Transcript Detail
| Transcript Title | Scoley, Bill & Mona (O2003.5) |
| Interviewee | Bill and Mona Scoley [BS and MS] |
| Interviewer | Peter Ruffles (PR), Eddie Roche (ER) |
| Date | 26/02/2003 |
| Transcriber by | Mark Green |
Transcript
Hertford Oral History Group
Recording no: O2003.5
Interviewee: Bill and Mona Scoley [BS and MS]
Venue: The Scoley’s home, Hertford
Date: 26th February 2003
Interviewers: Peter Ruffles (PR) and Eddie Roche (ER)
Transcriber: Mark Green
Reviewed/revised Jean Riddell (Purkis)
************** unclear recording
[discussion] untranscribed material
italics editor’s notes
PR: Peter Ruffles, this is the 26th of February, Wednesday afternoon coming up to half past two and I'm just off up the hill to Bill and Mona Scoley’s where I hope to meet Eddie, and we’ll talk about running the shop in the Wash as well as other things, and it is the year 2003.
[General discussion before the interview starts, not transcribed.]
PR: The chief interest really is whether you can remember anything on the Wash but could we get, well I suppose we ought to start back where you, Bill, were born and sort of trace the life bit through and if we can, we’ve been a little bit of… Now, your Dad was called Bill wasn't he?
BS: Yeah. His initials was William Thomas Scoley. Mine’s within, my name is William Haig Scoley.
PR: Oh, is it?
BS: The same as my grandfather’s was.
PR: Yes, oh I see.
BS: Who used, he used to live 72, just past you.
PR: Yes. Who I can remember with his raincoat folded over his shoulder. Which you don't see people walking out, they used to fold a certain way that…
BS: So that was the grandfather who lived in Hertingfordbury Road. Now, and yet it is funny, go on you should mention that, because I was looking up some old records and I found my father’s old driving licence.
MS: That's right.
BS: And it has got his address as 80 Hertingfordbury Road, now that is the first that I have known of it.
PR: That is where the Botsfords lived for a bit.
BS: Was it? Frank Botsford.
PR: Yes, well yes…
MS: Going away from Hertford?
PR: ...the first generation, yes, yes. So what’s the family tree then, and how did you come to be in Hertford that sort of pattern?
BS: Well. I got, well my grandfather as I say he came to Hertingfordbury Road. He had two sons which is my dad and his brother, which was Percy, and they both lived in 99 and 97 North Road, at one time, and built for them, because the field on that corner which takes in Greenways and that, was my grandfather's field. [Note: known as Scoley’s Field – fairs and circuses came there]
PR: Ah…
ER: Yeah, this is, this what we like to know, yeah.
MS: He kept his horses in there.
BS: Kept the horses there and everything, and the two both semi-detached pair of houses and they led into the field as well.
ER: Because they were a distinct pair of houses as opposed to all the others there.
MS: That’s right.
BS: I think they were built, well 1926 or something like…
MS: Botsfords...
BS: Botsfords built…
PR: Botsford built them.
MS: They were the only two there at the time, weren’t they?
PR: So what did he use the animals for? Were they leisure or, or working?
BS: Well he used to keep horses, as I say, and ferrets and things. He just used to go round getting rabbits and things like this. His best mate was, I remember, Jim Farrow.
ER: Not Pecker Farrow?
BS: Hm.
PR: Ah.
ER: He used to live down one of the Yards...
BS: Yeah that's right
ER: ...down Adams Yard.
PR: Hm
BS: Yeah.
ER: Yes. I remember Pecker Farrow he used to sometimes come over to the shop and he'd say, he used to do a bit, he used to do a bit of barrowing didn’t he...
BS: Barrowing as well, yeah
ER: ...and he’d say, I'm going out to so and so, does the boy want to come? And he was one of the greatest naturalists.
BS: We’d walk along by the Beane and he’d it show you, show you a fish down there or there's a woodpecker up there, he was brilliant. He used to wear gaiters...
ER: Yes.
BS: Gaiters and that sort of Australian hats.
ER: So they were cohorts then?
BS: Yeah, they were.
ER: Countryman, that's it.
BS: That’s it. As I say. Down Welwyn Hill and down as far as North Road Avenue virtually was his field.
PR: Now let's just be clear for the listeners and he was your…
BS: Grandfather.
PR:...grandfather and his name was William Haig Scoley.
BS: That’s right.
PR: How did he come to be there, then?
BS: I don't really know, I've not gone into the history but I can tell you what he was before. He was a jockey, and he was in the...hrm...The Horse Guards, and the rest of his family used to be at Peterborough and that. Martha and all that lot.
ER: So that field is part of what we know now as the old Sele Estate?
BS: That's right.
MS: Yes.
BS: It was sort of the first part up to Saddlers Way.
ER: Yes.
MS: Yes.
ER: Because we were talking to somebody the other day, well talking to Graham Warby.
BS: He was a bookmaker as well.
ER: Ah, a man of lots of, lots of, and Ben Warby bought his plot of land where that house is half way up, on the road on the right...
PR: Sandy Nook
ER: ...he bought that from Garratts. They owned a plot of land there.
MS: Yes, yes.
PR: Oh we have got a couple of photocopies here, we will have to tell...
