my story by joe bowler - downley...

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1 MY STORY by JOE BOWLER Before the council and private housing estates were built around the village from 1950 onwards , Downley, being a “ No through road “ village was a quiet and fairly secluded place with just two means of access and exit, one being Coates lane which was little more than a single track lane with a few passing places, and was used mainly to serve Manor Farm, and used by cyclists and people walking to and from their jobs at the Hughenden end of Wycombe Town The main road into Downley was Plomer Hill, from its junction with the A40 it rose to cross the main railway line from Marylebone to Birmingham, before a short level stretch which ended at the base of the very steep and bendy hill that rose up to the village. There were three bends in the hill, each hiding the steep climb beyond it, and many is the time that drivers have had to call for help as they had not started the climb in a low enough gear. It was a general rule that standing passengers were not allowed on the buses on their way up the hill, and this was met by many grumbles by people who were coming home from work, especially if they lived in the farthest part of the village. If there was even a small amount of snow both these roads soon became impassable , and it was not unusual for the village to be completely isolated for days on end. There are still people living in the village who can remember one winter when the snow reached the top of the hedges in Coates Lane where it had drifted, and most of the time we used to have to wait until it melted away naturally. When Plomer Hill reached the summit it was faced with the village green where the road then divided into two. The left hand road was called Plomer Green Lane, and extended right up to the top of the common by the Blacksmiths cottages and Forge. This marked the western perimeter of the village.. A small road branched at right angles across the common to serve several houses that just had a hard track in front of them. This track branched left and right, the left path leading to the Le-De-Spencers pub, and Stacey’s bake house. The road to the right of the village green was Littleworth Road, and marked the eastern perimeter of the village. This continued along as far as Coates Lane, where it joined up to the Commonside Road. This as the name implies extended right along the side of the Common until it met up with the short stretch now known as the High Street, which joined up with Plomer Green Lane and so completed the circuit of the village. I had always thought of the village as being roughly circular, but now I think it is more of a drunken triangle. For youngsters of Downley growing up in the thirties and early forties was a Golden Age, surrounded by grass fields, corn fields and woodland that stretched for miles, we were able to wander for hours on end, and got to know every footpath and trail, every tree that we could climb or hang a swing from,

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Page 1: MY STORY by JOE BOWLER - Downley Communitydownley.org/uploads/documents/features/My_Story_Part_1-Joe_Bowler.pdfMY STORY by JOE BOWLER Before the council and private housing estates

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MY STORY by JOE BOWLER

Before the council and private housing estates were built around the villagefrom 1950 onwards , Downley, being a “ No through road “ village was a quietand fairly secluded place with just two means of access and exit, one beingCoates lane which was little more than a single track lane with a few passingplaces, and was used mainly to serve Manor Farm, and used by cyclists andpeople walking to and from their jobs at the Hughenden end of WycombeTown

The main road into Downley was Plomer Hill, from its junction with the A40 itrose to cross the main railway line from Marylebone to Birmingham, before ashort level stretch which ended at the base of the very steep and bendy hillthat rose up to the village. There were three bends in the hill, each hidingthe steep climb beyond it, and many is the time that drivers have had to callfor help as they had not started the climb in a low enough gear. It was ageneral rule that standing passengers were not allowed on the buses ontheir way up the hill, and this was met by many grumbles by people who werecoming home from work, especially if they lived in the farthest part of thevillage.

If there was even a small amount of snow both these roads soon becameimpassable , and it was not unusual for the village to be completely isolatedfor days on end. There are still people living in the village who can rememberone winter when the snow reached the top of the hedges in Coates Lanewhere it had drifted, and most of the time we used to have to wait until itmelted away naturally.

When Plomer Hill reached the summit it was faced with the village greenwhere the road then divided into two. The left hand road was called PlomerGreen Lane, and extended right up to the top of the common by theBlacksmiths cottages and Forge. This marked the western perimeter of thevillage.. A small road branched at right angles across the common to serveseveral houses that just had a hard track in front of them. This trackbranched left and right, the left path leading to the Le-De-Spencers pub, andStacey’s bake house.

