The story of nature conservation at Hickling Broad begins two decades before Norfolk Wildlife Trust (known originally as Norfolk Naturalists Trust) was conceived. It begins, as so many stories of Norfolk conservation begin, with a shooting syndicate, a wise landowner and a brilliant, forward-looking gamekeeper.

'It is now the duty of everybody to guard this recovered inheritance which our forefathers so shockingly wasted.’

According to a detailed paper prepared by long-term NWT supporter the late Martin George, in 1900 the Honourable Edwin Montagu, then a student of natural sciences at Cambridge, visited Hickling Broad and was shown its abundant birdlife by Jim Vincent, son of a local gamekeeper. In 1908 Montagu visited again, this time accompanied by Lord Lucas, a member of the Asquith government. The following year they were joined by foreign secretary, and noted ornithologist, Sir Edward (later Lord) Grey. Between them they resolved to negotiate with the landowners of Hickling Broad and lease the site as a wildfowl shoot, with Jim Vincent, whose knowledge had greatly impressed them, as keeper.

Jim Vincent with two marsh harrier chicks 1943



Vincent is believed to have been employed from 1909 and his role was not merely to manage the shoot. He was also tasked with attracting and protecting other birds and wildlife. At the time Montagu’s harrier was an extremely rare British bird (as it still is today) and the shooting syndicate was proud of the protection afforded by Vincent to the pair which bred successfully near Whiteslea Lodge on the north shore of Hickling Broad in 1910. Likewise Jim Vincent kept watch over the marsh harriers, then nationally extinct as breeding birds, which were sometimes seen over the reeds at Hickling, hopeful that they too would settle to breed, as in time they did.

In 1900 a bittern boomed at Hickling, the only know individual in the UK of another species which was nationally extinct as a breeder. Bitterns boomed again in the following years, but no nests were found until July 1911 when Jim Vincent found a chick, accompanied in his search by the pioneering wildlife photographer Emma Turner, a redoubtable woman who lived on a houseboat on Hickling Broad. Vincent and Turner came to be the de facto experts on the bittern in the UK, finding numerous nests around the Broad in the years to come.

In her book Broadland Birds, Emma Turner recounts tales of the bitterns which she and Jim Vincent together observed, recorded and protected at Hickling, and vehemently expresses their commitment to the birds’ continued expansion in Norfolk. ‘This ruthless persecution is surely sufficient in itself to account for the practical extinction of the Bittern in the fenlands. [...] There are extensive tracts of reed-bed left in the Broadland where the Bittern would still nest, if only the numbers of birds which come over every winter were unmolested and allowed to survive. […] It is now the duty of everybody to guard this recovered inheritance which our forefathers so shockingly wasted.’ Elsewhere in the same account she charmingly describes a nestling which they found: ‘The young Bittern was the quaintest little ornithological oddity I had ever seen; […] A halo of light tan-coloured down stuck out all round his head, and his big greenish-blue eyes glared defiance.’ It is clear that for Emma Turner the bittern was the soul of the wild marshes of Hickling: ‘The older marshmen always spoke of this sound with a kind of awe, and the loneliness of the marshes seemed to me incomplete without it.’

Emma Turner's bittern photograph

In the 1920s, following the deaths of Edwin Montagu and another of the Whiteslea shooting syndicate’s members, Lord Desborough took control of the shoot. In 1927 he purchased the Whiteslea estate on which the shooting lodge stood. Soon afterwards he undertook major repairs to prevent the lodge sinking into the marshy peat on which it stood and he commissioned the wildlife artist Roland Green, who also lived and worked on the shore of the Broad, to paint for it a series of friezes representing the birdlife of the surrounding Broad and marshes.

In 1944 Lord Desborough approached Christopher Cadbury, a generous advocate of conservation and regular visitor to Whiteslea Lodge, and offered to sell him the Whiteslea estate for £5,000. However, Lord Desborough died in January 1945, before the sale could be concluded, and, burdened by death duties, his daughter Lady Gage was obliged to double the sale price to £10,000. Unable to meet this new price alone but still keen to secure the estate for conservation, Cadbury discussed the sale with the Council of trustees of Norfolk Naturalists Trust which, after due deliberation, decided in April 1945 to raise the money to buy it. Coincidentally the great Hickling keeper and conservationist Jim Vincent had died In November 1944, and had been replaced by Ted Piggin who had previously worked as his assistant.

From the minutes of Council meetings in the following months and years, it is clear that the purchase of the Whiteslea Estate was in many ways a burden to Norfolk Naturalists Trust. Funds for its acquisition came quite quickly but the running of the estate was hugely costly and in 1946 an appeal was launched in conjunction with The National Trust to endow both the Hickling and Horsey Estates.