BS: You can have that one but…
PR: ...our punters, bookmakers codes to cut errors and there's the name Scoley, job master Hertford, letters on telegrams.
ER: Well they had a unique way of putting things didn't they, not represented by anyone. I’ve got some old books of Hertford, 1905 Gravesons book of Hertford, and we would politely solicit orders from him, respectful customers, things like that.
MS: Yes, yes.
BS: Talking about Graveson's my father was the chap who opened up the men’s outfitters at Gravesons.
ER: So, Dad was, obviously he was a tailor by trade, trade and training, apprenticed.
BS: Yes.
ER: Do you know at all whereabouts he was apprenticed?
BS: No, I don’t, no.
PR: So, I am still dead keen that we get it clear for others, you know the orders of things. So those two houses were built about 1920…
BS: 6. [1926]
PR: ...6 by the Botsfords. And would the land have been his land then, or was he renting it?
BS: It was his land.
PR: Oh he actually...bought the…
MS: Yes.
PR: Gosh.
MS: And Greenways land…
BS: It was right to the Welwyn Road.
PR: Yes.
MS: That wasn't there was it?
BS: Oh, no.
ER: Greenways. So that was his land.
BS: Yeah. Right up to the Welwyn Road and round to those two houses.
PR: So where would, would he, he was obviously had a bob or two because the average person in those years wasn't owning land, it was very big families.
BS: I don't, I don’t, I can't tell you on that Peter, I just don't know.
PR: So, living round at number 72 Hertingfordbury Road, what's the history of the accommodation there, who was living there and for how long?
BS: Well, I mean as long as I can remember they lived there.
MS: Well I suppose your Father and Uncle Percy, Uncle, yes, Uncle Percy lived there until they married.
BS: I suppose so.
MS: It seems so, yes…
BS: I must admit I hadn’t….
MS: ...but your grandma was there.
BS: Grandma was there.
MS: Yes.
BS: Because, as you know, it backs onto the hospital but I haven't gone into the history of it.
MS: No, no.
PR: So well we can probably trace that with the aid of your street directories, can't we, when the name Scoley came.
ER: Gaps, there are gaps, you see, over the years, but um, that was the family home in Hertingfordbury Road and then when Pop and Uncle they moved into these two to houses in North Road.
BS: Yep, they were built for them.
ER: Probably that was probably when Pop got married or?
BS: I would think so, yes.
ER: Or something like that, that was the sort of thing that was done in those days.
MS: They did live there, didn't they?
BS: Percy went into the Air Force.
MS: Air Force.
BS: Regular Air Force, until…
MS: And he didn't actually live there again until after the war, after the last war, when he came out of the Air Force.
BS: The late 40’s, 50’s.
ER: And he came back to North Road?
MS: Yes. By that time we were living, Bill and I were living in one of them.
BS: We lived in 99.
MS: And 97 was Bill's Uncle and Aunt, and they lived there until it got a bit too big for them and they moved…
BS: ...down to Margate.
MS: Yes, well just outside Margate somewhere to smaller accommodation.
ER: So it was, even though he was in the Air Force it was still the Scoley ….
BS: Still belonged.
ER: Still their family home.
MS: Oh yes.
BS: Yes, yes.
PR: So what do you remember about 72 and the occupants there, and did you visit?
BS: Well, yeah because we all used to gather together at Christmas what have you, and they
used to go up and see them at times but apart from those sort of outings and trips to meet up the family, then we don't have any other recollections.
PR: I am trying to think when he lived longer than his wife didn't he?
BS: Yes. Yes.
PR: Did she have a fall down stairs was that, or did he?
ER: I can remember....
BS: No, he just died in his chair. He was sitting in his chair and he just died.
PR: I think she had a catastrophic fall.
MS: Fall, yes.
PR: I seem to remember. I can't remember her but I can, I have got a childhood memory of seeing him going off. So what, he would have gone past my house just for the sake of the story, if it wasn't raining but looking as if it might, Mac folded up into a sort of band across his shoulder, down to the shop in The Wash, and would he have xxx worked alone or was it, where there others, what was the business in The Wash, how did that?
BS: Well, first off he moved, he started up business by the cinema, on that side.
ER: On the opposite side of the road where there was a ladies shop.
BS: Clothes, a ladies hat shop on the left-hand side, and there was a DIY shop next door Old Crafts, old matey moved down…
ER: Bill Freeman Young who had the red shop next to Spencer's the butchers, in Railway Street
BS: In Railway Street that's right next to Wally’s,
ER: Yes, that's right, yes, yes, I remember that.
BS: My Dad had the shop there, it was the tailor’s shop for a short time before he moved over the road and bought a building.
ER: He had left Graveson’s to set up on his own…
BS: Yes
MS: Yes:
ER: ...as an independent which people did more in those days, didn't they.
MS: Yes, that’s right.
ER: They try to make their own way in life.
PR: And so Dad was there but Grandfather was there as well, was he?
BS: No, no, no.
MS: No, he wasn’t in…
PR: I thought he was just...
BS: No, he was just in one shop
MS: No, he wasn’t in your Dad’s business at all, was he.
PR: No? Oh, I assumed that was, he was going down to do some old, in semi-retirement sort of thing.
