I have recently discovered, through the internet site of Richard Foxcroft (www.telfordsites.co.uk) that on the far side of the road, continuing the line of the canal, there was, when the canal was in use, a railway line, which ran to Donnington.

The house was not connected to much in the way of services. Our water we collected from what I believed to be a spring, at the end of the canal, close to the road. My sister, Gladys, however, tells me that this was a tap, although she does agree with the location. I must bow to her superior knowledge in this case. She is, after all considerably older!

I do remember my mother collecting water for laundry from the brook which flowed past the back door. Gladys, once again, tells me that the primitive toilet was placed directly over this brook! Upstream? I’m not sure!

My elder sister, Betty inscribed her name indelibly in the family folklore during our stay here. The story goes that Betty, about sixteen at the time, was preparing to boil a kettle on a Primus stove which was standing on a table. This device had a small circular reservoir for methylated spirit, above which was a burner. The main, circular fuel tank, held paraffin which was pressurised by an in-built hand pump. The pressure forced the paraffin upwards, through a jet to the burner. Lighting of this device was effected by a match applied to the meths, which heated the burner and vapourised and ignited the paraffin. So much for the theory!

It seems that Betty had over-filled the meths reservoir and the spirit had overflowed down the stove and onto the table-cloth. She now applied the match! In seconds the stove was engulfed in blue flames, and the table-cloth was adding to the blaze! Betty took one look at this situation and knew precisely how to cope. She gathered up the flaming mass and went, like a bat out of hell, out of the house, across the grass to the canal bank, where she commited the whole lot to the muddy water.

Weatherwise, the two months we were in this area was about the worst time we could have chosen. We arrived on December 12th 1940 and departed on February 17th 1941. During this time there was heavy snowfall and the canal was frozen over at some point. It was quite usual to see swans and ducks alighting on the water, but they seemed incapable of recognising the solid surface of ice. Perhaps the poor things, swans in particular, were commited to the landing and were unable to abort. They came down in the usual way, flared out just above the surface and put their feet forward whilst beating backwards with their wings. Then they hit the slippery ice and all hell broke loose as they slid to a panic-stricken halt, in a jumble of wings, legs, tail-feathers and neck. They then gathered themselves and, with as much dignity as they could muster, began to slip and slide across the ice to their intended destination. It was really quite sad to see such an elegant aerial approach descend in seconds into such terrestrial pantomime!

A short distance away, on the far side of the road, lived a Mr and Mrs Jacks. Later in the war, in 1944, we met these people again in a different part of the same area, when we went to stay with them, in order I think to gain some respite from the ‘Doodle-Bug’ campaign which was being waged mainly against the South-East. They had moved house and were living at Lightmoor, near Coalbrookdale. The house in which they now lived was being very firmly nudged from behind by a slag heap, which had been produced by the local, worked out iron mine. Quite where these noble people housed the close on a dozen ‘visitors’ who descended upon them is a mystery to me, as it seemed to me to be an ordinary terraced cottage!

We kids explored these grass-covered heaps, which extended to a considerable height above the houses. Up on the top were several brick-built domes, with a circular hole in the top. These were about four feet high and covered the ventilation shafts of the mine workings below. Stones which we dropped down could be heard bouncing off the sides, before splashing into the water of the flooded subterranean tunnels.

Not far down the dusty track, which ran parallel to a single track railway line, one came to Lightmoor Platform, so insignificant a “station” as to not even qualify as a “halt”! Close to this was a junction from which one line led to Little Dawley and the other to Horsehay, trains having come from Wellington. (I think I have correctly described the juxtaposition of these places, but if locals or railway “buffs” tell me I am wrong, then I will gladly stand corrected!)
There was also a roof tile factory close by and for a long time after our visit to to the area we would look on the back of any tiles we came across, often to find the word “LIGHTMOOR” impressed in the clay.

Mr and Mrs Jacks lived in the house at one end of a row of about ten and the whole row was noticeably lower at their end as, so we were told, they were sinking due to the mining activity below. Whatever the reason for this subsidence, it is certainly true that the cellar was three feet deep in water.

