Transcript Detail
Transcript Title | Stockwell, Amos & Pleasance (O1994.2) |
Interviewee | Amos (AS) and Pleasance (PS) Stockwell |
Interviewer | Peter Ruffles (PR) |
Date | 01/08/1991 |
Transcriber by | Jean Riddell (Purkis) |
Transcript
HERTFORD ORAL HISTORY GROUP O1994.2
Interviewee: Amos (AS) and Pleasance (PS) Stockwell
Interviewer: Peter Ruffles (PR)
Date of Interview 1st August, 1991
Transcribed by JRP
Typed by JRP
PR: Here we go, off to Amos and Pleasance Stockwell.
Now, I'm in the house of Amos and Pleasance Stockwell, number 140, Mandeville Road, the last day of February, 1993, a bitterly cold day in February and this is a few words, from Amos in particular, promised last July outside Brewster's fish shop when I met him just before celebrating their. ..which wedding anniversary were you off to celebrate? ...the Diamond Wedding! I have to get it on the tape! So I'm repeating the bits you've just told me so it's on the recording and I don't get in a muddle. And Amos and Pleasance are both very well known Hertford people.
When did you ...now I remember you being in Fore Street when I was a little boy …
PS: Yes I was what?
PR: You were living in Fore Street when I first knew you. When I was little ....over Trueform. was
it? ...which shop were you living over?
PS: A shoe shop, wasn't it. I forget the name of them now ...I don't know who's got the place now. We lived over the top in a flat and also there was a greengrocer, Mr. …... forget his name now ….
PR: On, yes, the savings .....War Savings.
PS: Yes, that's right ….. Mrs. Gudgin ….
P: OH, yes, Mrs. Gudgin .....
AS: She was there. She did the War Savings …. 'course she used to grumble at me because we were over the top of her you see and I had a washing machine and she used to come and grumble at me because she could hear it from down below .....
PR: Oh, hear the thing whirring!
PS: I said, “Well if you don't like it you come and use it and I'll do your job.” “Oh well,” she said and stopped it and didn't say any more.
PR: When did you move in there then were you there ....
PS: Well let me see. I went there because …. I was lucky to get it, really, I went there because Robin …. er I wanted him to go to Christ's Hospital in Horsham and he was only nine you see, and you had to be …..it was left five hundred years ago, when the school actually started, I think, it was left by a man who was one of the boys who were picked up in London …. that's what they did first of all, you see, Christ's Hospital, picked all the boys in London that had no homes and took them to school in London Well, then, of course, it got a bit much, I think, and they got the place at Horsham …. beautiful place it was, lovely school and grounds, you never saw anything like it and the thing was that this man left £500. He evidently was one of the boys that were picked up in London, you see. He left £500 to educate a boy at Christ s Hospital and I forget how I knew of this …. my mother knew a lot, she was a Hertford woman, you see, and so , anyway I wrote to Horsham to find out how you got into the school and they sent me lots of literature about it and the boy would have to take an examination at the school, you see, to …. the one in London. They had first one in London then they'd gone to Horsham because it'd got too big. He would have to go and take an examination and they would send me the papers, you see, which they did. And then I had another letter to say that as now getting lots of bombs and things we would like you to take him to your County Hall and so he could take the examination there. So when it came to it and we got all the papers ….well they didn't send them to us, they just sent a note to us, to me like, he was in the army at the time, and told me that the boy was to go to the County Hall on such and such a day, you see, and the papers would be sent there, to them. So I said to him, “It means you1ve got to go up there,” and he wasn't very old …. well, he was nine when he went there and this was only eight then and he didn't seem to mind., he went quite happily off and I said, “Shall I come up there with you?” and he said, “No! No! I can go,” because we lived in Fore Street and the thing was it had to be a boy living in a certain part of Hertford that this man, had left the money ....
PR: Right, right!
PS: …. and you had to be in that part of it and one of the men that went there ...do you remember, I don't suppose you do though, he used to be Mr. .... a very nice man. He kept a shop of all different things. watches and all that kind of thing. Well, he was a boy there and you had to be in old part of Hertford to live, and I had a job to get a place there, but we happened to …. have a man at the church, he was not the vicar, the other one …. I forget what they call him.
PR: Not the curate?
PS: The curate …. and he'd got a house in Hertford and that was where it goes right across, you know, it did. I think there's some shop got them now .....
PR: Oh, yes, estate agents ....
PS: Anyway I thought, I'm going to get a house in that part of Hertford ..what it was, it took Fore
Street as far as where the what's 'is name is for the wall, you know, up in round the corner there and also took you down to where the slums were.
PR: Mm, yes, the Bircherley Green and …. yes ….
