Transcript Detail
| Transcript Title | Smith, Alec & Doris (O1999.10) |
| Interviewee | Alec Smith (AS) Doris Smith (DS) |
| Interviewer | Eve Sangster and Jean Riddell (Purkis) |
| Date | 28/04/1999 |
| Transcriber by | Jean Riddell (Purkis) |
Transcript
Hertford Oral History Group
Recording no: O1999.10
Interviewee: Alec Smith (AS) Doris Smith (DS)
Date: 28th April 1999
Venue: I Cross Road, Bengeo
Interviewer: Eve Sangster (ES) Jean Riddell (JR)
Transcriber: Jean Riddell (Purkis)
************** unclear recording
[discussion] untranscribed material
italics editor’s notes
SIDE A
[discussion]
JR: I'll just say that we're at the home, Number 1 Cross Road, of Mr and Mrs Alec Smith, this afternoon, Eve and I, and it's the 28th of April 1999, and we're going to talk about Alec and Doris's separate lives, and then -- briefly -- and then how they came together to live in Hertford again … [discussion] So -- you weren't born here, Doris, but you came here as a child? What year was that?
DS: Yes...well...
AS: We think it was 1927.
JR: It doesn't matter to be exact -- about 1927.
DS: We've got those photos of us, haven't we.
AS: I've missed out on the...l've put everything on one side, I think I've missed out somewhere along the line.
JR: Well, that seems to be a more modern one.
DS: It is amazing really, because before we moved here, you see, a year ago, me, sold and moved, we looked through different things...we spent so...a few months here and a few months in the Midlands, that's how we worked it till we'd made up our mind where we were going to live. And we were looking at some photos...l looked at that, I said, 'I've got a photo like that!'
ES: Oh, how strange!
AS: That, I think, I would call the start of the story, because my mother, and I mainly lived on my mother's side of the family rather than my father's - although my father's lived in Bengeo, which is another story, but -- sorry, an s-t-o-r-y, I mean! -- but this was taken in April 1914. That's the family tree, which is here -- many of them are still around...some of them, I think, you probably know. In fact, that one is the father of...Gwenda -- was it Gwenda who worked at the Museum? Well, she worked there anyway.
JR: I'm not sure...Gwenda?...you see, I don't actually work at the Museum.
AS: You don't? But she apparently worked there for 18 years. The fact is this, that as the thing started, a lot of...some of these people you've seen -- there's Annie Inman -- did you remember Annie?
JR: Yes, we had a recording with her.
AS: That was Annie, and that was Harry her husband, and all the family are there in fact, as they were. He was killed in the First World War, and these are other relatives -- that's my mother and various other people, and there's a list of who they are there , if that's any interest. JR: Well, I'll take a picture of that later, certainly, and I can jot down the credits after that. [discussion] Well, let's start...we haven't really started properly yet. [discussion] Well, let's start with Alec then. You're a native of Hertford, are you?
AS: Yes, in fact...[discussion]
JR: So you're a native of the town. Where were you actually born, and in what part?
AS: I was...l'm not quite sure where I was born, other than it was probably at the County Hospital, but my mother and father lived in Parliament Row, which was by the...what is now the War Memorial. And the first thing I can remember was getting onto a chair and looking out and seeing it being open for the first time and seeing all the soldiers round the War Memorial. And they were all in their reds and...you know, their dress uniforms.
ES: So what year was that?
AS: Well, I suppose that would have been about 1924.
ES: Yes. If you...What is your surname?
AS: Smith.
ES: Oh. I rnean, there was...l wonder why if you lived in Parliament Row your house hadn't been pulled down, or...
AS: It was pulled down immediately after..
ES: Because there was one bloke -- perhaps it was your family -- who stood out and refused to have their house demolished. And somebody said that when they actually unveiled the War Memorial they covered this house with the Union Jack, so it didn't give offence to the visiting dignitaries [laughs].
AS: No. My fathe r, who was -- and I will show you that one because I've got the photograph of that one -- [discussion]
JR: Parliament Row is actually the triangle that disappeared down there. I was thinking of the other one, where the pargeting is.