The road to the right of the village green was Littleworth Road, and markedthe eastern perimeter of the village. This continued along as far as CoatesLane, where it joined up to the Commonside Road. This as the name impliesextended right along the side of the Common until it met up with the shortstretch now known as the High Street, which joined up with Plomer GreenLane and so completed the circuit of the village. I had always thought of thevillage as being roughly circular, but now I think it is more of a drunkentriangle.

For youngsters of Downley growing up in the thirties and early forties was aGolden Age, surrounded by grass fields, corn fields and woodland thatstretched for miles, we were able to wander for hours on end, and got to knowevery footpath and trail, every tree that we could climb or hang a swing from,

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where we could find the wild strawberries that only grew in a couple of place,the sweetest and biggest blackberries, and the edible wild cherries, andwhere we could find the biggest hazelnuts‘, and even where we could dig upwhat we called pig nuts this was on the common in a spot that we used to callThe Glade, I’m not sure what they were but they did not seem to do us anyharm. We also knew where the sweetest fruit was grown in the allotments,and where we could do a bit of “Scrumping “ with the least chance of gettingcaught.One day on the way home from school two or three of us went to theallotments especially to scrump some pears that we had seen a few daysearlier, we had just put a few in our pockets when all at once there was aterrific bang of thunder, we were all terrified thinking that God had seen usand was showing his anger, the powerful messages of the commandmentswas very deep in the minds of us even at the age of six.One of the favourite areas to explore was the Common ,it was not soovergrown with trees as it is now, on the banks along from Well Cottage grewheathers, pretty air bells ? and all sorts of wild flowers, yellow furze bushesand ferns, as well as being home to skylarks and many different types of birdsand small animals, so much to see...The “Dells “ created lots of fun, these old clay diggings were spread overvarious parts of the common, some quite deep, many of which have beenfilled in over the years, in fact, the cricket pitch is played on what was thedeepest and most concentrated area of diggings. In some cases the dellsformed ponds, the one I remember best was sited on the left hand side of theroad that cuts across the common from Blacksmith cottages, this had a greatcollection of newts, among which were the large black ones that had a “ frill “running down the back and tail, we called them “ Jacks “ and the smallertypes “ Effs”, sadly this pond was filled in years ago, and I suppose thosecreatures have been lost for good.Many of those ponds had names that still exist, Big Daisy, Little Daisy,Mannings ( just a few yards onto the common from the top of Hunts Hill, I’msure I saw a hole just at the side of this pond caused by an unexplodedbombe during the Second World War, I cannot remember it ever having beendug up or exploded by the military.(treasure hunters beware); Other ponds inthe village were Sandpits, it may have got its name from the possibility thatsand was dug from it at one time, as I do know that there are several seamsof sand in the area. Another pond in that area is Kiln Pond, was thisconnected in any way with the tile making that was carried out in the village?It was always said to us as children that we must not play around this pond asthere was a very deep well in the middle of it, I do know that there was awooden walkway out to the middle, and that women would collect buckets ofwater from there for domestic use, so perhaps the old story was correct, Atone time within the memory of quite a few older villagers there was a pondwhere Jubilee Green is now, this used to have a tubular rail around the roadside, just a nice height for youngsters to hang by the knees from, I rememberfinding two duck eggs on the edge of the pond one day when I was on myway to school, I know that when the council filled in this pond it caused thecellar at No.3 Plomer Green Lane to flood and it had to filled and cappedoff.

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We were not aware of the hard times that our parents were having at thattime, short time working in the chair trade was a yearly event, and except for afew engineering businesses, and the building trade, furniture making was themajor business and employer in the area and of course many families werestill bearing the loss of the men that were killed and wounded in the great war,so many men from such a small village

We had three furniture makers in the village, Mines and West at the top ofNarrow Lane, they made high quality furniture which I think sold in thefashionable London stores, they employed machinists, makers, polishers, andtheir highly skilled wood carvers,. Another firm was Norman Spriggs,everybody knew him as Fiddle“. I’m sure that was no reflection on hishonesty, he had this massive three story wooden building, ( just behind wherethe hair salon now stands) and when the wind blew it creaked and groanedas if it was haunted, an eerie place to be in if you were an impressionableyoungster, he specialised in upholstery I believe. The last factory wasR.and H Mines, it was next to the Old school, and it was fascinating to lookthrough the window and see the machinery working, and the wood turnerswork their lathes, with great showers of shavings seemingly flyingeverywhere, they manufactured chairs, and I can still visualise Mr.Styleswalking down the wooden staircase from the polishing shop with chairs in hishand ready for dispatch somewhere. I remember somewhere about 1932that the factory caught fire, apparently one of the pressurised paraffin lampsthat they used for lighting had exploded, but it created great excitement in thevillage and everyone rushed to see it, what struck me as funny, and I stillremember is the spouts of water which were coming out of the firemen’sleaking hosepipe, and my concern that the school might burn down.

