Comments and Discussion.

Received from Barrie Kemp | Added to the site February 2024.

I have read some of the papers on this website and the archive today (18th February 2024), including the ‘principles’ document.

Back in 1986 – 1988, I was on secondment to the Special Education section of the Education Department of the Bedfordshire County Council. Part of my role was to review and then sign the papers for the admission of a small number of Bedfordshire children to out-of-county residential special schools. One of these schools was the Cotswold Community. I was so impressed with the ‘Principles’ document that I kept a photocopy of it for many years, and added the CC to my list of future potential career moves….. I never did make that move, but now after a 35 year career in special education, I am settling in to a community of ‘mature’ residents in North Bedfordshire. Thank you for your website and the archive that keeps the memory of the CC’s work alive.

The Principles of The Cotswold Community is a document included in the Archive Material from the work of the Cotswold Community

Received from David Riach | Added to the site MArch 2022.

I have compiled a list of the staff I can still remember, can you remember some of these I wonder?

• Derek Nimmo – House manager at the time of my arrival
• Hugh Smith – Arrived around the same time as myself, He was from New Zealand
• Trevor Blewett – House manager after Derek
• Barry Rogers – Engineering and Metalwork over in the Poly
• Fred Green – Painting and Signwriting In the poly and also in charge of canoe trips
• Marion Whitmore – Cooking and Needlework in the Poly
• Andy Smale – Used to run the birds and small animals section in the Poly
• Mr (Jack) Jones – Building Teacher
• Christine Bradley – Was like a Mum to me
• Merlyn Chesterman – I think she was Christines understudy
• Nick Benfield – House manager of The Cottage?
• Richard Balbernie – Principal
• Mike Jinks – Vice principal.

When I left Cotswold Community, I had a short spell at Tennal Assessment centre in Harbourne, Birmingham. and from there I went to Boreatton Park school in Baschurch near Shrewsbury, it was an 18th century Stately Home at one time and came with a few ghosts, it was set atop a hill and very bleak. It was very much along the same lines as Cotswold Community but really wasn`t as good, I didn`t enjoy my time there half as much as Cotswold Community, Cotswolds holds a special place in my heart.

Well, I left Boreatton after approximately 18 months and went into employmen as an apprentice Carpenter, but didn`t last very long, I then went to work at a small Steel Strip company operating various machines until I passed my driving test (cars) and then went into transport and have been there ever since.

I married my first wife in 1982 the day after my 25th birthday and had three children two girls and a boy, I have 5 grandchildren fron the girls but my son hasn`t had any children yet. Sadly that marriage dissolved in 2000, but remarried again in 2005 to a Black Country girl and living in Willenhall, Wolverhampton. My wifes daughter from her previous marriage got married in August last year and I was lucky enough to walk her down the aisle, such a proud moment and at Christmas gave my wife and I the news that she is expecting in August, so that will be grandchild No 6.

Well John, that has brought my story roughly up to date, but I have some very very fond memories of my early teens at Cotswold Community. It is such a shame that it had to close, because people like you and others like you who dedicated their lives for the benefit of youngsters like I was, you are unsung heroes and have my deepest respect.
With Kindest Regards
David Riach

Received from Tony Brown (Also known as Tony Davies) | Added to the site May 2021.

When i talk to people about my past i always mention the community by name and can not praise it highly enough. I usually explain that my time there really gave me a firm foundation.

I am now 53 and until the Covid 19 issues i was the group Quality Manager for the Trenchard Aviation Group. Having been part of the team that guided the group through the receivership process i was taken on by the last remaining group company called Airbase UK Interiors (You can see me on the website if you have a look)

My wife Lisa and I have been married for 23 years now and we have 1 pre teen and and 1 teenage son and believe it or not many of the values and skills that i learned at the community are only now just coming to the fore. Now that i have children of this age myself. I now engage with my children in the same way the community adults engaged with me.

We have lived in 3 houses since our wedding and because of my experiences at the community I always wanted a workshop but could not afford it. But at our last house the dream came true and I had a workshop built and put lots of tools in it and because the boys were now older I started to show them how to use all the tools. I don’t know how i know how to use all the tools because by then it had been 30 years since i picked up a tool but I just knew and it was fantastic.

We make things out of all sorts of materials and i encouraged them in any and every creative idea that they had (Still do) and I know that it is the best way to interact with your children because i remember all the creative interaction we had with the community adults.
At the community i learned how to interact, how to behave in a civilised manner, how to not engage in conflict and conflict resolution. The community gave me the tools that i needed to first survive and there after to thrive as I am today […]”

Received from Gary White | Added to the site January 2021.

