Mitcheldean

Mitcheldean calls itself a market town, which is generous for a place whose twentieth century was paid for by a photocopier factory. It spent decades copying other people's paperwork and still came out an original: old stone, post-war semis and a business park where Rank Xerox used to be, all squeezed into a Forest of Dean valley. Even its railway station, before the line closed, was two miles away in Herefordshire, so leaving was always a bit of a project. The thing it is best remembered for is a brass band whose own admirer only wished he could have heard it play with everyone sober at the same time, and that is still the most honest review the town has ever had.