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DPAC and TUC Disabled Workers block Tottenham Court Road - London 22.05.2013
Activists from DPAC and disabled workers attending the TUC Disabled Workers Conference blocked Tottenham Court Road in Central London for an hour and a half as they protested loudly against punitive government cuts to disability benefits and services which is impacting disastrously - and already fatally - on our most vulnerable citizens.
**From the DPAC website **
On the day of the success of the High Court ruling ruling against the Work Capability Assessment, activists from Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) and disabled workers attending the Trades Union Congress (TUC) Disabled Workers Conference blocked Tottenham Court Road in an unprecedented act of solidarity.
This Government has repeatedly used the language of division, trying to divide workers and claimants, public and private sectors workers, non-disabled and disabled people. Today we strike back as one, united voice.
The Cuts imposed by the ConDem Government under the cloak of ‘Austerity’ impact on disabled people in every area of life. The scrapping of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) and the Independent Living Fund (ILF) will tens of thousands of disabled workers, and will force many of them out of their jobs. Hundreds of thousands of disabled people both receive and deliver public services as workers in Public Service Departments, Local Authorities and the Voluntary Sector. ILF and DLA play critical roles in maintaining people in these jobs. The 1% uplift limit on Benefits, Universal Credit and the Bedroom Tax will impact on many disabled people both in and out of work.
The removal of many of our basic rights affect not just disabled people, but all of us. For example, the removal of Legal Aid for medical negligence claims comes at the same time as every single contract within the Health Service is open to tender by private companies. This has serious and significant implications for each and every one of us who make up the 99%.
But not everyone is being hit by austerity. While multi-nationals like Atos and Capita make fortunes, tax avoidance and evasion to the tune of tens of billions goes uncollected. The wealthiest 1000 UK residents increased their wealth by some 35 billion last year while disabled people and the poorest members of society were pushed into poverty and despair as the targets of brutal cuts.
Disabled activists have led the fightback against this Government since the beginning, and today disabled activists and workers lead the way again in the first joint, co-ordinated direct action by campaigners and unions on the streets of the U.K.
Shabnam O Saughnessy from DPAC said: "We are delighted to be joined on the streets today by our union comrades. This represents the first steps towards uniting resistance from communities and workplaces. It dispels the myth of disabled people as scroungers and workshy. We are not some separate group of others, we are your friends and neighbours, we work alongside you. Many millions of disabled people are being affected by cuts, and today is about getting our voices heard."
Mandy Hudson, co-chair of the TUC disabled workers committee said: "Trade unionists would like to send a clear message to this government that trade unions, workers and grass roots disabled groups stand together against the onslaught of vicious cuts rained down upon us by the Condems."
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All photos © 2013 Pete Riches
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From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
Eduardo Garcia, engineer, U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command Space and Missile Defense Center of Excellence, retires at the command's Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, headquarters, after almost 40 years of federal civilian service. Col. Douglas Waddingham, director, U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command Capability Manager for Space and Missile Defense, officiated the ceremony. (U.S. Army photo by Carrie David Campbell)
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
NATO Strategic Airlift Capability Boeing C-17A SAC 03 arrives at RAF Fairford on arrivals day at RIAT '18. (12/10/18)
While the stable block to the left of the picture has been renovated and contains apartments, the Grade 1 listed Hall has sadly drifted from decline to dereliction and is probably beyond repair. Lancelot "Capability" Brown worked on the landscaping of the park. The estate became famous in 1971 as the principal location for the film The Go-Between.
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan speaking at an event recognizing high-scoring students on this year's National Financial Capability Challenge.
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
An early image of the Great Vine at Hampton Court Palace on a postally unused postcard which was published by H.M. Office of Works.
The Great Vine is believed to be the oldest and largest vine in the world. It was planted in 1768 by the garden designer Capability Brown, and was originally a small cutting taken from Valentine's Park in Essex, which no longer survives.
