Three Hampshire Villages

This Hampshire travelogue starts at Breamore Mill on the River Avon before moving to Stourhead Gardens, filled with the picturesque – from classical temples and grotesque follies to a landscape of lakes and flowering shrubs. At Rockbourne we see more vernacular architecture and a dalmatian dog, while at Ibsley, we visit the Old Beam Inn, the River Avon, and more thatched cottages. We end with a shot of Red Funnel's new hydrofoil service setting off for the Isle of Wight.

Frank Bealing, who made this film, was an horticulturalist as well as a keen amateur film maker. His films provide a fascinating record of life in and around Southampton right up to the 1970s. His father set up a nursery business in Southampton that supplied flowers and plants to the White Star Line and later, to Cunard. Plants and flowers on the ill-fated Titanic, were supplied by Bealings. On his father's death in 1941, Frank took over responsibility for the business which, at the time, had to produce food for a nation at war. Bealing became interested in amateur photography and, from the 1930s onwards, film making. Frank's second wife, Nancy, appears in this film.