Inferno near Enford claims prized Barbies
12:00pm Thursday 9th February 2012 in News By Nigel Kerton
A collection of Barbie dolls worth more than £4,000 has been destroyed in a fire.
Highbank Cottage, at Newtown, near Enford, suffered severe damage after the blaze ripped through the two-storey property on Friday.
Eddie and Theresa Shoemark, who have lived in the roadside cottage for 27 years, escaped unhurt, but their 23-year-old daughter Natalie’s collection of 1,500 Barbie dolls were burned beyond repair.
Natalie and her brother Justin both live away from home.
Mr Shoemark, a clock and watch specialist, said: “Natalie said she was going to store the Barbie dolls until she was 65 and said they were going to be her retirement fund.”
Thirty five firefighters from Amesbury, Pewsey and Ludgershall attended the blaze, aided by an aerial platform from Salisbury that enabled them to tackle the fire from above and remove tiles to get to the source of the fire.
Mr Shoemark, 51, said the blaze was the final straw in what had been a distressing week.
It began when his mother, who lives in Salisbury, suffered a stroke and was admitted to hospital.
He is her carer and had been visiting her at Salisbury General Hospital every day, including the day of the fire.
After getting home from hospital, he met friends before going home and settling down with his wife in front of the logs burning on their open fire.
At about 10.30pm, they both heard what Mr Shoemark described as “a spitting and crackling” sound which at first they put down to the log fire.
Then, said Mr Shoemark, his wife thought she could smell smoke in the room and when he went upstairs to investigate, he could hear the spitting and crackling much louder so decided to check the loft.
“When I opened the trapdoor to the loft there were flames everywhere. We just got out,” he said.
Mr Shoemark called 999 and stayed outside waiting for the fire service to arrive.
He said he even contemplated using his own garden hose to tackle the flames.
“I thought about getting the hose, but then I realised it would be frozen and there would be no way I could get it up through the house to the loft anyway,” said Mr Shoemark.
Temperatures had plummeted on what was one of the coldest nights of the year – recorded at below minus nine degrees in some parts of the Pewsey Vale.
Police closed the A345 Pewsey-Salisbury road, which runs past the cottage, because of fears water from the firefighters’ hose could be danger to motorists.
The fire service called Wiltshire Highways to put salt on the road to tackle the ice.
The road remained closed to traffic until the last fire engine left at about 5.15am.
Mr and Mrs Shoemark plan to stay in Mr Shoemark’s mother’s home in Salisbury until their own house is repaired.
It is believed a spark from the wood fire could be to blame for the blaze.