I am sure that all this landscape has long since been swept away, to become part of the connurbation of Telford.
This process of regeneration had already begun when we were there. I clearly remember seeing, on a walk to Little Dawley, bulldozers levelling the blue-grey slag heaps which scarred the horizon. I know we all yearn for times past and say that modern urban planning leaves brick and concrete jungles, but these man-made mountains were the most dreadful of eyesores and we all remember Aberfan.

One small memory I have of that visit to Little Dawley, is of a yellow and black enamelled advertisement bearing the legend “Wrights Coal-Tar Soap”, high up on the wall of a building.

I was in the second class at Chelsfield Primary School, when the teacher drew our attention to a very serious-looking man who had entered the classroom. “This gentleman is a School Inspector,” she announced. “Just carry on with what you are doing, and he will walk around amongst you. He may want to ask you a few questions. Just answer clearly, if you are spoken to.”

He proceeded to stalk, self-importantly around the room, stopping here and there to speak to pupils. He stopped beside me. “Hello,” he said, “And what is your name?” “Barry” I replied. “And what is your other name?” “Marchant.” “Oh,” quoth he, “That’s the same as mine, but mine’s Merchant!”

My reaction to this was “And he’s a School Inspector and he thinks that’s the same!”

Some time after writing this anecdote I showed it to my sister, Betty, who is ten years my senior. She read the story and then, mentioning a local dignitary of the time who had been a school inspector, said, “Silly old fool! It wasn’t old Billy Fox was it?”

Each year, when this day came around, the whole school had to assemble on the playground. Some of the children were furnished with Union Jacks which they flourished enthusiastically as we lined up, facing in the general direction of the flagpole, which was situated in one corner of the playground.

We then went through some form of “parade” which culminated in our singing God Save The King. The Headmistress, Miss Shelton, or “Nod and Blink” as she was known to generations of children, would then attach a suitably sizeable Union Jack to the flagpole rope and attempt to hoist it aloft. I say “attempt to” advisedly. What in fact happened was that she would tug on the rope, to no avail. She would then gaze skywards and announce to her expectant charges, “It must be off the pulley!” She would then detach the flag from the rope and we would all trudge back into school and resume our lessons.This ritual would be repeated year after year, and as the flag was attached to the rope, I would think to myself, “That flag is not going up the pole because the rope is off the pulley, just like it was last year!” Sure enough, came the confident tug on the rope, followed by the annual peering to the top of the flagpole, and the announcement I knew would be coming. “It must be off the pulley!” In my six years at the school the flag never once made it up the pole!

My class, c. 1946
Back row (L-R): ?, Julie Huggins, David Bourne, ?, Eric Shoebridge, ?, Brian Edwards, Evelyn Keeton, me, ?, Norman Sampson, Anthea Jeffries, Geoffrey Scott
Middle row (L-R): Eric Costin, Ann Saunders, ?, Ann Hillier, Norman Smith, Shirley Thomas, Michael Hollot, ?, Geoffrey Hume, ?, ?
Front row (L-R) : Roy Widger, Audrey Blackamore, ?, Valerie Skinner, Garth Davis, Margaret Smith, Tony Blackamore, ?, Peter Bowles

At some point in the proceedings I decided to demonstrate my familiarity with the ways of the world by raising two fingers, in the ‘V’ sign. On seeing this, my mother, also demonstrating her knowledge of current, wartime, affairs, asked, “What does that mean? ‘V’ for victory?” Confident in my newly acquired vocabulary and thinking “Don’t these grown-ups know anything?” I replied, “No! FUCK!”

The detonation of Barnes Wallis’s ‘Tallboy’ paled into insignificance compared to the explosion of shock and disgust, which emanated from my mother! “Where did you learn that disgusting word?” she demanded, red-faced and shaken. “Don’t ever let me hear you say that again!” I detected that this was more than I could handle alone and desperately sought a way of laying-off the odds. I, therefore, immediately implicated my older brothers in the crime. “Ted and Ron told me it,” I pleaded, thinking, “What the hell have I hit on here?” and “If it’s so bad, how come she knows it?”

I don’t remember anything further about this event, but I suspect my brothers were none too pleased with my eagerness to pass the buck.

