Time Bottled
Selected for its remoteness near the village of Harrington,
in the flat expanses of Northamptonshire, was established a secret US airbase
(1944-1945), supplying
the wartime Continental Resistance.
Here airmen, known colloquially as the Carpetbaggers, lived, planes serviced and equipment housed.
Resistance leaders arrived for ‘delivery’ by nightflight and here staff of the US Office of Strategic Services (now the CIA) strategised.Their collective rubbish, much of it imported from the USA, was moved to a dump which became a treasure trove for local people.
Before the war, at the corner of the airbase, stood the Foxhall Inn, a pub that was demolished to discourage prying eyes and preserve the secrecy of these clandestine activities.
Over recent years, many old clay and glass bottles were found buried in what used to be the pub’s cellar. The bottles, if they could talk, could no doubt tell an interesting tale: what was drunk, by whom, and what they did with their lives.
These bottles have been collected by local people and given to Glover to preserve as scanned photographic artefacts. This collection is completed by a more recent series of plastic bottles
found on the same site, covered in grass and moss, a testimony of Nature
trying take hold.
Geof Rayner