ES: No, no, it was that little triangle. Bruton the tailor was there, wasn't he.
AS: Bruton the tailor was there.
ES: Was your father in business?
AS: No, my father...my father was in the Royal Navy for the whole of the First World War, and he...the first house we had was in Parliament Row and there was great difficulty with all the soldiers and sailors coming home, for finding somewhere to live...that we couldn't find anywhere to live. But eventually we had the offer of rooms, as a lot of them did, and that was at number 17 Riv erside in The Folly. And there was an old man living there, and he moved into what was their front room and with his bed and everything, and the rest of the house was left for us.
ES: This was when your house in Parliament Square...Row had been pulled down?
AS: That's right, that's right, and from there I went to the Infants' School, which is still the Infants' School in...by the Church, in the churchyard, and that was the...really the first place.
ES: I somehow thought they were all commercial premises in Parliament Row, but some were obviously...! mean, I know they had residential accommodation above them...
[Note: Parliament Row included a terrace of houses backing onto the Castle walls]
AS: But this was down at the bottom, because I remember that I was on ground level and I remember kneeling on the seat and looking out and seeing the feet of these people [laughs], and in fact being able to see all these people happening -- it was quite a day, you know, with all the soldiers round.
ES: So, when were you born?
AS: 1921, the 8th January 1921.
ES: Right, so you were a little chap, you were 3 or 4, when this great thing was going on?
AS: I was about two, I think, at the time, I certainly wasn't very old, about two when that happened, that's really the first thing that...it's the first thing I remember. I remember the people who lived next door were named Matthews, and in fact I know that because the boy Matthews and I went to school together in the churchyard where it is...that's right. And we were...it didn't...it wasn't a very satisfactory arrangement, having this old man there, because he...well, in fairness to him he was a poor man, and he wasn't very sanitary, you know, it wasn't very good, and my father eventually found that a house in Davies Street was...had been vacated, and it had got to be cleaned up...but the possibility of getting there, and in fact we...he went and kind of supervised its being cleaned up and we moved in, and I'm not quite sure what year it was, but I think it was about 1926.
ES: Is that off the Ware Road?
AS: Yes, it's...at the Nag's Head...not the Nag's Head, the Saracen's Head, along the Saracen's Head road there, going from Ware Road, along the Saracen's Head, then you turn left and you go up to Davies Street, and then along and then these houses are run parallel with the houses in Townshend Street. In fact, the end of their garden..
DS: Where I lived. It looked into yours
AS: ...the fence at the end of the garden looked straight into our house. And - surprise, surprise! -- the Mendays moved into that house, because that became vacant, and they had two chil...well, they had one...was it two children at the time?...two children at the time, and Doris was the one, and I remember that my father used to talk to Mr Menday, and I remember Mrs Menday who - you know, with ladies speaking, coming along speaking, and I remember them very well. But it was a fairly high fence, so I never really saw...there were...there were knotholes in the fence [laughter] which we could...particularly the tomatoes that Doris's Dad used to grow. But, you know...it was...we were friends, you know, we became...because we'd moved in at the same time.
DS: It's the first house and garden both our parents had...for themselves. They were lucky to have that in those days.
AS: Yes, that's right, it was the first proper house that either of us had had. Doris had come down from London...
DS: And lodged with the people next door..
AS: ...and lodged with the people next door, and had moved into that house as we moved in, so really...you've seen this photograph here, of the two of us?
ES: What, the little ones? Oh, they're sweet, aren't they.
AS: The little ones. Well, you see, those photographs...one of them was in Hardingstone, near Northampton, and the other one was here. Now, they never met, until...
ES: You have to say it's fate, don't you?
AS: Well, it is fate, because really what happened was that Doris lost her husband in January 1995. Now I knew Jo very well, because...well, I suppose we'd better go a bit...[laughs] you know, it's a question of how to fit the various pieces in...
JR: Well, let's go...
ES: Really, I suppose it's Hertford we're interested in, more than the love story, fascinating though it is!