At some point after witnessing this meeting I had a dream. In this dream I was standing at the side of the road in which we lived, at a point about 250 yards distant from our own front path. Once again, for the benefit of those in the know, this was outside the Blackmore abode. As I stood there, I saw an R.A.C. patrolman on a motorcycle and sidecar, turn in at the top of the hill, from the direction of St. Mary Cray. He pulled up beside me and asked, “Does Mr Marchant live up here?” I will not pretend that I know if and how I replied. What I do know, without a shadow of doubt, is that at some point in the days following, this very thing took place. I was standing in the very spot, when I saw the R.A.C. man turn in from the same direction I had dreamed. He stopped beside me, as I knew he would and asked, “Does Mr Marchant live up here?” I must have answered in the affirmative, because he went off in the right direction! I have no doubt a number of people reading this will be sceptical and understandably so. I can only tell you, it happened!

—

The occasional lesson taken in the garden of Chelsfield school on a sunny summer’s afternoon.

—

The damp, musty concrete smell of the school air-raid shelter to which we had to repair in the event of an air raid.

—

Standing in front of our house and seeing a fighter plane, which I think was a Hurricane, in a shallow dive, seemingly just above our roof. I distinctly remember the roar and rattle of the engine and the camouflage colours of the paintwork. It was clear, even to a four year old, that it was out of control and was going to crash.

—

During air-raids my father always stood outside the Anderson shelter, to watch the aerial activity, but to us children always said “You get in that shelter, it’s not safe out here!” There were enemy aircraft overhead, which were being engaged by our anti-aircraft guns. On the morning following I used to go out and collect shrapnel which had fallen to earth, and it was not difficult to find. Dad was quite right, it was not safe out there, except apparently for him! Maybe he knew something the rest of us didn’t, or had direct communication to someone influential, because he survived the war!

—

An official of some description, but I know not who or what, came to the school for the purpose of checking the children’s gas masks. On inspecting mine he declared it unserviceable, due to a cracked visor. This was in the form of a piece of transparent plastic material, oval in shape and sewn into the rubber mask. “I shall take this away and bring you another,” said he. “Meet me here, in the cloakroom, before you go home this afternoon”. I waited at the appointed time and place but saw neither hide nor hair of this worthy, nor yet of my replacement respirator. As a consequence, I must have been the the only child in the country who spent the entire war without a gas mask. But thereagain, I was the youngest of six children, and as such was probably regarded as expendable. The fact is, of course, that the German High Command was aware of my predicament, and being unwilling to make war on defenceless children, resisted the urge to use poison gas against South-East England!

—

The newly painted classrooms on returning to school after the summer holidays. Always the same colours; cream above, dark green below with a black line round the middle.

—

The utterly disgusting beakers, made of some form of plastic material, possibly casein, from which we drank, sometimes our milk and sometimes water. They were of about three different ‘colours’ and all uniformly filthy, being only ever rinsed under a cold tap.

—

Living in the house next door was a boy, six months younger than myself, who proved himself, at our very first encounter, to be thoroughly unpleasant. I distinctly remember that we faced each other through a paling fence and that he, after a few seconds of silent confrontation, spat in my face. This was my introduction to Norman, who proved, over the seven years we lived in that house, to be a bully, a liar and a petty thief. Should he, or his thoroughly decent older brother, Eric, read these words, then I can only say that it was so. He is still remembered in my family for his propensity for stealing and running off with any item small enough to carry. Seen making-off down our path with his ill-gotten gains, we would challenge him with “Hey!, that’s ours!” to which he replied “‘S’mine now!” and continue running!

The story I intended telling, however, is of his waylaying of me on my journey home from school. The school day started and ended with a walk of about a mile, to and from home. In the morning I usually had an older brother for company, but the homeward journey I walked alone. I was five years old and in the infants class, so possibly my school day finished earlier than my brother’s. Howsoever, this little nasty used to make sure he was ahead of me and would wait, out of sight, always at the same spot. When I reached his “lair” he would appear in front of me, saying “Fight!” I was really frightened of him, and all day I dreaded the homeward journey. I usually managed to get past him and he then followed me home, with more demands that I put my fists up and similar phrases. I cannot say, accurately, how long I had to endure this torment, but I do know that it was weeks. Suddenly there was a dramatic turnaround!