BS: No, he just used to do his rabbiting’s, take the ferrets out, take the pony and trap up the Flights, you know. I remember one time he bought me a horse, didn’t he? And he rode it down to the shop, and they all came out to look at it, and the tractor engine went by. Cor...[Laughter], It stood up on its high heels threw him off, [more laughter] nose was all bleeding, took him in the shop. My Dad ran up and caught the horse on Old Cross and brought it back. But you know, I mean...
MS: Fancy, today riding a horse!
BS: He was really battered, you know, but he got up you know and took the horse and I never saw that horse again. [Laughter].
ER: So father, he was across the road and did he move to where we know him first when, was that a better premise…
BS: Yes
ER: ...as his business was beginning to develop.
BS: That’s right.
ER: He came across to what we call the Flemish Building
BS: and it had accommodations there
ER: Yes, yes, I assume that...
BS: They all moved down there.
ER: ...that he moved down there and lived over the shop as people did in those days, yeah, because I found an advert for Scoleys in one of these Old Street directories, it had got W T Scoley, agent for Burberry weatherproofs, W T Scoley, Gents Model Tailor, uniforms and breeches maker, outfit hosiery and hatter, that's in that little red street directory, it's falling to bits, I very rarely take it out with me. Next to them was a ladies shop called Margaret’s, the hairdressers, where Mrs Paddick…
PR: Yes, used to have a hairdressers upstairs and something else downstairs.
ER: and had Matron, Middletons…
BS: And Harry Young is down there
ER: That's right, this is in, I think the 1929 edition of what I’ve got.
PR: Well, Evelyn Walls who used to live in Hayden worked in that hairdressers when she was 14, that is where she started in the hairdressers next to Scoley’s.
ER: Do you remember the other side of Scoley’s
PR: Franks
ER: Franks
BS: Franks, well done
PR: The Corner House. So who were the clients? I mean what kind of customers did you get because obviously there was plenty of choice wasn't there?
BS: I mean he used to get all the Farmers come in, the Sapsters and the Sinclairs, and Pearson, Pearman’s all that crowd that was where the money was coming in from those sort of people.
PR: Dane End and Little Munden.
BS: Made to measure, great big blokes you never pick them up, off the rack or anything.
ER: So how many people were working, was there, your father
BS: There was my father and normally one other.
ER: And they did the making, did they put work out?
BS: well, and there was the chap who used to make up for us, we used to cut it and used to get home maker, that was old Brownie down in Townshend Street.
MS: Do you remember Brownie?
BS: He was, he didn't have any legs.
ER: Ah, he was an outworker
PR: Oh yes, yes, yes. Oh, so he was working for your Pop at the time?
BS: Yes.
PR: Yes, yes.
MS: What was the name of that lady that you used to do work…?
BS: Oh, Miss Britten, but that was later on.
MS: Yes, because that was when I knew them, yes.
BS: Well old Brownie used to sit on his bench all day, sewing
PR: So when you say Miss Britten was the newsagents in the Ware Road that Miss Britten?
BS: No, Miss Britten lived in Tamworth Road.
MS: That was the sister or something, she lived with another lady.
BS: Yes, yes two...I think, I can’t remember.
MS: She was really a dressmaker.
BS: She just used to, yeah, and she used to do repairs, you know
MS: Alterations.
BS: People would…
ER: turn-up.
BS: Trousers shorter
MS: People…
ER: Turn-ups and copies
PR: Yes
BS: A bit like Spratt at Hertingfordbury, he used to do a lot of alterations from what people told me, so that was somewhere in the 1920s when father went there, or earlier.
MS: But you were was born…
BS: I was born in ’26.
MS: And your Mum and Dad then were living in…
BS: Russell Street.
MS: Russell Street, yes, that’s right off Port Vale.
BS: Yeah, yeah.
ER: Gas lamps and cellars where they kept the coal
BS: A black man brought me into the world. That was strange in those days.
PR: Yes, yes. Quite a claim to fame then.
ER: When you were born had your Dad already established himself in business on his own account?
BS: I think so. I think he was down at the…on the Castle side
ER: Yeah, yeah, but he was up and running.
BS: Yes, and I think he, you know, sought to buy the other property and move us all down into…
ER: So did he buy that property, opposite you know that big building? Which was quite a thing in those days because most people in, started up in business, I can remember when my Father took over from my Uncle in St Andrew Street it was, he did it on a shoestring, you know, and he couldn't afford well Archers wouldn’t sell him a piece of the shop so he rented and rented. So really father was quite fortunate, it probably put him in hock for a long long time to be able to purchase a building because it's quite a substantial building it wasn't it?
MS: Yes, it was a big building, yes, because that is where we lived when we first got married.
ER: I know the ….
BS: You mentioned about doing an apprentice. He went into London I can't remember the name of the people, one of the big ones, Hector Prowse I think it was.
PR: Yes that, that property is tall and thin and goes back a long way doesn't it.
BS: Yes.
PR: A Flemish sort of design, on the front. [Note – a mansard roof]
MS: There is a similar one in St Andrews Street.
PR: Yes, next to Eddie’s shop, number 54.
ER: It is one storey less than yours.
BS: That’s right, yes.
MS: Is it?
BS: Yes. As you go across Hertford, you can see it is, but you can see the same..
ER: Yeah, but it has got, you got a cellar there are in St Andre...in The Wash?
BS: No.
ER: I would think...
