Westfield Whimsicals

I was the first baby ever at the Rye Hospital He would throw us a sweet from the upstairs window

I ran away from Guide camp - saw bus with Westfield on it and went home.

I lived in a council house in We saw Westfield Churchfield from the window.

Is that a foreign Woodsmoke would linger land? I asked. on your washing

Voices from the Past 1930-1960: Westfield

You never knew what you would get!

Moving, interesting, laughed a lot.

A happy event.

How good it would be if more people could hear these stories.

INTRODUCTION

THE WESTFIELD GROUP The group met at Geary Place, a sheltered housing scheme run by Rother Homes in the village of Westfield. Geary Place is on the site of an old market garden and next to the primary school, both remembered by many of our participants. Those who attended part or all of the six sessions were predominantly from the area, some of whom had lived in Westfield, or in sight of Westfield, all their lives.

After the initial session we held seven further sessions and then gave a performance of participants’ memories to an intimate audience of friends, family and people from the local community in Westfield Parish Hall.

Attendance at the group fluctuated between six to twelve participants and there was much getting to know each other as even the people in Geary Place did not intermingle much. Playing name games, words in a box, writing poems collaboratively, casting a few

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spells at Halloween, we found ways to connect and gather people’s memories on topics ranging from handbags to parents, school, jobs, holidays, houses lived in, to the first time one fell in love.

Listening to music, reading poetry, laughing at the sly humour of Reg, the only man in the group, we began to put their stories together. We transcribed eight stories of individual’s memories and collated much material concerning the local school, rich with tales of the playground, school assembly, teachers and sweets – which you can enjoy reading in amongst the stories. Whilst always remaining faithful to what people in the group told us, these stories also contain elements of the group’s creative activities.

Fun, work, love, to real pain and hurt surfaced through the stories as well as an awareness of qualities that most of us today cannot understand – what it is like to live in the same village all one's life, to look at the same view for over 80 years.

Jane Metcalfe Clare Whistler Shaping Voices 2007

About the group:

“Thinking back to those days, I get the feeling you get when you think you made it up.”

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Westfield Whimsicals ROOMS REMEMBERED

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VIBRANT VI

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HILDA THE HOPEFUL

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FIRST JOBS

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ROGUISH REG

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BUBBLY BARKER

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INKY IRENE

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PHYLLIS – THE POETIC, HEAVEN–SENT YOUNG-AT-HEART, LOYAL, LAZY, INTERESTING SINGER

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KNITTING KILLICK AND DANGEROUS DAISY

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PHILADELPHIA JEAN

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NAME GAME

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WESTFIELD SCHOOL: NATURE WALKS WESTFIELD SCHOOL: TEACHERS & LESSONS WESTFIELD SCHOOL: PLAYING TRUANT WESTFIELD SCHOOL: IN AND OUT OF SCHOOL WESTFIELD SCHOOL: SWEETS WE LIKED WESTFIELD SCHOOL: MUSIC

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WHAT IS CREATIVE REMINISCENCE?

VOICES FROM THE PAST: 1930-1960: BATTLE

Creative Reminiscence sessions lead to informal performances of original stories based on the personal reminiscences of people over the age of 60. The sessions are run by facilitators with a strong background in the arts and provide an interesting, light-hearted and stimulating environment where those taking part can enjoy rediscovering and sharing their memories in a new and meaningful way.

THE PROJECT A series of five Creative Reminiscence projects for people over the age of 60 living in Rother, funded by the Heritage Lottery fund in partnership with Rother District Council (Indian Summer Project). Group sessions and performances were hosted in Battle, Peasmarsh, Bexhill, Westfield and Etchingham, with participants joining from surrounding areas.

Rooms remembered The first thing I saw was Westfield I asked mum “is that a foreign land?”

I could see fields from the window.

Knitting, knitting, always knitting.

Up and down the scale in the shed – Pom pom pom pom pom pom pom pom.

It was the middle of the night; He had a mass of black hair and a little tiny face.

The trains went past the scullery at the back, at the back, at the back of the garden.

We had a crystal set wireless with two sets of earphones.

I hated the smell of washing ’cos it meant cold meat.

We had to turn, turn, turn the mangle We didn’t even know mother was pregnant.

Dancing and singing to the gramophone.

I can’t, I can’t remember what pictures were on the wall.

Sitting inside, no windows, no door, only bamboo.

He’d throw us a sweet from the upstairs window.

Always music, music all the time.

Toot toot toot toot toot toot toot toot.

Roasting chestnuts on the range.

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Vibrant Vi

“He keeps pulling my curls!” I told my Mum. “He keeps following me.” “He always takes me to school.” Every time I went out, he was with me – so I never met anyone else. My husband Charlie. I was eight!