One afternoon I reached the feared spot and my tormentor appeared. “Fight!” he demanded and this time threw a fist, which just grazed my face. This was too much! I let fly with my fists and I gave him a pasting, the like of which he had never had before, or probably, since! I am not sure which of us was the more surprised. It had never crossed my mind in those weeks of bullying by this pint-sized thug that I might be able to beat him in a fight. But beat him I did, and reduced him to a quivering jelly. What’s more, over the ensuing weeks I followed his example, and I used to wait for him in the same spot. I showed him the same fear that he had shown me and I just hope he learned something!

—

The outbreak of war saw the establishment of an ‘army’ comprised mainly of men either too old or too young for military service. Their purpose was to act as resistance fighters in the event of occupation. The title originally given to this body was ‘Local Defence Volunteers’. The abbreviation to L.D.V. soon gave rise to the corruption ‘Look, Duck and Vanish’ and so the title was changed to ‘Home Guard’.

The local branch of this fine body of warriors took as their training area, the park adjacent to our home. Their parade facility was the clubhouse of the Westcombe Park Rugby Club. They would meet there on Sunday mornings and take part in various military activities, among which was training in the use of that fearsome weapon of destruction, the Smith gun. Two of these were kept in the clubhouse. The gun was run out for action on its two solid wheels. When the appropriate position was reached, it was turned over onto one of its wheels. This allowed it to traverse, in order to engage enemy tanks, trucks and infantry. I believe this device could hurl its projectile, under favourable conditions, a full one hundred yards. Don’t risk it, Fritz!

Smith gun details: www.home-guard.org.uk

—

My Father

The Home Guard played a prominent role on this particular year, however. They demonstrated their prowess as fighting men, with demonstrations of their expertise with the previously mentioned Smith gun, as well as with their other weapon of mass destruction, the legendary trench mortar. They were at their most impressive, though, with their signals demonstrations. From their position at the cricket pavilion they used an Aldis lamp to send, in morse code, the names of the various competitors in these events, and each person’s guess as to the numbers. They also signalled the results of races etc. These signals were received by further members of this elite band, who were positioned about a mile-and-a-half away in the lantern roof of a fortuitously placed house on a hill-top. This group of people received these messages and, at the conclusion of the festivities, signalled the results back to the pavilion. The winners of the various competitions were then announced.

However, my father stole their thunder by providing an express results service! He had been a signaller in the first world war and was expert in morse, semaphore etc. As soon as he saw what was happening he ensconced himself at the far side of the recreation ground from the signallers, in line of sight with both positions. With a small group around him he happily read out the outward signals and then, later, all the incoming results!

—

During my last year at primary school, I was one of a small group of pupils who had to undergo a weekly dose of religious indoctrination at the hands of the village vicar, Rev McKay. These lessons took place in the village hall, or ‘Reading Room’ as it was quaintly named. We would sit for half-an-hour, huddled round a small gas fire, while this boring, vindictive old bastard would try to make us learn various religious tracts. I never knew how our education was supposed to be furthered by this claptrap and I can certainly remember wondering on many occasions “Does this old fool seriously believe all this?”.

—

“Look out, here comes Gilham!” was a warning often given by one or other of we kids as we played in the local park. ‘Gilham’ was of course the hated enemy, the park-keeper with whom we carried on a running battle for all of the seven years we lived there. What is it about park-keepers? I suppose today they would happily find employment as traffic wardens! The man in question was always hounding us, and whilst we were not angels, neither were we the threat to his domain that he saw in us. The occasion that I remember is when he came after us for some perceived crime. We all ran off, but the smallest among us, Charlie Tyler, who was five years old at the most, left behind a pull-along toy. I seem to remember that he had been given this at Christmas and that it was a wooden lorry. From a short distance away, we watched our tormentor ‘capture’ this item and pull it behind him as he pushed his wheelbarrow back to his lair! I believe some of the older boys went and got it back, no doubt with a telling off for whatever act of civil disobedience we had all perpetrated.

—

At roughly eleven years old I developed a liking for a little girl of about nine. Her name was Jill Sage and I took to accompanying her towards her home each day, after school. As her home was not directly en route to mine, this involved a bit of a detour. On the first occasion I did so, my mother demanded to know why I was late getting home. I told her where I had been during the lost fifteen minutes, at which she became very cross and told me I was not to do so again. Some chance! Every day for some time after, the pattern was the same. I would go with Jill and rush back home on my bike. Then the inevitable “Have you been with that girl again?” “No!” “Yes you have!”. One afternoon I went as far as Jill’s house and in so doing, passed the home of some family friends, Dave and Alice Sawyer. On arrival home I went through the same question and answer ritual with my mother. That evening the parents decided we should visit Dave and Alice. As we got out of the car at their house, the first thing Alice said to me was, “Hello Barry, I saw you go past with your girlfriend this afternoon”. And of course to employ a modern expression, the shit hit the fan! Thanks Alice!