MS: I think you did, Bill.
BS: Got a cellar?
MS: Well, I’m sure your Dad told me.
BS: Well the shop was actually a cellar.
ER: I was going to say because you went downstairs to it. Because I tell you why I asked you that, The Wash in old times to use a phrase, was notorious. It was called The Wash because it flooded.
BS: Flooded, that’s right.
ER: So cellars. I don't think there were many cellars in that area at all but the shop, the place next to ours where we were, he’d got a cellar so you are both the same height really, but his was one drop down and you were one drop up. Because when Peter does his film show [?] this is Scoley’s shop is a significant pointer, because it is something that hasn't changed over, it was there when your Father bought it, was established. It has been there a long time without it changing. The only thing that has changed about it is the shop front…
BS: Yeah, that’s right [chuckles]
ER: ...and it's always a feature point, that people could always pick it up.
MS: Yes, that’s right.
BS: Now you know, now you mentioned it because the back way used to go in and upstairs to the kitchen, the lounge, but the shop used to come down to big steps to get into the shop, didn’t it.
MS: Yes, yes.
ER: Yes, I can remember that.
BS: And then it was into there, and up to the front.
MS: That’s what I am thinking of being the cellar.
BS: We were below the ground levels.
ER: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
PR: Well, what were the other facilities like, I mean the accommodation wise, did you have to have, well, coal fires wouldn’t it
BS: Oh yeah, yes. Coal fires.
PAR: Up to the first floor.
BS: Yep.
PAR: And water, was that?
MS: The room that, at the front of the building, that was our
BS: Over the shop
MS: Yes, that was our sitting room
BS: yeah, massive coal fire.
MS: And it had a fireplace in the corner. It was huge, it was as, like that.
ER: What set at an angle...so like the television is?
BS: Yeah, that’s right.
MS: So you could get half a tree on it, you know..[laughs]
BS: And you had a beam going through it, funny enough, remember?
MS: Yes, yes.
BS: Through the actual chimney. Amazing.
PR: Gosh, that would, overheat that and you’ve got a problem.
BS: Yeah, and all the walls were um,
ER: Lath and plaster
MS: Lath and plaster [laughs]
BS: No, and cloth.
ER: Yes. Hessian cloth.
BS: Hessian, yes, that’s right.
ER: Makes me feel that your property where you were was built the same people who built our place at St Andrew Street.
BS: But it was associated with a monastery apparently.
MS: Well the church wasn’t it, was it St. Mary's, round by Old Cross
PR: The library, yes.
MS: And it was, and I think your dad told me once, this is what I'm thinking that it was a cellar but there were, there was something there that they thought were graves or…
BS: I didn’t know that. I know it had…
MS: ...or memorials you know set in somewhere or other.
BS: They had some stained-glass windows in it, at the back.
MS: Yes, yes.
ER: It could have been partly a chapel then…
MS: That’s right
ER: ...at some time going back. Probably quite an interesting building for anybody who was interested in researching this.
PR: Did...a date on it, you don't know the…?
BS: No, I’m sorry.
PR: ...no. Well, I mean that can be tracked down. In a way we like the colour, the fireplace for the beam…
BS: It was a four-storey building.
ER: Don’t mention to our ‘Maitre d’, Mrs Riddell ‘cos she would track it down, ‘cos, actually my wife is into that sort of thing, researching history of buildings. Quite interesting but, um, that is an interesting building in itself...
MS: In itself it is.
ER: ...because people often say to me, it's been a long while, what was it before, I mean it is what you call a smelly stuff shop now, has all this…
BS: Magic stuff.
ER: ...all that sort of thing. I can remember it as a Co-op shop and I can remember it as a tailors and I say I can always remember a man standing outside the door, a very smart man always had a tape measure…
BS: Yep, round his...
ER: ...round his neck, either looking for a customer or or waiting, anyway I’m digressing and we are jumping ahead of ourselves a little bit.
PR: Well we have probably covered the ground really, it is just, always envious of Doris Paddick and her sitting room, looking out over The Wash, I mean that must have been a lovely window.
MS: Oh, it was. Oh, you could sit there for hours, you know, watching...
BS: There is one point you ought to know. You talked about tailoring and outfitter, we also used to sell fishing tackle.
ER: Did you?
BS: Allcocks fishing tackle. That was because Dad used to be associated with the Wickham’s Cup on Mill Bridge where they did all the fishing, and all the carp. In fact that old cup over there if I remember rightly, wants a clean on...but it’s a….have you got glasses on?
PR: Yes. [general laughter]. Yeah, Hertford Working Men's Club, replica of the Wickham’s Cup won by W T Scoley 1930.
ER: so, was Dad a member of the Working Men's Club?
BS: Yeah.
ER: The Old Cross Club
PR: So what, well I get muddled up now with these working men's clubs because the one The Wash was the other way, it’d be…
BS: It was in The Wash,
ER: Where Sloppy, where Sloppy Joes is now, that was...
First tape ends
ER: We are up and running. We did one once, we were chatting away to somebody for half an hour, and there was nothing going on [general laughter]
BS: Yes, so that’s, that’s...
PR: So, when the Wickham’s presumably must here be to do with the brewery itself.
BS: Yeah. Yeah well before they did all that changing the water down there, over Millbridge, you used to have a big fishing club there, the Wickham’s Brewery.
