Wiltshire

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The family lived first at Starvall Farm, but I was born in a thatched farm cottage at Fresden, which was just two isolated cottages a mile and a half from Coleshill. The first home I really remember was at the bottom of Eastrop Hill in Highworth. It was two houses knocked into one, with a huge great living room, kitchen, and a parlour. There were two bedrooms upstairs. The front door opened into the scullery, with a red and black tiled floor, coconut matting, a big copper, and a big open fireplace with two hobs: one an oven and the other a hot water tank with a tap. There were deep cupboards on either side. There was a large pantry, a great big scrubbed table, and a whacking great dresser. The parlour became a bedsitting room for Grandma (Mother's mother, the only grandparent I knew) when she came from Bishopstone to live with us. Lighting was by oil lamps, and sanitation was an outhouse at the end of the garden--a one-and-a-half-holer over a pit which had to be emptied out by Father every so often. Father had no education, and couldn't read or write. He was a farm labourer and head cowman. In later years he worked for Mr. Wolfe Barry, son of Sir John Wolf Barry (architect of the Barry Docks and of Tower Bridge). Father wore a milking smock to work, and earned 14 shillings a week. Mother worked in the mat factory, the Vorda Works, making coconut matting, and got 16 shillings a week. She wore a "palm"; of leather with a steel patch to push the needle through the mats. She had to bring work home. When Mother went off with another man, Flo took over running the house. She worked on finishing mats and I had to help. The mats came in rolls with lengths of the fibre connecting the mats, and this had to be cut and woven back in. When I was old enough I had to do a dozen before I went to bed. Food included rabbits, chicken, meat--a weekend joint and pieces for stews. Vegetables--cabbages, savoys, broccoli, cauliflower, parsnips, onions, turnips, swedes (from the fields), runner beans, broad beans, peas and potatoes--all grown in the garden. For a while Father also had an allot-ment, although that may have been just an excuse for him to stop off at the pub and have a drink. In Highworth the pubs were the Fox, the Fishes, the Red Lion, the White Horse, and the Saracen's Head. For afters we had tapioca and rice puddings, pancakes, fruit and custard on Sundays, suet puddings, boiled in a cloth, either ";currant duff"; or plain with jam. Jam was always home-made--plum, blackcurrant, goose- berry, redcurrant, and rhubarb. I was 12 before I tasted marmalade--- Mum went shopping into Swindon and brought a jar back, but it was bitter and I didn't like it. Mum and a couple of other women would go into Swindon on a Saturday afternoon. One day they bought some margarine at a Maypole shop, and that was my first taste of margarine. My first tomato was when I was about 10 or 11, and I didn't like it. You got to Swindon on a cheap train from Highworth, by way of Hannington, Stanton Fitzwarren, and Stratton St. Margaret. There were three houses together where we lived. At the back there was a concrete yard with a big brick shed and coalhouse. In the shed there were ";prongs";--T-bar digging forks and pitchforks--spades, and dutch and draw hoes, rakes, and dibbers (including a special long one, 4"; in diameter, with a 1"; cross grip, for planting potatoes). There was a large front garden and a huge back garden. They were all flowers in the front--lilies, michaelmas daisies, ";Granny nightcaps"; Father did look after the front garden. Some kids would play in the lane and keep kicking their ball into the front garden. Eventually Dad wouldn't let them have their ball back, so young Charlie Southam went bawling home to his father. Pretty soon the father came to our front door, with ";Please, I be come to ax thee civil, ut thee gi'e I my boy's ball. "; To which Father said ''No ! I usn't. "; Reply: ";Thee rotten bugger. . . "; and so on. The way people used to speak: ";Her be a lazy wench"; ";Tha's needn't come home with that sart of talk, tha bist the same wench as when tha went."; "Tha bisn't in Lunnon now, tha bist at 'ome."; and one of Dad's favourite sayings when it was raining out: ";There en't nobody out partickler while I be in."; My old Dad was a plodder. He'd plod on and on and do what we had to do. He wouldn't just knock off. If there was something on the farm he thought needed doing he'd stay and do it. At the Coronation in 1911 we had Coronation mugs, a holiday from school, and a party on the front lawn of Highworth School--we were usually only allowed on the back grass--sitting on the grass, with bread and butter and currant buns. We were all given flags to wave. We were all lined up and we marched around the centre of the town and then back to the school. We had combs with tissue paper and played them going around the town. I remember singing:

Bring the comb and play upon it!
Marching here we come!
Willie cocks his highland bonnet,
Johnnie beats the drum
Mary Jane commands the party,
Peter leads the rear;
Feet in time, alert and hearty,
Each a Grenadier!

