, 15th century.

The former has a “Cadaver tomb” – which portrays the occupant as a rotting corpse rather than in the pink of life. Such macabre depictions came about in the wake of the Black Death, mid 14th century and gave the message “As I am, then you shall be.”

All Saints, in St Nicholas Market now a Christian study centre, is 15th century. Purgatory was the intermediate station between possible bliss in heaven and the damnation of hell.  In order to avoid staying in this nerve racking place, (presumably under cross examination), no longer than absolutely necessary it was essential to purge as many of one’s sins as possible whilst still on earth. Of course, it helped if you had some money. Alice Chester, a widow “in good prosperity” in 1485 believed the Rood Screen at All Saints was rather ordinary so left a large bequest to the church to provide a new one.  “Rood” is an antique name for “cross”. The Rood Screen, in a mediaeval church was of ornate carved wood and separated the chancel from the main altar. Above the screen in the “Rood Loft” the crucifix looked down on the congregation, reminding them of Christ’s humanity and His suffering on their behalf. 

Agnes Chester was a contemporary of John Cabot, who is believed to have come to England in 1484 and lived just along the way in St Nicholas Street. Perhaps they bumped into each other. Just twelve years after Agnes died Cabot set sail on his epic voyage across the Atlantic to find a shorter sea route to Asia and stumbled upon Newfoundland.

My father in law went to sea at the age of fifteen. A note in his log book says “Daddy asked me to get him a monkey.” As he could not find a suitable monkey, he brought back an ethnic water jar made of thick pottery, slightly listing to one side, with two jug eared handles sticking out from the neck.

“Daddy”, our grandfather, Arthur Lindegaard, a naturalised British citizen who had returned to his native Denmark was pleased with the souvenir and commemorated the voyage by writing “MED “MINSK” TIL ALGIER 1923” in black ink round the swelling of the bowl and drew imagined scenes from North African life round the belly. Long after, in the 50s or 60s, somebody attempted to turn the pot into a table lamp: the result of this regrettable enterprise, a broken electrical plug, is still stuck in the neck. Aesthetically, the thing is hideous. So far so ordinary.

The 1960s come and we inherit the pot. In between Arthur’s decorations, his squatting Arabs, donkey riders, camels and so on there is tiny faded writing. We can see dates, starting in 1940, and recognisable words: Curfew, Mussolini, Afrika, “Kbhn”, Casablanca, Leningrad…..

An English-Danish Dictionary is called for. On 20^th March 1940 the “Minsk” was torpedoed and sunk; Arthur wrote it on the pot. He expands his idea globally. He somehow manages to listen to the BBC news. He writes notes, one after another on the pot. It becomes a history of the Second World War. Armies march across Europe and Africa and around the pot. Stalingrad, Tunis, Casablanca, Tripoli, Naples…. Then “Invasion Normandiet 6 Jun 1944” he records, followed by a verifiable list of Allied successes: “Rumania, 23 Aug, Paris 24 Aug, Bulgaria, 26 Aug, Athens, 14 Oct, Belgrade, 20 Oct.” Only “Finland 3 Oct” seems out of place in the world picture. It is easy to check. Arthur seems to have been shocked that on this day three “Soviet infiltrators” were shot in Helsinki. He was happier on 20^th October when Yugoslav partisans and the Red Army occupied Belgrade.

The entry for “15 Nov 1943” is particularly poignant. “Kirke Kionkerne i Englund Ringede” he writes. It is “Ring the Bells”, Churchill’s order after El Alamein, when church bells were rung for the first time since 1939. Churchill famously said it was “not the beginning of the end but the end of the beginning”. Tears come to my eyes.

So I see Arthur crouched over a crackling wireless set. It is in occupied Denmark. It is our grandfather’s little resistance in a mad world. My thoughts run riot.

How did he even come by a radio? Where did he hide it? Where did he hide the pot? His courage astounds me. I worry for what could have been.

Sadly, Arthur died suddenly on 14^th March 1945, aged 68. He never knew the end of the story.

Have you been listening to “A History of the World in a Hundred Objects” on BBC 4, weekday mornings at 9.45 a.m. and repeated at various times during the day? If not, I urge you to do so. 

The objects concerned, all from the British Museum, are posted on the website and there is also a chance for local people to post their own artefacts. I have posted the Kingswood Miner’s Candlestick and am pleased to say it has just appeared.