THE WAR ILLUSTRATED No.15 - SECOND BATTLE OF SHOBDON

17. FINIS

Standing in the grounds of Shobdon Court, Lieutenant Lucy tugged at the braided cuff of his commander, Senior Captain Maynard. 

"Come away, sir. There's nothing more you can do here" he muttered sympathetically. "If we make a move now, we can evade the Anglicans at Shobdon Instructional Centre and still make our own lines. It appears that Sir James is making his own way back, albeit somewhat unsteadily after all that time in "The Red Lion". And Queeg will already be landing at Hereford Racecourse."

Maynard cursed, reluctantly giving the necessary orders. But he had one last duty : his own Regional HQ. If he could not occupy Shobdon Court, he'd be damned if that jumped up grocer, Hodges, had both the Bateman mansion and the title....

"Explosives ready?" Maynard enquired of his Chief Engineer.

"At your command, sir". A nod from Maynard and the Chief Engineer pressed the plunger.... 

The final destruction of Shobdon Court. Readers of this blog will recollect that while Shobdon Church and the
Stables and Servants Quarters to this great Herefordshire Country House remain to be seen by the casual tourist,
Shobdon Court itself has utterly vanished. It is only now that the true VBCW story of its destruction can be told...

It is just possible that the Chief Engineer overestimated the amount of explosive necessary for the job....

"Where to, sir?" Lucy had commandeered the Automobile Association command car. Maynard studied his maps carefully. "Mmm....Mortimer's Cross, Lucy. That's where we'll hold'em. All of them: the damned Reds, those sanctimonious Anglicans, traitor Hodges and his toadies - let 'em all come. We'll hold them at Mortimer's Cross!"

We usually finish a Big Game Report with a grinning photograph of the winner of the Umpires' Award, on this
occasion the fabulously valuable "Golden Grenade of Shobdon" (with real sound effects!). Unfortunately, due to
the demise of the 28mm Anglican staff photographer, no such photograph of this time's winner - Alan (Senior
Captain Maynard) actually exists. To compensate (although it may be that Maynard would not regard it as
any compensation at all) we have a photograph of Mr Hodges' (JP's) standard bearer (and Nan) celebrating his
elevation to the aristocracy (by force of arms, at least). On to Mortimer's Cross and the Autumn 2019 Big Game!
(Note heroic LDV cyclist pedalling into the picture...perhaps an early (and very VBCW)
example of "photo-bombing"?)


WITH MANY THANKS TO ALL WHO CONTRIBUTED PHOTOGRAPHS AND TEXT
TO ALLOW THIS HISTORICAL RECORD TO BE WRITTEN AND ILLUSTRATED