The earliest I remember is when I was three. We had company, they were all talking. Mum said all at once I started crying and sobbing and sobbing. They were talking about that when you get older, you wore black bonnets. I didn't want my Mum to get older, to be a granny. She lived till she was ninety-three – but she never wore a black bonnet! I just turned ninety myself – no bonnets for me either !

Its autumn now . I always think of bronze chrysanths and my favourite colours, green and yellow and wood smoke lingering on your washing. I was given so many beautiful, colourful flowers for my birthday. The bunch from the Church was especially big.

When I was a child I didn't like Mondays – I hated the smell of washing because it meant cold meat and pickle day. We came home from school, had to walk a mile, and you knew you had cold meat. What wasn't eaten went in the stew pot. We all played outside by the lamps in the street, no getting scared at Halloween, we never had it. In bed by 7pm Never had a school uniform, you wore what you had.

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Right at the start, I was born in a big house, like two flats really, up and down – we were up! Maybe that’s where I get my get up and go. I'm still interested in everything that goes on, in everyone else too. I live in Roselands surrounded by people. At one time I was actually a warden of a housing place at Littlebourne near Canterbury. Every time I retired I got another job, always on the go, always liking company.

Pluck an age out of the air. Where was I at 40? In Croydon, married with two children. I had Tudor windows. I always hated them – they never looked clean.

At age 25 it was a completely different story. I was in hospital in Stanmore, Middlesex. I was encased in plaster for two years. Two years in hospital.

I had an accident with the Fire Service, as I was being driven from one fire station to the another. the driver drew up sharp to miss a dog and the edge of the seat caught my back. In the ATV was a place to store the hose, it was empty and open. As the van lurched the girl next to me fell right in, then I followed her. For a whole year I lived with the pain in my back. Then I went to the Doctor. He said “Now think if you have had any accidents.” I had forgotten all about the accident in the van. My back was fractured. I could have been in a wheelchair. Two years feels long at the time but nothing compared to that.

The orthopaedic building was in the long, straight huts built for the Dunkirk boys – it didn't make any difference to us, we just lay in bed. 28 beds, one stove in the centre for heating. We were all long term cases, all to do with the services, all women. Somebody brought in an old gramophone with a wind up handle, the most able would wind it up and then we would listen to it wind down. There was a marvellous Sister, who after being paid, bought cakes for us 7

once a month, and we had a little party. I would be sleeping, and wake up with a plate of cakes under my nose.

We were evacuated to Scotland when the V bombs started – the first hospital was great – electric blankets and everything, but it was the wrong one, so we went on to the Isle of Skye, to another set of wooden huts. We had High Tea which was a little table arranged on your lap. but as we were lying down it was very difficult to reach the food! My brother came up to get us home, we had to stop at another hospital on the way down. Quite an adventure! Well you did ask.

And here I am at 90, taking part in everything that's going on, Creative Reminiscence, Keep Fit, this performance, you name it I will give it a go!

Vi Hewett Westfield School Whimsies:

Nature Walks We had to do nature walks at Westfield School. We would collect leaves, take them back and write about them, stick them in books or put them up on the walls.

Going to and from school was a nature walk. It was three miles there and back – through fields and woods from Staplecross to Westfield – all weathers.

Our nature walk was up by the doctor’s surgery, up near the cricket fields We wore old socks and gaiters which we had to take on and off to be dried by the fire.

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Hilda the Hopeful I remember my first day of school 83 years ago. I was five years five months.

They put me in the baby class. There was Miss Austen from Canute Road and Miss Pearson who rode a bicycle. I liked school so I never played truant – not even thought about it. Later I went to Ore Senior Girls. We never went near the boys. I didn't like boys much then. We wore gym slips and if we were very good we would buy a piece of braid at Mr Wickens to tie around your waist to brighten it up. You always had a hanky in the pocket in your knickers. I used to tell my brother that was where I kept my sweets when he asked for them, then he wouldn’t want them because they’d been in my knickers. I made my first dress at school, my carrot dress – blue, green, red and pink tiny carrots all over it. My sewing teacher did the difficult bits, it had a full skirt.

I was born on the Ridge before it was called the Ridge. 1918. 18 Landsview Terrace. The house is still there. Westfield was the first place I saw from the window. “Is that a foreign land?” I asked. My father met my mother at the little tin church, the curate church of St John’s Hollington. Long gone. She played the organ and he sang in the choir in St Helens. He was a baker – did the rounds using the mill in Baldslow on a horse and cart. He started at 4am The round went almost into Hastings from Baldslow to Beaconsfield Road. He went to each house, each loaf wrapped in white tissue. There was always the horse and cart to look after as well. When I was seven I was sent to a house on Grange Road with an extra loaf. I went to the front door and was told “servants round

the back!” I can recall our kitchen. It had a range with that kind of larder that 9

went under the stairs and one by the fireplace for cups and saucers. My sister was younger than me and I was bossy!

