Country diary: Martha, a tribute to Buxton’s miners, has been knocked off her plinth. Why? | Mark Cocker

Buxton, Derbyshire: Acts of vandalism are not unusual. Have we normalised the destruction of ‘common ground’? Our town is blessed to have the Buxton Civic Association, a charity devoted to the built and natural environment. It owns and manages, for wildlife and people, almost all our important woods, including Grin Low, which was a historically important area for lime‑burning. To celebrate that industry, the civic society commissioned wooden sculptures – Charlie, then Martha – to highlight the important work done by miners in uplifting the fertility of Derbyshire’s farmland. Martha’s origins are bittersweet. She was created out of a groundswell of public outrage and generosity when Charlie was vandalised in 2021. In quick order, the same nihilism was visited on Martha after her installation: she was daubed with swastikas and her eyes gouged out. The sculptor, Lorraine Botterill, repaired the damage, but this week, two years after Martha had been reinstated, she’s been smashed off her wooden plinth. Last week, the charity Hurst Farm, working on the outskirts of Matlock, suffered similar desecration. Their youth volunteers, aged between 11 and 14, had just put the f