PS: Yes, that part, and you had to get a house somewhere there, included in this Hertford bit you see and I remember I was going round and I thought, what on earth, I couldn't find anything anywhere, you see, and that's where the boy had to reside.
PR: Yes, and that's how you came to be living right in the centre of the town. Where were you before that, then Pleasance, before you moved into Fore Street?
PS: The new place up …. my mother bought the house, didn't she, right up Gallows Hill way, wasn't it, and they had Gallows Hill, a lot of council houses and then they had one row of houses which were not council houses and my mother bought the end one, you see.
PR: Ah, where's that, what road ….
AS: Turn right to go to the green roof down there, but go just a little further along the other way
which leads to the Foxholes housing estate, there's the ditch and these private houses run along there.
PR: Oh, I see, but you needed to …. I always thought that was such a lovely spot I was always
envious of you, living right in the heart of the town.
PS: Oh, it was too, I've never been so happy in my life as I was there. We lived there for some time. Anyway, I didn't know where to get a place and I was just going, you know, giving up hope of it and going along Fore Street and something inside me said,” Go and see MR ...” I forgot his name now. He was the curate anyway. And something else said, “Don't be silly. He wouldn't know any thing about it. He was a stranger.” and “Go and see him,” you see. And it said it three times. And I got to where he lived because he lived over the shop, you see, and turned in there, and I had no idea he lived there, not then. It was just something inside me made me go there. So I went there you see and I told him I was desperate trying to get somewhere in Hertford within a certain part. It had to be a certain part, that part, down by all the …. slums they were at that time and then I told him. I said, “I just can't do any more. I've been everywhere”
He said, “Let me tell you something but on no circumstances let the vicar of All Saints' know, because if he knows I'm leaving he'll get someone else straight away.” He said,” I'm leaving, I
can't get on With the vicar and I shall be leaving within a month .....
AS: Mr. Curts, Cootes …
PS: What?
AS: Was his name Curts? or Cootes?
PS: Who?
AS: Curate!
PS: Oh, I forget what it was now.
AS: Something like that wasn't it Curts, Cootes ….
PS: Anyway he said, “I'm telling you this now don't mention a word, because if the vicar gets to
know he'll get another curate here and he'll get this flat.” But he said, “The man that owns the shop underneath is coming to see me tomorrow” This was in the flat above. He said, “Would you like me to ask him if you can have this flat because you'll be right in the centre of where you've got to be.”
“Oh!” I said, “If you don't mind. So I said, “I had no idea you were going and I had no idea of anything about this flat,” You see.
So, he said,” No, well I shall be talking to him tomorrow and I'll ask him and I shall tell him why. That you've got to get the boy here in a certain part of Hertford." ….
PR: To qualify for Christ's Hospital..
PS: So the next day, I wasn't on the 'phone then, he said, “Come and see me on such and such a day.” And 1did. He said, “You've got the flat. He's only too pleased to let you have it.”
PR: Mm! So how many of you were there in the family at that stage?
PS: Well I'd got the three children and myself because he was in the army you see.
PR: Right. so that's ..Let's have them in their right order..,first born?
RS: Robin …
PR: ....was the eldest and he was about nine then ….
PS: ....... and then Christopher and then Gillian ....
PR: ...then Gillian, right.
PS: The three children and myself.
PR: And Amos was away fighting?
PS: No he wasn't fighting.
PR: Wasn't he? Bury St. Edmunds, oh! What were you doing in Bury?
AS: …. chaps as they came up ….
PR: Oh!
PS ..... and I lived there about twenty years and I loved Fore Street and then the boys were grown up then and they said why don't you leave here and go somewhere else, you see, which we did. We went to two other houses before we ....
PR: Came to, yes, Mandeville Road. So, were you ....where were you born then Amos?
AS: I was born in Ware.
PR: Hardly dare mention that to the Hertford listeners~ ….
PS: Well, I wasn't born at Hertford ….
PR: Where were you born?
PS: I was born at Bushey. near Watford.
PR: But your mother was a Hertford person.?
PS: My mother was from Hertford, yes. Well actually she was born in Bedford but when she was a fortnight old they'd all moved to Hertford you see, my grandfather. He was the head gardener up at Brickendonbury and they moved there you see and she was born a fortnight before they moved so she was born at Bedford but brought up in Hertford.
PR: So how did you come to play for Hertford Football?
AS: I didn't play very much for Hertford at all, you know. I played my football at Ware and when it come to the end of my time as it were and we got the children come along, growing up, I had to cut and so I offered to be a fill in for Hertford second eleven. I told them I didn't want anything to do with the first eleven but. I would be a fill up for the second eleven and I did that for a couple of years.
PR: Oh, so you …. yes …. you were there for, you played a few games.
