CLARE WICHBOLD T HE SINGING SUF F R AGE T T E


Clare Wichbold’s thirst for knowledge and discovery is unquenchable, and her ability to retain information and recant it is encyclopaedic. She can make any topic enthralling and boy, does she have some fascinating subject matter.


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“In 1928 all men had to be 21 years old before they could vote, and women couldn’t vote at all before 1918” Clare extolls, as we talk about her cur rent absorption into the Suffrage movement. Today that’s like telling a 25 year old that in the 1990’s you only met people at work . . and you had to go IN to work , or by going out and physically socialising; evolution has moved apace.


LOVE WAS IN THEIR BONES Born Clare De Rouf f ignac, Clare’s life has been consumed with a fascination for history in all its forms, in par ticular archaeology. She even met her husband of 35 years, Dave, on an archaeological project when Worcester ’s Crowngate was being built. Clare was a specialist in enviro-archaeology, bones and understanding past lives, and, seeing them both together dur ing this interview, you can tell that any long dark winter evenings are filled with the chat of two minds with deeply shared interests.


For many years Clare worked for English Her itage down near Por tsmouth, then made a depar ture into a Funding role with Big Lottery in Birmingham. “It felt good to be able to support important projects that passionate people would never be able to finance exclusively themselves” she remembers. Her move fur ther west came with what was then the Southern Marches Par tnership and a similar funding role.


“We’d always dreamed of a smallholding with rare breed pigs, and so we got one.” Says Clare, of her former Welsh border abode


(The Marches region is the borderland between England and Wales, created by the ancient Marcher Lords as they battled for the castles and land between Mid Shropshire r ight down to Chepstow in Monmouthshire).


MIND OVER MATTER Clare’s detailed and inquisitive mind f itted well into the work of funding applications and bid wr iting. Always going beyond a sur face appraisal, she would delve into the deeper stories to discover their real hear t and heritage. With


a naturally eloquent delivery and infectious


enthusiasm, Clare is an easy public speaker. While diminutive in physical stature, her vivacious character f ills a room and her intelligence commands respect and a listening ear. Never has she seen her spina bif ida as a disability or bar r ier to exploring new challenges.


Eventually her work brought her to Hereford Cathedral and I can per sonally recall a zoom meeting where Clare had a new f r iend in attendance – a skeleton, and several more unear thed body par ts, recovered from a project in the Cathedral grounds that cur rently dwelled in her of f ice! She wickedly delighted in this shock ing scene and the reaction of those less accustomed.


Constant travel prompted a move nearer Hereford and the pretty village that she and Dave live in now. The cottage garden and orchard paddock are plenty to tend to these days. “The old canal runs alongside our lane, it floods,


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