AS: It is, yes. But I think it has to form part of it. But what happened was that after we'd met one another, as we had, and Doris remained in Townshend Street, and I'd been in Davies Street, and then we moved to Currie Street, which was the same street in which my parents had lived...my grandparents had lived.
ES: These were all rented houses, were they?
AS: These were all rented houses.
JR: So your grandparents were Hertford people?
AS: Yes. That was my grandparents, and the family of them, which was 1940. [discussion] I think it's the only one in existence that takes everybody into account.
ES: So what was your grandfather?
AS: Well, I've got photographs of him...he was a coachman. Going back even before this, my grandfather was coachman at the Castle. My grandmother was a maid at the Castle.
ES: It's not the photo we've got?
JR: It is...l'm saying all this...it's the Inman family we're talking about...Storeys...
ES: That chap...that photo we've got...of the slim chap standing outside Water Lane cottages, that's your grandfather?
DS: You see, Alec's name is Storey Smith. I'm only Smith, but his mother named them as Storey Smith.
AS: There's my grandfather and grandmother ...that was my father and mother in Davies Street. That one goes back...that's Annie when she was...that was Annie in 1914.
ES: When I saw her she was 101 and a half, so it's a little bit difficult to tell...not that she had actually changed very much.
AS: She hadn't changed at all.
JR: Let's put these all in one place, so I can re-photograph them if I can.
DS: There's one photo that's in here -- she's very pretty there.
ES: I'm sure she was a very pretty woman...she was small, wasn't she.
AS: She was. I can tell you stories about her, but perhaps they shouldn't count [laughs]...but in fact it might be worth just mentioning it, because what happened was that -- in fact I have made some notes which I could quote to you -- but the...
DS: I love that photo of her. Isn't it lovely? I think she was a milliner, wasn't she? Her house was all full of hats, and when her husband came home for dinner, she was so concentrated on all these hats she was making, he never got any dinner, did he. [laughs]
AS: She was a milliner, yes. Yes, he had to go to the pub and get a sandwich and a glass of beer. He was a wonderful man, because he'd been...he'd had...he was an orphan and he was sent to sea, he and his brother were sent to sea, and he finished up in Hertford and his brother finished up in New Zealand, from all accounts.
JR: This is Inman, Major Inman, is it, Storey Inman?
AS: Yes, yes. Of course, you know about his background? Well, I know that he lived in Talbot Street, which was fairly close to my grandmother's house, it was kind of next door...but the 25 Curie Street and the house in Talbot Street were one block and in the earlier days it was known as The Rookery, because there were four houses...they'd both got four storeys in them and there were two storeys there, two storeys there, two storeys there and two storeys there, and so they had four families living there. And it's probably just my imagination, but I thought that was why it was called The Rookery, because my grandparents had ten children [laughs] so you can tell that there were...well, there could have been up to 40 children in that as it was.
ES: Is it still there, this block?
AS: Well, yes indeed, because it...the interesting thing is that, my wife has said, that when I came home from the War we just had a two-roomed house...
DS: One up and one down.
AS: ...one up and one down, and everything was shared, it was a very tiny little place...
ES: Where was this?
AS: This was at the back of the shop in Talbot Street. There's a shop there and in those days...
ES: The shop just as you turn in, on the left, one of those?
AS: As you're turning in from Ware Road -- it's turning to the right to go down, it -- and on the left-hand side about 50 yards down is a shop -- it used to be a sweet shop, the people's name was Lee, in fact, it so happens...
JR: Is this the shop that's now Frith's Electrical? Washing machines?
AS: I think so, but there were some other people took the house over, and I can't remember the name of them, I ought to because they were...became quite good friends. But we were in this two-roomed place, which...and obviously there wasn't much chance of getting anything else, and Miss Brickwell who was the owner of these houses died and she left it for occupiers to buy the houses. And of course none of the family had got any money and my mother bought the house -- she was the eldest daughter -- and she bought the house, because my father had died and she had money, and she had the money that he had, so she bought the house.
