April in the Peterborough Guild is usually time for the first Guild meeting of the year. This is the Spring Meeting and features the six bell striking contest. That this April marks our fourth event hasn’t changed the plan for the day. The striking contest is open to bands within the Guild, and they can choose to ring 120 changes of a method or call changes. In the past, the best band has won the Weaver Shield. This year, there was a change with the Weaver Shield being presented to the best method ringing band, while the new Centenary trophy was going to be presented to the best call change band.

In the 38 years since the Weaver Shield was first presented, in 1986, the most teams entered has been 17, on two occasions. So, when 21 teams entered the 2024 competition, it presented an unexpected logistical challenge to Simon & Cathy Dixon, producing a ringing order for the bands. The introduction of the Centenary trophy alleviated the problem slightly, allowing the contest to be split across two towers, with the 12 call change bands at Guilsborough and the 9 method bands ringing at Cold Ashby. That left the challenge of arranging bands such that people didn’t need to be ringing in two places at the same time, while accommodating the various limitations on band availability. It is possible that mastering 3-dimensional chess may have been simpler.  

On the day the plan was put into action by the stewards at each tower. At Spratton Richard Allton & Paul Mason ran the open ringing. At Guilsborough the 12 bands were chivvied into place by Alistair Donaldson & me. Ringers’ names were taken, and band photos snapped. With just one swop, the bands stuck to the 12 minute time slots - almost to the minute. The churchyard was in a constant flux of ringers arriving, talking, listening and leaving. At Cold Ashby Simon Dixon stewarded, with Richard Allton on band photographing duty. There was one small delay caused by a late, illness induced band change, however even with that the contest was also completed in good time.

The increased number of bands also presented a challenge to the host branch. Accommodating a large influx of people in a small village could have caused parking problems for ringers and villagers. The field that is usually used for event parking was too wet for the purpose, instead additional parking at a barn and the Sports club had been arranged. Then there was the impact on catering, with the branch laying on a tea for over 120 people. If I am ever faced with feeding the 5000, I know who I am going to call. Guilsborough branch rose to the challenge with aplomb; I have never seen such an impressive spread and the tea urn was putting in overtime. The well-appointed community hall in Cold Ashby was not at all cold as well as being cheerily decorated with bunting. It was packed to the rafters with ringers enjoying meeting friends and the vast array of cake.

Talking of cake, we really didn’t need any more, but there was another PDG100 birthday cake. I promised there would be cake, so cake there was. Again. This time Alistair and I managed to cut it without getting caught on camera.

The meeting was held in a packed church, that, in true Anglican tradition, filled from the back. Having got through the short business element, attention turned to the results of the competitions.

The judges were from Kent. Stuart Cox judged the call changes while Neil Jones took on the method ringing bands. Both judges were complimentary about the standard of ringing and the number of bands entered, even if that did make their task harder. Stuart reported that the last call change contest he’d entered they’d been the only band and had still come second. There’s a story there that deserves exploring further! The judges made comments on each band in order they had rung (with Neil also playing guess the method) before giving the scores in reverse order. The results are in the tables below.

Call Changes

Method

Each band was presented with their certificate before the winners were presented with the trophies. This was the first time that the Centenary trophy had been presented. Chris Bullied collected it on behalf of the Pattishall band while Richard Allton took the Weaver Shield for the Towcester branch.

Alistair Donaldson presenting the Centenary Trophy to Chris Bulleid of Pattishall	Richard Allton receiving the Weaver Shield from Alistair Donaldson on behalf of Towcester

It was good to see that there were bands from 7 of the Guild’s 10 branches, a good coverage. It was also great to see the number of bands with recent learners, some had only been ringing ~6 months, the Whilton call change band was formed entirely of Jubilee learners. Being on the short side, I particularly liked the foresight of one band that brought their own boxes with them, in case there weren’t enough of suitable height available. The band photos were not universally welcomed, there was some grumbling (which I ignored). If there was a prize for most enthusiastic band being photographed it would go to Cransley, who threw themselves into putting on their best poses.

(L to R) Nick Watts, David Dainty, Brenda Shirgress, Su Mallett, Claire Harris, Philip Pinchin, Tracey Pinchin

The day finished with open ringing at Cold Ashby before everyone dispersed back to the 4 corners of the Guild. It was an excellent day and all who contributed are to be heartily thanked for their efforts. We do it again next year on 12^th April 2025, get it in the diary now.