IT may have been hot, hot, hot last week, but this summer is not going to be remembered as a scorcher.

Looking back to the legendary summer of 1976, perhaps that is just as well.

At least we are not enduring a severe drought where hosepipe bans are enforced, sharing bath water was encouraged and the grim prospect of water rationing was a reality.

With the countryside tinderbox dry, the drought conditions led to large heath and forest fires throughout the area.

The worst-hit area was common land around Tadley, Silchester and Pamber Heath, where fires threatened homes.

In fact, a massive fire saw more than 15 acres of scrubland and a plantation of young tree destroyed between Silchester and Mortimer. It was described as the worst fire the area had ever seen.

Within minutes of the fire starting, flames had engulfed a large area of the common, sending up a huge column of smoke hundreds of feet in the air.

Silchester had suffered several serious fires that summer, two of which completely surrounded the village.

Meanwhile, some of the South’s major rivers were reduced to little more than a trickle compared to their normal flows.

The River Test in Whitchurch was no exception.

However, the world-famous trout river was still able to offer sport to fishermen, according to Gregor Mackenzie, who for more than 25 years was a ghillie and water bailiff on the river.

Back in August 1976, Mr Mackenzie said told The Gazette: “I reckon the Test is running at about half its volume and this means that the fish, lacking the oxygen from the flow of new water, are that much more lethargic.

“They are obviously down in size, for it is like putting you in a hot room – you don’t have much of an appetite.”

The ponds in Eastrop Park dried up. Some mums came up with an idea of filling the dried up paddling pool with sea water to bring the seaside to Basingstoke.

Meanwhile, things went with a bang at Sherfield-on-Loddon. The drought unearthed a Second World War hand grenade at the bottom of the village pond.

The mud-caked grenade was discovered by a former Home Guard soldier, Ernest Bowman, who was among volunteers who had decided to clear the dried-up pond.

The grenade – thought to be a Mills bomb – was initially placed by Mr Bowman under a tree, but a worried neighbour called the police the following day.

Bomb disposal experts from Aldershot duly arrived and decided it was in too dangerous a condition to be moved and the grenade was detonated in the pond.

Mr Bowman said: “It made a tremendous bang and I think the whole village heard it. Everyone came running out of their houses to see what had happened.

“I think it may have been a Home Guard member who threw the grenade in the pond.

“I can remember us using the pond as target practice during the Second World War, and this must have been a grenade that was thrown in and did not explode. The pin was missing, but the mechanism was jammed.”

Everyone was able to breathe a sigh of relief as the rain arrived at the end of August.