Transcript Detail
| Transcript Title | Slight, Florence (O1996.7) |
| Interviewee | Florence Slight (FS). Also present: Kathleen Hill (KH) |
| Interviewer | Peter Ruffles (PR) |
| Date | 08/04/1996 |
| Transcriber by | Jean Riddell (Purkis) |
Transcript
Hertford Oral History Group
Recording no: O1996.7
Interviewee: Florence Slight (FS). Also present: Kathleen Hill (KH)
Date: 8th April 1996
Venue: 38, Sele Road, Hertford
Interviewer: Peter Ruffles (PR)
Transcriber: Jean Purkis (Riddell)
************** unclear recording
[discussion] untranscribed material
italics editor’s notes
A recording bedevilled by massive electrical interference
PR: Now, gotta say my little bit. It is Easter Saturday. This is Peter Ruffles reporting for Hertford Museum from number 38, Sele Road, the home, oh, I should say 1996, put the year in, the home of Florence Slight and Kathleen Hill. And I've popped up just for a few minutes to ask, with both Florence Slight and Kathleen Hill a few details about memories in Hertford.
Were you born in Hertford?
FS: Yes.
PR: Whereabouts?
FS: Hattams Yard
PR: Off St. Andrew St.? That was, how many years ago?
FS: 85!
PR: 85 years ago! And, were you part of a big family, or was it just you and your parents?
FS: No, me mother wasn't married.
PR: Right. Like lots of parents, then and today.
FS: And I was born down there but she used to go about with this other man. And, 'm, that's how it was. I was born down there but in the end lived with my aunt, Mrs Moulding.
PR: Where was that? Where were you living.
FS: That was up West St.
PR: Oh, you don't remember the number West St?
FS: No, it was down one of the yards.
PR: Ivy Passage?
FS: No, the other one.
PR: Now, where are we, Wallfields Alley?
FS: There used to be another one.
PR: Yes, there were one or two up there. On the right or on the left as you go towards Horns Mill?
FS: On the right as you go up.
PR: So it wasn't very far from where your Ma was, just through the alley. And were you the only child that your mother had?
FS: No, I had a brother. He got killed in the war.
PR: Was he older that you or younger?
FS: Younger. And then she had another baby and that was put in a home. That was a girl.
PR: Oh! And you've never seen anything of her since?
FS: No, never seen her.
PR: Do you remember her being born?
FS: Yes, yes, yes. I wa'nt very old. And then me mother died of, what do you call it, when the milk turns or something.
PR: Oh, yes. What was it called? That was common wasn't it? So did your brother go with Mrs. Moulding too, or did he stay with Mum?
FS: Yes, we lived together for a while. Then he went to the war, 'cos he got killed in the war. He was killed in the Japanese lot when they was in that boat or something.
PR: Did he?
FS: I remember the Zeppelin coming over. We lived down Anchor Yard, then.
PR: Now, you'll have to, where's Anchor Yard?
FS: Not Anchor Yard. it was Anchor Yard where I lived at the end and then it was Oaker's Buildings where I saw the Zeppelin.
PR: Oh, that's just beyond St. Andrew's Church from here.
FS: Yes.
PR: Good gracious.
FS: You could see the people in it, you know. I always remember that.
PR: Well, you were quite young then, I suppose.
FS: Yes. I wa'nt very old, about 4 or 5 I think.
Transcriber’s Note: If she was 85 in 1996 she was born in 1911 Zeppelin was 1915 so she would be 4
PR: So, were you living in Oaker's Buildings?
FS: Yes, at the time.
PR: I know it sounds like a quiz, all the time asking questions, but it's nice getting the pattern because nearly everybody lived in yards in those days, off St. Andrew St, Fore St, and Maidenhead St. Yes, that was the, before they built
(Telephone rings)
KH: Sugar!
PR: up here, Sele Road, and then
FS: Yes.
PR: So when you were living in Oaker's Buildings, was that with Mrs. Moulding still?
FS: Yes.
PR: So, did she have her own family as well, or just you?
FS: Yes. She had three boys.
PR: And husband, was he there? What was his name?
FS: Um, Charles, I think.
PR: Because a lot of families lived in Oaker's Buildings that are still around now. The Ansells. Do you remember the Ansell family?
FS: Yes.
PR: Ivy Ansell, we've talked to her and her sister Elsie.
FS: Is she still alive?
PR: Yes, Elsie, and Ivy too. They've done little memories you know, recording. So where were you at school then? Did you go to school?
FS: Yes, St. Andrew's School.
PR: Oh, blimey, so did I!