But she found after a time that she couldn't afford to keep running the house because you were restricted in the rent that you could charge, and the upkeep of it after the War was such that she was out of pocket all the time, she couldn't do anything about that. And so I wanted a house, I wanted something solid and bought the house from her, paid her all the money that she'd lost and all the rest of it on it, and so I relieved her of the problems of it, in the anticipation that at some time or other we would be able to live there.
Well, it so happened that one of her...one of the sisters had had a bad marriage -- the husband had been very ill and he eventually died -- and she 'went home to Mum', you know, and stayed with Mum, and then she...then when my grandmother died, at 96 I think, she took the house over and I had nothing to do about it. And I was still out of pocket because she was having things done and charging me up for them, so I was always out of pocket. So my wife and I decided that we'd like to have a house that we could live in, and one day -- we looked at a number -- but one day in 1964 my wife had seen that- this house -- The Gables -- was up for sale. What it used to be -- it used to have a garden which went right the way through to the passage. But McMullens had got the house and the wife of the brewer had got cancer and she eventually died and, you know, it all...everything was falling apart.
So they sold those two houses to an architect, or rather those two pieces of ground to an architect for £3,000 each and it was cut off as it is here, and they left this other part of the house, which is known as The Gables, and it was going for an auction in Ware. And my wife had taken a fancy to it and she said, 'Oh, I like that, etc, etc.' -- no idea of how much it was going to cost- *, and we went...so l...she was so interested in it that I thought I ought to go and see if I could buy it, and...but I didn't really think I was going to [laughs]. But I had a few bids and eventually it was knocked down to me [laughs] so I had to come home and tell my wife, 'We haven't got any money -- in fact I had a bit of money -- but in fact we've got a house!' She was horrified [laughs].
JR: That was this one?
AS: No, it was the whole one right the way through.
JR: The one that fronts onto...?
Transcribers Note: “The Gables” has its front door on Duncombe road near where it meets Farquhar Street. It was once one big house on the corner of Cross Road that was split in two down the centre forming The Gables and St Michaes
1931 Marguerit Jourdains executors sold the property to William Wallace Jones. This was still the full plot bounded by Duncombe Road, Cross Road, the footpath and the rear boundary of the houses in Bengeo Street. W.W. Jones was a dairyman, and had premises in Dolphin Yard, off Maidenhead Street, in the town centre. It was he who divided the house back into two properties, The Gables in Duncombe Road and St. Michaels in Cross Road.
1943 Mr Jones sold The Gables, St Michaels and his business premises to McMullen and Sons Limited.
1945 The Gables is occupied by Mrs C E Copinger and St Michaels by Eric Lloyd. 1953 McMullens sold St.Michaels to Kathleen May Bedington. The Gables meanwhile was occupied by various McMullens staff/directors.
AS: Yes. This room was part of it. The history of it is that it was the room where Lady Jourdain's daughter who was a spastic used to...she used to do everything in here. There was a place where there was a bath in the corner and there were various other things.
JR: So it's an annexe to the big house..
AS: It was...no, it wasn't exactly an annexe because what happened is that The Gables as it is -- that went on just the other side of this -- was a conservatory. Now that has just been at great cost...has been converted to a nice part of the house, they've just spent £30-odd thousand pounds on having work done on it. But ...we'd got the house, but it was too much for us...we didn't...we just didn't need a house like it, and I got authority to build a bungalow to take off those parts of the house that I wanted, and this room seemed to me to be something which could form the basis. Our kitchen outside here, in the room next here, was the store room, and our dining room as it is now was the vinery, and the bedrooms were, you know, other odd pieces, for use of various...
DS: Stables and things.
AS: ...yes, and so in 1974 I converted the whole lot, and in 1975 I sold the rest, to...the interesting thing was that the chap who came round to buy it, he was an optician...
Notes: 1965 McMullens sold The Gables to Alec Francis Storey Smith and Vera Joan Smith.
1972 Alec Smith obtained planning permission to separate the coach house, vinery and stables from the main house and build a single storey extension to them. They then moved from the main house into the new bungalow so formed, and this became 1, Cross Road. They rented out the main house for a couple of years.
