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Blakeney
Blakeney lies on the North Norfolk coast between
Morston and Cley.
Jack Higgins
(1929 - ) did his research for the novel The Eagle Has Landed
(1975)
while staying in the Blakeney Hotel. The book tells the
story of a group of German paratroopers who land in
England during World War 2 and attempt to assassinate
Winston Churchill while he spends a weekend in North
Norfolk.
Blakeney Hotel
The novel begins in the churchyard of St. Mary and
All Saints in the fictional village of Studley
Constable. Higgins (the narrator) is here looking for
the grave of a 17th Century sailor called Charles
Gascoigne but instead comes across the hidden burial
site of Colonel Kurt Steiner - a paratrooper - who was
killed in action in 1943. This provides the catalyst for
the rest of the novel's dramatic story line. Studley
Constable church could be modelled on that of Salthouse
which certainly has headstones with spooky engravings -
which Higgins mentions in the book:
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' I worked my way through methodically, starting at the
west end, noticing in my progress the headstones he'd
mentioned. They were certainly curious. Sculptured and
etched with vivid and rather crude ornaments of bones,
skulls, winged hourglasses and archangels.' |
In 1976 the novel was made into a film - directed by
John Sturges and starring Michael Caine, Donald
Sutherland, Donald Pleasance and Robert Duval.The North Norfolk coast has always
been at risk of invasion through out the centuries -
particularly at Weybourne Hope where there is deep water
close inshore. Today the cliffs and beaches are still littered with WW2 pill
boxes and tank traps.
In the 1950s the nature writer Richard Mabey used to
visit Blakeney with friends and he became fascinated by
the saltmarshes and the muddy creeks. He continued to
visit Blakeney during the 1960s and 70s and expeditions
to gather plants such as samphire and fennel inspired
him to write his successful book Food for Free
which was published in 1972. It was also returning to
Blakeney later in his life when he was suffering from
severe depression that prompted him to move permanently
to Norfolk - leaving his beloved Chiltern hills behind.
In another of his books - Home Country (1990)
- Mabey summed up his feelings for the north Norfolk
coast as follows:
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'I sometimes wondered if the closeness of these unstable
edges of the land was part of the secret of Norfolk's
appeal to us, a reflection of a half-conscious desire to
be as contingent as spindrift ourselves, to stay loose,
cast off, be washed up somewhere unexpected. Down among
these shifting sands the world seems to be all
possibility.' |
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Links:
Blakeney
website
St. Nicholas' Church |
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Supported
by Norfolk Tourism