CD2

(27 mins)
 

2/1

DANCES / LEARNING THE PIANO / MEETING HUSBAND / MRS BALE / WORKING AT 14 / MOTHER / LYNMOUTH FLOOD / EXE BRIDGE

[BJ asks if she had time for a social life at all] Yes. They used to have dances, when they could get away. But when you're working, you've always got to ask to go out. [BJ says she remembers her saying she walked to Withypool for a dance] [laughs] Yes, that's right, they walked to Withypool. Bridgetown, they always used to walk, they didn't bother to hire a car, they couldn't afford to. They could cycle, but if it was several of you, you might as well walk. [BJ asks if the people they met at the dance would also have walked in] Some of them. Some of them had come by car, if they could afford it, she expects. But there weren't so many cars until after the war. They used to hire sometimes. Dulverton used to be reasonable. They used to get one from someone called Evans, years ago. They would send a driver. So, if you got about 5 of you it was alright. A taxi service, that's right.

at the beginning of the last war, the buses used to come sometimes for dances at Minehead, special dances, at the Regal. They used to go in there some times. She used to love dancing, but her husband didn't dance. So she gave up, when she got married.

[BJ asks if she sang as well] Yes. [BJ asks when she learnt to play the piano and the organ] She didn't. She's entirely self-taught [laughs]. she must be gifted. It's just one of these things, she supposes. They used to have an old organ, a harmonium, at home. Then when her husband was in the forces she bought a piano. And learnt to read music, and learnt to play. Yes, she taught herself to read music. Because her children were both organists, the 2 younger ones. And they played the piano, so she picked their brains.

[BJ asks how old she was when she met her husband] Oh she doesn't know. Twenty-one or two, she supposes, something like that. She was working at the vicarage then. Still cooking. [BJ says so she'd moved on from working at Edbrooke, with Fanny's family] Oh, she only stayed down there. They used to keep the guesthouse, they had paying guests coming in, through the fishing time of the year. And then her brother died. So she went down again for a little while, with Mrs Bale, and they used to go all out for walks, together. Yes, she liked walking. She [Mrs Bale] used to go off for walks, and she used to go with her, because she was still rather upset. They'd go all up over Collie's Head, and right the way around, when it was nice weather.

She worked for Miss Le Bas for a while, her family. Only temporary jobs, just whilst someone was sick. [BJ says you never settled down in one place] Not until she was older. They were always glad of her at home, to help out. Because she was the young one.

[BJ says it sounds as if she didn't really enjoy the hard work that she had to do, that it all came too soon] Well, that's the problem, isn't it. Children of 14 nowadays, you don't think of them having to work, do you? She means at that age, they're still classed as young children, where they were out earning their living. And her mother, she worked on the farm at Nethercote [where BJ lives] when she came there. She forgets, were they Pearces or Rawles? Somebody or other. And does BJ know what she used to have for Sunday dinner? Chicken's neck in fat bacon, on a Sunday. [BJ says, the whole family had that] No, she was the maid, working on the farm. So they were very very poorly done by. She got married quite early. She was a Webber, from Wheddon Cross, at Cutcombe and she came down. Dad was from Winsford. Yes, she lived at Nethercote. She used to ride horseback and bring the eggs and butter down to the village. And she used to know Ernie Bevin. She used to say he was quite ignorant [laughs]. He used to call after her, she supposes, when she was on the horse back.

[BJ asks how many people would they have had working at Nethercote] Only her, she supposes, she doesn't know. [BJ says so she'd have to eat the chicken neck on her own] Yes, she expects so. It makes you laugh, really. She's not sure if it was Rawles or Pearces. She's got a feeling it was a relative of Victor's [Stevens]. She can't remember. She used to hear Mum talk about it. So they weren't kept any better, were they.

[BJ asks where she was when the river flooded, the Lynmouth flood] She was living down at Edbrooke Cottages, going home to Howetown twice a week to help out with Mum's work over there. She used to go over and do her washing. [BJ asks whether the flood affected her very much] Yes, she had to go through the woods, to get home. [BJ says it must have been quite impressive] Yes. To see that bridge put up, that wooden bridge, after the stone one that was there, the one over at Exe Bridge. It used to be a beautiful stone bridge, with arches, over there. And then they put that one up there. It's totally different.

But it always flooded in the village. Going back to being a child, she was always having to be carried across the wall there, to go home. The wall where Tim's [owner of post office] garden is now. If you had a thunderstorm, somebody would have to take them across. It always used to flood there, and across the other side. It was always bad there. But after the arches were gone, they built it differently, and altered the weir, and it doesn't flood very much now, she thinks.