There were several individual craftsmen working in their sheds or workshops,my granddad used to finish of the roughly machined backrests of the Windsorchair known as a Smoker Bow, he took great pride in the finish of these andwe had to take the greatest care in carrying them across to R.and H Mines. Ican still remember the smell of the glue pot that used to stand on the woodburning stove in his little workshop, this consisted of a metal pot partly filledwith water, and the glue pot fitted down into the water which when heated upmelted the cow heel glue, a piece of cane beaten flat at one end made a formof brush for applying the glue.

Another man that we all used to know well was Mr Collins who lived in whatwe always called Bottle Cottage, in Plomer Green Lane, his speciality was tofinish the back legs of a type of chair, why we got to know him so well wasbecause he would sometimes have some “back feet” that were not goodenough to finish, but they made super runners for a sledge, a rub down with abit of sandpaper, a coating of lard or paraffin, and they would allow you tospeed down the banks of the common, we all liked Mr Collins and his wife,they were gentle and very nice folk.

Downley in the early thirties, and indeed in some parts much later had very

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limited services, water was drawn from the well which collected rain from offthe house roof, and in some cases was discharge into large water butts, whenthe first council houses were built semi rotary hand pumps were fitted in thekitchens, which brought the water up from the well, for the people thatmoved into the new house this was a big step forward into the twentiethcentury.

The main drainage didn’t come to the village till the middle thirties, so thewaste was dispatched to a cesspit, which was collected when necessary by alorry which we called the “Dirty Dennis”, for those houses without acesspit the bucket lavatory was the accepted means of collection, thedisposal of which involved all sorts of methods, open trenches across thegarden covered with lime and soil, or in open pits, which in time were filledover with earth, they used to say that was where the best runner beans andsweet peas grew.

There was a man in the village that used to earn a few shillings for emptyingthese buckets, and could often be seen in the twighlight hours carrying twobuckets on a wooden yoke ,no doubt to be despatched to his own private littlehole.

Those bucket lavatories were sited in small brick or timber buildings, thesehad an small door in one side to allow the bucket to be removed,, they wereusually sited away from the house, and it wasn’t a very pleasant journey tomake on a cold winters night, The seats were made from planed wood,mostly single seaters, but sometimes a smaller seat especially for childrenwould be made to fit over the larger hole, toilet paper was made fromsquares of newspaper, a hole pierced in one corner and a piece of stringthreaded through and hung up on a conveniently sited nail, much time wasspent after reading an interesting piece of paper, trying to find the matchingpiece from the rest of the bundle; to secure the door a piece of string wasfixed to the door and tied back to a nail on the wall.

Because it wasn’t practical for everyone to go out to the privee in the coldnight air every household had a collection of chamber pots,( often referred toas “Jerries”) which were modestly placed under the bed, it was a convenientway to allow everyone to pee in comfort, and I’m afraid that the emptying ofthem was left to the mother of the house, they were often emptied on thecompost heap as it accelerated the decomposition, not very hygienic, butpractical.

Lighting was given from paraffin wick lamps, some were really beautifullymade, and they gave just enough light to read by, for seeing to get to beda candle was the only other means of light, so when the electricity was finallylaid on and each house had a light in the kitchen and one in the living room ,as well as one 15 amp plug for power we all thought we had truly enteredthe twentieth century The number of appliances that were connected to thelighting socket was unbelievable, and would have had today’s health andsafety officials in spasms.