We wore red, white and blue sashes and carried flags. The headmaster of the school was a Mr. Booth--we used to call him Featherlegs because his trouser legs used to flap as he walked. He always carried a walking stick on his arm. He would cane children for the least thing. I remember being caned across both hands. Miss Wise was very short and wore high heels--she was a bitch and I hated her. In the 6th form I was top of the class. One day I was sent to buy some writing paper and envelopes from the stationer, because I was top of the class. Mr. Gale, another teacher, an elderly bachelor, was a very nice man. He lodged with the Woodbridges--I think Mr. Woodbridge was a harness- maker Other teachers were Miss Dorothy and Miss Clara (I think) Smith. There were 6 or 7 classes (the infants were in a very old-fashioned school the other side of the road). Now and again we used to walk to Faringdon to Mr. Goddard's shop, the draper--clothing, materials, bed-linen, and shoes. More often Mr. Goddard came around with his van. You paid one or two shillings a week. The first car that came through Highworth, I can remember, belonged to the Pleydell-Bouveries. People would say "People'll be getting run over with these yer motors . " The shops in Highworth included Marsh's the draper, Smith's for sweets tobacco, oil and groceries. Tovey's the bakers (who made lardy cake). At Christmas, or some certain time in the year, there had been a bequest left by some lady that there should be a pound of bread from Tovery's for each family member, and the same with a butcher for half-a-pound of beef for each person. That made our Christmas joint, being a big family. On the afternoon of Christmas Eve there ~-would be quite a to-do getting the bread and the beef. Every so often there was some money distributed under another bequest. Our Christmas dinner was beef, vegetables, Christmas pudding with custard (made from packets). At teatime there would be bread and butter and jam, Christmas cake and mince pies. Other shops in Highworth were a butcher, later taken over as Mr. Reason's, and a coalman, Mr. Baldwin. We didn't use the greengrocer since we grew all our own. Christmas stockings were our ordinary black woollen stockings. There were always a few nuts in the toe--cob nuts, walnuts, almonds and brazils--then an apple and an orange and sometimes a banana, and a little packet of fruit- drops, a small book, some pencils, a pair of stockings, a sugar watch made of icing with a paper face on it. The main present was nearly always a doll-- eventually a china-headed one that went to sleep- -I thought that was wonderful ! In the snow there would be a slide in the lane, and plenty of snowballing when the snow was deep enough. I can't ever remember having a snowman. My mother was Methodist at one time, but I suppose she rowed with some of the Methodists and we went to the Congregational chapel. As children we went to Sunday School morning and afternoon, and chapel in the evening. After Mother left us, Elsie and I stayed with Dad, and we were far better dressed than before. He took us to a Miss Smith in Westrop Hill; she was dressmaker and made us some beautiful blue dresses with a white tucked yoke--I felt quite posh! There were five roads out of Highworth: Eastrop to Faringdon, Westrop down to Lechlade, the Swindon Road, the Shrivenham road, Hampton Hill to Hannington and perhaps to Cricklade. I first travelled by train at about the age of 12 and went to Swindon for a Christmas treat given.by the Buffaloes, at a swimming baths (all covered up, of course). They served the food, then cleared the tables away and had a film show. When my mother went off with this other man she took Ri and Jess the two youngest children with her. Eva was in service at a boys' college beyond Faringdon somewhere. She was very good and would come home as often as she could, get clothes for us, and must have spent nearly all her month's money on Elsie and me. At school we would sing

Vote, vote, vote for Mr. Lambert
Kick old Cawley out of doors
For he's only made of tin
And we'll never let him in
And he won't come to Highworth any more.