In recent years I had by chance met the Darvel community in a church in Hastings, and had been invited to the Robertsbridge community. It was a strange feeling to visit somewhere new and have it feel so familiar. I can tell you that the hard work by the staff who worked with me at the community had not been wasted, their help gave me a direction, a path to follow. Had I not been referred to the community I dread to think of how my life would have turned out. I often feel a sense of duty to help the less fortunate, spending a year and a half as a volunteer for a recovery organisation helping people with alcohol and drug addictions, also being employed as a winter night shelter supervisor. I do not know if you receive communication from other former pupils, but I would like to say a thank you to yourself and former staff for not writing me off.”

Received from Graeme Kerridge | Added to the site December 2020.

Susan Ellery and Stephen Topple provide me with updates on Community members from time to time when we have a chance to see each other and it has always been interesting to follow the different paths people have trod. The Community experience continues, for so many of us who worked there at various times, to have been a source of inspiration, and you and others who took leadership roles can be immensely proud of the flow-on impact that you had, not just to the boys, but also to the staff who moved beyond the Community to work in many fields.

My own path after I left the Community in mid 1979 and returned to Australia was into healthcare/hospital management. What had particularly interested me from the Community experience was a view of a systems approach to managing caring institutions, and I thought that there was scope to apply the approach to hospital management. (Indeed, as you would know, there has been extensive research, particularly in the UK, of systems analysis to hospitals.) Keeping that framework in mind, and despite all the very challenging power and culture battles that characterise the healthcare industry, I worked at senior levels of the public healthcare sector in Australia for over 20 years till I finally got a chance, once my daughters had finished school, to move into international health development – long a passion of mine given my initial Economics training. I then worked in international health development in about 26 countries around the world – Anglophone Africa, South and South-east Asia, the Pacific and the former Soviet Union, primarily supporting programs for HIV, TB and Malaria. This included a period based in Washington DC managing and mentoring teams of consultants around the world for development programs of the US Government (under the previous US administration!) which was a fascinating, challenging and very personally satisfying experience. So, I have been very fortunate in my career, getting to work with people in vastly different settings/cultures/complexities to progress programs which create social/community value. Obviously, the pandemic has changed my activities significantly, but it was about time I focused on other things anyway.

However, what I wanted to share with you was a note that I received last week from AB (not his real name) who was one of the boys we worked with while I was at the Community 77-79. About 2 years ago, I received a message on my Linkedin account asking whether I was the person AB remembered from the Community, and, after I had replied that I was, AB said that he would send through his story at some stage. While I was very keen to hear what had become of him over the past 40 years, you would know better than I that frequently nothing comes of those communications, given that, for so many boys, their lives will have been very difficult and telling their story opens up pain they would prefer to move beyond.

Last week, 2 years after the initial contact, I received another message in my Linkedin account from AB which totally blew me away. He provided me with his personal story since leaving the Community, including several very difficult years where he floundered, but then gradually found that he had skills that he could use and the capacity to pick himself up when life’s fortunes knocked him down. Despite ups and downs, AB appears to have actually “done it” – breaking out of that cycle of deprivation, and managing to grow into a person with an enviable range of skills, personal insight and resilience. He appears to have even managed to have a stable relationship and fathered two sons who, reportedly, are doing well and undertaking tertiary studies.

I remember having to take AB to Children’s Court several times for the things he got up to when he was at home in his early days at the Community, including breaking into kindergartens to steal soft toys. The family situation he came from was, like for most of the boys, one of multi-generational deprivation and inadequacy – you would know the situations only too well. (Susan Ellery tells me that AB described to her how he would walk around London, looking at adult men and wondering whether they were his father.) So, making his life into what appears to be a healthy and fulfilling one, albeit with challenges that he is still working through, is a phenomenal achievement. It was wonderful to read that he considered that his experience at the Community was a turning point for him (even if he left under somewhat messy terms which you would presumably have information about). It was an extraordinary privilege to have him share his story so candidly, including that he continues to work through some of the damage of his early childhood.

His story is a very impressive one of resilience, and a positive outcome for which you and others at the Community can be very proud. Receiving it from AB was a wonderful gift.

Very best wishes for your work, John. I will try to keep informed of the “ex-Community community” through Susan and Stephen. I hope you find this story of AB of interest. Best wishes for the Christmas period and may 2021 be a better one for all of us.”

Received from Trevor Cade | Added to the site August 2020.

My work at the Cotswold led to a 37 year social work career, including a CQSW at Sheffield Univerrsity; 15 years with Suffolk Social Services before 13 years as a Children’s Guardian. The Cotswold was my grounding for any good work I did later. I wish you well.”

