The Kilvert Walk

Strangely, in all the time I've lived in Hay, I've never been on a Kilvert Walk!
On Sunday, though, I had the chance to join the Kilvert Walk led by Oliver Balch, as part of the Hay Independence celebrations.
The Rev. Francis Kilvert was a Victorian curate, who lived in Clyro for much of the time he was writing his diary, which he began around 1870, so he knew Hay well, and often wrote about Hay and the local characters. As Oliver said, he was in a unique position in Victorian society - well educated (he went to Oxford), and welcome in the homes of the local gentry, but it was also part of his job to visit the poorest members of his parish, so he had a much broader view of local society than most people did.
We started, around 20 of us, at The End, the shop on Castle Street which was used for the Wayzgoose the day before. In the window was a special offer - a copy of Oliver Balch's book Under the Tump, about the local area, with a free goose egg!
As we went around town in a big loop, we stopped at intervals so that Oliver could read passages from the diary and talk about them. We also had a member of the Historical Society along to tell us about the history of the castle. Oliver also said that he had promised not to talk about the history of Hay, so as not to overlap with the History Walk later in the day.
We went into the Castle grounds to stand on the very lawn where croquet was played at a party Kilvert went to, and he also mentioned people going down to the archery field. Oliver didn't know where that was - I called out that it was now the car park.
Down under the bridge, by the river, Oliver told the sad story of a girl who had become pregnant, was not allowed to marry the father of the child (or have access to her own money in the bank - she needed her brother's permission to take it out, and he wouldn't give it), and eventually drowned herself in the Wye, close to where we were standing.

Then we walked along the Bailey Walk - narrower than the old railway track, but with a better view of the river - to the old castle tump where we stopped again, and some of the party took advantage of the wooden bench with the carved bears on the ends to sit down.
Then it was back to The End, where somehow we all managed to cram ourselves into the shop for the last part of the talk, where Oliver also read from his own book. Earlier, he read a passage where Kilvert was embarrassed because he had preached at Clyro Church in the morning, and then come over to Hay and was asked to preach again for the afternoon service there - and sitting in the congregation he noticed someone who had heard the same sermon that morning! So I had already heard the passage Oliver read out, at the event at Booths where he was the "warm up act" for Lizzie Harper and Adele Nozedar - but it's a very good passage, and fitted perfectly with the end of the Kilvert Walk.