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Cooking was mostly done on the kitchen range, a cast iron top on which youcould boil saucepans and kettles, and a side oven from which came the mostwonderful tasting cakes and tarts as well as the roast Sunday dinner, from theopen front you could make the most delicious toast ,much tastier thananything cooked by modern day electric toasters or grilles, the main drawbackwas that the fire had to be lit every morning, this needed lighting wood to start,and the wind in the right direction otherwise you could get a room full ofsmoke, the main fuel was coal which was delivered in big sacks weighing onecwt. usually half a ton at a time, a big outlay for the family, very often weyoungsters would help out by bringing boughs back from the wood.Sometimes you were able to buy a complete tree from West WycombeEstate, I remember our family buying one of these trees, cutting it down witha long cross cut two handled saw, the morning ended in disaster becausewhen the tree crashed down it frightened the horse we had hired along with acart to get the tree home, the horse reared up and charged off, tearing awheel of the cart in its rush to get away, I can‘t remember the outcome, butI‘m sure they got the wood home somehow. Trying to copy our elders meand my friend borrowed a similar saw from the farmer Mr Cross, it was reallyblunt ,but we selected the tree we thought would fall nicely, and when afterhours of sawing the tree finally crashed down it made so much noise it reallyscared us and we ran off, of course we would have been in real trouble if wehad been caught as I think the tree was suitable for furniture making.

In most houses Monday was the busiest day of the week, this was when theweekly wash was done, which meant that the copper had to be lit to boil thewater, this was a brick built structure which had a firebox below a deepshaped bowl, either made of copper but more often galvanised iron, it wasoften built next to the kitchen range and shared the same chimney, all sorts ofburnable material was used to get the fire going well.I remember old shoes, cardboard etc. as well as wood and coal being

shoved into the firebox, gradually the water would start to bubble and in wouldgo the sheets, shirts, and anything that needed boiling, the clothes wereuntangled with the help of a copper stick, usually a piece of round woodabout thirty inches long, this was also used to lift the washing out of the boiler,the washing then had to be taken to the sink to have the soap washed out, itwas a very hard and time consuming job, particularly as families tended to bequite large in number in those days , the next problem was to get all of thiswashing dry and aired easy enough in warm weather but a real headache inwinter, and many people will remember a series of washing lines hanging inthe kitchen as well as the wooden clothes horse used for airing, this wasplaced in front of the fire, which could be dangerous if you didn’t keep an eyeon it, but was very effective.When the washing had been taken out of the copper the remaining waterwas used for other purposes, and this is a true story told to me by a villager,her family consisted of three girls and one boy, and when the clothes hadbeen washed, and the water in the boiler had cooled down sufficiently theirmother sat them all around the rim of the boiler and that’s where they hadtheir weekly wash down, that wasn’t the last use of the water as it was heatedup again and the weeks crockery which had been collected up was thenwashed in the copper

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The copper was also used to boil up water for the weekly bath ,this wasusually a big tin bath sited somewhere near the kitchen range to try and keepwarm , this was the situation in most house before the council houses werebuilt, even in those for some long time water still had to be taken from thecopper to the bath but this was not considered a chore to be able to enjoy theluxury of a proper bath.Even when the washing had been dried it had to be ironed, a pair of solid castiron flat irons would be placed on the kitchen range to heat up, this wasalways a bit hit and miss and the irons were sometimes tested by a quick spiton the base, if it disappeared too quickly the iron was too hot, a thick clothwas wrapped around the handle as this was the same heat as the iron base,an electric iron was one of the appliances that was sometimes connected tothe light socket when the electricity had been laid onto the house. The sheetsetc. were then ironed on a wooden ironing board, just like the ones that areused today, I often wonder how the women managed to survive in thosedays and in the years before, every job was hard work, cooking cleaning,washing, they had so little rest it is no wonder that they looked old before theywere middle aged.

Large families were not unusual in those days, and counting up the number ofchildren that belonged to the parents that lived in the twenty two councilhouses in Littleworth road came to roughly eighty nine,of course many of the older children had left home, married, or the girls mostlikely “in service” this happened frequently to relieve the pressure ofovercrowding in the small two bedroom cottages that was the normalaccommodation in villages, if they were lucky they would have a kindemployer, but often they could be treated little better than slave labour, and ifthey stepped out of line in any way, such as being a few minutes late inreturning to the “Big House” they would be dismissed instantly and thrown outof the house regardless of time or weather.

