In October, my 17 year old daughter, Ella, and I will take on the challenge of completing of the Royal Parks Half Marathon…. You might be
thinking “So what?” or “That’s easy for you as I see you running all the time” and to some extent you would be right and I hope it will be a fun bonding experience for us and a challenge to Ella who has only run a 10k so far… but it could have been a different story, I may not had met my lovely wife and therefore Ella may not be here and I might not have been able to get to where I have in life i.e. good health, lovely family, good job, working in the charity sector, … so what’s the story?

I was born into a reasonably idyllic upbringing on a dairy farm on the English/Welsh border largely in ignorance of adult matters around
me. However, I have since learnt that about a year after I was born my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. She fought on for 8 years, fighting the cancer and fighting for a good education for myself and my brother. I don’t fully understand the finances but somehow through a mixture of my brother’s scholarship (he still is the clever one) and giving up our bedrooms to B&B guests in the summer months, my brother and I had been attending “prep” and were destined to moved up to “big school” i.e. the public school system but in this case backed by the charitable Worshipful Company of Haberdashers. The photo is James and his mum, Rosabelle, on our last family holiday to Weston-Super-Mud.

My mother’s death just before Christmas 1979 was devastating to the family. My Dad lost his companion, lost of his support just as the farm
entered the tough winter months etc.. He regularly attended parents’ evenings still in his farm clothes “fresh” from the milking shed.

But that’s often when you see the best in people. Relatives stepped up and took us in for holidays. The local community paid for my brother and me to go off to PGL for a summer holiday (giving some respite
for Dad). We had a “Home Help”, a lovely lady who came in to do some washing and cook a meal, but I’m not sure how that was funded.

In the midst of all of this I had this strange trip to go to meet a vicar in a cottage some distance from us. I didn’t know what this was at the time but the vicar was assessing me and my father to see whether “The Canon Buttle Trust” (now called Buttle UK) could help. We must have passed/qualified and this wonderful organisation stepped in to help with my school fees until I reached “big” school… work hard, school reports went to them as well as my Dad…. and I secured my place at Monmouth School and an “Assisted Place” provided by the Haberdashers… we still had to give up our bedrooms for B&B guests and farming was not pleasant for my Dad through TB scares, milk quota limits, etc. but school led to University and then to a career in Accounting and then a job at the Charities Aid Foundation.

That early push and help by The Buttle Trust is part of my history
so I owe them some support. I have a regular standing order from my CAF Charity Account but the Royal Parks Half is an opportunity to raise a bit more that may help an 8 year old child in a similar or probably far worse situation.

So please help support Ella and I raise some money for them.

Thanks for reading

James

Below is a little about Buttle UK. I was fortunate to
benefit from them when most charities at the time would have ignored what must
have seen as a “reasonably comfortable well spoken middle class family”...
Buttle UK simply saw a family in crisis.

Who are Buttle UK?

Buttle UK is named after Frank Buttle, a remarkable man
whose hard work and personal sacrifice helped to establish our grant
programmes, which have been helping children and young people in need across the UK since 1953. Buttle UK exists today because of an East End clergyman’s single-minded vision to raise £1m to,‘Launch 1,000 children each year out of poverty.' When Frank Buttle died on February 11, 1953 he was just £80,000 short of his £1m target. This fund was used to establish today’s Trust. Since then, the money has been re-invested and multiplied countless times and ways.

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