It is the most famous grape vine in existence, and over the centuries millions of people have come to have a look at it.
It is 36.5m (120 feet) long, and the trunk has a girth of 80 inches. It produces between 500 and 700 pounds of sweet dessert grapes each year,
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
A team from the 193rd Special Operations Wing's Regional Support Group's 271st Combat Communications Squadron brought their Joint Incident Site Communications Capability (JISCC) trailer to Texas part of the Hurricane Harvey relief effort. The equipment allows for civilian first responders to communicate with military assets on the ground. Approximately 200 Pennsylvania Guardsmen with a variety of skills and assets, including aviation, maintenance and transportation, continue to provide aide to the affected areas in Texas. (US Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Matt Schwartz)
ROYAL MAIL MARKS 300TH ANNIVERSARY OF CAPABILITY BROWN'S BIRTH
15.08.2016 | category: General
Royal Mail has launched a set of eight Special Stamps to mark the 300th anniversary of the birth of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown.
Brown is remembered as ‘the last of the great eighteenth century artists’ and as ‘England’s greatest gardener’. The stamps showcase eight of the best loved examples of Capability Brown’s work and are a celebration of his contribution to the English landscape.
Locations on the stamps feature: Blenheim Palace, Longleat, Compton Verney, Highclere Castle, Alnwick Castle, Berrington Hall, Stowe and Croome Park.
Ceryl Evans, Director of the Capability Brown Festival, said: “It is wonderful that Royal Mail has issued a set of Special Stamps to celebrate the work of Lancelot "Capability" Brown in his tercentenary year. The Capability Brown Festival is working to raise the profile and understanding of historic landscapes and what better way to bring these stunning images into people’s lives, homes and offices than on a stamp.”
Philip Parker, Stamp Strategy Manager, Royal Mail, said: “During his lifetime, Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown literally changed the face of Georgian England. By the time of his death, he was known to have shaped or influenced around 250 landscapes - these stamps pay tribute to the lasting legacy of his work.”
The stamps are available from 16 August at www.royalmail.com/landscapegardens and 8,000 Post Offices.
For seven days from 16 August, Royal Mail will provide a special handstamp on all mail posted at the postbox in Kirkharle. The handstamp will run from 16-22 August and will feature a line drawing of Brown based on the portrait of him painted by Richard Cosway, c.1770-75, by the kind permission of Bridgeman Images.
For seven days from 16 August, Royal Mail will provide a special handstamp on all mail posted at the postbox at the junction of the B6342 and Kirkharle Cottages. The handstamp will run from 16-22 August and will feature a line drawing of Brown based on the portrait of him painted by Richard Cosway, c.1770-75.
President Cyril Ramaphosa is in Parliament to give an update on state the capability for economic recovery and the fight against crime. [GCIS]
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
The 501st Military Intelligence Brigade demonstrated its capabilities during a Korean-language only capability exercise for 160 intelligence professionals from the Republic of Korea military here Dec. 10.
For the Dragon Brigade, this CAPEX was unique because it was conducted in Hangul with the help of Korean linguists from the brigade’s four battalions: 3rd MI Battalion (Aerial Exploitation), 524th MI Battalion (Counter Intelligence and Human Intelligence), 532th MI Battalion (Operations and All-Source) and the 719th MI Battalion (Signals Intelligence).
The senior representatives at the CAPEX included ROK Air Force Brig. Gen. Park, Kyung-jong, 3rd Brigade Commander, Defense Intelligence Command and ROK Army Brig. Gen. Son, Ki-hwa, the Director of Intelligence Operations for the ROK Joint Chiefs of Staff J-2.
Also participating were intelligence professionals from the Korea Defense Intelligence Agency, Defense Intelligence Command, Defense Security Command and the ROK Intelligence School.
The Brigade Liaison Team gave the ROK intelligence professionals a welcome brief that explained the different missions the brigade executes on a daily basis in defense of the Republic of Korea.