I still remember Wildish the Butchers in Queen’s Road. Mr Wildish had lots of grounds in St Helen’s Woods where he lived. One day my brother came back with a mark on his shoulder. He asked Mum: “Is there a mark there?” She said,

“Why, what have you done?” He’d been scrumping in the Butcher’s land and the policeman had grabbed him by his shoulder and threatened him with his leather gauntlet glove.

When I was a nanny in Bexhill I went out with a photographer; I used to hold the measure for him, outside and inside. George. He was a Londoner and he came down two or three summers. But it was Reg I married. My brother Leslie and I had a soft spot for one another. Leslie thought I needed to get away from being a nanny so he took me on the back of his motorbike to go roller-skating. I had seen Reg in the Post Office a few times – he worked there – and liked the look of him. He showed me how to roller skate – bend your right knee, bend your left knee. A very kind man. When he got called up he wrote and said could we meet up for old time’s sake? And it went on from there. He was teaching my granddaughter to roller skate in the same way the night before he died.

Reg and I married in 1941 when I was 23. We had a 48 hour weekend honeymoon and a year together then I didn’t see him again until 1946. We went to live in a bungalow in Westfield, had our first baby in 1949. If there weren’t so many trees you could almost see it from Geary Place. There were two bungalows in one. It was built by a man who built all the bungalows along the Ridge. We had the larger half, my sister had the other one; she was there first.

We slowly improved the place; the landlord provided the things and we did the labour. It had a big garden and my father did all the digging. We had 10

magnolia/lilac panels over the fireplace and a lilac panel behind the bed. I was there till I came to live in Geary Place in 1993.

I used to love hats. I wore them all the time. I remember I had a brown one with a feather up the side. But I’m not in the mood for them now. My daughter said “You look cross mum”, so I stopped wearing them. I’m still a bit bossy, like everything to be just so, but my heart’s in the right place.

Hilda Simmonds

Westfield School Whimsies:

Teachers & Lessons There was Mrs Piggot, Mrs Green, and Mr Pratt who lived in the school house.

I went to the same school: Piggot, Green, Pratt and Hinge.

Mrs Hinge was the headmistress when I went.

Teachers – they’re like grannies when you’re that young.

We used to go to Battle for woodwork lessons once a week.

The doctor was in the big house at the corner. We’d have a lesson there.

Went just after lunch and came back about three.

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First Jobs

What was your first job?

How old were you?

13, 20, 14, 15, 14, 14, 14 How old were you Maureen?

In a little tiny teashop, waiting at round tables with white lacy cloths Wearing black, with a white lacy pinny and a white frilly thing for your hair Tea and cakes, no sandwiches!

Philadelphia Jean started at fifteen In a large hotel in Bexhill, The Arundel, near the Clock Tower.

She wore navy and white and lived in Irene lived in too, in service at a house in Hailsham general dogsbody more like cleaning, cooking, clearing out and polishing grates Even lived in the attic!

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Phyllis, a little older, became An Assistant Matron at a boys prep school Mending socks, hundreds of socks, bathing boys, washing their hair, playing football in all the right clothes, teaching dancing slow slow quick quick slow more quick than slow I imagine!

At a farm guest house on the Ridge, Hilda was another general dogsbody Mrs Denyer, the Ex-Captain’s wife bellowed

“If I don't find it as I like it I'll stand here until its done!”

She had to do it right, right away.

Vi went from Colliers Wood to Tooting Broadway then by tram to Victoria 2d to work at Parnells the Drapers.

Put in millinery she hated it, always hated hats, They didn't suit her face or sit on her curls.

Wearing black with white collar and cuffs Inspected every day.

She only lasted a month!

Reg surprised us all He was a snuff maker working for Mr. Billy Bradshaw Blending Violet and peppermint packing them in packets, like tea bags – they were very popular in barber shops

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And what did you get paid? six shillings a week, six bob, ten bob a week 15 bob a week!

I can’t remember...

How long were you there? two years, four years, two years, ’til the war, always and only one month!

Westfield School Whimsies:

Playing Truant I used to play truant on Wednesday to do fox hunting. I’d follow the hounds.

I never had a chance. I lived in the back of beyond across three big fields, three miles; I had to take next door’s children as well, so I had to go.

I decided with a friend to play truant; went up to the churchyard and wandered around. Unfortunately my Mum and Dad came with a bunch of flowers for my grandmother’s grave; I got a huge hiding.

