Digest of stories from The Luton News: Thursday. September 13th, 1917.

Owing to engine trouble, an airman attempted to alight in fields on the Hitchin-Luton road on Tuesday afternoon, and crashed through the hedge into the road, which was completely blocked.

The airman had difficulty in finding a suitable landing place owing to the number of woman workers on the fields. A girl cyclist and a pony and trap containing three people coming from the direction of Luton had narrow escapes.

The airman also missed but narrowly the telegraph wires and a clump of trees. He escaped injury, but the machine was damaged and was afterwards removed by the military. Market day traffic was diverted through an adjoining field.

• On Tuesday night a terrible experience befell Bert Boon, a man employed at Mr Stewart Hubbard's Regent Street dye works and resident at 28 St Ann's Road. About 7.15 pm he stood on one side of the vats to put some dye into the hot water when he slipped and fell in, almost being immersed. It was indeed fortunate for him that the water was clean and that it was not boiling. His workmates rushed to his assistance, and he was taken to the Bute Hospital. He had sustained scalds to the legs and arms, but his clothing had kept the water from his body. He is now going on very satisfactorily.

• The Borough Education Authority have given permission for a collection to be made in the Hitchin Road Boys' School with a view to providing a memorial to Mr George Wells, a former assistant master recently killed in action.

• The parents of children attending Luton elementary schools are to be circularised to the effect that in the event of an air raid the children will be kept in the school, and parents are requested to refrain from visiting the schools during a raid.

• Herbalist Joseph Flemons and his belladonna pickers at Dunstable [Photo James Field].

• Last year we announced that experiments were being made in Dunstable to cultivate medicinal herbs, especially those which were formerly imported from Germany and Austria in large quantities. Success has attended these efforts, as our photograph depicts. It is said that in the olden time the monks ministered to the people spiritually and medicinally. If that be so, there is something in the statement alleged, that the present herb gardens are in close proximity to where the monks originally had their herb gardens for medicinal purposes.

• On Saturday morning a motor van belonging to Messrs F. Merchant & Sons, of Manchester Street, got out of control in Reginald Street and, swerving round, crashed into the fence which separates Nos 81 and 83. The gates of these two houses were completely smashed, the front doors were damaged and a pane of glass in one of them broken. Happily no one was injured.

• The spacious warehouse and factory in Upper George Street, known as Connaught House, has just been purchased (through Messrs Douglas Stratford & Co) from Messrs Kershaw & Co, on behalf of Messrs B. Bennett, manufacturers of Luton and Dunstable. This well-known firm is one of the oldest in the straw trade, having been established over 100 years. For many years they have carried on business in the warehouse at the corner of King Street.

• The Navy League recently wrote to the Borough Education Authority offering to send a lecturer to address a mass meeting of the older scholars of the elementary schools on "Mines, Submarines and Torpedoes" or "Our Navy, What It Has Done". The Authority have declined with thanks, and Councillor Murry Barford, as Chairman of the Schools Management Committee, said the reason was because member thought the teachers were fully competent to give the instruction and it might open the door to other organisations. The Authority might be constantly hammered for opportunities to address the children.

• A marriage has been arranged and will shortly take place between Major A. G. Rainsford Hannay (Royal Engineers), of Creetown [Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland], and Muriel Erskine Austin, eldest daughter of Mr and Mrs William Austin, of Rye Hill [Cromwell Hill], Luton.

• Florence Barrington Bradley, only child of Mr and Mrs E. J. Bradley, of Deep Denes, Dunstable Road, Luton, was married in a double military wedding ceremony at St Andrew's Church, Montpelier, Bristol, on Saturday. Her husband was Quartermaster-Sgt Edward Charles Long (Royal Field Artillery), whose sister Florence Edith May Long married Wheeler Herbert Haysham (Army Service Corps Motor Transport) in the same ceremony.

• We are pleased to learn that Mr Leonard F. Wheeler, who was formerly a teachers at Hitchin Road Boys' School, has been gazetted as a Second Lieutenant. A native of Cheltenham. he came to Luton some six years ago and was a prominent member of the Town Cricket Club and the Luton Amateur Football Club. He joined the London ("Queen's") Regiment in August 1914 and was invalided home after being wounded in France last year. While recuperating, he was recommended for a commission.

• Mrs Edith Hills, of Chapel Road, Breachwood Green, has been notified that her husband, Pte Gerald Edward Hills, has been missing in France since July 20th, and she asks if any of his comrades who happen to know anything of him will communicate with her. Pte Hills, aged 31, was employed by the Prudential Insurance Co before enlistment in May 1916. He was trained at Ampthill and went to the Front last September. [Pte Hills was later confirmed to have been killed in action on July 20th.]

• Many friends will remember Stoker First Class Horace Stanley Sharp (Royal Navy), of 5 Windmill Street, and will deeply regret to hear of his death on September 3rd at Chatham Dockyard [as the result of an air raid]. Particularly sad is the fact that on the day of the news of his death reached relatives (September 5th), his brother Harry (private, Royal Engineers), familiarly known to his pals as 'Nifton,' was admitted to hospital in France suffering from a gunshot wound in the back. Of so serious a nature were the injuries that he died shortly afterwards.

