Time to reflect

THE River Wye in Buckinghamshire is a chalk stream that flows southeastwards for 10 miles from its source in the Chilterns, through West Wycombe, High Wycombe, Loudwater and Wooburn Green, to its confluence with the Thames at Bourne End.

For centuries, the river powered corn and fulling mills until, in the late 1600s, the arrival of Dutch experts in paper-making and water-management led to the creation of dozens of paper mills along a complex system of watercourses between the hamlet of Loudwater and the village of Wooburn.

One of the largest was Clapton Mill, whose Dutch owner, Groner Steyn, erected an imposing family home on high ground that overlooked the