I didn’t exactly play truant. I wanted to go to school on my own because Joyce Smith wasn’t there to take me: My Mum said “Look before you cross the road.” but I didn’t and I got knocked down; I was six and a half.

I always tried to learn as much as I could.

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Roguish Reg

The name’s Reginald: Roguish, Energetic, Gorgeous, Independent, Nifty, Amiable, Lovely, Delicious Reginald. I was Smoky in the RAF cos I smoked a pipe and was quick like smoke. I’m the cat among the pigeons – no offence ladies.

Sweet like the sugar in my tea. Twinkle to my foot therapist. Reg for short. But I’m usually called “Hey you!” So take your pick.

Now let me see: R for Roguish: Yes I was a bit of a rogue when I was a lad. Not surprising really. I went to ten different schools in Leicester. My parents just kept on moving: Charnwood Street, Fullwell Rise, Caldicott Road; and so forth. My first day at school I said to Mum “I’ll swear if you take me there” and I did: b*****, b*****, b***** all the way to school. To be honest I didn’t like lessons. In my younger, younger days I played truant, wandered around and went for “nature walks” in the city, all by myself. Once in the playground a lad jumped on me back. Ooh, I caught him a beauty and he went straight down. My dad was a boxer so I knew a thing or two about it. We both got the cane. I was quite partial to Mint Imperials. I’d buy a farthing’s worth and if a teacher saw me eating them I could swallow them quick as you like. Me and some lads used to tie one door knocker to another, knock on doors and run away, skate along the ice on the paths, then watch people slip over – hmmm.

E for Energy. I had bags of it. Had to to keep up with my Dad. He taught boxing to younger fellows in the Jolly Anglers Pub – there was a gym there. Some of 15

the lads would come home after. One of them was very good, Len Wickwar, he was the Middleweight Champion of the Midlands! He came to visit us. Our toilet was upstairs and there were no lights. He says “Come and see us up the stairs and wait for me". He was scared of the dark! So I had to go upstairs and sit on the top step in the dark and wait for him.

My father was a driving instructor before the war – there were only two schools in Leicester then; it was quite profitable, £20 a week! I know – I used to do the books. He also became Inspector of British Boxing for the Midlands area. My mother was busy too. She was a van driver, worked for Billy Bradshaw who had the largest tobacco business in Leicester. Balkan Sobranie was the thing in those days. She delivered around the shops. When I was 13 I went to work for Mr Bradshaw too. He made snuff. Menthol snuff was all the rage – peppermint, violet – very popular in barber’s shops. They had a machine where you could buy it. I used to put the scent in it and pack it in packets like teabags. 15 bob a week. I shouldn’t say really but me dad taught me to drive at 13 and I had to drive sometimes during the war. His eyesight was failing; strictly illegal.

G for Gorgeous – Well I am, aren’t I? I was quite familiar with the back of the bike shed, but my first real girlfriend was when I was 14. Ellen – she was in the office, I was in the warehouse. We came together very nicely. We used to go to the Little Theatre, the amateurs; I remember seeing The Enchanted Cottage.

We liked music. We’d get up in the balcony for 9d each – a lot of money then.

Saw the Halle (pronounced “Hall-ay”) Orchestra, Adrian Boult. I thought, “He’s

not much, hardly moves the baton, not working very hard.” She was a very nice young lady. We stayed together till I was 17 when I went into the air force.

I met my wife quite soon after, so I for Independent didn’t last very long. She was in the Land Army, I visited her at a farm; she was lifting a bale of hay up.

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“Leave that,” I said, “I’ll do it” – I got hold of it and I couldn’t shift it! N for Nifty – not. She hiked it onto her back and up the ladder. I thought She’s gonna keep me quiet... and she did.

A for Amiable; can’t you tell? I’m the most amiable man in the group. The only one do I hear you say? One and only more like. I was never at a school long enough to make friends, but I made up for it since, so L for Lovely is for all the lovely people I’ve met and still meet and last but by no means least: D for Delicious – the smell of my mother’s handbag. I can still remember the scents and powder compact, that sort of thing. A leather bag, not very heavy, a ration book and a little white handkerchief tucked inside. There was always a certain aroma.

You see I’m a sensitive fellow really. Sensitive Sells. That’s me: Reginald Elijah Sells. Des Res. Oh and before we part, a word of advice – always be careful behind the bike shed.

Reg Sells

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Bubbly Barker

Talking of handbags, I’ve been thinking about mine. [looking in bag] There’s me diary, address book, lottery, glasses; middle bit – sweets, purse, money, keys; next bit – pair of glasses, indigestion tablets, kids Abbey things – a cheque book, nail file, a comb and a mirror; this side – a phone, more keys, a lighter.