AS: Oh yes, I was surprised how often they wanted one to make up … nearly every week.
PR: Yes, 'cos they're …. Ware Town is one division higher than Hertford at the moment isn't it....
AS: Yes, it was the opposite then.
PR: Yes! So Herting …. we'd better just mention Hertford a bit, playing at Hertingfordbury Park.
AS: Yes, that's right, with the pitch running …. no the pitch was still the same way as it is, it'd had been changed over by then …. 'cos the pitch used to be running the other way with the goal back to the river and then running through to the estate as it were …
PR: Yes! Ninety degree turn. And was there quite a following for Hertford Town then in those
days?
AS: Yes, quite a following, I think, to-day.
PR: More than the twenty five they get to-day?
AS: Oh yes, yes! I mean it would be a bit of a guess … I would think it would be more like four or
five hundred I would think.
PR: Yes! So .... and what about things like the changing facilities and that sort of thing at the club … I mean was there much club building?
AS: We used to get changed at the back of the stand. There was a stand you know and at the back of the stand were two changing rooms with …. I think there were some form of shower arrangement you know, not quite so up to date as they've got now perhaps but you'd get a wash down.
PR: Mm ..... did you play away as well as at home with …. you travelled sometime?
AS: Oh, yes!
PR: What sort of time are we thinking about, what year would that be, Amos?
AS: Thirty, thirty-three I suppose or 'thirty five somewhere about there, say thirty-four …. might
even be a little bit later.
PR: So where would you have travelled and how would you. what kind of transport .....
AS: Dye's little coach!
PR: Oh, the chara ....
AS: It was one of the Dyes who was driving, you know. One of the guards teams played in the league .... I forget which one it was, but one of them and then there was the second team of the clubs which played in the same league as the Hertford one, and it was always a pretty good run down then.
PR: And it was always pretty reliable was It, Dan Dye's vehicle?
AS: Oh, yes!
PR: Because the road obviously ...you couldn't hit a motorway or anything like that and travel.
AS: No trouble to get there all the same.
PR: Ah. And Dan Dye was probably involved with management, or at least the directors of the
club, was he at that time?
AS: He had something to do with the club … I didn't have anything to do with that side of it.
PR: No, no!
AS: He had something to do with the club committee or something.
PR: Reg Dye did until very recently, didn't he when he died, yes.
AS: That's right and another one who is still around. You probably know him he lives in Port Vale. He's often walking in the town nowadays. I can't think of his name. It might come to me in a few minutes, you know, but he used to be with the club a lot and he would do any jobs …. he would run the lines. Be …. do the ambulance trios ....he was a jolly good chap.
PR: Well, every club needs someone don't they like that and as churches do and other places, they need a utility man who'll do everything.
PR: So, you've been to church this morning .... do you get a lift down there and back …. it was
snowing today wasn't it so....yes.
AS: Our neighbour across the road.
PR: Ah! But you do your exercise with the dog each day?
PS: Yes, oh yes she's been out, haven't you?
PR: Where do you go....what sort of route from here in Mandeville?
PS: When the field's dry we just go down the road and up the steps into the field but it gets very, very muddy you see so with the snow and the rain we take her all round the …. not this part but right the way down the other way, don't we, but she likes going up the field best.
PR: Yes, across the other side of Brickendon Lane is that? Do you go across the road and up the back by Cecil ….
PS: Instead of going straight along there you just cross the road and up the steps and into the field.
PR: Yes, and if you went far enough you get to the back bridge and Bayford …
PS: That's right yes.
AS: Wormley, eventually.
PR: Wormley in the end, yes.
PS:. It's quite a nice I mean she's over ten years old now and that's quite enough for her. There's quite a bit up that field, there's two fields together, really and we go up as far as the railway bridges ...that great big bridge that goes over and then come back and that's quite enough for her now.
PR: Yes, and enough for you I should think.
PS: Well, I'm not supposed to do much 'cos I've got heart trouble you see, so the doctor makes me rest.
P Yes, yes, do things gently, yes.
PS: 'Cos we came to Hertford because my mother was Hertford woman and my father went right through the First World War, you see and came home and he used to run the village band.
Anyway, he was taken ill and died a year and a half after he came out of the army. He was only
thirty-eight.
PR: Oh, dear!
PS:. And my eldest brother. He had heart trouble and he died at eighteen and I had a younger
brother, you see, younger than me and he died about three months ago.
PR: Yes, and usually the ticker is the trouble. So All Saints' Church you've been to most of your married life then I suppose.
PS: Sixty-five years I've been there, but my mother because she was a Hertford woman, they lived up in Ware Road and all her family, her father, mother and aunts and so did we, when we stayed there as children, they went to the old All Saints' Church ...my mother loved that church and then she was going to school one day and she saw a lot of smoke coming out of the church and she just went off to school, you see, quite happily, when she came home, it was half down.