Attendees were then broken into three groups and visited the equipment and capabilities static displays at the 3rd Military Intelligence Battalion flight line, the Ground Component Command-Combined Analysis and Control Center and the Field Station Korea.
U.S. Army photos by Sgt. Shawn Cassatt
For more information on U.S. Army Garrison Humphreys and living and working in Korea visit: USAG-Humphreys' official web site or check out our online videos.
170808-N-KB401-637 ATLANTIC OCEAN (Aug. 8, 2017) From left to right, the Royal Navy Duke-class frigate HMS Westminster (F 237), Royal Navy Duke-class frigate HMS Iron Duke (F 234), Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth (R08), Royal Norwegian Navy frigate Helge Ingstad (F 313), Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77), Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Donald Cook (DDG 75), and Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea (CG 58) sail in formation during exercise Saxon Warrior 2017, Aug. 8. Saxon Warrior is a United States and United Kingdom co-hosted carrier strike group exercise that demonstrates interoperability and capability to respond to crises and deter potential threats. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Michael B. Zingaro/Released)
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
170808-N-KB401-621 ATLANTIC OCEAN (Aug. 8, 2017) From left to right, the Royal Navy Duke-class frigate HMS Westminster (F 237), Royal Navy Duke-class frigate HMS Iron Duke (F 234), Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth (R08), Royal Norwegian Navy frigate Helge Ingstad (F 313), Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77), Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Donald Cook (DDG 75), and Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea (CG 58) sail in formation during exercise Saxon Warrior 2017, Aug. 8. Saxon Warrior is a United States and United Kingdom co-hosted carrier strike group exercise that demonstrates interoperability and capability to respond to crises and deter potential threats. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Michael B. Zingaro/Released)
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
MHRN (Mental Health Resistance Network) member Roy Bard addresses the public and other High Court users.
DPAC, Mental Health Resistance Network & WinVisible vigil at High Court supporting judicial review of Work Capability Assessment (WCA) London - 08.07.2014
Disabled activists representing Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC), the Mental Health Resistance Network (MHRN) and WinVisible (Women With Invisible Disabilities held a dignified vigil on the steps of the Royal Courts of Justice to show support for the judicial review taking place this week intended to make the Dept. for Work and Pensions (DWP) prove to the court that they are abiding by a previous court order that they make reasonable adjustments to the Work Capability Assessment testing process to make it fit for purpose and to abide by the Equalities Act 2010.
A previous judicial review had ruled that the WCA was clearly biased against people with mental health disabilities, and great harm has been done to many people as the DWP has refused to take into consideration any medical evidence or evidence crucial to any understanding of how a claimant's mental illness affects their daily lives and their ability to work. This cruel process has put people with mental health problems at a substantial disadvantage. The testing process has caused a great deal of distress, anxiety and fear, and there is clear evidence that there has been a significant number of suicides by claimants going through the Work Capability Assessment process, run up till now by disgraced French IT firm ATOS.
This photo © Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit, blog or otherwise exploit my images without my written permission. I remain at all times the copyright owner of this image.
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The Phased Array Tracking to Intercept of Target (PATRIOT) Advanced Capability-Three (PAC-3) program is an air-defense, guided missile system with long-range, medium- to high-altitude, all-weather capabilities. It is designed to counter tactical ballistic missiles (TBMs), cruise missiles, and advanced aircraft. The combat element of the PATRIOT missile system is the fire unit, which consists of the following: a phased array radar set; an engagement control station; a battery command post; an electric power plant; an antenna mast group; a communications relay group; and launching stations with missiles. Patriot’s fast-reaction capability, high firepower, ability to track numerous targets simultaneously, and ability to operate in a severe environment make it the U.S. Army’s premier air defense system. The PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement, currently in development, is planned to be used with the PAC-3 system and is the interceptor for the Medium Extended Air Defense System. PAC-3 is a product of Program Executive Office Aviation.