PR: Ah. Oh, it went right…
ER: And they fished that pool, where the doodlebug fell would that….
BS: Yes, more or less...
ER: ...where you blew your pictures of Wickham’s brewery off the map sort of thing, and that is where they used to function from.
BS: That's right and we all used to stand round there, because there was a long pavement right under the bridge, and round and they all used to fish there.
PR: Yes, deeply interesting water, isn’t it, different...
BS: And the pub itself there, had all fishes in cases round the walls and...
ER: The Brewery Tap, or whatever it was called.
BS: No, it was called….
PR: or The Woolpack.
BS: No, no. The other side, opposite The Woolpack.
PR: Yes, yeah, The Brewery Tap, well that's what it said on the wall.
ER: The brewery was at the back and they had a pub of their own on the front on Main Street yeah, yeah, we have got some pictures, well Peter has got some pictures.
PR: Were you, where were you when the doodlebug?
BS: I was up North Road fortunately.
PR: Did you hear it?
BS: Yeah, so I came down because all the fronts were blown in and what have you, and we lost the cat for two weeks that was left down there, and I don't know if you remember the Locks. Miss Locks, Locks Cabin the first sweet shop around the corner in...
ER: Oh, is that what their name was? I used to go in there, The Cabin.
BS: The Cabin
ER: Very dark.
BS: Yes, that's right just the two sisters.
PR: Where was that then, which?
BS: The first, first shop in…
MS: Maidenhead Street.
BS: ...Maidenhead Street on the left-hand side.
ER: It is the shop where they sell gins [?] and stuff like that.
PR: Yes, yes.
BS: Between that shop and…
PR: Very narrow little…
BS: ...a little alleyway which was the back entrance to our place.
ER: Had you got two entrances then? Could you get to yours through Maidenhead Yard or didn’t it go that far, you had to go along that little dark…
BS: Little dark alley between the cabin and the flats this was. Used to have your own key and unlock there.
ER: It's amazing, what you can learn in 10-minutes about something you've been looking at for 60 odd years, isn’t it…
MS: Trouble is when you are young you don't bother to record it, do you.
PR: No, no. I don't remember that cabin anyway, I can't, I know the building you mean.
ER: The sweet shop was between the Co-op and Walkers stores.
[There is the sound of what appears to be the pages of a photo album being turned in the background.]
BS: That was me in the front.
PR: I can’t think what it, I’m remembering…
ER: That’s right. I can always remember some of these, ‘cos…
BS: Yes, because Mum and Dad…
ER: ...I used to be humping a truck from the arcade back to St Andrew Street there is always someone…
BS: Well these windows of course were all put in after it was all blown in. It was a long time we had to wait for, to get these temporary windows
MS: you couldn’t buy that plate glass then, could you.
ER: So, Burberry’s, agents for Burberrys
PR: So you went on the level for a bit and then down into the shop did you rather, it looks as if...
BS: Yes, it slopes down
ER: Yes, the door was set back was it not?
BS: Setback, that's right.
ER: A little alcove.
BS: Sloped down to, and a step down, and you were in.
ER: It was a very smart shop really, wasn't it?
MS: Oh yes.
BS: Oh yes.
ER: I mean that, that gives you a message doesn't it? W T Scoley not, you know, Joe's or tailors or something like that.
BS: That was my dad and mum,
PR: And who is this then?
BS: That’s me!
ER: The young, the young Bill. [laughter]
PR: Oh it’s you and,,,?
BS: Ah, that was my sister.
PR: Get my glasses behind these...oh yes
ER: She was a smart baby wasn't she?
BS: Yep. That was my dad on a horseback at, that’s Gilbertson and Page at the back…
ER: Oh down what used to back onto the Railway Yard down the East Station.
BS: Yeah
MS: Round...
ER: If you talk to people about things like that, they don't know what…
MS: No, no.
[laughter]
ER: Those were the days. Those sort of things.
BS: Do you remember old Dearing, Geering, used to be, I think he was up at Neil's or somewhere garages. [Geering and Tregaskiss on Castle Street]
ER: The name, the name rings a bell.
BS: He used to get an old charabanc, we used to go with him.
ER: They organised a trip.
BS: No. He just used to get hold of this car and take us down.
ER: Yeah, because so many people didn't have cars, did they?
BS: No.
ER: I was talking to someone the other day about when old Godfrey had these taxis, they were posh taxis weren't they, and the drivers wore peaked caps.
MS: Oh yes, peaked caps
BS: Didn’t know anybody then.
MS: Would you like a cup of tea? [Mona leaves to make refreshments]
BS: There is one without me, in fact you can see my Mum’s Sister on that one
ER: Looking out the window…
BS: Looking out the window.
PR: Who were the characters around the town in your day when, about the place. You used to, it was a small town in a way wasn’t it and everybody seemed to…
BS: Yeah, yeah.
PR: I mean were there any customers that you did not want to see or….
BS: Funnily enough, as you know there were some rough elements in the town but they always used to come to our shop rather than go to the, you know Hepworths or any of the other, and they were always, you know, good, good for their money, you know, a bit you know
ER: I think probably your Dad would have sussed out the ones to avoid.
