CADBURY'S MARLBROOK

Keen students of the Hereford VBCW will remember His Majesty's Government's disastrous loss of Leominster to the newly raised forces of the Bromyard Social Democratic Republic, the precipitate retreat to Hereford of Commander Queeg's WYRD Force (all aboard the Black Arrow!) from Leominster Station, and the voluntary self immolation, contrary to orders and in the face of overwhelming numbers of Presteigne Communists, of Staff Captain Maynard and Eustace Spode at Leominster Brewery.

While Spode has proved to be the beneficiary of the complicated politics of the Welsh VBCW, the sad Staff Captain (now stripped of all privileges and reduced in rank to Private, 3rd class), still labours dawn to dusk in the newly opened Salt Mines of the Black Hills. Not that "dawn to dusk" has any meaning when one is imprisoned as deeply underground as Staff Captain Maynard...

And so the strategic picture "in County" changed, and then changed again. HMG's disordered retreat from Leominster to "the Dinmore Hill Line" (the last naturally defensible geographical feature before Hereford itself) has left uncovered one of the most valuable economic assets in Herefordshire - the Cadbury's Factory at Marlbrook, just off the A49 to Hereford:

The modern day entrance to the Cadbury's plant at Marlbrook.

Cadbury's built the Marlbrook Factory in 1936, just before the outbreak of the VBCW. Nowadays, according to the BBC, it produces 97,000 tonnes of "milk chocolate crumb" per year, processing 180 million litres of fresh milk, 56,000 tonnes of sugar and 13,000 tonnes of cocoa liquor in the production process.

Many passing the present Cadbury's factory on the A49 will have little idea of its pivotal importance in the Hereford VBCW...

The unobtrusive modern day Cadbury's factory from the A49

identifiable only by a discreet corporate logo..

The Marlbrook chocolate factory of today in fact bears little resemblance to its predecessor of 1938. Whether this is due to post-war commercial expansion or the explosive destruction of the plant during the VBCW is still a matter of opinion and extensive historical research...

In search of milk chocolate crumb...the Cadbury's Plant at Marlbrook
still attracts legions of distinguished VBCW researchers, anxious to establish
the true events of 1938. This is the traditional commemorative picture
of a visit to Marlbrook.