Read more on page 268 of the 2013 U.S. Army Weapon Systems Handbook: armyalt.va.newsmemory.com/wsh.php .
[1]
Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
[2]
Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
[1]
Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
[2]
Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
DPAC & UK Uncut protest against benefit cuts at DWP - 31.08.2012
Following their earlier joint protest that morning at the Euston headquarters of ATOS Origin - the French IT company which has sponsored the paralympics, despite its role in forcing tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people off their life-saving benefits after declaring them "Fit for Work" following the seriously flawed Work Capability Assessment stipulated by the Dept. fo0r Work and Pensions (DWP), DPAC and UK Uncut activists descended on the Westminster headquarters of the DWP and protested outside.
Several activists managed to get inside the entrance foyer of the government building, which was the trigger for a short-but-overly-aggressive encounter with a large number of Territorial Support Group police who waded into the disabled and able-bodied protesters to force them away from the front of the building which houses the offices of Secretary for State for Work and Pensions Ian Duncan Smith and Minister for Disabled People Maria Miller.
During the quite unnecessary action against the peaceful protesters - several in wheelchairs - one disabled man was thrown out of his wheelchair to the ground, breaking his shoulder. Another man's motorised wheelchair was broken in the fracas, and one man was arrested.
Some of the protesters managed to speak to Maria Miller, MP, and told her to her facve how much misery and human despair her department's policies of demonisation of the disabled - portraying them publicly as workshy scroungers and benefits cheats, even though Disability Benefit fraud is extremely small, only 0.4% of the overall benefits budget, despite frequent, outrageous lies peddled by the DWP and minister Ian Duncan Smith as it behaves no better than the German government in the years running up to World War II as they turn the public against the very weakest, most vulnerable members of the British population, blaming disabled people for the country's economic misery - cause by corrupt bankers.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
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DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
[1]
Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
[2]
Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
[1]
Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
[2]
Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
[1]
Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
[2]
Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
Broadway Tower is a folly on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second-highest point of the Cotswolds (after Cleeve Hill). Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 65 feet (20 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was the brainchild of Capability Brown and designed by James Wyatt in 1794 in the form of a castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1798–99. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered whether a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester — about 22 miles (35 km) away — and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. Indeed, the beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillipps, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s. William Morris was so inspired by Broadway Tower and other ancient buildings that he founded the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings in 1877.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee, as well as a gift shop and restaurant. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village.
Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
Croome was 'Capability' Brown's first major commission - he designed the house and the landscape park. He also removed the Church of St Mary Magdalene which already stood on this site and replaced it with a church of his own design.
DPAC and TUC Disabled Workers block Tottenham Court Road - London 22.05.2013
Activists from DPAC and disabled workers attending the TUC Disabled Workers Conference blocked Tottenham Court Road in Central London for an hour and a half as they protested loudly against punitive government cuts to disability benefits and services which is impacting disastrously - and already fatally - on our most vulnerable citizens.
**From the DPAC website **
On the day of the success of the High Court ruling ruling against the Work Capability Assessment, activists from Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) and disabled workers attending the Trades Union Congress (TUC) Disabled Workers Conference blocked Tottenham Court Road in an unprecedented act of solidarity.
This Government has repeatedly used the language of division, trying to divide workers and claimants, public and private sectors workers, non-disabled and disabled people. Today we strike back as one, united voice.
The Cuts imposed by the ConDem Government under the cloak of ‘Austerity’ impact on disabled people in every area of life. The scrapping of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) and the Independent Living Fund (ILF) will tens of thousands of disabled workers, and will force many of them out of their jobs. Hundreds of thousands of disabled people both receive and deliver public services as workers in Public Service Departments, Local Authorities and the Voluntary Sector. ILF and DLA play critical roles in maintaining people in these jobs. The 1% uplift limit on Benefits, Universal Credit and the Bedroom Tax will impact on many disabled people both in and out of work.