1976 Alec and Vera Smith sold The Gables to Mr and Mrs Kemplen. Mr Kemplen built the double garage in 1976 himself.
1998 The Kemplens demolished the derelict Victorian conservatory and replaced it with a single storey extension.
DS: He's still there.
Transcribers Note: The Kemplen’s sold the house and moved to a smaller one in Bengeo c2012
AS: He's still there...he's a nice man...he reckoned that he could look after the place and all the rest of it, it needed work done on it, and it's only recently after 25 years he's really done with the work. But he's done a marvellous job, or rather he's had a marvellous job done. So we're...we feel very happy about it.
ES: So what happened to The Rookery?
AS: The Rookery is still in existence, except it's...
ES: You sold it though, having bought it from...?
AS: I bought it, but what happened was that I bought it and then as a big family, and suddenly people were asking , 'Why should he have the house? He's only one of the...' Nobody said to me, 'Did you buy it?' I paid...actually I paid a good price for it.
DS: Double what his mother paid.
AS: I paid double what my mother...actually I paid £250 for it, and that...in that day that was quite a bit considering all the work that had to be done.
ES: When was that?
AS: That was in...actually it was in 1974, so I kept it for about...l kept it for 20-odd years.
[Note: I think he means that he paid £250 in 1954 but he says 1974, perhaps when he sold it.]
DS: Well, your aunt...your mother and your aunt didn't get on too well, so...
AS: Yes, my mother needed...that's right...
DS: It was left...your aunt was in there.
AS: That's reminded me, that had my mother lived, she could have had the house. I mean, by that time, I'd made a name for myself, you know, I'd worked my way up in the system and I had a good job and was well paid, and I could have...l would willingly have let my mother have it. In fact...
DS: She went and lived with your brother.
AS: She lived with my brother but then she bought the house that my brother lived in. I didn't get anything at all. Having said that, I didn't want anything, don't misunderstand me, I'm not saying I should have had this...
End of Side one
Side Two
AS: ..it was quite a long long time **-- , but in fact we went round and we finished up by really going and seeing him in hospital up to the time that he died.
DS: Then I said to Alec, I said, 'W ell, look ,' I said, 'I won't be able to see you for a few months. I ought to go to Australia [laughs].' So he said, 'Oh, I'd like to come too.' So he did.
AS: Well, you see, Doris's son had been at school with my son, and he was quite happy to have us there, anyway, because both of us apart, we felt horrible, but at least we'd got somebody to talk to, somebody who understood, that's what it was all about. And on Sunday, this coming Sunday...well, what happened about that was -- we spent two months in Australia, we came back again and brought Eddie's wife back with us, because she wanted to go and see her family in Northampton, and it was about the end of April -- I thought, 'Well, you know, we've got two homes , but we're happy together,' and so I said, 'Well, I think we ought to get married.' [laughs] She said, 'I agree with you.' And believe it or not, I phoned the Registrar and just said, you know, about this, and I'd been retired for at least ten years, hadn't I, about ten years, and she recognised my voice. Well, I was very well known, you know, in all kinds of different ways.
ES: Oh, was that the woman who lives in West Street, the Registrar, Mrs McEwan?
DS: Oh yes, it was
ES: So she married you, did she?
AS: Yes, so I said about it, and we didn't do anything...what happened was that we...Doris had got her family in the Midlands, my son was in Hertfordshire, as indeed was my daughter, and we couldn't very well say to...you know, get all in touch, and say we're going to get married or anything like that. So we didn't tell anyone.
ES: Well, I suppose you could have done. But anyway you didn't.
AS: Well, we could have done, but it wouldn't have worked.
ES: No, no, so you got marri ed and surprised them.
AS: Yes, yes.
ES: Children need to be surprised sometimes.
AS: Well, I think that they can do what they like, but the whole point is this, that on Sunday is our third anniversary, this Sunday...yes , and she tells me that I've got to take her out to dinner, so I mean...there you are, you see.
DS: Well, I always never would cook dinner on my wedding anniversary, and I'm not going to [laughs].
ES: How are we doing on the photograph front?
END OF RECORDING