PR: Yes,yes!
PS: It was on fire, you see.
PR: Yes, yes, started in the night and she …. it was probably well under way as she was going to
school.
PS: And er, so she must have been one of the first that had seen it you see, the postman saw it and it was him that gave the …. she lived on the Brckendonbury, you see, so she had to go very early to school because the gardener, the head gardener had a most lovely house …. we used to go up there as children. She used to take us up that avenue first and go into it and so she was early, she was at school at about eight o'clock and that was about when she saw it.
PR: Just around Christmas time I think, wasn't it, a few days before Christmas.
PS: And er, anyway then they had all their you know hymns, you couldn't do much more than that, and prayers. They did it in the hall, you know. When you get old you forget the names of things.
PR: It would be the Shire Hall, I suppose, yes, yes.
That's where they did all the services. Until they built this other church, and actually she said it was only the top half of the old church that was burned. The other they could have built it up but all the people that …. wealthy people in Hertford said, “No! We want a new church and they pulled the lot down 'cos it was a very old church, and made this great big one.
PR: And now, of course, when in a way its too big isn't it for its present use, yes.
PS: The other vicar reckoned he was going to take a lot of the pews out but he left.
PR: Yes, so you will have seen plenty of vicars at All Saints over the years.
PS: Yes, when I was old enough to go to church we used to go as children with my grandparents and you daren't say a word ….my grandfather was very strict man but when he came back, my young brother and me because my other brother died just before you see and that's what made us come to Hertford …. they're all buried at Bushey, the whole family are, and anyway when they came to it, there was far too much room for all the people in Hertford but they kept the on the church. Well, this morning when we went I counted there was about forty people there.
PR: Well for a snowy morning that wasn't too bad really.
PS: But always the far sides of the church very rarely have people in them.
PR: Who is your favourite vicar then over the years, who did you get on best with?
PS: Well, I forget the name of the first vicar when we came, I wasn't very old then and then there was …. we had another one ….
AS: Landolf Smith, wasn't it?
PS: What?
AS: Landolf Smith ….
PS: Landolf Smith was the one when we came here, yes, that's right, because he had cancer and died. And then another one came and I can't remember his name and then we had another one He was there in the war, not the first war and he was there a long time ….
PR: Was that Peter Burgess? Was he called Pe ….
PS: I think his name was Burgess.
PR: I'm not sure whether the Peter's right, is it?
AS: No, I don't think so.
PR: No, I'm thinking of Peter Briggs, but it is Burgess, yes!
PS: And he was very angry because his daughter joined the army.
PR: Oh!
PS: And she came in her uniform and he didn't know anything about it!
PR: Oh! She startled him!
PS: Anyway he was laughing over it afterwards. And then we had …. who did we have after that?
AS: After who?
PR: Christopher Perone for a while ….
PS: Oh, yes he was a good one but he wasn't there very long. He used to come and see us.
AS: Then the short one.
PS: Yes, Haw!
PR: Reggie Haw, yes and then Mowbray and now we've got our .....
PS: Another one before that of course what's name came .... he's gone up to …. somewhere in
England, not north England, is it?
PR: Oh, Derbyshire, Derby …. yes, yes, yes …
PS: It's snowing again ….
PR: Oh!
PS: .... and there was one before him wasn't there ...oh …. somebody else in the country and he wasn't there above a year and died. He was a nice man though and then we've got what's name the odd one that's gone off …. forget ….
PR: Well Mowbray's gone and now you've got Bill Kemm.
PS: That's right, we've got him.
PR: Yes, with a loud voice.
PS: Pfror ..doesn't he!
PR: Yes!
PS: My word, made every one jump at first~on the first day.
PR: I think he's getting on well, though isn't he?
PS: He's quite a nice man. He was here the other night.
PR: Oh!
PS: My daughter, Gillian, you know, she lives in Bengeo and he'd only been here a week then and he called in to see her, you see.
PR: Good going!
PS: She said, “ How did you know your way here?
He said, “I'd got to find somewhere so I came up to Bengeo and yours was the first house I thought of coming to.”
He came in and she said, “Would you like a cup of tea?”
“Oh, yes, please,” he said. And biscuits or cake with it. And so he had, he had about three or four cups of tea and then he went out into the other room where Norman, that's her husband, he'd got, what do you call those things that they …. he bought one of those, didn't he …. you know those …. want something and they put something on it and it shows it all up on the screen. Anyway the vicar was very interested in that and so he went out and had a look at this and then another bit and another bit and that was an hour gone by and then he came back in. He said he thought he'd like another cup of tea so he had another cup of tea.