We would be Liberals versus Tories, calling names and booing. One group would yell out ";We're not afraid of you--we've got Alice Collett on our side!"

At school we learned writing with copybooks, lots of dictation, arithmetic (getting up to algebra in the top two classes), history, geography, nature study and drill--physical jerks. There was some sort of day with tea on the grass, and games, at least once a year, but I couldn't tell you what it was for. I worked for a little while on a farm at Hannington, at Bidemill Farm, working on the farm and in the house--including driving the horse with a swath - turner. The farm was owned by a Mr. and Mrs. Brinkworth. They had cows and some hunting horses, which Mr. Brinkworth bred. There was a son, Freddy, about 10 years old, and a girl of about 7; they went to Miss Someone's school, a private school in Highworth. He was a swine, that boy--he would hit me around the legs with a riding crop. I only stayed there a year--you had to stay in a job for a year to get a reference. We lived at Castle Eaton after Hannington, so I left Bidemill Farm. I lived in there, but you had to have somewhere to go on your day off. I went into service at Keble House in Fairford, the home of the deceased brother of the late John Keble. The household was made up of old Mrs. Keble, bedridden, two spinsters, Miss Edith and Miss Grace, and one of the daughters, Mrs. Kestell-Cornish, wife of an army officer, who had two children, the boy at Keble College. Some people who lived next door to us at Castle Eaton had a daughter who worked as cook there, who told us that they needed a girl to train as parlourmaid. They kept a cook, a housekeeper, a kitchenmaid, a nursemaid, and a parlourmaid.

I had to walk 5 miles home to Fairford on half-days. I might have one Sunday in four at home; the weekly half-days started after lunch had been washed up, perhaps around 2 o'clock, and I had to be in by 8 or 9 o'clock. Eventually I got a second-hand bike and I cycled both ways. There were a lot of soldiers billeted in Fairford; the cook's husband was overseas in the Army. This was Ruth Card whose mother lived next door or next but one to us in Castle Eaton. The kitchenmaid had a soldier boyfriend. I stayed there for a year.

The baker who delivered at Castle Eaton came from Water Eaton, and had a daughter, Miss Akers, who was housekeeper for the Swinsteads. They needed a general housemaid at ";Holmwood";, Cedar Road, Sutton. The housekeeper did the cooking. Mr. Swinstead had been art master at Christ's Hospital, Horsham, and his wife had been needlework misstress at the girls' Bluecoat school in Hertfordshire.

At Sutton the only exciting thing for me was that in Cedar Road there were some very large houses, 10-bedroomed houses. There were soldiers billeted in the empty houses. They would form them up at the end of the road then all march down. I would often be cleaning the hammered copper nameplate on the front door, and there would be all kinds of whistles. I gave them a wink now and again!

At Swinsteads you were lucky to get out by 3: 30 p. m. on your half-day, and then you had to get in by 9 p. m. I met Elsie Benham, who worked in the cab office in Sutton, and used to go to her house on my half-day. She and her parents lived in Church Lane. Mrs. Benham was very good to me-- better than my own mother, in fact. Although I was only the maid, after I had left and was working at the Wallington County School, Mrs. Swinstead invited me to go and have a cup of tea with her.

In about 1919 I moved to Mr. and Mrs. Pope, Holland Park, Sutton, to a better-paid job. They also had a large house in Norfolk. One daughter, an old maid of about 50 years old, lived at home, and she was exceptionally nice to work for. Even after I was married she came to Carshalton to tea and to lunch one day,. I went home for a while because Mum was ill, then I went to work for Wallington County School for Girls. I knew Alice Truman from Swindon who worked there; I worked there for about two and a half years.

I was married at Epsom Registry Office. We lived in Pound Street, Carshalton, where we had two rooms with Mrs. Simmons, a widow with three children, two of them grown up and working. We shared the kitchen and she would usually have her Sunday dinner on a Saturday just for our convenience. ALICE WINCHESTER (nee COLLETT) 1982

Edited for the Internet by Darren J. Wheatley

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[Last updated: 26th September 2000 - Brian Pears]