—

The day I famously set fire to a field of long grass, whilst making a ‘campfire’ in one corner. This to the consternation of my mother and sister, who caught sight of the conflagration as they walked home from the village.

—

Another occasion, in the same field, whilst out walking the dog, I heard a doodlebug approaching and turned to watch for it. It came very low over a nearby woodland known as Oashes Wood and the whole of the rear fuselage was aflame as occasionally happened if the pulse-jet engine developed a fault. The engine spluttered and stopped as it was almost overhead. I grabbed the dog and lay flat on top of it, in fear for my life and thinking my last minutes had come. However, it continued its glide and came down in Petts Wood, some three miles distant, crashing onto a bungalow and killing two unfortunate people.

Just outside the village was Lilleys Farm, which I passed on my way to school each morning. (But probably not on the way home, as I often made a detour!) On the evening of June 20th 1944 a V1 ‘Doodlebug’, apparently intercepted by a Mosquito fighter, came down at this farm. A large house, presumably originally the farmhouse, was destroyed. These premises were used as a kennels and were owned by a Mr and Mrs Chapman, both of whom, sadly, were killed. The memory I have is of the oddly conical pile of rubble, to which this lovely house was reduced.

—

The next memory is of my older brother, Ted, whom I trust will forgive me. He is my senior by six years, so at the time of this event he was about 16 and I was 10. I believe he was working as a baker’s roundsman at the time and was about as short-tempered as any lad of that age. I have an enduring memory of Ted coming home from work one evening, in a foul temper and hurling himself down into a wooden kitchen chair. What I have never forgotten about this, is that the chair made no attempt whatsoever to arrest his floorwards progress! As he hit it, it simply disintegrated into its component parts and accompanied him to the floor. It was as though the legs, seat and backrest had all been simply balanced there awaiting an unsuspecting victim.

—

Ted again, but this time as a 12 year old. A soldier had come down from the camp at Chelsfield House to see one or other of my sisters. He parked his army lorry on the road and went up the long, narrow path to our house. Ted saw his opportunity and said to me “I could drive that”, and promptly proceeded to climb into the cab. He started the engine and made off towards the end of the cul-de-sac in which we lived. He was turning the truck round, at a point about two-hundred yards away, when the soldier came running down the path in something of a panic. I don’t think Ted was his favourite person at that moment but I do wonder how far he would have had to run if he had left his lorry facing out of the cul-de-sac! I now have it on the authority of the perpetrator that the driver had good cause to be worried. It seems the Chevrolet truck, as such it was, carried a cargo of artillery shells!

—

We lived, at this time at the edge of a public park which was surrounded by a narrow strip of woodland. One day, one of our ‘gang’ of youngsters noticed that a cat had become marooned on a branch of a good-sized oak tree. It was apparently unable to summon up the courage to attempt the descent so we decided to be good samaritans and rescue it. We fetched the necessary equipment, which consisted of a blanket and a clothes prop! Four of us younger kids took the corners of the blanket and stretched it out in what we judged to be the correct location for moggy-catching. One of the older boys, I’m not sure who, then stretched upwards with the clothes prop and placed the fork under the belly of the unsuspecting feline. With a mighty heave the animal was dislodged from the security of the branch and sent flying through the air! It came down nowhere near the blanket, but landed on all fours and made off like a bat out of hell. Any more cats to be rescued?

One day a party of soldiers, Pioneer Corps I believe, descended on this field and began to excavate a hole, of substantial proportions, right in the middle. Before long this had attracted the attention of the local urchins, myself included. “Whatcher doin’ mate?” and “What’s that ‘ole for?” eventually elicited the information that the field was to become a balloon site. Over the next few days a large block of concrete was cast in-situ in the hole, with a pulley-wheel secured to the top. This was to become the anchorage point, the cable passing round the pulley centrally beneath its hydrogen-filled charge!