• News has been received of the death of Pte John William Martin (Royal Sussex Regiment), son of Mrs Martin, of 189 North Street, Luton. He was reported missing on October 21st, 1916.

• We regret to record the death of Sgt-Major Harry Parks, of the Rifle Brigade. He was the youngest of three brothers in the Army, the sons of Mr Andrew Park, of 14 Collingdon Street, Luton. Sgt-Major Parks went out to France in February 1916 and about 10 months later was awarded the DCM. He leaves a widow and six children.

• Much sympathy will be felt for Mr Gurney, straw hat manufacturer, of 48 Hartley Road, Luton, in the death of his son, Pte Percy Gurney, aged 21, who was killed in action on August 16th in the fighting round Ypres. He was an old school of Hitchin Road and Waller Street schools, and until he joined up in July this year he assisted in his father's business. He joined the Essex Regiment and was transferred to the Northants Regiment. Mr Gurney's other son, Frederick, was killed in April at the age of 22 while serving with the Beds Regiment.

• Mrs Manton, of 14 Chobham Street, Luton, was learned that her son, Pte Percy Manton, is a prisoner of war in Germany. He was reported missing on February 11th and Mrs Manton has received no letter from her son. However, Mr Foster, who is employed at Messrs J. W. Green's brewery, where Percy Manton worked before joining up in July 1916, has received a postcard from him from a prisoners' camp in Germany and he seems to be in good health. [Percy Manton survived the war and was repatriated. He died in Luton in 1984 at the age of 87].

• His many friends will regret to learn that Sapper Sidney Tompkins (East Anglian Royal Engineers), of 3 Althorp Road, Luton, has been admitted to hospital. He was badly gassed in July and invalided home, being sent to St Luke's Hospital, Halifax, for four weeks before being moved to the Halifax Infirmary, where he is now. He married Selina Ann Smith at St Paul's Church, Luton, on July 8th, 1905, and prior to joining up he worked as a carpenter for builder Mr White.

• Now that the census of tea stocks is complete, direct Government control of supplied from grower to buyer can be introduced. Tea will be purchased and imported on Government account, and it will be distributed through ordinary channels to merchants and retailers, with the scale of prices being officially fixed. Although there is no present cause for alarm concerning supplies, all possible economy should be exercised in the use of tea, as in the case of all foodstuffs.

• A crowded audience assembled at the Public Baths on Monday evening to witness the aquatic gala organised by the Luton Ladies' Amateur Swimming Club in aid of the Wardown V.A.D. Comforts Fund and the St Dunstan's Home for Blind Soldiers. The occasion marked a new era in swimming in Luton, for the whole of the programme was provided by ladies, and as a programme, too, it was one of the biggest and certainly one of the most interesting and successful ever given in Luton.

• At a combined meeting of Leagrave and Limbury parishioners, held in the Norton Road Schools on Monday night, the Rev S. H. Collins (Vicar of Biscot) brought up the question of a recreation ground for the young people in the villages, urging that a committee be elected to interview land owners Mr W. T. Lye and Mr Alfred Blundell. If land could be obtained, the Carnegie Trust would help with the making of it into a recreation ground, said the Vicar. If they were going to get rid of diphtheria, give the children open space.

• A company of Church Lads' Brigade Cadets, attached to the King's Royal Rifles, has just been formed in connection with the Holy Trinity Church, Biscot. The Vicar had the idea in mind for some time past, and three weeks ago it was very favourably received by the parishioners. The lads are very enthusiastic and over 30 lads have joined up. The headquarters will be the Parish Room with parade drills on Wednesdays and Thursdays, and it is hoped to run a football club and a social club.

• The father of a New Town Street boy under the age of 11 was fined 10 shillings after pleading guilty to allowing his 10-year-old son to sell newspapers in Mill Street on August 31st. Newsagent Albert Edward Young, of Barber's Lane, pleaded guilty to employing the boy, although he believed he was 11 and had a licence to sell newspapers. He was fined 20 shillings. Mr Young was told to see that boys produced a licence before employing them.

• About 1pm on Monday a stack of corn belonging to Mr Lionel Hull, of Leagrave, was discovered on fire. The stack was one of seven in a field by the side of the road from Leagrave to Sundon. By the time the Limbury Fire Brigade arrived at about 2 o'clock, four stacks were burning furiously. As the ricks were some distance from the nearest water supply, which the Lea, there was no hope of saving the stacks and they had to be left to burn while everything was done to prevent the three remaining stacks taking fire. A strong wind was blowing at the time. It is a popular belief that the fire was caused by boys who were surreptitiously smoking cigarettes under cover of the first stack and that a lighted match or cigarette end was dropped amongst the straw.

• Children playing near a straw stack on Mr Poulton's farm, Dallow Road, on Sunday afternoon are believed to have set it on fire. The Luton Fire Brigade turned out with the motor engine but Chief Fire Officer Andrew saw immediately that it was hopeless to save the stack and the firemen's efforts were directed towards saving several other stacks.