Extracts from emails received from Nicole Kujat (nee Ponpetzki) | Added to the site March 2019.

30th January 2019
“I came to the Community twice to work (in 1994 or 95) and a third time for a short visit.
I remember Steve. I recognised him on one of your photos too.
It’s hard to remember but I shared a flat with John Franklin during my first stay and I was friends with Liz and Stuart and Ian (an Irish worker), who left during my first stay.
When I came I was the first German volunteer as far as I remember and soon a girl from Bavaria joined and during my second stay, a girl I had talked to on the phone, before she came because you asked me to do so.
I got your personal bike and my first house was the old Bruderhof building [Larkrise] where the more advanced boys lived. There I remember Chris, the twins who were black, a boy who was very much into sheep and later lived in a separate building.
I had tutor times with some boys of other houses, Graham and Gary, and I worked in the school. I remember also having taught Shane and being part of some ‘holdings’ with Ashley, from another house, who used to go swimming with me. Nick died when he visited his mum during my stay and a smaller boy, possibly Paul, had a lot of individual time with me.
During my first stay the head of Larkrise was a very friendly tall man with dark hair who liked to work with Steve.
When I came the second time, I had a lot of tutoring times and helped out in one of the schools where Gary and Graham were. Stuart was Graham’s key worker and he was good to work with. I took the boys out several times on my own for trips or swimming lessons, especially Graham on leaving days, when most of the boys went home.
Because of my memories of my work at the Cotswolds, many years later my husband and I took a foster son into our family and it worked out well. My youngest son is now 15 and I often tell him and my students about my time with the boys.
I always wanted to show my son the area and it’s a pity that the home does not exist any more.”

1st February 2019
“I remember Paul [Van Heeswyk] well. A lot of what he taught me in our private sessions, especially the psychoanalytics, I still use in my daily work. Peter [Millar] I remember as well. Apart from being a regular teacher in secondary and junior school, I am responsible in our school for all kinds of obsessions and addictions that occur with students. On a daily basis I work together with older students and teachers, sometimes parents, to create a good school atmosphere and we are quite successful. Additionally, our school has a voluntary teachers team that comes together regularly to discuss certain ‘cases’ and to advise students, parents and fellow teachers on all kinds of problems. I belong to this team too.
So the CC really marked my life and I am still regularly in England, being responsible for a students exchange with the IVC in Impington/Cambridge.
All my experience with the CC qualified me for Jermain, our foster son, who came to our family when he was almost 11, and left our family when he was 20 due to girlfriend and job. He still lives nearby and comes around each fortnight. Before he moved in with us he was in a children’s home for two years, being the son of an alcoholic mother who couldn’t look after him.”

Received from Barry Rogers | Added to the site October 2018.

I have to tell you that I installed a new forge area in the polly with the help of a some boys in 1974. The boys made ‘S’ scrolls and ‘C’ scrolls for shelf brackets and wall lights. Bill Denson was one of the boys who helped, and who, I believe, has been in contact with you. In a meeting it was described by Glyn Jones as a “Phoenix Rising from the Ashes.”

Also, I can find no mention of the early pioneers who helped establish the future of the Community. People like Dave Gilbert, Roger Fildes, John Pilston, Bob Dunne. myself and many more who laid the foundation for the those who followed, when sleeping in was unpaid and a sofa in the sitting room was our bed.”

“I have tried to bring together the early days of the Community, in no particular order, and its progression with dates as I recall them which led eventually to the more structured therapeutic community.

My first day there in 1969 as a teacher was working with Gordon Godfrey in number 11 with a group of boys, some of whom were still living in the buildings in what ultimately became the Poly square. The Cottage was already up and running. Two houses in the drive were opened which became Bulderston, and number 11 became living accommodation for the boys with Roger Fildes (an ex-telephone engineer) its competent manager. Richard wasn’t keen on the name No 11, said it sounded “like a bloody public lavatory”. The problem was solved when the place burned down.

In the Poly, I was initially upstairs with a group, where we wrote, rehearsed, sang songs and made 1st WW uniforms, with the help of the talents of Community wives. It was a play we named, “Christmas in the Trenches” It was put on in the large hall with all boys and staff attending. I directed it, and the cast included John Cooke, Bob Yeo, Bill Denson and others whose names I cannot recall. This was produced Christmas 1970. Nick Benfield and Christine Bradley were in the cast which gave some adult poise to the boys. As a post performance treat, for the strolling Shackespearean troupe, Trevor Bluett had arranged a delivery of fish and chips which we all ate with gusto along with lashings of adrenalin and the usual Post mortem, which, of course, we all decided was positive.