PR: Well, he's obviously in training … you've got to have a good tea appetite, haven't you to be a vicar.
PS: And she was the first one in Hertford she'd been to see. He didn't know her, and anyway she used to go to church quite regularly but she doesn't go quite so much now.
PR: So you joined the choir at All Saints' then after you married, came out of the army. Yes, Ibe obviously ….
AS: Well the kids were in the first choir.
PS: He'd just come out of the army so we made him go to the choir. He stayed there forty years, didn't you?
PR: Mm ….
Side B
PR: You didn't have to take a voice test or anything? You just …. they let you in.
AS: You just take it quietly, you know. Listen as much as try.
PR: Because it was a very professional choir all the time, wasn't it. Well, perhaps professional's not the word, but a very high musical standard.
AS: I would say cleverer musicians than they've got now.
PR: Yes.
AS: Perhaps this chap brings them along better. When you take what's name that worked at Horns Mill, forgotten his name now, used to live up Bullocks Lane.
PS: Who was he?
PR: Freestone …. yes ....
AS: Freestone .... he came to Hertford I think from Leicestershire and he told me that when he first came to Hertford he went into St. Andrew's Choir and a lady in St. Andrew's Choir., in St. Andrew's Church, rather. ask him if he would like to take advantage of a course in London and she paid for it, and he went to London for voice training.
PR: Yes, yes!
AS: And so he knew what he was up to. Then of course the Culls, they knew absolutely what it was all about their voices may not have been as great as all that but ....
PR: What voices did they sing? Freestone was a ....
AS: Tenor! Frank Cull was a tenor, Reg Cull was a alto ....
PR: Yes, only just died, hasn't he, Reg.
AS: When I joined the choir, I'd been in a fortnight when your father come along ....
PR: Oh! right!
AS: And, of course, when we were introduced he was Bury St. Edmunds and re been at Bury St. Edmonds for three years so we naturally had plenty to talk about.
PR: Yes, yes! So did my dad came after he was demobbed, like you, about the same time, I suppose
AS: A fortnight after I joined the choir he came and joined the choir. But he'd been in the choir
when he was stationed in Hertford, apparently.
PR: Yes, he came to Ware Read with a little unit of some kind and joined then, did he, yes. Was he …. my dad sand tenor …. was he any good?
AS: He was very, very accurate, he hadn't got one big bulldozing voice, very light, but he was very good and very accurate indeed.
PR: I remember him spending ages by the piano at home, my dad, practising anthems, because he would take solos sometimes, would he?
PS: Oh, he was in the choir, was he?
PR: Mmm, yes, All Saints' but we all, of course, were at St. Andrew's, the rest of the family, Tom and I ….
AS: And your father always used to go to communion at St. Andrew's.
PR: Yes, but the music, which was his worship was at All Saints'.
PS: I used to see your mother quite a bit, used to have a long talk.
PR: Well she was an old Hertford person. Now let's think who else was in the choir. Amos when you were there.
AS: I went to churches in Bury St. Edmunds, you see, including the one where your father went. I mean, I wasn't linked to any particular church I used to wander just where I wanted to go. I'd go to Congregational or the Abbey or St John's I think it was ….
PR: Yes, the high church, yes ....
AS: …. or anywhere I wanted to go.
PS: Well, what made him go to church really, he'd just been demobbed from the army and he was as miserable as miserable so we didn't know what to do with him. So the boys were going to the choir and said why don't you come with us to choir. So he went to the choir and he stayed there a long time.
PR: Yes, forty years! And there was Mr. Bonsor, the butcher ….
AS: Yes! Now he was a pretty good musician, you know.
PR: Was he!
AS: Yes, he …. 'cos I got to know him very well …. we had coffee several evenings and that sort of thing and he played the violin.
PR: Oh! I didn't know that. I just remember him in the little butchers shop next to McMullen's …
AS: Yes, he played the violin.
PR: His little beard!
PS: Did you know Michael Radliss. (Raglass????)
PR: Yes!
PS: He died a little while ago.
PR: Did he?
AS: He was top boy ….
PS: My brother died. My brother was seventy-nine on the 3rd September and he died a fortnight afterwards didn't he …. was taken ill and then the doctor took him him and rushed him off to hospita1 and he died after he got in and the other one Michael Radliss (Raglass????) died about a month or five weeks after my brother, didn't he. He had, he came in one day 'cos we'd been down to his house twice. They had a very nice house where they lived, kept the garden beautifully and he came in and said he'd got a pain across there, you see, and he couldn't move with it you see. So she made him go to bed and got the doctor and he died a1most ….
PR: Mmm, yes! I remember dad telling me about Mick, Michael. Oh, so Bonser, Vernon Hale ….