There’s such a lot stuffed in there! Like up here. [taps head] There were five of us kids. We lived in a house in Ashbourne, Derbyshire.

6 Tiger Yard. It was a three tiered house with a big hall and lounge and kitchen and scullery. I remember the bath hanging up on wall in the scullery. I shared a bedroom with my two brother’s and sister and there were bars on the bedroom window cos I sleepwalked.

Dad was a storeman in the RAF. Derby was his last posting, then he was a bus driver for a while and later on the line at Vauxhall’s. He was also a boxer. Once he was supposed to go to South Africa with a bunch of boxing mates, but he missed the plane and the plane crashed. Lucky for him, but not for them.

Our parents were quite strict. That was normal in those days. My dad had his plot where he used to grow veg. If we didn’t eat our veg we had it for tea or breakfast until we did. All those cold broad beans, brussel sprouts etc staring at us on the plate. I used to hate them! But it must have had some effect ’cos I like broad beans and brussel sprouts now!

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Mum and dad never openly rowed a lot but there’s one incident sticks in my mind. There was this cup lay under the cooker and it was broken. They wouldn’t pick it up and wouldn’t let us go anywhere near it. It went on for weeks. We all knew something had happened but nothing was said. We’d catch each others’ eyes and wonder. I was nine or ten and I can still see that cup; a white cooker on legs, the cup under it, next to it a Rayburn, above that an airer that you used to pull up and down. We had a budgie – when you let it out it would fly up and pick off all the hankies. A white cup under a white cooker.

I wasn’t a naughty girl – mischievous might describe me, but never really naughty. I liked a laugh, a good time and I still do. I met my best friend Elsie when we were little. We went from primary to secondary school together. Like Siamese twins we were. We’d go to the youth club and take it in turn whose house we’d get changed in. We used to turn our cardigans round, so the buttons were at back. Well it made a difference. I suppose we thought it was grown-up.

We’d go out with lots of different boys. If we didn’t like each other’s boyfriend we’d say “No.” All of a sudden she met this boy at 18 and went to Australia as a £10 Pom. Of course I missed her, but then I got married. I was 21. My husband was in the Merchant Navy and on the Orianna – he had Elsie’s address in Melbourne, so he went and visited them. He brought home such a lovely photo of her. A year later I had a letter from her husband – she was killed in a car accident. We were friends from when we first went to school. She was very tiny and used to fill her bra out with socks! Oh we had some laughs.

My parents kept a lot of things quiet. One night, in the middle of night, dad brought in this little bundle. It had black hair and a little tiny face. It was my young sister and we didn’t even know mother was pregnant! I was nine.

Recently I went to a fortune teller in Eastbourne and she said “No, I mustn’t 19

tell!” I like to keep a bit of mystery about me. Perhaps I get that from me parents. Mysterious Maureen.

Talking of bags, I remember having a Dorothy bag at school; a lap-bag you kept cotton reels in. It was made out of a piece of calico folded into three with a lid that dropped over it which you tied round you whilst you sewed. And if I’m going to a dinner or a dance I’ve got a little “dog” bag – weighted. I can stand it on a table or hook it on one. I use the same one every January ’cos I can’t afford a new one. Not room for much in that – hairbrush, lipstick, me Vanderbilt perfume and a hanky of course.

Maureen Barker

Westfield School Whimsies:

Sweets we liked Mint Imperials, gobstoppers, bubblegum, strings of coconut called tobacco, liquorice shoelaces, liquorice – a solid block like wood, aniseed balls, sugared almonds, sherbet dabs, Sharps toffees, Devonshire cream toffee – classy, acid drops, pear drops, sherbet lemons and sweet cigarettes – we used to swagger down the street with them.

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Inky Irene

Impeccable Irene, Intellectual Irene, Irresistible Irene, Irene is for Ink, dark blue ink, deep, dark swirls of deep blue ink, containing lands and islands of secrets and mysteries.

93 years is a long time to live. Now it seems as if I am observing the world rather than it observing me – that may always have been true. I never played truant and I’ve never been to Harrods. I lived in John St, Lewes when I was ten, in a terrace house right opposite the police station. I had to be good. I went to schools in Newhaven, Hove, Lewes and Brighton and always with my halo.

I lived in 78 West Street near the Level and Southover Street, fourth turning on the left, another terraced house with my mother and stepfather, I had lost my only brother when he was two. I was still in the same house at 40, with my mother, stepfather and daughter. I remember the bedroom – a bed, a cot for my daughter, lino on the floor, dressing table, wardrobe, a sash window – there were pictures but I can’t remember them. Impeccable as my memory is.