The soldiers, on completion of their soil-grubbing, moved on to the next site and were replaced by a detachment of R.A.F. Regiment who set about the technical part of the task. On arrival on site they erected tents, for sleeping and eating and dug slit trenches, in which to take cover in the event of a “flying-bomb” coming to earth near their site. We were told that it was not unknown for a “snagged” doodle-bug to spiral down the balloon cable!

After a few days, lorries arrived bearing the balloon and everything that was needed to get it into the sky. I remember that we kids “helped” as the balloon was unfolded and stretched out on the grass, centrally over the concrete anchorage point. The winch lorry, or possibly trailer, was positioned at some distance, facing away from the balloon. Its winch cable was run out, passed round the pulley and attached to the balloon.

One of these trucks carried a load of long, slim steel cylinders, which we soon discovered to be filled with hydrogen, under pressure. These, when unloaded, were stored in several stacks along one side of the field, the stacks being triangular in cross-section. Everything being ready, the time had come for which we kids had been waiting, with mounting excitement.

One after the other, the cylinders were attached to the balloon, valves opened and their contents discharged. After what seemed an age, the fabric began to stir and after several hours and countless cylinders, the envelope took shape. Having spent a good part of the day awaiting the launch, I had to go home for my tea before the exciting event. I was just preparing to go back to the site when our dog began to bark frantically. I ran outside and there was the balloon, looming, like an enormous silver moon above the trees, as it ascended into the evening sky!

Another site had been established about a quarter of a mile away, the number of which was 1078. The relative proximity of this one meant that an air of friendly competition had grown up between the two crews. To the chagrin of 569 the “neighbours” could be seen to be somewhat ahead in their preparations. Accordingly, we all, crew and kids watched in silence as the blokes at 1078 got their balloon off the ground. Their satisfaction was short-lived, however, as just a few feet clear of terra firma, it burst and sank back down. An enormous cheer went up from we who were watching, but it was tempered with some sympathy for our colleagues up the lane!

In the few months they were there, these airmen made friends with the people round about, and were invited to homes in the area. At the end of their tour of duty they gave us children a party, with what rations they could muster. The thing that I remember on the table was the 7lb tin of jam, which the kids tucked into with great gusto!

On the day in question a boy came into the classroom about an hour late. This was totally out of character, for he was a pleasant, bright boy who seldom put a foot wrong. The teacher rounded on him angrily, “Why are you late? How dare you come to school at this hour?”. The poor child looked up at her wanly and whispered, “Please Miss, my mother died this morning”. All her womanhood and all her dormant maternal instinct came to the fore with a rush. She gathered the child into her arms, saying “Oh you poor, poor little boy!”. He, of course, was sobbing his heart out, and the rest of us were just stunned. (The tears have been coursing down my face as I wrote these words, but I am now back in control) Just imagine, the child’s mother died that morning and someone sent him to school!

—

Another teacher at this school was one ‘Jock’ Robertson, a P.T. teacher who had in a former life played professional football for the Scottish club Queen’s Park. As you might expect, he was an arrogant bully of a man, over six feet tall and hard. He used to take great delight in beating the boys on the buttocks with the largest rubber-soled plimsoll he could find. Try it today, mister!

However, there is one particular incident I want to tell you about. High up on the end wall of the school hall, which doubled as the gymnasium, was a clock. You know, boys, the one you all had to stand and watch when you were ‘kept-in’ after school for some misdemeanour! One morning, when we went into the hall for P.E. (it was called physical training in those days) Jock noticed that the clock had stopped. He instructed a number of boys to position the ‘box’ against the wall, directly under the clock, whereupon he jumped up onto it. He then called the smallest boy, by the name of Stringer, to climb up beside him. Facing the wall, he now reached down and formed a platform with his left hand and ordered the unfortunate child to stand on it. Instructing the boy to put his hands on the wall, Jock proceeded to hoist him aloft until his left arm was at full stretch above his head. “Feel on top of the clock and you will find the key. Now wind the clock and put it right!” The petrified child managed to carry out these instructions and was then lowered to the ground. The clock must have been fifteen to sixteen feet above the floor. This show-off no doubt considered that he was one hell of a hero. I thought then, as I do now that it was an irresponsible act of gross stupidity!