In the Poly I, with the boys, set up an internal radio station and anyone could request a piece of music (which was usually borrowed and returned a few days later) Mike Jinks managed to help out with money to buy some equipment. I moved downstairs in 1971 when Ian Shaw left and I took over the general crafts and engineering section. Dave Gilbert along the passage was producing clever and skillful woodcrafts. John Cooke patiently carved from a solid length of wood, the chain which illustrates the cover of “Spare the Child”.

Marion (Whitmore?) gave cosy, homely security to the boys with her cooking sessions. Boys would proudly show me their gastronomic creations offering me a slice or a scone which I was clearly expected to eat in front of them. These were the sort of sacrifices one had to make with forced mumblings of yum-yum.

The forge was started in 1971 using what equipment we found around the place. The electric motor on the forge had to be changed. It was 3-phase. we salvaged a single phase motor from somewhere, fitted it and we were soon producing our brackets, trivets fishtails and so on.
Andrew Smail must not be forgotten with his pets and plants. He gave boys a plant in a pot which they nurtured and saw grow. They had a pet to care for, feed and clean.

Fred and Glyn were there in the C. A. Joyce days. Fred with his canoes. Glyn Jones instructing on building walls, both valuable in their ways, but not, I think, entirely convinced the way the Community was going.

Just a small and probably insignificant point. We always referred to Mrs Docker-Drysdale as Pip. Bill Denson remembers “Pip Drysdale” Giving him a cigarette at his interview. He say “I was only 13″. Imagine the reaction today!”

Received from Jill Brew Cutler | Added to the site April 2017.

I am unsure if you remember Colin and I? As an CC occupational hazard we met there and continue to plod on in life here in Cairns Australia. Colin when in the UK went on to work as an Art Psychotherapist but that was way too specialised for Australia so he did the practical thing for our children and re-qualified as a teacher to get support the family in the school holidays!! He never taught as a teacher but they utilised his behaviour management expertise and has been instrumental in supporting schools in this region develop their behaviour support strategies etc. I have been involved in family therapy work and for the last 10 years have been working in remote aboriginal communities in Far north Queensland which has been a huge learning curve.

Our two children are grown and Ewan, born while at the community, has a film business and Ailsa has traveled and now settled into nursing.

I always thought one of the things that bound Colin and I together was and is our shared values and those that were reflected in our work together at the community. We have fond memories of the friends we made and still have and the work went onto to influence all that I do.”

Received from Nicola Kelso | Added to the site April 2017.

I was a volunteer there in the early nineties for a relatively short period of time. At that age (19), I was , in hindsight acutely ill-prepared for the needs of the boys and, having arrived at the time of Vanessa’s tragic accident and death, it was clearly and very obviously understandably a difficult time for the staff and boys too. However the ethos and work of the community stayed with me and, although I have varied my career somewhat, taking the SEN teaching route, many of the skills first learnt at the community apply still, particularly in those pupils with attachment disorders and complex needs.

Team teach techniques also always remind me of the community and I now realise the benefits of positive holds where absolutely necessary. In other words, to wrap up, I absolutely love my vocation with a passion and feel that, at the foundation of it all, I, like many others, have the Community to thank for that.”

Added to the site May 2016.

I was in St Andrews House and the master was a Mr Goldsworthy. He was a nice man who I remember as a very understanding man.

The school was run in a regimental way. On entry you were given a number, mine was 547. The staff you came in contact with NEVER called you by your number. There was a certain amount of bullying but you will get that at any school.

I made some very good friends and one of them, we kept in touch 60 plus years, going to each other’s wedding. Unfortunately he died about 5 years ago and I went to his funeral in Surrey.

At the school we worked in the shoe repair dept run by Mr Soloman, who we kept in touch with after we left the school and visited him in Stroud where he had a shoe repair shop.

Going back to the school, it did reform me and I have no regrets in life. I became a Rolls Royce Chauffeur and I have a RR certificate for over 500 thousand miles.

If there are any old boys of the school who would like to get in touch I would be happy be in contact. If I can help you with anymore information I would be glad to hear from you.”

Received from Nick Maslen | Added to the site January 2016.

It wasn’t a great time in my life, having come out of a long term relationship I decided that I needed to make other changes to address the loss. As it turned out my change of job was probably not my wisest decision. It did however propel me on to a BSc Behavioural Science degree course at Huddersfield Polytechnic and to a subsequent career within the voluntary sector.