AS: Yes, he had, I keep my fingers crossed, was he seventy-three when he died or did he do seventy-three years in the choir?
PR: Seventy-three years in the choir. He was ninety when he died.
AS: Seventy-three years in the choir, I think he did.
PR: Did he!
AS: He was another one, got a light voice but sang very accurately.
PR: Yes! He built that houseboat didn't he, that you could see over at Mill Bridge. For years it seemed to be in the water by Durrant Hall.
AS: he built the …. at the back of the church, when they are christened, baptised, the baptismal thing which they wheel along and push over the ….
PR: Oh! A sort of cover for the font …. oh, that's his handiwork, is it? Old Vernon Hale the carpenter.
AS: And he did the screen bit behind the choir on the parson's side after someone who's got a lot of money put the front on the lady chapel and he paid for the front on the lady chapel and he afterwards built the side bit. He could have done the other. They invited him to but he was getting on a bit and he thought it was far too much for him to do. He had a go at the other and he completed that. They looked after Erica a bit, didn't they when the mother was in hospital and ….
PS: Who did?
AS: Mr. and Mrs. Hale.
PS: No! It wasn't them!not looked after Erica, but she was ….
(lots of noise)
AS: Eric lived if you like, or looked after by the people who lived further up London Road but any times in between Mr. and Mrs. Hale looked after her. Any times that didn't quite fit.
PS: No! You got that wrong ….
AS: I'm not! I know it's right.
PS: The mother she had, I forget what it was, but it was an illness that killed them pretty quickly but she survived and I used to go and see her in hospital because everything was on ration and She said, “ Do you think you could spare me a bit of butter, because we don't get it in here, so I took her butter.
PR: OH! Right. So was in the County was she and Michael, we took Michael …. Michael used to
come to us a lot because he used to play the violin beautiful violinist wasn't he and he stayed with them fter they got married, for a bit anyway. He used spend practically all his time because his mother was out of work all the time, you see, and Erica was friendly with a little girl two doors up and she used to be there a lot,you see, and then Michael pretty well spent all his time with us and Erica she stayed with a neighbour who'd got this little daughter, until her mother came out of hospital.
PR: When did women come into All Saints' Choir then? Were they there before your arrival?
AS: No! They came after I was there. I forget the exact circumstances. I think it was some of the young ladies that were in the youth club what I think wanted to come into the choir and they sort of pushed a bit, you know, and it was arranged but I don't think in the first instance Connelly was very happy about having ladies.
PR: No! It always struck me as a little odd because in those days it wasn't quite the thing and yet they were there before we had women in St. Andrew's Choir. Was Edith Fosdyke one of the earliest ones?
AS: Connie, Edith Fosdyke ….
PR: Connie Murkin, or Connie Ditton as she ….
AS: The girl whose father was Mayor of Hertford …. was on the railway, lived down ….
PR: Proctor?
AS: Proctor, yes! She was a school teacher, wasn't she. She was another one. Someone who lived at the bottom of Ware Hill .... forgotten her name now but she was another one, and so on, you know. I suppose there was about half a dozen when they first started and a few more come along. One, her mother and father lived just across the road, on the other estate there. Her husband died a coup1e of years ago. What was her name? Just down the bottom, across the bridge turn left, you know, on the other estate.
PR: Purkiss Road or Brickendon Lane!
AS: Who was that? Her husband died about a couple of years ago.
PS: Oh, I don't know her name. She lives near the end of it doesn't she. She's a very nice person.
AS: She was a very nice person and later on her daughter came in.
PR: What about the, I mustn't go on too long, but what about the shopping in the middle of the town? I mean, when you were a young housewife as it were .... plenty of choice of shops to go to? If you'd got the pennies to spend!
PS: Yes! Apart from the war time of course. You couldn't …. I think …. mind you. living in Fore
Street I only really went there to get Robin the period that he had to stay in the middle of Hertford before he could go to school but i liked it so. I was never so happy in my life as I was there and anyway they were very good to us, well to me. 'Cos the children were young then and when there was anything coming in they used to say take some with you or you won't get it.
PR: Which shops would that have been then?
PS: Well, there was …. one of the shops was the one that had all the dresses and I forget that name. They went round the comer...because you wouldn't remember that.
PR: Ph, Mc …. not Mcfarlane's .... further up.
PS: No! That wasn't but Graveson's were good to me ...because when Robin went away to school, Chris was only about seven then. He used to cry every night, used to break his heart, because he'd gone away you see. I didn't know what to do with him so I went to Dr. Vivien because he was very good to me. Well, he came to me when my babies were born. I liked him very much and he was very and he was very proud of Robin getting into Christ's Hospital and so, 'cos I had a letter from Robin saying, “Bring me home I don't like it here.” And I went to Dr. Vivien. used to go to him for everything and I said, “Now look what can I do?”