BS: I always remember a chap coming in, Dad was behind the counter, and ask for a shirt or something and Dad put it, and this chap said ‘Oh, you've been buying them in for something special’ he said ‘I know what you people are like’. My Dad came round the counter, he beat it [laughter]. That is what I was telling you about. [Note – he is showing a document re 80 Hertingfordbury Road]
PR: Oh yes. 80!
BS: 80. I never knew that until I sorted that out.
PR: And yet, and it’s in the...
ER: Street Directory as 72
BS: Ah, yes, and that was my grandfather’s so I don't know what age he is…
PR: 1917. Very, very early licence isn't it, didn’t need, well to pass your test but you needed a licence. You didn't need to pass a test, did you, but you just applied for...
BS: That’s right.
ER: Is this a local school, is it?
BS: Yeah, I think so
ER: Cowpers?
BS: No, that is the old Bengeo school...and that’s where it got its name, actually
ER: And that is when you were there?
BS: Yeah.
ER: Now I have seen one or two Bengeo school ones….
BS: Do you know anybody there in...
ER: of my era, where blokes like Charlie Toghill and Peter Mabbit who were my age see in the ‘60s, I am not being rude or anything like that, and like last week someone gave me a picture of a scout troop in 1947, 48 and I am desperately trying to work out who they were.
PR: They look all rather better off Bengeo boys then.
ER: So this must be in the late ‘20s early ‘30s?
PR: Who's there then Bill, then?
BS: Who you might know? Eric Pocock.
PR: Oh yes, [laughs]
BS: Maurice Pocock, Brian Wilde.
PR: Gosh, yeah. Yes, the jugs give him away don’t they.
BS: That chap Goslin, Philips, Ruskin, Gardner, Freeman, George, remember George? Used to be a decorator up Bengeo, that is his son.
PR: Oh yes.
BS: Schultz. That’s um, Mills, Freddie Hopkins.
ER: Cor he, now, was he anything to do with Bill Hopkins? He used to be the foreman, transport foreman at MacMullens and now drives a lorry for Parcels.
PR: Yes, no he’s the one called Fred and that would be younger, that Fred would be younger
BS: This is the family like, um…
PR: Jessie Hopkins
BS: Yeah, you know, her husband used to work down Chaseside
ER: Oh, I know, yes.
BS: That’s the brother or something, that’s me of course [laughs] Maurice Pocock, Brown, Maurice Hart, Skidmore, who’s that...Wagland, then there’s Alan Saunders, Jimmy Buckles mum’s brother
PR: So did you know Mona, meet Mona through being at school with him as it were? Where you a...?
BS: Well, it is a long story. As you say I used to go to school with him. So I, then we worked together. We both worked for Creaseys we both did an apprenticeship for type-writer mechanic and then I went to the Town Clerk's office, well via the British Oak Insurance Company I went to the Town Clerk. Mona worked there and her Father worked there, and of course we used to, you know, work together and that's how I met her really.
ER: So you weren't in the family business overlong then?
BS: No.
ES: You escaped.
BS: Oh, no. I was young then, you know, sort of just coming out of school and my first jobs were that. Perhaps I should have said it the other way round. I went to British Oak Insurance Company first and then I went to the Town Clerk's office, and then I took this apprenticeship with Creaseys and of course from there I went to the army.
PR: Mona's Dad, what was he doing at the Castle at the time?
BS: He was the Commissionaire. He used to carry the sword for the Mayor.
PR: With the furry hat.
BS: That’s right.
ER: and did he live in Sele Road?
BS: Yes.
PR: Sergeant yes, Sergeant-at-Mace yes. I was just trying to get it said on the tape.
BS: Charlie Mansfield used to carry the other thing.
PR: Was Charlie Mansfield related to George Mansfield who was a member of the Council for Bengeo? 1 Tower Street?
BS: I don’t think so, but I wouldn’t swear to it.
PR: I never sorted that out when I was a kid I couldn’t quite...yes.
BS: Well when I went in the army, Mansfield’s son was the Corporal in charge of the hut where I went.
PR: Yes, little world. So Mona’s Dad would have done that sort of work on civic occasions, but was working full-time at the Castle otherwise.
BS: Yes, as a Commissionaire.
PR: I hadn’t realised that, I only ever see, well, you know
BS: You see the pictures.
PR: Yes, see the pictures on the wall.
BS: No, he worked full time at it. He was a member of the Corp of Commissionaires.
PR: Oh.
ER: Yes, he had been a regular soldier, previous like, in the first war and so forth.
BS: Yep.
ER: I used to remember him in Sele Road because we lived in Sele Road at 69 and that was number 79.
BS: 69?
ER: Yeah. That was one of those houses up, you went up the little cul-de-sac
BS: By Paggett’s and Brooks’?
ER: That’s right, and we were on the left-hand side for a while, then we moved to the right-hand side, we had the end one, at number 79, lovely big garden and looked out over the railway, everything like that. You tended to know, even as a little lad you knew everybody…
BS: You knew everybody there.
ER: ...in Sele Road. And I can remember old Mr Buckle, and I can remember Jimmy Buckle, ‘cos they were on the left-hand side coming up. And their garden, had big long gardens, didn’t they? They went to the railway bank, didn’t they, ‘cos there were some allotments.
BS: That’s right.
PR: What number were they?
BS: 51, 51.
PR: Ann Butler [?] today.
