place

Bradlaugh Fields

Local Nature Reserves in NorthamptonshireWildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire reserves
Hills and Holes 1
Hills and Holes 1

Bradlaugh Fields is a 60-hectare (150-acre) open space in Northampton. The site is a former golf course. In 1987 it was proposed to build housing on the site, but after a campaign by local residents it was acquired by Northampton Borough Council and opened as a wildlife park in 1998. It was named after Charles Bradlaugh, a leading nineteenth century radical and atheist who was MP for Northampton. Three fields with a total area of 17.5 hectares are managed by the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire as a nature reserve also called Bradlaugh Fields. Hills and Holes is at the southern end and two adjoining meadows, Scrub Field and Quarry Field, are at the northern end. Hills and Holes is an 8.3 hectare Local Nature Reserve (LNR) and Scrub Field is a 5.1-hectare (13-acre) LNR.Bradlaugh Fields nature reserve has ancient hedgerows and unimproved grassland. Birds include blue tits, chiffchaffs, great spotted woodpeckers, sparrowhawks, redwings and fieldfares. Hill and Holes is an ancient disused quarry which has grassed ridges and hollows, some of them steeply sloping. There are a variety of habitats including limestone grassland. Scrub Field has a diverse selection of wild flowers, including Knautia arvensis and knapweed in higher areas, and bird's-foot trefoil and yellow rattle lower down. There is access to Hills and Holes from Kettering Road, and other access points include a footpath from Aintree Road which passes between Scrub Field and Quarry Field.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Bradlaugh Fields (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Bradlaugh Fields
Aintree Road,

Geographical coordinates (GPS) Address Nearby Places
placeShow on map

Wikipedia: Bradlaugh FieldsContinue reading on Wikipedia

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 52.268 ° E -0.88 °
placeShow on map

Address

Aintree Road

Aintree Road
NN3 6EA , Spinney Hill
England, United Kingdom
mapOpen on Google Maps

Hills and Holes 1
Hills and Holes 1
Share experience

Nearby Places

St Matthew's Church, Northampton
St Matthew's Church, Northampton

St Matthew's Church, Northampton is a Church of England parish church in Northampton, within the Diocese of Peterborough. The church is a Grade II* listed building. It was erected (1891–4) in memory of brewer and MP, Pickering Phipps, beside the Kettering Road. The architect was Matthew Holding. Canon John Rowden Hussey was vicar from its consecration in 1893 to 1937. Walter Hussey, vicar from 1937 to 1955 succeeding his father, was a patron of the arts. He celebrated the church's 50th anniversary with a sequence of events and commissions: the commission of the anthem Rejoice in the Lamb from Benjamin Britten; a performance from the BBC Symphony Orchestra (2 October 1943); an organ recital by George Thalben-Ball, and the commission of Henry Moore's sculpture "Madonna and Child".Buoyed by the success of the 1943–44 commissions, Hussey continued to commission new works of art. Other musical commissions included The Revival by Edmund Rubbra (1944); Festival Anthem by Lennox Berkeley (1945), Lo, the full, final sacrifice from Gerald Finzi (1946), and works by Christopher Headington, Malcolm Arnold and others. There were commissions of poetry: a Litany and Anthem for St Matthew's Day from W. H. Auden and The Outer Planet from Norman Nicholson. The recitals continued throughout this time, most notably with two concerts by the singer Kirsten Flagstad In the north transept is Henry Moore's stone sculpture, "Madonna and Child" (1944) and in the south transept a painting of the Crucifixion (1946) by Graham Sutherland. The triptych in the Lady Chapel is by C. E. Buckeridge. A 2009 addition is a bronze statue of St Matthew by Ian Rank-Broadley.A 1956 oil and watercolour painting of St Matthew's Church by John Piper is in the collection of the Northampton Museum and Art Gallery.