(Laughter)
PR: And that was Miss Turnbull. She was quite a young teacher, well, not old anyway.
FS: No.
PR: Was she a bit strict?
FS: Yes.
PR: Because she lived next door to us down here. What about Miss Hornby, was she there?
FS: Yes, too.
PR: And lived at Frogs Hall
(crackles)
(PR on about Hornbies)
PR: What was school like in those days? What sort of lessons?
FS: Oh, all sorts of lessons. We had to behave ourselves as well.
PR: That's the biggest difference. Did I say that?
FS: Better that they are today.
PR: And was Miss Row there?
FS: Yes, she was there. Yes, she used to live along of Ware Road, didn't she?
PR: Yes, yes. I didn't know that. People have said that they remember, and what about Polly Rutter, was there a Miss Rutter?
FS: Oh, yes. She used to teach me. Oh
(Much laughter)
FS: Yes, she was strict.
PR: And they had coal fires in the classrooms.
FS: And we used to have the nurse come round looking in our hair. The doctors used to come round and examine us and everything else.
PR: Yes.
FS: They don't do it today!
PR: No, no, but you must have been fit enough then to live to 85!
FS: Yes.
PR: No problems with your health then, over the years. You've been pretty fit.
KH: You had asthma, didn't you mum?
FS: Yes. It's just me hands, now.
PR: So old Polly Rutter gave you the run around. Who else was in your class? Can you remember any other children at school with you?
FS: I can't remember now.
PR: You must be one of the longest survivors, really. At 85 there won't be many of your class around.
FS: No, no.
KH: A lot of your friends have already died, haven't they?
FS: Yes, yes.
(Talks then of leaving Oaker's Buildings and going to live with Aunt Rose.)
FS: She took me off to live at Ware near mother. And then of course when she met Uncle Walt, her husband, she went to Canada with him. She wanted to take us. She wanted to take me, but then of course they wouldn't let her because the war was on. I had to go back with Mrs. Moulding and that's where I lived ever since, until I got married.
PR: So how did you go on indoors, cooking and washing and that sort of thing?
FS: Oh, I used to have a stove, do all the cooking on the stove.
PR: Did you have to help with that, or did Mrs. Moulding do it?
FS: Oh, yes, I should have got a clout if I didn't.
PR: And did you have much to do with your Mum then, because, had she died, how much later?
FS: I wa'nt very old when she died.
PR: It was a tough start in life.
(Laughter)
PR: Elsie Ansell reckoned that the toilets in Oaker's Buildings were all in a row at the bottom of the yard.
FS: Yes, all in a row and the water tap was up the top. You had to fetch water from outside.
PR: Was it a row of doors and you had your own particular one?
FS: Yes.
(Tape goes on to record answers to rent questions.)
PR: Were there any characters living in the yard? We're told sometimes about Chitty Wren.
FS: Oh yes, his daughter lives up here.
KH: Whereabouts up here? Up in this road, you mean? See what I mean, Mother's got a better memory than what I've got!
FS: Yes, she's still alive, ain't she? You know! She used to come down here with her big hand bags.
KH: You don't mean Flo up there do you? (Flo Allatt)
FS: Yes, she was a Wren.
PR: Oh, what! I haven't seen Flo, she's got very bad feet. Oh, she's still there! Would she have been brought up in Oaker's Buildings. Crumbs, I've forgotten about Flo. Haven't seen her for ages.
KH: Tell Peter what you did before you went to school.
FS: Went shopping.
KH: What else.
FS: Well, we used to have to go and get wood and chop it up and sell it for firewood.
PR: Well, where did you get the wood from, then?
FS: We was give it. From some of the shops.
PR: And who would be the people that would buy, who would be your customers?
FS: We'd take it round the houses. They'd buy it for firewood.
PR: A whole different way of life.
(Some talk about Moulding and Ansell, a popular name; Mrs. H. and of St. Andrew Street today)
PR: So when did you come up to Sele Road then? How long have you been here?
FS: Oh, I came up here when I got married. First we were living with his sister. Then we got a house up here. No, Horns Mill first, and then we moved up here, number 43. I remember these being built. I was about 15 or 16. Dickie next door was one of the very first. She must have been the last, probably, of the first.
(Rehearsal now of some names, by PR) Petitt; Bailey; Drury, window cleaners; Hattams; Fisher the post; Day; Bennett; Ilott and Ilott next door; Roger Britcher (locally pronounced Bridger); lawn mowing at 64, Hertingfordbury Road for old teachers, Dartons and at Mrs. Phipps, 31, Mrs. Ansell, my dad's mother
KH: Mrs. Rose Hayter, Wench Crook, Richardson.
