'You never forget what it was like'

6:04am Wednesday 8th August 2007

A GENTLE breeze rustles through the grass as the cattle lie in the fields, soaking up the August sunshine. It is an idyllic picture of British farm life. The only reminder of the terrible scenes witnessed here over Easter 2001 appears to be the broken sign attached to the Cleminson's gate. "Keep Out," can just about be read in scarlet letters. "No Entry."

But, as it turns out, there is another reminder - the cattle themselves. For most of the land at New Hummerbeck Farm, in West Auckland, County Durham, is now let to another farmer. The Cleminsons have not been able to face re-stocking it since the spectre of foot-and-mouth came calling, followed by the men from the ministry and the Army with their shotguns.

Among the 270 animals culled, was Jessica Cleminson's pet cow, Caroline. Jessica was eight years old when she wrote in her diary of the death of her pet, circling the tear marks as she went.

Six years later, and the pain of what the family went through has begun to heal, but it will never be forgotten. In the Cleminson's farmhouse kitchen, Jessica, now 14, is sitting at the table, looking through some of the dozens and dozens of cards, letters, poems and drawings she received after her diary was published in The Northern Echo and picked up by the national media.

"We had letters from all over the world, from South Africa, Australia. I remember my hand hurting having to write back to them all and say thank you," she says. "It was like other people were going through it as well. They were saying 'we understand how you feel' and 'we hope it gets better for you and your family'. I didn't really realise that it had affected so many people. I wrote in it because I was upset, and I didn't want to upset my mum and dad. I never thought it would affect anybody else."

But at a time when farmers across the country were seeing their cattle slaughtered, their livelihood's left smoking on putrid-smelling pyres as the disease spread further, Jessica's diary struck a chord.

She had known Caroline since she was born.

"She used to let me and my sister Laura ride on her back and would let us stroke her," she says. "When we found out she was in calf we were all so excited and dad said because she'd had twins before, she might be expecting twins again."

Jessica, a pupil at Bishop Barrington School in Bishop Auckland, had not had her diary long and had bought it in the pound shop at the MetroCentre a few days before the restrictions on movement hit the farm.

The family had seen their neighbour's cattle burning on a pyre at the top of the bank on Good Friday, 2001. The following day, a vet from the Ministry of Agriculture called, looked at their 18 pigs and said they appeared to have the disease.

"Within quarter of an hour, we had the police and the Army at the bottom of the lane stopping people coming in," recalls Jessica's mum, Susan.

"We were hoping against hope that they wouldn't have to be killed, but in the end we had to tell the children."

The family had to get a licence to take Jessica and Laura off the farm for two days while the pigs, 250 breeding cattle and Caroline were culled over the weekend.

"Caroline was killed on the Saturday night," says Susan, 50. "She had a good feed and they just gave her a lethal injection. It took about four hours. I was with her all the time.

"The other cattle were shot by the Army. I never went out. I couldn't. I had the radio on in here, the television on in the lounge... yet I could still hear the shots ringing out. The Army drove them away, then everything was silent. Even the birds left."

It was after the culling that Susan found Jessica's diary under her bed. "Dear Diary", she had written during one entry. "We have foot-and-mouth. Caroline has to be... I can't even say it and she has to be... with her baby inside. Please Lord, how come you did this to us?"

"I couldn't believe how distraught she was and how much it had affected her," says Susan. "I was sobbing after I'd read it and I showed it to Stephen (Jessica's father)."

As the contractors came in, spending weeks disinfecting the farm, the story of Jessica and her pet cow went across the world and came to the attention of Tony Blair. Stephen met the then Prime Minister and called for more funding to help farmers diversify.

Around that time, the cards and letters began arriving. People wrote of their own loss of beloved pets; some wrote poems, some sent church music on CDs, others drew pictures.

"I think it probably kept us going in a way," says Susan. "Replying to everyone and thanking them for taking the time to write. We kept them all for Jessica so when she was old enough to understand she could read through them."

"I'd forgotten how many there were," murmurs Jessica, looking through the pile.

Six months after the slaughter, and vets from across the world were still coming back and forth to the farm. Eventually, Susan asked a Spanish vet if she knew whether the tests for foot-and-mouth had been positive. No, she replied, they hadn't.

"So we had never had it in the first place," says Susan. "We had begged them not to cull the animals, to wait and see, but they did. It was all for nothing."

Stephen's family had farmed the County Durham fields around them for 400 years. They still have some arable land and rent out the outbuildings and fields and have converted outbuildings at their other farm in Kirk Merrington into industrial work units. But, as a family, they have decided they will never re-stock it.

"We couldn't go through it again," says Susan. "Jessica was traumatised by it all for so long afterwards, as were so many other children. My heart goes out to those people in Surrey. I hope the lessons have been learnt from the last time. You get over it, but you never forget what it was like."