One of the strange things was that most of the men were very rarely called bytheir proper name ,in our house there was a Flattey (Fred) Mitchel (Stan) andJoller (Robert),going along the houses in Littleworth Road was Wiff, Gedall,Chummey, Nobby, Domby Aggle, Sugar, Happy,I cant remember the Sextons nicknames) Paint, Dick, Drummer, Dibby

and Chewy, that was most of the names of the first twelve house inLittleworth road, and this was repeated all around the village,

By the old Bricklayers Arms,( which stood where the grass area outside thedog beauty parlour now stands,) the road turned at right angles to join ,whatis now known as The High Street, and continued to join Commonside, thisbasically forms a circle of most of the village; Once when some councillorswere visiting to inspect some proposed work in the village one of the partysaid to my Granddad “ Joe I reckon Downley must be the axx.hole ofWycombe” granddad always proud of Downley replied,” well, and you havejust passed through it” a brilliant cut down I think.

As I walk around the village I often think of the people that lived in the houses

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that I am passing, and of incidents that may have taken place, in the firstcottage in Littleworth Road lived Mr. Brooks, a painter and decorator bytrade but in his spare time a very talented artist, his paintings of differentplaces around the village were eagerly sought after.

I lived at No.1 (now No. 18) Littleworth Road, we had a clear view along tothe old farmhouse and the big barn, and often we would open the back doorwhich was only about three feet away from separating us from the field to finda horses head almost reaching into the doorway, or some cows hoping for asnack of some sort, one day we even had a deer looking in at us,

The fence on either side of the road was an avenue of giant elm trees, andmany of the men who served overseas during the war said that those treeswere one of the things that most reminded them of home; We used to have asuccession of people calling at our house as granddad was a Parish andDistrict councillor as well as being involved with the local hospital and thevillage cricket team etc. . he worked very hard for the betterment of the villageand it’s people;Going along the road from our house was Mrs McCarthy, known to everyone

as “Mac “ she took in washing , I suppose to help with the family budget, shealso would be called on to prepare people after they had passed away, itsaved money by not using the undertaker, she was a happy go lucky womanand very popular in the village, very patriotic too as I remember on V.E nightshe was doing hand stands showing her large bloomers on the back of whichwas fastened a union jack flag. at No. 3 lived Mr Langley we used to takeour clocks and watches to him for repair, further along was Mr. Rupe Sexton,a tall man with a long moustache, who was still delivering slow spinning ballsfor the village cricket team at the age of 62.Next door lived the Stallwood family, the tales told about them would make a

good novel on their own, head of the family was known to everyone far andwide as “Paint” he was only about five feet high, but tough as old boots,apparently he couldn’t read or write but he ran a very successful greengrocerybusiness from a woodshed in his back garden and many a housewife wasglad to go to him for six pennyworth pot herbs, which consisted of one each ofonion, Swede and a turnip

He had a large round of customers, all of the village, and up to Naphilland Walters Ash, to do this he used a flat bottomed cart about ten foot byfour, which had an apex type canvas cover which stood about tree feet abovethe bed of the cart, wooden crates were laid at forty five degrees along bothside of the cart, filled with all sorts of vegetables, fruit and potatoes, one ofthe tales told about him was that he would say “I’ve got some lovely tomatoestoday mam, but, I wouldn’t advise you to buy themThe cart was pulled by a lovely old horse ,(maybe a Welsh Cob) ginger incolour, it seemed to know exactly where to stop for each customer, andwould like to have a little fast trot along Commonside at the end of thedeliveries, Mr Stallwood liked to chew twist tobacco and people reckoned thathe would turn round looking along the length and could spit so far as to gopast the back of his cart, I had many a ride out on those rounds, and to ayoung lad it was a bit like riding in a prairie cart in the wild west, there is a

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very peaceful feeling sitting behind a gentle horse when it is just amblingalong.

Mr. Stallwood also used to have another small business which was to deliverthe Sunday papers, although he couldn’t read he used to like to look at thepictures while having his breakfast before delivering to his customers,Granddad used to get mad because every page had grease on them.

I cant believe the story that he laid in bed with a umbrella up because theroof was leaking , but, who can tell.

