Congratulations to W.Bro. Dr. Andy Green, Past Master of the Wyggeston Lodge No.3448, who was promoted to Provincial Junior Grand Warden at the Provincial Grand Lodge of Leicestershire and Rutland Annual Meeting on Friday 25th November 2016.

During his investiture, the Provincial Grand Master, R.W.Bro. David Hagger, paid tribute to Andy’s commitment to Masonry at all levels especially with the Universities Scheme. The Provincial Grand Master and Andy were thrilled to welcome both the Past Assistant Grand Master and Past President of the Universities Scheme, R.W.Bro. David Williamson, and the Scheme’s Chairman, W.Bro. Edward Lord OBE to the meeting.

Andy was Initiated in The Wyggeston Lodge No.3448 in December 1998 and was the first Candidate in the Province of Leicestershire and Rutland to be introduced via the Internet. He became Master in 2006, and subsequently was instrumental in the Wyggeston Lodge joining the Universities Scheme in 2011.

He became a joining member of the Leicestershire and Rutland Lodge of Installed Masters No.7896 in 2013. He joined the Lodge of Research No.2429 in 2014. He is a Founder member of The Iron Bridge Lodge No.9897, Province of Shropshire, in 2015 and was its Primus Mentor. In December 2016, he will be a Founder Member of the David Kenneth Williamson Lodge No.9938, the Installed Masters Lodge for the Universities Scheme.

In the Province of Leicestershire and Rutland, he was appointed active Provincial Senior Grand Deacon in 2012 and the Provincial Webmaster.  In 2013, he was appointed Provincial Training Officer and in 2014 was appointed Provincial Communications Officer a role which he continues today. He is also Chairman of the Provincial Tercentenary Committee.

In the United Grand Lodge of England, he was appointed to serve on the Universities Scheme Committee in 2013 and was promoted to Vice-Chairman in 2015. He was appointed Past Assistant Grand Standard Bearer in 2016.

Bro. Yogesh Patel was Installed as 105th Master of the Wyggeston Lodge No.3448 at the Installation meeting held on Friday 18th November 2016 at Freemasons’ Hall, Leicester.

The lodge was extremely honoured to welcome W.Bro. Richard J Moore, Senior Grand Warden, accompanied by W.Bro. Peter Gibson-Leitch, Assistant Director of Ceremonies, as the representative of the Provincial Grand Master.

The Installing Master, WBro Paul L Bodycot, conducted the Installation ceremony with great sincerity after which WBro Thomas Bodycot addressed the Master.

The Master  invested his Senior Warden, Bro Paul R Marvin, and Junior Warden, Bro John L Harvey, for the ensuing year who were addressed by WBro Robert J Hutchinson.

The Master also invested his remaining Officers including Bro Peter W Clarke, a Universities Scheme Initiate, as Secretary, Bro Robert J Hutchinson as Treasurer. WBro Peter RW Smith addressed the Brethren.

After the meeting the Brethren enjoyed a splendid four course Festive Board including mushroom soup, honey mustard glazed lamb noisettes, and fruit sorbet. In addition, Bro. Peter Clarke generously supplied Graham’s 20 year old Tawny Port as an accompaniment to the cheese and biscuits.

The lodge looks forward to another busy year ahead as the Universities Scheme lodge for the University of Leicester which already has planned a quadruple Initiation at the December meeting.

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Bro. John Phillips recounts his recent trip to the Somme to lay a wreath on behalf of the Wyggeston Lodge and the Master whose father fought in the battle 100 years ago.

It seems strange to say this, to strip away 100 years in a few words, but I owe everything around me to the first day of the Somme. It was finding pieces of rusty, century old barbed wire on the battlefield that made me head to university to study archaeology. Before that I, like many people in their early twenties, had no clue where my life was heading. Six years after picking up that barbed wire, I’m sat writing this on my lunch break at my job as a full time archaeologist.
It was whilst studying at University of Leicester that I decided to follow in my grandfather’s footsteps and join freemasonry. That of course, turned out to be a decision that opened my life up to so many new friends, new experiences and new ways of thinking. The Somme sent me to Leicester. Without the Somme I would not be an archaeologist or a Freemason. 
I’d known since that day six years ago that I needed to repay those that fought and died on July 1st 1916, if only in a small way. I never could have predicted I’d be paying my respect on behalf of Freemasons, but life takes you in so many different directions. Of course, for the 20,000 killed on the 1st July 1916, those twists and turns that make a life a life were never possible. 20,000 dead. That number gets retold so often that we become numb to it. 20,000 dead on a single day in the same place. It is utterly staggering.