BS: Is it?
ER: Used to be next to Maurice Hall.
PR: Yes, Daily Telegraph the Hall’s, No.49 that was a....lightened your bag when you got past there.
ER: I can remember I used to walk through and there was a family, Castle’s, lived next to a fellah named North, and Castle’s, Olive Castle used to walk me to St Andrew’s School and that, I forget what her father did, but I remember that as a little lad of five or six years old, and we walked down past Buckles and people like that. You knew where everybody lived then
BS: and of course, used to be Drury’s lived there.
ER: Yeah, the window cleaner.
BS: And his two sons which were Len and Maurice, well Maurice used to work with my Dad in The Wash.
ER: Yeah.
[Mona returns]
PR: Oh. So was Mr Stackwood?
BS: Oh yeah, Stackwood. Mona will tell you more about the Castle than me, she knows everybody. About Stackwood.
PR: We’ve got round the Castle now, straight out of The Wash
ER: We’ve got you courting yours truly, about Dad and…
[general conversation about pouring tea; sugar etc]
ER: Young Mr Scoley has just brought a shoe-horn in, that’s in mint condition. It’s the last thing he purchased from our shoe-shop sometime before we retired, well packed up.
BS: What did you call me?
[more tea-related conversation]
PR: Talked about your Dad and how, their side of things and how on parade and Mr Mansfield with him, but we couldn’t work out whether Mansfield was related to George Mansfield the one, the Alderman.
MS: No, I don’t think so.
BS: I said didn’t think so.
MS: No, no, I don’t think so.
PR: But what, did Mr Stackwood, was he a late recruit to that team or was he on parade days used to?
MS: I think he was.
PR: ‘Cos I don’t know he was in the earliest, earlier pictures when your Dad was there and would have been working on the, I don’t know what his history was?
ER: Was that Mr Stackwood who was the gardener lived in that house…
BS: Round the back,
ER: ...in the back of the Castle
MS: Yes, yes. Well they had that house built for him, just before the war.
PR: Oh did they?
MS: And then they knocked it down.
PR: It went. It didn’t have a letterbox. You had to put the paper behind the drainpipe.
MS: Oh did you? It was a nice house.
PR: It was the News Chronicle. Nice redbrick, substantial.
MS: Yes, yes. They were a lovely couple, Mr and Mrs Stackwood.
PR: Unless you were doing the wrong thing [laughter], me and my brother trying to go over the loop on the swings or...
MS: That’s right
ER: Yes, we were very severely controlled. He’d got one of these, if I’m right, a sort of Hitler type moustache.
BS: He did have a moustache, yeah.
ER: He was a very, if he came down there and you were messing about he’d soon…
BS: Yeah.
ER: ...he was a very severe looking man.
MS: This is my Dad you are talking about.
ER: No, old Mr Stackwood.
MS: Mr Stackwood, yes. He was tall and
BS: Lean.
PR: Got very skinny legs when he put his gaiters, well, his stockings on.
MS: Stockings on.
BS: I think he did it for a short time.
MS: I can’t really remember how he came into it, no.
PR: Were your family one of the early ones into Sele Road then, were they? I wondered when did you move in?
MS: We moved in there before the war, my Dad retired from the army. He was in the regular army. And we, he got a job here in Hertford. We were then living in Hitchin, and we had to have a house and the Council found him one in Ashley Road and we moved there but we were only there a few months when this one became vacant.
PR: And the much sought after Sele Road. Everybody wanted to live in Sele Road.
MS: Yes, yes, Actually it was Jacky Fisher parents...
PR: Sid and...
MS: ...and the two children living in 51 Sele Road and they moved to North Road and we moved into their house. [Laughs]
PR: All change, move round and so on
MS: yes, and we were there until
BS: Until you moved up here
MS: Um?
BS: Until we moved…
MS: Until I got married…
BS: and moved down the shop.
MS: And my Mum and Dad still lived there until my Mother died and then he moved up here to a bungalow.
PR: Oh did he. I lost track then, or forgotten, that’s probably it. College or working.
MS: Then he died. And that was really the reason we moved up here, so we would be near.
BS: Near him.
MS: Where he was.
PR: 43 Calton Avenue is a good place to be, isn’t it?
MS: Yes.
BS: Except for vandals.
PAR: yes.
BS: And developers.
PR: You’ve had developers, always had the threats. What about this Women’s League of Health and Beauty, Mona?
MS: The League of Health and Beauty actually is a bigger organisation, a country-wide and we had a class in Hertford which I belonged to, and Joan.
PR: For a year or two, and Joan Game, who became Joan Goode, and who became Joey Beagle.
MS: Yes. I don’t really remember the.. or I didn’t know why the League of Health and Beauty decided to close it down, but they did. They used to meet in what was either the Pioneer Hall or St John’s Hall whichever you like to call it.
PR: Oh yes, by the Methodists yes, in the Ware Road.
MS: Yes.
ER: The Co-op Hall, opposite where Streets’ [Note – a garage]
MS: That’s right, that’s where we had the League of Health and Beauty. But of course there were a group of us that really enjoyed it and each other’s company, we wouldn’t want it to…
ER: Was that a forerunner of what they would call as a health club, keep fit club?
MS: That’s right, yes, yes.
BS: You did movement to music, didn’t you and what not?