The removal of many of our basic rights affect not just disabled people, but all of us. For example, the removal of Legal Aid for medical negligence claims comes at the same time as every single contract within the Health Service is open to tender by private companies. This has serious and significant implications for each and every one of us who make up the 99%.
But not everyone is being hit by austerity. While multi-nationals like Atos and Capita make fortunes, tax avoidance and evasion to the tune of tens of billions goes uncollected. The wealthiest 1000 UK residents increased their wealth by some 35 billion last year while disabled people and the poorest members of society were pushed into poverty and despair as the targets of brutal cuts.
Disabled activists have led the fightback against this Government since the beginning, and today disabled activists and workers lead the way again in the first joint, co-ordinated direct action by campaigners and unions on the streets of the U.K.
Shabnam O Saughnessy from DPAC said: "We are delighted to be joined on the streets today by our union comrades. This represents the first steps towards uniting resistance from communities and workplaces. It dispels the myth of disabled people as scroungers and workshy. We are not some separate group of others, we are your friends and neighbours, we work alongside you. Many millions of disabled people are being affected by cuts, and today is about getting our voices heard."
Mandy Hudson, co-chair of the TUC disabled workers committee said: "Trade unionists would like to send a clear message to this government that trade unions, workers and grass roots disabled groups stand together against the onslaught of vicious cuts rained down upon us by the Condems."
--------------------------------------------------------
All photos © 2013 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or blog my images without my written permission. I remain at all times the copyright owner of this image.
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A walk around Minterne Gardens in Dorset.
The garden walk is about 1 mile in a horseshoe shape.
You can take different paths on the last leg of the walk, we went on the upper path.
The River Cerne passing through the gardens with waterfalls.
Information below from leaflet from Minterne Gardens:
The Minterne Valley, landscapped in the manner of Capability Brown in the 18th century, has been the home of the Churchill and Digby families for 350 years. The gardens are laid out in a horseshoe below Minterne House, with a chain of small lakes, waterfalls and streams. They contain an important collection of Himalayan Rhodocdendrons and Azaleas, with Spring bulbs, Cherries, Maples and many fine and rare trees; the garden is noted for its Autumn colouring.
Of particular note are the large plants of Magnolia Campbellii which flower in March and April, together with a profusion of spring bulbs. Many flowering cherries were brought from Japan in 1920 and the Pieris Forrestii with their brilliant scarlet shoots, originally came from Wakehurst. A very fine collection of Davidia Involucrata (the pocket handkerchief tree) produce striking bracts in late May and early June, when the streams are lined with primulas, astilbes and other water plants.
Panoramic of the three river shots.
DPAC & UK Uncut hold ATOS Closing Ceremony - 31.08.2012
As the Grand Finale to a week-long national campaign of protests against French IT company ATOS Origin and its spinoff ATOS Healthcare which carries out the much-criticised Wirk Capability Assessments on behalf of the DWP, which has seen tens of thousands of severely sick and disabled people declared to be "Fit for Work" and thrown off their disability benefits, several hundred activists from DPAC (Disabled People Against Cuts), WinVisible, Disabled Activists' Network, UK Uncut, Right to Work Campaign, Unite the Union, the GMB Union, Occupy London and the National UNion of Students descended on ATOS' London headquarters to carry out what they had billed as the "ATOS Closing Ceremony" - a reference to ATOS' hugely derided sponsorship of the Paralympic Games which is, say the activists, an act of spectatular cynicism by a corporation which is currently contracted by the Cameron government to the tune of £100 million to conduct the much-feared medical assessments without any reference whatsoever to peoples' medical notes of histories.