[BJ says the parish records got damaged] So they say, yes. Which is a pity. [Back to top]
 

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HUSBAND'S CAREER / UPHOLSTERING / RAMC IN WARTIME

[BJ asks where her husband came from] Liverpool. She met him at a dance at Bridgetown. [BJ says even though he doesn't dance] That's right [laughs]. He was with a [lowers voice] a gang of soldiers, he was a soldier. [BJ asks if this was during the war] He was a regular soldier, actually. Yes, at the very beginning, he was at Dunkirk. [BJ asks what he was doing down there] They were at Baronsdown, waiting for the invasion. Baronsdown is the League Against Cruel Sports place, there was a great big house up there then. And they were waiting, they came there, because they thought the invasion was going to be from that area somewhere. Then they were sent all over the place.

[BJ says so it was a wartime romance] More or less [laughs]. More or less. [BJ asks if she followed him, went off with him] No. No, because he was in the country quite a bit, and then he went to D-Day landing, right through. He did about 6 and a half years, he didn't stay in. He was RAMC, a nurse actually. But he was an upholsterer, and his family were cabinet makers, and French polishers, all the way through. So he went back to his job when he came out of the forces, and went back to upholstery again. But his real trade was cinema seats, and there were very few cinemas in Winsford [laughs], so he had to travel.

She stayed there, and he would travel, and come back every second week, every third weekend, depending on what work was about. He used to do antique furniture in Winsford, and big furniture as well, in his spare time. Upholstering it. He did the chair BJ is sitting on. The majority of work, in the village, nearly every house has got something he's done. But, his real trade was cinema seating. [BJ says that's a bit thing to do, a lot of chairs] Yes, she's got photos of any amount of different ones. And the cafes, he used to do the cafe seating as well. He worked so hard, and those cinema seats were heavy, to carry about, you know. To unscrew them and take them out. But he liked it, so that's it.

[BJ asks where they lived then] Down at Edbrooke Cottages, she was there 42 years. She's only been where she is now [by the village green] 3 years. They were there 40-odd years. [BJ asks whether it was a difficult life, with him going away] No, not really. She always found something to do. She worked in the garden, like she does now, and while her mother was living at Howetown, she used to go over there. And he worked at Minehead, he had a workshop at Minehead as well. So when the buses ran through he'd go to and fro. He couldn't drive, she did the driving. She learnt nearly 30 years ago she supposes, she wasn't very young when she learnt, for the first time. She took her test in Minehead.

[BJ asks was it difficult, during the war, knowing her husband was going away and coming back] She never thought about it. She never thought about it. And she never thought, ever of him being killed. She never even thought that way. And all his mates used to get killed. People get telegrams and you'd think, 'It won't be me.' And it never was. Thank goodness for that. He died at an early age, he was only 56. She thinks a lot of it was through the stress and strain of the war, because it was awful. Picking up pieces of dead bodies, and one thing and another, in the RAMC, it's not a very easy life. They've got the dirty jobs, haven't they? He didn't used to talk about it very much. [Back to top]
 

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SISTER OLIVE / UNIFORM / VALUE OF MONEY / MOTHER / PARENTS' BACKGROUND / MOTHER AND NETHERCOTE

[BJ asks about her sister Olive dying at 18] She was working at Hoe Farm, on the Wheddon Cross road. She was cooking for the Stoddart family. It was his birthday and she was making a special sauce. A down draught caught her starched apron and it went in flames. She went up one flight of stairs and the other girl heard her screaming and came down the other. And by the time they reached her she was all in flames. And they rolled her up in a rug and took her to hospital, but she didn't survive. Their parents never really got over it.

[BJ says you must have been close to her] Yes, very close. Very close. They did everything together, dressed the same when they were children. And her other sister, she was older [breaks off] She [AT] met somebody one day at Dulverton, not very many years ago, and they asked if she was one of the Miss Gardners. She said yes, and he said, 'Which one?'. She said it didn't really matter, because she didn't know what he had heard [laughs]. But with three of them more or less [the same age], when they were younger, they used to be about together.

[BJ asks if she wore a starched apron when she worked] Yes she did. She always wore either a check dress and a starched apron and a cap. And in the afternoon a black dress and a little apron, and black shoes and black stockings. White cuffs. [BJ asks if they provided the clothes for her] No. You provided it yourself, out of your 50 bob [laughs]. She was more than that, she was nearly £1 a week, when she finished. She supposes that was a lot of money. No, you found your own [uniform]. [BJ asks what year £1 a week would have been] [thinks] 1941, probably. You bought everything yourself, yes. Yes, you didn't have a lot of money left, really. But it helps you now, to be careful now. You don't throw it away, because you learnt at an early age that money doesn't grow on trees.

