Tree felled for HS2

 

This is going to be a very sad HPANWO Voice article. For over two hundred and fifty years the Cubbington pear tree has loomed over the Warwickshire countryside and provided fine fruit for local villagers. It was actually voted Tree of the Year in 2015 by the Woodland Trust. On Tuesday that proud ancient tree was felled and taken apart in just ninety minutes by workmen bearing saws and mechanical diggers as part of the construction of HS2, see here for details: https://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.com/2020/09/hs2.html. The campaigners trying to save the tree could only look on and weep. I can imagine the horror with which JRR Tolkien would have responded. Lord of the Rings has many scenes with the destruction of trees, more in the books than in the films, which was for him the ultimate act of barbarism. Cubbington villager John Taylor said: "It's one of the saddest days of my life. The tree has meant so much to people around here and to see it reduced to twigs in a matter of minutes is just heart-breaking." However, the forces behind the creation of HS2 regard the feelings of ordinary English country-dwellers with as much contempt as they do the natural world. These things are in the way and simply have to be moved. Source: https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/fury-englands-tree-year-chopped-19135753. As for the workmen carrying out the demolition, what did they think as their saws ripped apart the wooden body that has stood there since their ancestors walked the land? Although of course in this day and age many of them would not have had ancestors in this land. One of the reasons why corporations like foreign workers is because they lack that emotional attachment to the country and its people. I suppose they would say: "We're just doing our job." So much evil has been done by people using that excuse. In one of Doris Lessing's books, The Good Terrorist, one of the characters laments: "People did this! People!" If I had been one of them I would have refused, even if it meant dismissal. At moments like this I feel the weight of the New World Order on my shoulders more heavily than at any other time. I've always known this would not be easy an easy quest, right from the very day I started HPANWO; but right now the hill we have to climb looks so steep and high that I don't see how we can make it.
See here for more background: http://hpanwo.blogspot.com/2020/02/st-helena-airport-portal.html.
And: http://hpanwo-bb.blogspot.com/2009/02/rockall-chapter-1.html.