The Parish Magazine February 2024

around the villages —3
2024 Sonning floods recalls
old memories of 1947 . . .
The Parish Magazine - February 2024 27
Above: January 2024, Peter Rennie took this photograph looking
towards Shiplake from the top of the St Andrew's Church tower.
Right: an aerial photograph from the 'Look and Learn' photographic
library showing the Sonning floods of 1947.
CHARITY RACE NIGHT
Saturday
24 th February ‘24
7pm for 1 st race
@7.30pm
Pearson Hall, Sonning
on Thames
Ticket price: £20 (for Race Night & Fish and Chip Supper)
Venue: Pearson Hall, High Street, Sonning on Thames, RG4 6UL
Email: Sally Wilson on mustangsallywilson41@gmail.com or
Phone: Sally Wilson on 0118 9793328
Opportunities are available to sponsor a Table (10 in total) or Race (6 in total)
at the event. Email Sally for further information.
This is a fundraising event to raise funds for the
Vestry Wall at St. Andrew’s Church
Charity No: 1101944
From The Sonning Parish Magazine April 1947:
Rev Sidney Groves, vicar of Sonning wrote:
Sonning Vicarage, March 19, 1947.
My dear People, We are all deeply concerned as to the
sorry plight in which the Sonning Eye folk have been
plunged by the floods and to a lesser degree by the gale,
and can only hope that by the time these words reach
your eyes the waters will have gone down and the houses
be once more dry and clean, and habitable — but how
many houses in Sonning Eye are really habitable? This
disaster has shown up afresh the lack of decencies, not
to say the amenities of life, from which our parishioners
in the Eye suffer; it seems difficult to believe that either
the local authority or the landlords have done their duty
by these people; callous neglect stares one in the face
on every side. Now that the war is over, such conditions
must no longer be tolerated.