For two hours the crowd chanted slogans, listened to oral testimonies from people whose lives have been badly affected by ATOS decisions, heard accounts of people driven into such despair by dealing with ATOS that they have comitted suicide, and also heard many accounts of seriously ill people thrown off their benefits by ATOS who have been forced to look for work - having been declared fit for work - and who have died shortly afterwards. The list of people irreperably harmed by ATOS' computer-driven tick-box assessment which cannot possibly take into account the huge range of physical and mental disabilities seems endless.
Following some dogged Freedom of Information requests by two Daily Mirror journalists earlier this year it is now known that an average of 32 sickness or disability benefit claimnants who have been thrown off their benefits by the DWP following an ATOS zero-point rating and placed in the Work-Related Activity Group or who have been put on Jobseeker's Allowance have died shortly afterwards. In many instances relatives of the deceased have claimed that the stress of being treated in such an inhumane way by ATOS contributed to their deaths.
During the protest at Triton Square the 500-strong crowd were entertained by a street theatre performance which saw a fraudulent "ATOS Miracle Cure" booth set up. The "ATOS Reverend" would lay hands on a disabled person and tell them that "by the power of ATOS you are no longer disabled", and sent them through the ATOS Miracle Cure arch, but sadly once through the arch the disabled people realised they had been tricked and they were still, of course, disabled... but worse was to come, as each disabled person was then confronted by an "ATOS Doctor" who stated that because they were now officially no longer disabled and were fit for work they could now be assigned to do their dream jobs, to which end the phoney doctor handed each person a sheet of paper on which was written "100 meter runner", "Bar Tender", "Mountain Climber" and other completely unsuitable job titles.
At around 2:30pm a section of the crowd took off and headed for Westminster where they picketed outside the Department for Work and Pensions, during which an over-agressive action by the police resulted in a disabled man's shoulder being broken as he was knocked off his wheelchair when police shoved protesters into him.
All photos © 2012 Pete Riches
Do not reproduce, alter, re-transmit or reblog my images without my written permission.
Hi-Res, un-watermarked versions of these files are available on application
Media buyers should email me directly or view this story on <a href="http://www.demotix.com/users/pete-riches/profile.
Standard NUJ rates apply.
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
From the sand dunes of Essaouira to the peaks of the Atlas Mountains, the all-new Range Rover demonstrates its full breadth of capability in Morocco.
170808-N-KB401-493 ATLANTIC OCEAN (Aug. 8, 2017) From left to right, the Royal Navy Duke-class frigate HMS Westminster (F 237), the Royal Navy Duke-class frigate HMS Iron Duke (F 234), Royal Navy aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth (R08), Royal Norwegian Navy frigate Helge Ingstad (F 313), Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77), Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Donald Cook (DDG 75), and Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea (CG 58) sail in formation during exercise Saxon Warrior 2017, Aug. 8. Saxon Warrior is a United States and United Kingdom co-hosted carrier strike group exercise that demonstrates interoperability and capability to respond to crises and deter potential threats. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Michael B. Zingaro/Released)
[1]
Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
[2]
Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
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Broadway Tower was inspired by the famous Capability Brown and completed in 1799 from designs by the renowned architect James Wyatt. It was built for the Earl of Coventry as a folly to his Springhill Estate and dedicated to his wife Peggy.
Legend has it Broadway Tower was used as a signalling tower between Springhill Estate and Croome Court near Worcester, which can be seen from the roof platform.
Many famous people have had association with Broadway Tower, including Sir Thomas Phillips and the pre-Raphaelite artists William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Rosetti.
Broadway Tower is open to the public allowing you to travel into the past of this important building and visit the viewing platform constituting the highest point in the Cotswolds at 1089 feet or 331.6 metres altitude.
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Broadway Tower is a folly located on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second highest point of the Cotswolds after Cleeve Hill. Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 55 feet (17 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was designed by James Wyatt in 1794 to resemble a mock castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1799. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered if a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester - approximately 22 miles (35 km) away - and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. The beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillips, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee as well as a gift shop. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village. Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
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