I still remember my time at the Cotswold Community vividly and I am now very pleased to have had the opportunity to work with such a committed group of people who had a very clear understanding of the task in hand and clarity about how it was best tackled. I have taken this insight with me throughout my career in the Voluntary Sector – Citizens Advice Bureau – Housing Association and for the past 21 years Age UK.

I am sorry to read that the Community is now closed but the impact on the boys you supported and the staff that you employed is still alive today. Thank you.”

Received from Anthony Cottington | Added to the site July 2015.

Received from Isobel Terry | Added to the site April 2015.

Received from John Ray | Added to the site April 2015.

Received from Kevin Tate | Added to the site September 2013.

I am writing to say hello and to let you know that I was a boy at the Cotswold Community from 1988 to 1993 I spent 5 years at the Cotswold Community and lived in Long Barn.

I am writing to tell you that after reading your papers on your website and really understanding what the Community was all about I believe that the Cotswold Community actually helped me to find a meaning in life and would like to thankyou for all your hard work.

I am now 37 Years old and I remember my time at the Community as though it was yesterday,
Yours Sincerely,
Kevin Tate.

Received from Rich Sammons | Added to the site March 2013.
Comments on archive entry – Routines, Limits and Anchor Points

1) get better long term results for entire family units

2) be able to serve a much wider range of kids/families needing support and services.

Like Browndale, the philosophy was founded on principles of normalization, and the programs had a no reject/no eject intake-discharge policy, and made an unconditional commitment to work with kids and families no matter how difficult they were. Since the residential programs had relatively restrictive intake policies and/or discharged the more difficult kids, we had no problem getting referrals.

Also like Browndale, we believed in small heterogeneous groupings in the alternative homes, rather than larger homogeneous milieus that dominated residential and institutional settings. A 4 bed home might consist of an autistic child, a developmentally disabled youngster, a behavior problem kid etc., and would include both sexes. We felt this was less threatening for the kids than a large homogeneous mileau where there was significant contamination, and thus a dependence on artificial group control devices. Our clinicians had no authoritarian positions, but were utilized in a consultive role, similar to the way a family utilized a family physician. Will be happy to forward some additional info if you like. Anyway, I know John also did some work in England and, I believe, the Netherlands, and would like to know if you know of any of his work in those areas, since I’m hoping to arrange a visit within the next year.”

Received from Symon Bain | Added to the site August 2012.
Comments on archive entry – The Beginnings of the Cotswold Community

Received from Bill Preston | Added to the site August 2012.
Comments on archive entry – The Beginnings of the Cotswold Community

Received from Stephanie Rampton | Added to the site December 2011.
Comments on archive entry – Greenacres

Thanks for sharing your view of Greenacres… good to know the place is not forgotten.”

Received from Brian Gannon | Added to the site December 2011.
Comments on my paper – Circle – Viscious and Virtuous and on archive entry The Management of Violence

Recently Craig Fees (of the PETT Archive) contacted me with a view to giving more coverage to “therapeutic community” aspects of working in group care contexts and I readily agreed to join him in such an endeavour with support from our website.

I have been in the field for fifty years and in those years most of our professional and academic reading (here in faraway South Africa) tended to be English rather than that of any other country, so I have naturally been drawn to Wills, Lyward, Beedell, Balbernie & Co, who were at the time working in similar practice territory to mine!
It has been a hard job for many of us to penetrate the strongly behavioural and control focuses encountered in America, but it is good to see some enduring change, perhaps more in Canada where there is a growing awareness of “relational” practice and an understanding of Redl’s “life-space” more in community and “everyday events” terms.

To cut a long story short, as part of CYC-Net (where we regularly get 3500 to 4000 visitors a day and run a discussion list of 3000+ members) we publish a monthly online “journal” called CYC-Online and are committed to making freely available on the web as much helpful and instructive reading as possible. Your article on “Circles, Vicious and Virtuous” on your work at the Cotswold Community, and Dockar-Drysdale’s piece on Management of Violence are just two articles which I think would be most interesting and informative for our readers and I wonder whether you would give us permission to use them?

My co-editor on CYC-Net is Dr Thom Garfat of Montreal, another veteran in the field, who recently visited and spoke at Peper Harrow. The chairman of our Board of Governors is Prof Leon Fulcher who does some work with Kibble in Scotland and also with Foster Care Associates.
In my career I worked in three care agencies, as principal of the last two. I founded South Africa’s National Association of Child Care Workers in the 60s, developed their wide ranging training up to the 90s and through them did some teaching at various colleges around SA and also at the University of South Africa. Started CYC-Net in the mid-1990s.”