His son Jack was another who had many tales told about him, I rememberhearing a fire engine passing our house very late at night, and next morningthe rumour was that Jack having put the horse in a new stable at the top ofCoates Lane thought that it might be frightened of it’s new surroundings, sohe lit a candle and placed it on a ledge along with a comic for it to look at,sadly the candle fell down onto the straw bedding and the horse died in theflames: Another story that I think must be taken with a pinch of salt was aboutthe time that Jack went to volunteer for the Territorial Army , they asked him ifhe could shoot a rifle, to which Jack said yes, they had a 22 rifle range at thebarracks in Suffield Road, and the “butts” were at the base of Tom Burt’s hill,with the targets all prepared the instructor told Jack to fire at the bull, now,there was a herd of cattle on the hillside, among which was a bull, so whenthe instructor said “fire” Jack did, and the bull fell down dead, I don’t know ifthis story is true, but it would not surprise me to learn that it was.

At No.12 lived the Styles family, one of the houses where we youngsters werealways in and out of, on the back of several doors would hang long lengths ofcane that Mrs. Styles would use for caning chair seats, she was an expertcaner, as were many women in the village, and it was one of the chores of theStyles children to take the finished pieces down to Vere’s factory in ChapelLane, and to bring back more for their Mum to work on, Next door in a smallbungalow lived Mr. and Mrs Harris, I remember her because at certain timesof the year she would make Ginger Beer, we would take an empty bottlealong and a few pennies for a refill, she and Mrs. Styles were also a verygood card player.

Further along the road was a wooden store owned by Mr.Styles, he sold mostgeneral items of grocery, soft drinks and cigarettes and tobacco, one day afew of us had saved up some money and thought we would try somecigarettes telling Mr Styles that they were for one of the boys dad, Mr. Stylesquickly realised that we were fibbing, but thought that he would teach us alesson, he said sorry but he hadn’t got the cigarettes that we had asked for,but knew that the boys Dad likes a tobacco called Black Beauty, one of thestrongest tasting brands, he said with a packet of cigarette papers to go withit the boys Dad would be satisfied, we all went down into the wood and quicklyrolled up a cigarette each, it wasn’t long before we were turning green andfeeling like death, it was then that I realised why Mr Styles had been smilingas we went out of the shop.

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There used to be a shop on the corner by Peters cottage, this had several;owners over the years, the last one was Roger Smith helped by his wifeCathy, (she also used to play the organ at the Methodist Chapel in ChapelStreet) again this was a general store the original convenience store, itformed a very dangerous corner and was demolished sometime after the warI remember Peter who lived in Peters cottage,( I suppose that is how it gotit‘s name),he was a small stocky old man, with a long beard, I know that thechimney of the cottage was struck by lightning one day, but Peter had a luckyescape as he was sat on the “ privee “ in the garden at the time,

In the early forties Mrs. Coburn who lived in the house adjoiningthe shop ran dancing classes for the local girls, and we boys would take it inturn to look through the letter box, and when the word went round that“Norma” was doing the splits there was a mad scramble to get a look..

At the top of Coates Lane was a small workshop owned by a Mr. Mulllet, thatwas used for something to do with furniture but I cant remembermuch about it. On the opposite side of the road was a long cottage which wasowned by Mr. Smith, he was the ploughman for Mr. Cross, and I can see himnow ploughing the fields where the houses stand between Hithercroft Roadand The Pastures, he used two massive horses, a black Shire, and a brownClydesdale, he loved those horses and must have walked behind them forhundreds of miles in his time at the farm;At the common end of Narrow Lane stood the old Tin Church, this was aChurch of England church and had it’s own Priest in Charge TommyCampbell, ,he was very popular with all the lads and had a goodcongregation, somewhere about is a photo of me and Jim Mullet stood at theentrance to the church dresses in our cassocks and surplusses, Mrs. Cooperwas the caretaker, and also the bell ringer, and the story is told that the bellrope was that long that she could walk the full length of the aisle dishing outthe hymn books while still ringing the bell, also she could walk outside thechurch door to see if there were any latecomers still tolling the bell, she was afaithful member of the church and very highly thought of.; after Mr. Campbellleft the village there were several temporary visiting priests, one I rememberwas a Mr. Nash, one Sunday afternoon we were singing some hymn whenone of the boys deliberately sang a high note when it should have been a lowone, Rev. Nash dashed down the aisle and gave the boy a hard smackaround his head, one of the Sunday school teachers a young Mrs. Greengave him such a strong dressing down saying he should be ashamed to treata young boy in such a manner, I don’t know how far the complaint went, but Icant remember seeing him at the church again, it was a sad day when theyclosed the old church down and started to build a massive church in PlomerHill ,this was only partly completed when the war started and some time latera fire started which burned down the wooden wall which shielded thecompleted part of the church, eventually it was demolished and the presentchurch was built on the same site, a much more practical building for the area,and well used by the different faiths.Somewhere at the back of the cottages facing the common used to be a smallblacksmiths forge, the owner specialised in making hand tools for thewoodworkers in the village, and it was said that you dare not leave anything