(Talk of Ruby Henry. PR saw her last week and daughter, only surviving child on her way up to mother this afternoon and of town shops and Railway Street.)
PR: Did you see some of the fighting in Railway Street?
FS: Yes, my Granny used to live down Railway Street in one of the yards. I used to go. She lived where they've got those new shops.
PR: Coleman's side?
FS: She lived up a passage by Colemans. It had to wash the floors and that, every week. And turn the bedroom out. I worked for Wiggintons, on the Old Cross. I went up there when I was 14. She come up the school to see who was leaving. They used to do that. I went there and I got married from there. I had just that one job.
PR: So they were living where Barber's was. (Wigginton's again now?)
FS: Yes.
PR: I bet that was a place to keep tidy.
FS: It was as bad when they moved in along of North Road down by Cross Lane.
PR: What time would you have started in the morning? Was it a long day?
FS: Well, I started at eight and wasn't finished afore evening when they had their tea. One afternoon off a week, that was a Wednesday. I worked Sundays.
PR: l can't think what you had to do all day. There weren't that many of them. It wasn't a big family, was it, Wiggintons? Who? Otto?
FS: Otto, Gwen, Stopher Wigginton.
PR: Oh, Stopher! Did he go abroad? One of them went to Australia, I think.
FS: Tom.
PR: So your job was generally to keep the house going, was it?
FS: I was paid 6/- a week.
PR: So they were obviously all right to work with, because you stuck it out.
FS: Oh, yes. I was there when she died. She had cancer, the bleeding kind. She fell out of bed one day and burst it. And after she died I looked after the old man. They all went to work, London. They all had good jobs.
PR: What about Gwen, did she work?
FS: Yes, she was all in selling houses and that sort of thing.
(More interference during chat about Gwen in old age, cycle in Cross Lane, collecting Conservative subs and farmers used to pay their tax to the Wiggintons.)
PR: Oh, did they? Because he was an accountant and
FS: Yes.
PR: I reckon that's it. What I ought to do is pop off home for the camera so I can take a picture of you with your microphone on. What did you do on Sundays?
FS: Oh, don't ask about Sundays! We went out Sunday mornings for a walk and in the afternoons we had Sunday School. The Gospel Hall we went.
PR: Hartham Lane.
FS: Come home, sit up at the table for every meal, couldn't talk
(Laughter)
knitting and needlework. Used to eat your meal, couldn't talk.
PR: Was that the case with most families?
FS: Yes! Sunday Clothes, best boots, weekday clothes, best on Sundays. We used to make the clothes, wear hobnail boots. Repairing cost money.
PR: What about the pubs? Was it only the men, or the women, too?
FS: Women as well.
PR: Did you have one that you would use?
FS: No.
PR: But it wasn't men only then?
FS: No. It used to be rough down there Saturdays.
PR: Some of the fighting was planned, though, wasn't it?
FS: Yes.
PR: What families would do that, then, in those days?
FS: Rough ones.
PR: Fighting families, mostly Hertford people. They wouldn't come in from Ware?
FS: No.
PR: So, you couldn't have time for entertainment, I suppose. Would you go to the pictures, or anything like that?
FS: No, we'd do something at home. We never had time to play.
PR: What about sleeping? How did you manage to fit into the accommodation?
FS: Some slept downstairs, some slept up.
KH: How many bedrooms did you have?
FS: We had two.
PR: Would there be fireplaces upstairs in the bedrooms in the winter?
FS: No! Wouldn't have a fire! I remember when you'd get a twopenny packet of tea, milk, in Railway Street. There used to be a milk shop down there.
PR: So, how did you meet your husband then?
FS: Up here.
PR: Did you know him a long time?
FS: Yes.
PR: You don't know where you first met him?
FS: Up here, Sele Road.
PR: Did he live up here then?
KH: What were you doing up here then?
FS: Sorting the washing. Aunt Lil.
PR: So you just kept your eye open for a good man (Laughter) did you get married here, locally, then?
FS: Yeah, Registry Office.
PR: And that was before honeymoons.
FS: Yes.
PR: Just got on with living.
(More trouble with camera flash gun.)
My technology's not really working! That's the end of the batteries (camera).
(To get himself adequately in the picture, PR tells the tale of how he nearly led himself into a slightly premature death the previous day, on his bike with a log of oak under his arm. Having descended Thieves Lane hill on to A414 roundabout at an amazing speed, out of control. Gets called a 'silly old fool' and switches off.)