“Leave him there,” he said. “For goodness sake ….to a school like that,” he said. “For goodness sake don't take him away,” he said. “He'll never forgive you.” And when I got home, we had a late post, because we used to have it in the afternoon, a letter from Robin. “We're doing cricket tomorrow.”
But Chris, he used to cry and cry at night and couldn't do anything, wouldn't eat anything. because Robin had gone, you see. Because they've always been like that. They are now, too. And anyway. I went to the doctor and said, “I don't know what to do with Christopher. I just don't know what to do with him. I said, “He's, you know, since Robin's been gone I can't do anything.
He said, “Change his school.”
I said, “Well, where?”
He said, “Go and see Mr. Bunce at the Grammar School and get him there,” he said, because he was at Abel Smith School before that, he was only, well he went in the lowest form in the Grammar School. There was a lady who used to teach them. They were the young children about seven and so I said alright.
I had an awful job to get uniform because you got it bit by bit during the war time. I managed to get the blazer. They were very good to me at Graveson's. They used to call me in like that. “Some more things in, come and get it for your boy. quick before the others get in.” That's how he got his Cap and that sort of thing. Anyway, he went off to …. somebody took him up to Grammar School, his first day, and …. 'cos I was feeling awful on that day. He came back. After dinner he said, “I've got to take my cricket things, we've oat cricket this afternoon,” and that was him. He fixed in at the
Grammar School like that. He was. there until he was seventeenor eighteen and I remember you going there, I will tell you why……….
(Load crackling noise!)
*….County Hall and your mother came along the other side of the road and she waved to me and you were holding her hand and you got to the Grammar School gates – they had gates there then – and your mother couldn't get you to go up them and she called to me across the road and I said I'll stay here and you try and get him up there, you see. And she took you up there and you was alright then. The next day I saw you coming and going.
*Transcribers note: Peter Ruffles says this is rubbish!
PR: Yes, I remember going up the long drive for the interview on my own, and leaving her in the Castle grounds. Hmm! Gillian, where did she go to school?
PS: Ware Grammar!
PR: Ware Grammar …. mm!
PS: She was only …. actually there was a bit of row over it. She was at Abel Smith School and the headmaster there called me in one day and he said, “You know that Gillian should be going to the Grammar School,” and he said she should when she's eleven years old. “Oh!” I said, “she's got another two years then.” “ No!” he said I want to get her in at nine. He said she's absolutely marvellous at school. you see and she's well worth going to the Grammar School early. So he said, “If I give you a letter to take there, to the Grammar School mistress there, take it to her and see if she'll take her in at nine years old.”
So she did, not that she was a very nice woman, she wasn't, but she did and there was a bit of a row over it …. some of the people at the other schools because she got in early. Anyway, she went there and she was there until she was eighteen and Christopher. as I say. was so upset about Robin going, so I sent him to Grammar School. Had to pay for him to go there you see and then …. let's see. that was Robin at Christ's Hospital, Chris there and Gillian at the other Grammar School.
PR: Mm, expensive time.
AS: I went to the Same school as your father went to at Bury Sf. Edmunds .....
PR: Oh. did you?
AS: .... and took German lessons. We went about five or six times and I think we had four or five different teachers.
PR: Well, ,that's smashing!
AS: What I wrote out ..when you er ....
PR: Oh, yes, that's right, you sent me a scribbled something and weren't very happy with it 12th August ….yes.
AS: Well I don't think I've altered anything I've said from in there really.
PR: No! Buck Wrangles!
AS: D'you know him?
PR: I know Buck,yes. Tallish chap yes, well he's had a lot to do with Hertford Football club you know. Yes! That's who we ought to get hold of didn't we ….
AS: Well, he's still very talkative. His brain hasn't gone or anything like that. I should think he's
got some information behind him.
PR: And you've got Monty Gladwyn. Yes, so that's smashing. Can I take this away with me. There'll be some good leads. That's great! Well, I'd better ….
PS: Would you like a cup of tea?
PR: I would but I must keep moving, because it's school in the morning and I've got a lot to get in and they say the snow's going to be inches thick in the morning. It's going to go very cold and stuff coming down from Denmark tonight ....
AS: What do you do at school now?
PS: Well, I teach English; but I do all the cover for the absent staff, fill in, have to organise who
takes one ….
AS: What are you? Deputy head?
PS: No, I'm called the registrar, and I also am the Pastoral Support Tutor and that means I have to tell them off if they've been naughty and offer a shoulder to cry on if they're upset or bereavements, Or one or two get a little in the family way. I have to be kind …. chi1d abuse officer, all that sort of thing.
PS: I can't see you telling any of the children off!