At 14 I went to live in as a general dogsbody in a big house in Hailsham. My mother was a cook and my father was a painter and decorator; they both kept quiet about their jobs. Maybe I have followed on with some family traditions – The less said the better. Then I went to work in a laundry, five different laundries, I was much happier, packing and sorting, making things clean and white.

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At 60 I retired and went to Sweden. I didn’t want to be alone unlike Greta Garbo. My daughter’s husband was Swedish and they lived there. Beryl, who changed her name to Tracey, had been in show business – dancing, singing, pantomime, touring and so was he.

I lived there three years – very nice, very friendly I never learnt the language, they sent me to lessons but by mistake I went to the Advanced.

My granddaughter Anne Louise taught me most of my Swedish when I was babysitting her; that was the best way to learn it.

I missed my friends. I came back to Sussex to live with my two aunts in Westfield. I moved into Geary Place 20 years ago. My daughter visits once a year in June.

These are some facts about my life. I keep quiet about all the joy and pain.

They are inexpressible in words like these. So I stay a mystery.

Deep Inky Irene Irene Akehurst

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Phyllis – the poetic, heaven-sent young-at-heart, loyal, lazy, interesting singer

When I was three, I lived in Beckenham, Kent. I remember riding on my Fairy Cycle all round our garden. My toes just touched the ground. When I was ten, I played with the girl next door. She climbed over the garden wall one day, and we became friends for life. She sang and danced, and I did too. I remember a billiard room. There was no billiard table, but a wooden dance floor. We would put on the gramophone and dance to the music of Jack Hylton, and the voice of the Whispering Baritone. We tried the waltz, the Quickstep, the Foxtrot, and even the Tango, my friend and I. My Father was a banker. He loved every minute of it. The Bank had a rule that you couldn’t get married unless you had £500 a year. Just before he was 30 he went to his boss and said I want to get married, so I need £500 a year. And he got it! His job meant that he moved about a lot, and my mother went with him.

They had a daughter in Cardiff, a son in Derby, another in Leicester, and then, in Birmingham Edgbaston they had me!

When I was twelve I was taken on a cruise with my parents and sister. The first time we were not left behind. It was very exciting; we went to Madeira, Tenerife, Casablanca... There was a very attractive ship’s doctor. He was much older than me – 44! – but I fell in love with him, hook line and sinker. He let me dance with him, and we played deck quoits, deck tennis, table tennis. I was thrilled. We all 23

went to tea with him in his Chinese cabin. I was very attracted to my doctor, and I did miss him afterwards.

We went on other cruises with my parents – to Turkey, Greece, Spain, Lisbon, the Canary Islands, Gibraltar... so many wonderful places.

So many beautiful clothes, and dance dresses – and bags. I’ve owned dozens of lovely evening bags – black bags, beaded bags, diamante bags, bags covered with pearls...

All my family was older than me, and I felt very much at ease with older people.

I lied to my husband to be, whom I met when I was sixteen. I pretended I was not at school – but I was!

At seventeen I was sent to Switzerland, to live with a family in their Chateau. It was a beautiful place, decorated with flowers all up the stairs. Such wonderful scenery. There were girls of all nationalities. We had lessons in French History, Literature. We learnt dressmaking, and Chef taught us to make fondue. We had to speak French all the time. If Madame heard us chatting in English she would say, “Parlez Francais!” The husband, Le Maitre, took us skiing. There were no ski lifts in those days, and we had to climb up the slopes on skins, to stop us sliding down. The daughter of the house became a friend, and we still correspond. The son flirted with all the English girls. My great friend came out to stay, and I said to her “Whatever you do, don’t fall in love with him.” And she did! Actually, he married one of us. They had to be engaged all the war, because of the hostilities.

I got my first job as an Assistant Matron at a boy’s prep school Glengorse, Battle. I bathed the boys, washed their hair. I’ve mended hundreds of socks.

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Big socks, little socks, cotton socks, woollen socks... I even played football with the boys. They were terrified of me!

I got married in 1930, when I was just 22, – to the Headmaster!

When I was 25, we moved back to Starr’s Green with our little girl of two. I continued to help out at the school until 1968. I sometimes taught singing to the little ones, and I still sing. I was a member of the Battle Choral Society for many years, and now I’m with the Winchelsea Singers.

I love driving. My legs give me a bit of bother now, so I can’t walk about, and driving is my independence. It makes me free...

Phyllis Stainton,

Westfield School Whimsies:

In and out of school We had separate playgrounds and you weren’t allowed to look over the wall.

We did games: rounders, skipping, hopscotch, touch, air raid practice: Blow the whistle and down.

