2011

The date was set for the first Memorial shoot Sat 30th July 2011, now all we had to do was organize it. We decide to make it a 60 bird shoot over six stands and a pool shoot. I wrote to local business’s to ask them to sponsor one of the stands and the first seven that I asked all accepted and promptly sent us a cheque.

The seven sponsors for the first shoot were:-

  • H & M Construction
  • McFarlane Family Butchers
  • Lord Strathmore
  • Middleton Forge Ltd
  • Alston Road Garage
  • Middleton Care
  • ME & CE Bell Cronkley

We are very grateful for the support of our sponsors.

We also wrote letters off to most of JRaine & Son suppliers to ask for raffle prizes, the response very fantastic and we ended up with a raffle with more than 40 prizes. We borrowed traps from Teesdale Gun Club and  various other people from miles around, we just had to ask and everyone was so willing to help. The trophies were all donated from members of the Mitchell family, Teesdale Gun Club and Lord Strathmore. We had six classes as well as the Marwood V Aukside syndicate trophy, a local inter syndicate shield. The gun club helped us to source the clays at a good price, Rebecca Tiplady organized the bar and McFarlanes Family butchers sorted the catering. Bouncemania supplied us with a Marquee and Bouncy Castle’s to keep the children amused, Donna & Gemma agreed to do some face painting so, everything was coming together.

Finally the day arrived and turned out to be one of the hottest days of the year, we had a total of 106 guns shoot the course, and all the admin work was kept in order by Helen Beadle who had a busy afternoon, the markers and trappers all had a hectic day but we could not have managed without any of these people and we are very grateful for all they did on the day.A big thank you also to Andrew Morrow and Peter Henderson for the design of the course.

The results of the first year were:-

Mens

  1. Andrew Morrow    54/60
  2. Roger Ayton           52/60
  3. James Swinbank   51/60

Ladies

  1. Jackie Hammond  37/60
  2. Lyn Cuthbertson    32/60
  3. Karen Turnbul        25/60

Undere 16’s

  1. Adam Holmes   39/60
  2. David Mitchell  34/60
  3. Matthew Dent   19/60

Veteran’s (over 50’s)

  1. John Scott   50/60
  2. Ted McFarlane   48/60
  3. Tony Marsden    48/60

Local

  1. James Swinbank   51/60
  2. Peter Henderson   50/60
  3. Ted McFarlane      48/60

Gamekeepers

  1. Andrew Morrow   54/60
  2. Roger Ayton          52/60
  3. Roger Ayton          51/60

Marwood Syndicate  237          Aukside Syndicate   213

We managed to make a profit of £2000.00 on the day, and for our first year we were very pleased for all the support. We had agreed to share the profit with two of Stephen’s main interest’s so Middleton Christmas Lights got £1000 and Teesdale Gun Club got £1000.