Di writes history of Ditton

A Shropshire village’s hidden past is uncovered for the first time in a new book by a local historian which draws on a wealth of archive material.

“Ditton Priors, A Settlement of the Brown Clee” is the first book written by Di Bryan, who lives in the village and is the secretary of the Ditton Priors Local History Group.

She believes it is unique in painting a picture of the area in the hundreds of years leading up to the Norman Conquest.

“Quite a lot of people know about the railway, the quarry, and the depot, but it was the early history that really interested me. Nobody really knew anything about it,” said Mrs Bryan.

“Nobody has ever tried to put together a history of pre-conquest Ditton. Most people know about the Iron Age forts on top of the Brown Clee - Abdon Burf, Clee Burf, and Nordy Bank - but I don’t think anybody knew anything leading up to the Domesday Book. Domesday is Ditton’s first entry into the records.

“I have put together a scenario for what happened in the 400 years before the conquest. No-one else has ever done that before. That’s totally new, and that to me is very exciting.”

She argues that Ditton Priors was an important Saxon manor with valuable trading links with Droitwich.

Her researches into the village’s past also benefited from a stroke of luck. Although Ditton Priors never had a tithe map, an estate map dating from 1768 turned up recently and proved the key to unravelling various aspects of the village’s past. The map is used on the cover of the book.

“I can’t tell you how important that map turned out to be. It was found in a local doctor’s attic.”

Farmers without exception gave her permission to wander over their land in search of old roads, boundary walls, and other earthworks, and owners of some of Ditton Priors’ oldest houses gave her access to look around as part of her researches.

Manor Court Rolls and other documents gave an insight into the lives of ordinary villagers.

“As far as I know, we are the only Shropshire village which has published its Manor Court Rolls,” she said.

Mrs Bryan is not herself a native Ditton Priors villager, but an incomer from Birmingham.

“Me and Hugh are coming up to our 10th year in Ditton. I think it’s a rather nice village to live in. There are all the services you would wish and still a lot of the old things are left. The landscape is beautiful.

“That’s one of the nicest things. You can go walking and find tracks and hedgerows, ditches and banks and so on which have been there for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Landscape moves on, but you can still see why the village has developed as it did.

“I often think of a historian as someone who is responsible for the memory of a village. You and I are as we are because of what has happened to us and the memories of what has happened to us. In order to understand how a village develops you need to understand how it’s developed as a village in the past.”

• In a special link-up between the Shropshire Star and publishers Logaston Press, copies of “Ditton Priors, A Settlement of the Brown Clee” can be ordered through the Shropshire Star. Cost is £9.95, plus £1.50 p&p.
• To buy a copy contact: Editorial Support Department, Shropshire Star Book Club, Ketley, Telford, Shropshire TF1 5HU. Office hours telephone (01952) 241459 or 241496 before 4pm; fax (01952) 254605; email, editorialsupport@shropshirestar.co.uk. Discuss with them your preferred payment method.