We went up near the doctors and played stoolball We went to Lady Newton’s House instead of roving the roads.

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Knitting Killick and Dangerous Daisy

Knitting always knitting Always lived in Westfield Westfield always Westfield All their lives.

Hazel – I saw a bus with Westfield written on it and I got on it and went home! I was homesick. I ran away from Guide camp over near the viaduct at Crowhurst – Bardocks. I went on the Saturday and on Monday by St Leonard’s pier I saw the bus. I left my friend to tell them I had gone; she just said "I can have your pillow!" I was meant to be there a week. I was twelve.

I have always lived in Westfield and so has my friend Daisy. I lived just across the road – Workhouse Road. The first council houses in Westfield. Number ten, South Terrace.

Daisy – Same as Hazel, Workhouse Road, South Terrace, I was at number four.

Hazel – We used to play in the street Hazel – There were lots of children. Three at the bottom house – George, Jimmy and Flo.

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Daisy – And Charlie and Freda in the next one. Next to that there were so many I can’t remember them all! The mother died and left six, then the father married again and had another six.

Hazel – I had two brothers much older than me; it was a bit like being an only child, so I had a room on my own. There was a bed and a washstand and that was it. You didn’t have much then. Dad was fifty when I was born. Mum thirtynine. My mum was a good cook. I remember roasting chestnuts on the range.

We had a bath in the bathroom but I don’t think it was used very much ’cos you had to boil water in an old fashioned copper; the pipe went into the fireplace.

Your mum used to do laundry for people in the scullery. There was a stove with irons around it. Ten irons on ledges.

Daisy – We’d wet our fingers to see if they were hot enough.

Hazel – We had a penny to carry washing in old baskets – to wherever it needed to be.

Daisy – Do you remember that man who would throw us a sweet from the upstairs window?

Hazel – I could see fields from my window Daisy – I could see some horses Hazel – We used to go to school together, Westfield School, just across the road.

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Hazel – We had separate playgrounds and weren’t allowed to look over the wall: you could look through a wire, by the bike shed which was in the girls’ part.

Daisy – We used to play outside Hazel – We used to play skipping, doing the alphabet: “Tell me the name of your

sweetheart.” His name was Don Adams; I met him when I was staying in Hastings with my aunt. I met him playing in the street. I made myself stop on his initials D A – it meant I did not skip for very long!

Daisy – The council houses were built just at the end of World War One, eightyfive years old.

Hazel – There was one house for the policeman and two for East Sussex roadmen.

Daisy – There was an extra room built on for police business.

Hazel – Daisy lived at number four and me at number ten South Terrace.

Ours are still standing.

Both – Where we lived at 25 Hazel – Almost the same, on the road down at The Moor, my husband was in the army, I lived with my mother and father; there were two bedrooms. They’re all gone now.

Daisy – Same council house. I was the youngest, two brothers, three sisters , three bedrooms – They had all gone.

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Both – Where we lived at 40 Hazel – Same again. Jean was at the bottom of the garden. It had an outside loo – the shed and toilet were joined.

Daisy – Same – still there! The loo was in a passage coming to the back door, no water, we used a bucket. When the mains were put in my dad complained as we lost all the manure for the garden!

Hazel – Where Geary Place is used to be a market garden.

Knitting always knitting Always lived in Westfield Westfield always Westfield All our lives.

Hazel – I could see fields from my window Daisy – I could see some horses Hazel Killick and Daisy Russell

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Philadelphia Jean

I always think my brother is older than me but he’s not. Perhaps it’s because he is so tall and I am so small. I was tiny when I was born – four pounds; so small they made a place for me in a drawer. I was the first baby ever to be born at the Rye Hospital. I should have been called Philadelphia, but my godmother came along and said “Nonsense – she’s too small to have such a long name!” So I became Beryl Jean –now I’m just Jean. But I should like to have been Philadelphia – makes me think of soft cheese and that famous American orchestra.

Dad lost two wives. Mum was number three. There were seven of us altogether – three half brothers, two half sisters, me and my brother. We all lived in a lovely big old cottage at Chitcombe on the Cripps Corner. There was a huge great Bramley in the garden loaded with apples for cooking. We didn’t know where to put them there were so many – always. We’d have them cooked with dark brown sugar. There were gooseberries, pears, apples, loganberries, damsons, raspberries, strawberries – veg too. I can still see this tree in the garden.

My dad was a marvellous musician; he played the Euphonium. There was a great big shed in the garden and he taught brass to beginners up there. Terrible racket!

We all had a go on different instruments. I started my “noise” with anything going, playing scales up and down. I finally settled on the bugle. I’d push the 30

middle valve down and off I’d go... joyful exciting athletic naughty Jean. I’ve always tried to learn as much as I could. Always.