At one of the festive boards of Wyggeston Lodge No.3448, I was chatting about the battlefields to some of the brethren, when our Master Elect leaned over and mentioned that his own father had fought at the Somme two years later in 1918. Paul Bodycot took the chair for the 2015/2016 Masonic year and I realised just how special, how once in a lifetime it was that the son of a Somme veteran would be Master 100 years exactly since the start of the first battle. Perhaps even more moving was that Paul’s brother Tom is a Past Master in the Lodge. Their father fought as a Private in the 2/4th Leicesters, C Company. He was captured on the 21st March 1918 during the first day of the German Spring Offensive at Ervillers. He was 19 years old. He would, in the traditional sense, have been too young to join the craft. 19 years old. Three years younger than I was when I found that barbed wire on the battlefield. I put forward to the lodge that I would lay a wreath at the Thiepval memorial to the missing, where the centenary will be largely focused. The idea was met with an instant yes. I was honoured to take on the responsibility.

Each time I drive through the Somme I am humbled by the calmness of the beautiful French landscape. Never could you imagine the horrors that occurred a century ago. As I walk through the miles of headstones it is easy to forget that beneath each name is the remains of an actual person, a mother’s son. As an archaeologist we often talk of how the people of the distant past lived full lives, had the same problems as us, the same woes. Those in the First World War were often so young that this was not the case. The youngest soldier to fight at the Somme was 12 years old. Those 20,000, and the hundreds of thousands throughout the war did not get to live their lives. We must never forget their sacrifice. 

It was quiet as I walked towards the Thiepval memorial, wreath in hand. A group of school children were searching the list of names for any that matched theirs. I looked around at the fields, the mud and the sky. Nothing ever changes on the Somme. The same earth I walked across is the same the men fought for. It is a perpetual 1916. Farmers still find skeletons every year. It is not a part of history but a part of the present. As I placed the wreath, I thought of everything I owed to the boys of the Somme. I thought of Paul and Tom’s father. I thought of not only the Freemasons that found themselves in the trenches, but each and every soldier that gave themselves for their country. I suppose there can be no stronger masonic trait than that sort of selfless giving.

I placed the wreath and walked away. The words I’d written echoed through my head as I headed out into the countryside: “From the brothers of Wyggeston Lodge to those that gave their lives a century ago. We will never forget. Thank you”.

Members of the Wyggeston Lodge, which meets in Leicester, are getting ready to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the formation of the First Grand Lodge of England. The build up to the Tercentenary starts on the 24th June 2016 and will continue until the end of 2017.

Six members of the lodge are currently undergoing rigorous training for the Leicestershire and Rutland Light Blue Club Tercentennial Centre Ride which will consist of a 300 mile cycle ride over four days in June 2017. The cycle ride will visit all of the Masonic Halls in the Province together with Freemasons’ Hall in London and the birthplace of the Grand Lodge of England in St. Paul’s Churchyard. The proceeds of the ride will be in aid of the Masonic Charitable Foundation and Rainbows, a local children’s hospice based in Loughborough.

Plans are also afoot to hold a joint Universities Scheme meeting between the three Scheme Lodges in the Province. The Wyggeston Lodge, the Scheme Lodge for Leicester University, together with the Castle of Leicester Lodge No.7767, which is the Scheme Lodge for De Montfort University, and Lodge of Science and Art No.8429, the Scheme Lodge for Loughborough University, will each conduct one of the three degree ceremonies in order to progress their own and each other’s members. The date for this special meeting will be on Saturday 25th February 2017. Visiting brethren are most welcome to attend and should contact the Lodge Secretary Andy Green.

Over the past few months, the Leicester based Wyggeston Lodge and its’ members have been filmed as part of the forthcoming new four-part documentary ‘Inside The Freemasons’ to be shown on Sky 1 this winter.

The exclusive documentary will feature the most in-depth look ever at the Freemasons in the run up to our 300th anniversary in 2017. With footage of Freemason ceremonies, never seen before on television, ‘Inside The Freemasons’ uses unprecedented access to the United Grand Lodge of England and its lodges, including the Wyggeston Lodge, to introduce viewers to members of the society as it approaches its tercentenary next year.

W.Bro. Andy Green, a member of the Wyggeston Lodge, will feature along with other members of the lodge sharing what it means to be a Freemason in the modern age: “Freemasonry has given me confidence, transferable skills, a great deal of enjoyment and so many genuine friends. I’m therefore extremely proud to be part of this ground-breaking documentary which will bust the myths surrounding our wonderful fraternity and show the public what we are really all about.”

Viewers will also learn the truth behind the regalia, the jewels, the handshakes and the symbolic working tools as they get to know masons from all walks of life.

Siobhan Mulholland, Commissioning Editor, Sky Factual said: “We can’t wait to use this unique access to show Sky viewers the real Freemasons as we look at little known history and traditions, determining myth from truth.”

Emma Read, executive producer for Emporium Productions, who are making the documentary, said: “We’re thrilled to have been given such unprecedented access to the hidden world of the Freemasons to make a documentary series. Most people are familiar with Freemasons as an organisation, but few actually know who they are, what ‘lodge life’ is really like and why men join in the 21st Century.”