Reporting its launch the Eastern Daily Press of 17th May 1946 read, ‘This is an opportunity the nation cannot afford to lose, and Norfolk should be foremost in supporting the appeal. Through the work of the late Lord Desborough and his head keeper, Jim Vincent, who died within a few weeks of each other, 18 months ago, Hickling became world famous as a breeding ground for wild fowl and a resting place for migrants. Horsey, under the ownership of Major Anthony Buxton, has been the fellow to it in fame and careful guardianship. Since the Norfolk Naturalists' Trust became possessed of Hickling last year, it has appeared that an endowment fund of £15,000 will be needed for its property maintenance. A property consisting of marsh, fen, and water cannot pay its own way, but to maintain its value as a bird sanctuary Hickling must be tended as Lord Desborough and Jim Vincent tended it. In addition £5000 is needed for the purchase of the Horsey Estate of 1732 acres. Major Buxton has offered to sell it on most generous terms to the National Trust, binding himself and his successors under a lease of 99 years to maintain the property to the satisfaction of the Trust.’

Three days later, Peter Scott wrote in support of the appeal in The Times: ‘How many people can trace an early interest in ornithology to the boom of the bittern across Hickling Broad? How many have hunted for the caterpillars of the swallow-tail butterfly on the banks of the Candle Dyke? How many have learned to sail a boat to windward through the reed-girt approaches to Heigham Sound, or fished for rudd behind the island in Horsey Mere?’ Of Hickling and Horsey, predicting today’s Upper Thurne Living Landscape, he continued: ‘Together these two areas will total some 2,330 acres of unspoiled marshland of inestimable value from the point of view of conservation.’

Despite these lofty appeals to the generosity of the public, in his account of Hickling Broad Martin George reports that the appeal was not apparently successful. An exception was the most munificent donation of £5,000 by the widow of Russell Colman, who suggested that her late husband’s name might be associated with the restoration of one of the windmills on the estate.

In the ensuing years, the minutes of Council meetings are full of reports of difficulties at Hickling. Whiteslea Lodge itself, built, as verified by Dr Joyce Lambert of the University of East Anglia, on a deep and unstable bed of Broadland peat, was subsiding, while its celebrated pictures were being devoured by woodworm. Two mills on the estate were crumbling. Christopher Cadbury, in particular, was also concerned about the low wages of the keepers on the estate, but, straitened by circumstances, the Council were unable to raise them. In the event Cadbury himself pledged £25 a year for seven years to increase their income, in addition to supplying a tractor and mechanical cutter to ease the arduous task of reed-cutting in the winter months. In 1952 he went so far as to purchase Stubb Cottage and offer it to Norfolk Naturalists Trust as a home for one of its estate employees.

In return for his unfailing generosity, in December 1952 Colonel Cator (donor of Ranworth and Hickling Broads to Norfolk Wildlife Trust) proposed and the Council agreed that Christopher Cadbury’s lease of Whiteslea Lodge should be extended upon its expiry in 1960.

In 1953 Norfolk Naturalists Trust entered a relationship with the Nature Conservancy, which preceded today’s Natural England, under which, some of the costs of managing the reserve would be paid by this national agency. Despite the huge expense involved in maintaining such a large and important site, and the initial worries of the Council, the Hickling National Nature Reserve has deservedly come to be one of Norfolk Wildlife Trust’s most cherished reserves, sitting at the heart of today’s Upper Thurne Living Landscape.

Since the early days there have been many improvements in public access to the reserve. 1970 saw the launch of the Hickling Water Trail, an event led, just months before his death, by the famous birdwatcher and author James Fisher. In 1975 Stubb Mill was added to Norfolk Naturalists Trust’s property here. Following its restoration in 2010, funded by Heritage Lottery Fund and a Broads Authority millwrights bursary scheme, and the addition of interpretation boards recounting the lives here of generations of the Nudd family, the mill is now opened to the public one Sunday a month from April to September, or by arrangement. In 1991 the Hickling Broad Visitor Centre was opened by Desmond Morris and Sarah Kennedy. It was built in memory of Ian Mackintosh, Chairman of Norfolk Naturalists Trust during the 1970s and subsequently Vice-President. On 28 November 2001 His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales held a reception at Sandringham House to mark the 75th anniversary of Norfolk Wildlife Trust and the following day, in honour of all that has been achieved here, he visited Hickling Broad.

In the early years of the twentieth century the Whiteslea estate at Hickling Broad was the private preserve of ministers, aristocrats and royalty, with dedicated and forward-looking keepers protecting its rare birds. Since 1945, as a Norfolk Wildlife Trust reserve, it has been loved by the whole of Norfolk. Montagu’s harriers no longer breed in Broadland (in fact there were only five nests in England in 2016) but marsh harriers and bitterns both breed at Hickling, the former in numbers which would amaze and delight Jim Vincent. Vincent’s bearded tits still call softly from reed over which swallowtails flutter, and teal still pipe from quiet dykes. Many things in Broadland land and water management have changed since their days but, standing on the damp lawn of Whiteslea Lodge today, Jim Vincent, Emma Turner and Christopher Cadbury would recognise the Broad which they loved and protected and would be glad for all that, in the past seventy years, Norfolk Wildlife Trust, its neighbours, donors and partners have done to preserve this exceptional place and its wildlife.
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