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made out of iron outside your house at night as next morning it would be goneand probably turned into a chisel or another useful tool.

There used to be a shop along Commonside that has long ceased to be usedfor that purpose, it was in the “Pink House”( that the late Joe Pidgeon usedto live in ) it was run by Mrs. Mines the wife of the furniture factory ownerMines and West, it was a grocery shop and tea importer, I’m sure there is aphoto of this shop around in the village, Mrs. Mines also used to run a clothingbusiness and employed several local women and young girls asseamstresses.

Just before the shop above lived Mrs. Smith,(one of the West Family)She employed quite a few local women who sowed sequins on expensivedresses that were bought down from the fashion houses in London, this was avery skilled job, but I doubt very well paid.

Where No.3 Commonside is now used to be a sweet and tobacco shop, alsoselling all sorts of useful items paraffin being one of them, and we would oftenbuy a bottleful to put on the sledge runners , I remember that there used to betwo slot machines outside of the shop, one to buy cigarettes, and the other tobuy a small bar of Cadbury’s chocolate, the first person I remember owningthe shop was Mr. Bond, I remember this because some of the older boys letthe brakes off of his car and rolled it down the bank of the common, the younglads were’not little angels in those days,

Moving along the road a few yards one came to the centre of the village, therewas the Methodist chapel at the beginning of Chapel Street, this is wherequite a few of us youngsters went when the little tin church shut down, ( andwhere quite a few of us were married in later years,)it was supervised by acircuit minister, a full time position, but mostly served by local lay- preachers,who ran the classes for young children and took the services, it was quite ahappy place to go, and much less formal than the old church. Next door to thechapel lived the James family, Mr. James repaired watches and clocks as ahobby, he was known as “ Cold wind “ because regardless of however warm itwas when people said to him “good day Mr James, lovely day,” he wouldalways reply “ yes it is but there is a cold wind “.Quite a few of the old Downley families lived in Chapel Street, the Smiths,

Youens, Mines, and Bristows, there is a wonderful picture somewhere in thefamily of old Mr and Mrs. Bristow celebrating their Diamond Wedding with alltheir children and grandchildren shown in a large group outside the villagehall.The school was at the top of Chapel Street, and the children went there fromthe ages of four to fourteen, (it wasn’t till about 1938 that the new school wasopened at Mill End for 11 to 14 year olds) I remember my first day at theschool, so many children running around shouting with excitement, one thingstill sticks in my mind was Dave Youens running around the playground incircles, arms outstretched making out to be an aeroplane, the real thing was arare sight in those days. The teachers that we had still stay in my memory,Miss Brown teaching the infants, She became Mrs Church on being married,she cycled all the way from Lacy Green every day ,she was a much loved

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person and even in old age remembered the names of all her old pupils, therewas a Mrs. Brown who took the next age group and then a Miss Thomas , avery attractive dark haired welsh lady who I’m sure caused some initial stirringof the hormones in the older boys, Mrs Meadows took the fourth year pupilsand served the school for many years, she was quite strict, but well thoughtof, and finally in the last year the Headmaster Mr. Avery took the classes hetaught all subjects, and such sport as we were able to play, he was definitelya teacher of the old school, demanded good manners and obedience, andwas much respected for it.

On the opposite side of Chapel Street to the chapel was a wall that ranround two cottages, one either side of a pub called “The Golf Links” they wereall joined up in a row, and were demolished about 1933,

The cottages were only two up and two down with a landing at the top of thestairs, at one time they were occupied by the Bowler family and the Sextons,they both had quite large families and it must have been a real headache tofind room for everybody to sleep, they must have had very low ceilings as Iremember when the Hall family lived there their son Peter was ill in bed andthe local priest Tommy Campbell took him a book which he was able to passup to Peter balanced on the end of his walking stick.