PR: Oh, I'm shocking, if they really need it, you know, they get th,e short back and sides, but I try not to.
AS: A broad brief.
PR: Yes, but I like the caring side of things and I enjoy actual direct teaching but you don t get so
much of that any more. It seems you're for ever filling in forms and recording test marks without doing the actual classroom teaching to the same extent as we used to which is contradiction, really but I go along the bottom here just before seven through the Woods to Brickendon and I'm at school just a few minutes after seven.
PS: Which school?
PR: Broxbourne School And this is the nicest route the nicest way. It's fairly busy but if I'm a bit late, about half past seven at any time, you meet a lot of traffic, but my bits usually nice. Well, that's super, managed to pull together a few bits and pieces that we wanted to.
The Cull family, of course, is very interesting to us …. the Culls …. the sweetshop …. Cathy and
Trilby and Frank Cull and Reg Cull ….
PS: Oh, yes ....
PR: A lot of people mention them when we're talking.
PS: Did you go to the funeral?
PR: No, no! Very quiet wasn't it, very quiet affair.
PS: There was about forty people weren't there. Yes, it was a shame because he always used to
to stay and talk to us ….
PR: He was nearly ninety eight, but he hadn't been to church for a long time, had he, years ....
AS: He hadn't been out all that much.
PS: When another vicar came, they didn't like him so they left, didn't they ….
PR: Yes, they both left together, didn't they, Frank and Reg.
PS: Frank didn't live so long after that but Reg did, you see.
PR: Reg went on and on, tail thin beanpole of a ….
AS: There was a time when they used to be known as Bowler Cull, Trilby Cull and Cap Cull.
PR: Yes, Betie, the bowler, wasn't it?
AS: And, err, Frank used to wear a trilby and Reg wore a cap.
PR: Where do you think they got their musica1 knowledge then? I don't know anything about his
school.
AS: I don't know where they got their schooling but I would think probably that they joined the choir when they were kids and that was it.
PR: Yes! Studied it as they went along.
PS: Well, they were there when I came to Hertford.
AS: Mr..Hale was seventy three years in the choir and the chap you mentioned first of all who come from Leicestershire, or somewhere …. or as I said a lady paid for his ….
PR: Yes, Freestone!
AS: He- was very knowledgeable about music ...no doubt about it at all. H knew exactly what it was about, though he couldn't play an instrument.
PR: Yes, that was like my dad .... worship …. his worship was through music and that was the lead in for him and that must have been the same. Anyway, I mustn't, err ….
PS: Just tell me, are you going to have women priests?
PR: Wel1 we've got some good examples from women. Marion Harding has been super with us and I think any one who wants to see an example of someone who is so capable in all the requirements that a priest would have, need look no further than Marion.
PS: Was she at St. Andrew's?
PR: Yes!
PS: well our vicar was going to get some women in. He believes in havjng women priests. This
morning he took communion you see There was one giving the wine or was it the bread she was giving? ….
AS: The bread!
PS: The bread and she hadn't got anything on like a surplice or anything like that. She just had
a dress on and she was helping do it. I don't think I like women ….
PR: No, people are uncomfortable. We have people helping with the chalice. I'm one of them and at St. Andrew's the Bishop licenses but ….
PS: Yes! That's an right, but not women ....
PR: Yes! I think it depends on what you've been used to …
.
PS: But Gillian came home, 'cos I haven't been well for a time. It's my first time for about four weeks going to church, isn't it, 'cos I had to have the Doctor …. terrible pain and he came, didn't
he and he stayed until after twelve. Then he came every day until …. he told me not to go out. I was supposed to go out in the cold whether but Gillian had been to church you see and she said the vicar, he goes to see her a lot because {repeat of previous vicar's visit to Gillian}
PR: So she struck up a relationship with him ….
PS: {Goes on repeating the previous account of Bin Kemm's visit to Gillian's} and of course the first one he saw in church was her, you see, and he came and spoke to her but not to me! She said
that he said that he wants to get as many women priests as he can get and she said, “Well, I wouldn't like women priests.”
He said, “You wouldn't?”
She said, “No!”
“Oh, but,” he said, “they're very good.”
She said, “I don't like shaking hands all over them (??????) That's what he does, shakes hands, you see. So anyway he seemed quite pleased with the way she was telling him off.
PR: Well, at first it was a bit tricky for us to get used to them at St. Andrew's but it's …
PS: Oh, you get them there?
PR: Yes, we got a lovely ….
PS: I think it's men that should be a priest not women.
AS: Are you going to Hoddesdon
PR: Yes! I'm going to see my old friend Mr. Lionel Fiddaman. He's housebound now and I'm his
gardener. His wife has died just in October and he's been housebound since then.