Dad came from a Welsh family. As a small boy he had a whistle and was in bands. He was in the choir in Brede Church. In his spare time he was also a band master in Northiam and Brede and played with other bands in Rye, Peasmarsh.

He used to go to contests: Bellview, Crystal Palace, Tunbridge Wells Assembly Rooms. There would be the massed bands from the north. I would choose which I thought were the best then wait for the adjudicator to come out of the little room to see how close one had got.

He was good at everything, my dad. The farmers used to apply to get him off his original job working for the council – he was part of a big gang doing the drainage on the roads – so he could go hop-drying. He was also a tree thrower, a thatcher, a builder.

When I was 18 I had a job as a waitress in the Carlton, Warrior Square. I lived right at the top. Did a bit of everything – cleaning rooms, breakfasts etc. A man on the seafront would stand next to Queen Victoria playing the violin. Once I heard him play this lovely tune. I went home to dad and sang it to him and he wrote it down. I sang it all the time: One Day when we were young....

I went in the army in 1940 – the Terrors. Did the calls in Dorset – Blandford, the Tank Camp, Devon – all over the place. Then I came back and got married: 62 years ago, Tenterden church. We had s lovely big cake. Our honeymoon was a night in a guest house in Windsor. They thought we were from ENSA, we were so jolly and all dressed up!

We started married life living with mum in the cottage – just the three of us by 31

then. Our first home was a prefab in Northiam. It’d creak and crank when it cooled down. Very hot in the summer. When Mum died we went back to Dad’s house for a while then later on moved to a new-ish council house here in Westfield – Churchfield – with my husband and son. We’d been on the list for ever. It had dormers and I didn’t like them much. I worked in a big house – a Holiday Home. Benskins, just down Cottage Lane – where children who went to boarding school couldn’t go home because parents were abroad.

They all said I could sing before I could walk. They would say “Oh, she’s singing

in tune.” I can do anything with music, jazz, classical, blues, pop, you name it I can do any style. We had such a wonderful time making music together. It’s like a tonic to you if you love it and we all did – nine of us round the piano in the sitting room, us making our noise, mum singing. She had a lovely voice and sang ballads. We were like the Von Trapp family. Happy.

I sing all the time in my room at Geary. You have to – or it goes. It reminds me of those wonderful times. I’ll never forget. If you had good parents like we had you always miss them, don’t you?

Jean Lindsay

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Westfield School Whimsies:

Music The music teacher came from Brede.

The Headmistress at Rye, Mrs Lupton, came over to teach music.

There was Miss Hunter. She was a hard-core christian.

We sang All things bright and beautiful, There is a green hill far away, We

plough the fields and scatter, He who would valiant be, Onward Christian Soldiers, The Skye boat song, Oranges and lemons – “chip chop chip chop and off with your head”, The Road to the Isles

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Westfield School Whimsies:

More in and out of school I pulled one girl’s plaits and locked her in the toilet.

There was bomb in the playground People went from Westfield to Wales My sister’s children went to Wales and came back lousy We had separate playgrounds and you weren’t allowed to look over the wall.

I went to a fête there, and gave a pat to a donkey which kicked me – my first kick from an animal.

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Westfield School Whimsies:

More music Everyone used to visit the big house once a month and later once a week. We used to go on the lake, and play the player piano.

Mrs Lupton from Rye always sang Cherry Ripe. I can still hear her shouting and hollering I remember Blow the wind southerly While Shepherds washed their socks by night All seated round the tub A bar of sunlight soap came down And they began to scrub.

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The Peasemarsh Group Reg Sells

Facilitators/writers

Maureen Barker

Jane Metcalfe

Hilda Simmonds

Clare Whistler

Irene Akehurst

with

Vi Hewett

Philippa Urquhart

Jean Lindsay

and

Daisy Russell

Sarah Norris

Phyllis Stainton Hazel Killick

Project Manager Rachel Lewis

Shaping Voices in partnership with

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Shaping Voices Shaping Voices is an East Sussex-based not-for-profit Arts Company whose aim is to bring the arts to groups of people in East Sussex who would not normally have the opportunity to explore this area of activity.

www.shapingvoices.co.uk

Design: www.designraphael.co.uk Print: www.elephantgraphics.co.uk

What is Creative Reminiscence? – a series of creative group sessions which lead to informal performances of original stories and monologues based on the personal reminiscences of people over the age of 60.

Contact Shaping Voices 01424 718 048 info@shapingvoices.co.uk www.shapingvoices.co.uk

This creative reminiscence project and book were funded by The Hertiage Lottery Fund and Rother District Council

Š Shaping Voices March 2007