by Paul Curtis

Created on: May 25, 2007

THE NORTHEY ISLAND INCIDENT

It was the summer of seventy-one, or was it seventy two? "Chirpy, chirpy, cheap, cheap," was top of the pops at the time; no matter it was one or the other.
Which ever it was it was when the 6th Stevenage Scout Troup set off in a beat up white Ford Transit heading for the wilds of Essex.
We where camping for two weeks in a farmers field on Northey island in the Blackwater estuary close to the town of Maldon.

It was a time when life still held infinite possibilities for our motley crew, Del, the Lawther brothers, Big Pete, Tiny Tears and a host of others whose names have been lost in the mists of my mind.
We were a mixed bunch and we did all the normal scouty type stuff you know digging latrines and that kind of thing.
We had to make our own rudimentary cooker and each patrol took turns to be on kitchen duty, which included cooking and scrubbing the burnt black saucepans.
One bright spark in our patrol had the idea that if you mixed washing up liquid and washing powder into a paste and spread liberally onto the base of the saucepans it made then easier to clean afterwards. What a load of old tosh what it actually did was make the job twice as difficult as you had to chisel off the burnt remains of the washing paste as well as the normal blackness.
We went off to Southend-on-Sea one day all of us pilling into the back of the transit and sitting on wooden benches like the forms you get in school gyms. Not a seatbelt in sight and not even the benches were secured. No one with half a brain would dream of doing that today but at the time it seemed quite natural and we didn't think twice about it.
We were a very unsophisticated bunch of lads so we had a great time "kiss me quick" hats, amusement arcades and of course the Cursal with the Rotor and the Crazy Mouse, very tame compared to today but we loved it.
In exchange for the farmer allowing us to camp in his field, which as I said was on an island, required us to plant rice grass in the mud banks around the island.
The Blackwater estuary was tidal water and when the tide was out there was just a great expanse of mud between the island and the mainland save for a narrow channel.
Unfortunately for the farmer every time the tide went out it was taking some of his island with it, hence the rice grass.
The idea being that the grass would bind the mud together and therefore prevent the island being slowly taken out to sea.
For our part we had to wade out into the mud at low tide up to our knees and plant

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