Extinction made the Dorset village of Tyneham famous. When Churchill evacuated it to make a tank gunnery range he vowed the people could return. Attlee broke the promise and Tyneham became a poignant symbol of a vanished rural England and of unrewarded patriotic sacrifice. The village was the focus of campaigns by landowners, ecologists, cranks, a cult for architects, artists and film makers. Preserved perfectly by the Army, the empty village filled up with fantasies and utopias. Hippy architects, hanging judges, artillery officers rearing butterflies, rural fascist communes; writing about the English countryside will never be the same again.