MS: Yes. And they closed down and we, just as a small group of ladies we couldn’t find somewhere to meet and Mrs Botsford, she was one of them, and she let us go to her house in Ware Road,
ER: That was Gladys.
MS: Gladys.
ER: Phil’s
MS: And we met there. I mean it wasn’t really very convenient for her or, or all of us, and we moved around a bit. We went to, I don’t know what they called it but on the corner of the old car park.
BS: Oh yeah, Evergreen Club.
ER: The Evergreen Club.
MS: Evergreen Club. That’s right.
BS: They had a caff down the bottom and that was on the right.
MS: That’s right. Well they let us have it for one evening a week, so we used to go there and then for some reason or other they stopped going there. We didn’t have anything for a while and then I was helping with the Scouts, and I spoke to the Scoutmaster and he said why don’t you come up here and it had got a concrete floor [laughs] and um, we said ‘right, we will’ and at that time the church was changing its carpet from red to blue
PR: That didn’t last long but yes, there was a time.
MS: He’s, I don’t know, Joan asked, I can’t remember now who it was. Anyway, they were just going to dispose of the old carpet and we said ‘right, if you don’t want it, we’ll have it!’ Which we did and we had it up at the Scouts Hut for quite a time and um, Elsie wasn’t well at all, in and around about that time.
PR: This is Elsie Summers-Gill.
ER: Yes.
BS: Yes, lived at Church Road at the corner there.
PR: And then down George Street.
MS: Yes. So she spoke to John, her husband and she said well why don’t you come down to the Church Hall? So we said ‘Oh, good’ so we did, and we were down there for years.
PR: A long, long time.
ER: I suppose that was more central to, for people.
MS: Yes, and warmer and, you know, much more convenient.
BS: How many years was it that you did it?
MS: I can’t remember.
BS: You took the class from…
MS: Yes. Well I used to help out, see, you know she was getting a bit tottery.
PR: So would you be up at the front, showing movements?
MS: That’s right, yes. We went on and on.
ER: How many years were you doing that?
MS: I really can’t remember, because I can’t - I mean it was long before Elsie died, so. Because we, um, bought a cupboard for the choir’s papers….
PR: Yes, that’s right, it’s all here
MS: ...books and things….
PR: Yes, built-in that…
MS: and sort of in memory of Elsie.
PR: Yes, Elsie. So did you have to learn, did you teach new things each week or did you have a rout - a varied routine you could pick
MS: Well there were quite a lot of things you could remember from your old classes, and we had an excellent pianist then. What’s her name? Jean, Jean…what’s her…
BS: Jean Ellis?
MS: Jean Ellis. Yes, she was our pianist.
PR: She became the secretary of the school along here.
MS: Yes.
BS: Lives in, um, Square.
ER: Lawrence Close.
BS: Lawrence Close.
ER: My daughter’s Mother-in-Law [laughs]
MS: Is it? Yeah, and I would say to her ‘let’s do this’ you know, and I would sort of show her that, and she’d say ‘oh, that’s all right. Will it go to this?’ you know, and she would play it, and I just built on that, you know, and we did that for a bit.
PR: So the health comes from the movement, the music, [laughs] I was going to say where does the beauty come from? I'm leaving myself in an awful mess [laughter]
ER: The beauty was already there, Peter.
PR: Of course, of course, how silly of me! But, did you, was that what the evening was or did you go into beauticians, beauticians, use all those...?
MS: Oh no, no,no. It was
BS: Purely exercise.
MS: It was actually, it was movement to music. It wasn’t strenuous.
ER: A social thing as much as anything?
MS: That’s right, yes. So more or less anybody could do it, you know, if they wanted to, and it was pleasant.
ER: better than doing watch weight, er, weight watchers, I would think.
BS: It was quite strenuous, some of the exercises.
MS: Oh yes, yes. Some were.
PR: But the movement is still going nationwide as it were, is it?
MS: Well, Health and Beauty? Well I think it is, I’ve really lost touch with it now.
PR: Haven’t heard of it for a while. I assumed that when you carried on independently it was because the whole national movement changed.
ER: No, they have got a group at Bengeo School and they are mostly senior women...choosing my words carefully, I mean…
MS: Yes.
ER: ...there is a lady I know, Mrs Goodrup she lives on our estate, she’s, well she is older than me and she, you see her going up there with her, they take these foam mats…
MS: Yes, that’s right.
ER: ...still goes up there and does her …
MS: Yes, well it is, it is good.
ER: Free social thing.
MS: Yes. and if you felt a bit fed up with, I don’t really want to go, by the end of the evening ‘I did enjoy that’ [laughs]
PR: But its successors I suppose have developed, line dancing and aerobics.
MS: Yes, not so energetic as aerobics and….
PAR: But I mean…
MS: ...not quite so
PR: ...but there weren’t any aerobics in those days anyway, so.
BS: As Mona says, it is still going on now, in the Church Hall.
PR: Yes.
BS: You handed over what two years, three years ago?
MS: Two, yeah, about two years ago.
BS: Yeah. Jill Studd.
MS: Yes. They still, well I started not having a Christmas Party but, the beginning of December just having a little feast [general laughter].
BS: Socially.
ER: Drinks and buffet.
MS: Didn’t really know what to call it but its you know, just very informal and
Tape ends