[BJ asks about her mother's eyesight] She was like her sister [now], she was partially sighted. She couldn't see to read or anything. [BJ says was that from an early age] No, after she was about 80, 82. She had her for the last 3 years of her life. She was so full of fun. You'd never have realised - she'd got jet black hair, and it never changed colour. It's like hers, she's never had anything done, it stays the same. And her mother's was jet black. And she had a stroke, and AT went to the hospital and didn't know her, her hair was grey, and she couldn't recognise her, it had changed.

[BJ asks how long her mother worked up at Nethercote] She doesn't know, about 4 years, she expects. About 4 years. She was married very early. Because doesn't think she was much more than 18. She could have left school early. She means, they were leaving at 12 or 13, as soon as they were old enough to work, they were working. She thinks she was small, but she was 14 when she left school. She thinks she married at 18, or 19, something like that. She was at Cutcombe school, Dad was Winsford. She thinks her father, and her uncle, were both from there. Grandfather must have been from there, she thinks. Of course they can't go back on the records because they've [the parish] lost them [in the flood]. Her brother, and all the older ones that knew all the family, are gone, are dead, so they can't trace them up. But she knows her auntie bought, after the Aclands gave up, the little cottage that was part of Dowry Cottage, which they've all had in together, and after her grandmother died, her auntie bought it for him (her grandfather). He didn't stay there, he got married twice more. He finished up in Chard, he was 91.

So, she thinks they went to Winsford school, but whether it was the same school, she doesn't know. But Uncle and Dad went there to school. So, mother was from Cutcombe, so he must have met her while she was working at Nethercote.

[BJ says it's quite far to go from Cutcombe to Nethercote] Yes, but they didn't go home very much she doesn't expect. She doesn't know.

[BJ says presumably if they had a maid in the house they must have had other people working outside] Yes. Dad might have worked there, as a boy. She doesn't know. He could have been working there. [BJ asks if she thinks the lane was any better] She shouldn't have thought so [laughs]. Her mother used to ride horseback, she knows that, to Nethercote. That's before she knew anything, because she's never seen her ride a horse [laughs]. They've got a horse and wagon [photograph] there, on show [in the exhibition] and somebody said that was Mrs Gardner and her baby. She could recognise Bob Mitchell, but she doesn't recognise her mother, or anybody else that's there. [Back to top]
 

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DARBY'S KNAP / EDBROOKE COTTAGES

[BJ asks why Darby's Knap, the new housing association houses, are called Darby's Knap] Because Mr Darby used to walk there Sunday mornings, when he used to come out of church, down and up again. But they always knew that place as Windy Knap, so she doesn't know why they called it Darby's Knap. He used to live at Liscombe, and he used to come to church on Sundays. And she supposes after church he used to walk down as far as there and back, before he walked home to Liscombe again. Knap means hill. They always called it Windy Knap. And it is a windy place, she'd never go build houses down there.

Edbrooke Cottages were never supposed to have been built there really, that was a mistake. It was dilapidation houses, what would be called slum clearances now. Two tenants were from Bridgetown people and 2 were from Winsford, this area. And she supposes Squire Everard let them [the council] have a piece of ground, and they kept them up as far as they could, that way. But they say now it was a mistake, they should never have been built there, because it was out of the place altogether [outside the village boundary]. But they let in all those people.

[BJ asks where the slum clearance people came from] Houses that were over there, across from her. That house she was saying her grandfather had, the Gays were there. That was all to pieces, they let those in. [BJ says, so they pulled those houses down] Well, it was made into one house there. And one from Bridgetown. Two from Dulverton, she thinks, came out there, as well. And with the packing from Dulverton, they brought out beetles, and that place was swarming with beetles, when she went in there. [BJ says, of course you lived there yourself, and that she must have been quite pleased they were built] [hesitates] She doesn't say anything about it, because BJ's recording it [laughs]. When she went in there, it was [hesitates] it was an awful place. They used to call it Chinatown, and Flea Terrace, and all sorts. She threatened she'd never go there, but she did. And they worked on it, and worked on it, and worked on it and made a nice place. But the council would never do anything there. And now they've done so much, haven't they, down there?

[BJ asks if it was the people from Winsford who were sad that they were building outside the village boundary] Well nobody minded. It wasn't that. It was when they applied for houses, because she thinks Esmond Ford applied in his own place, where they built Darby's Knap cottages, he applied for a bungalow, because he'd got a farm and he'd got cows and things, and he lived up above Karslake House. And he applied for planning permission and was turned down every time. And when they said about these being built down there, they were told they were never supposed to be built there, they were outside the building area. But he never got permission. And she was surprised, that he sold his ground for somebody else. She wouldn't have. Because he tried and tried to get a bungalow there, because he kept cows, and goats, and sheep. He'd got a couple of fields there she supposes.

[END OF RECORDING] [Back to top]