The pub was run by Tom Allnutt and his sister Sarah, there was also a brotherHarold but he worked elsewhere as a chauffer I think.

The next shop was owned by Mrs. Spriggs, and again was a general store,but she also used to sell shoes and boots, and some everyday clothing , theshop was a delight to visit, there were big round cheeses which were cut witha wire attached to a peg at either end, not an easy task, there were rows oflittle wooden drawers, containing all sorts of goods, buttons, cottonstobacco, needles, she would sell practically everything that one would need,and I think had been very generous to people who were going through a badtime , she was also a generous supporter of the little tin church which stood atthe top of Narrow Lane, and was very sad when the church authoritiesdecided to build a monstrous great church outside the village boundary, Shealways employed a schoolboy to deliver the groceries to her customers, it wasthe best job for a boy in the village, and when I managed to get it followingBob Langley I was really pleased and did it until I left school, the wages werefive shillings a week and a bag of peppermints, and for this you had to bethere every evening and Saturday mornings, the round stretched all aroundthe village and across the common to the houses beyond the Le-De-Spencerspub , there were no deliveries on Tuesdays but on that day you had to chopenough lighting wood for the rest of the week, and clear out the weedsbetween the black bricks that made up the footpath, and there were a lot ofthem, I really disliked that job.To help carry the groceries I made up a trolley, made up of four pram wheels,the front pair fitted to a piece of wood that swivelled on a centre bolt, and forguiding I used an old pram handle, this was much better that the usual ropehandle, I used to enjoy the deliveries to the top of the comment because onthe way back I could start off from Blacksmiths cottage and freewheel almostto the top of the hill leading to the High Street. My last delivery on Saturday

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morning was to Tom and Sarah Allnutt who lived in one of the old cottages(where the footpath sign is at the rear of the bungalows leading into PlomerGreen Avenue) by this time I was starving hungry, and Sarah would alwaysbe dishing out a Sheppard’s pie, It smelled wonderful and my mouth stillwaters at the memory of it,

Mr Jim West had the butchers shop, and it fascinated us youngsters to seethe great sides of beef being carried in to the cold cupboard, sausages hungon rails, and at Christmas time he always used to put a pigs head with anorange in it’s mouth in the shop window, it seemed a very scary thing to me.He was one of the few people in the village that had a phone at that time, andI seem to remember that he had a nice little sideline as a “runner” for abookmaker, people would pop in with their bets written down and he wouldring them through, I suppose it must have been profitable, he also owned the“Mountjoys Retreat” pub in Moor lane, his sister Pearl looked after this and Ithink most of the village lads had their first drink there, there was a type ofpianola in the “big room” which played tunes printed on a revolving drum, Ithink you had to put a penny in a slot to make the thing work, but I seem toremember that it only played one tune, “in a Monastery Garden” which after awhile got pretty boring.

At the rear of the pub was a slaughterhouse, villagers would take their pigsthere to be dispatched, it all seems a bit medieval now the way it was carriedout, first the pig was stunned or shot with a special gun, then it was strungup by it’s back legs and it’s throat was cut to release the blood, it would thenbe laid on a bed of straw which would then be set on fire to burn off the pigsbristles, then moved inside for preparing for salting, or to be smoked,depending the owners preference, or of course to be carved up for sale in thebutchers shop, there were just a few people in the area that could salt a pigsuccessfully, this required a lot of skill time, and patients.Mr. West’s brother “Billy” also lived at the pub, he had lost the lower part ofhis left arm,( Presumably in the first world war ) he was the assistantgamekeeper for the West Wycombe Estate and patrolled mostly aroundBranch Wood and Cookshall area, of course this patrolling interfered withthe local men’s necessary sport of catching rabbits, a good meal and cheapwhen times were hard, now Billy liked a game of dominos so once a week agame would be arranged in the Mountjoys, and fixed for the time that Billy hadhis mid-day break, the players would let Billy win quite a few games, keepinghim occupied a bit longer that he should have done, meanwhile a couple ofthe gang would be round the woods catching as many rabbits as possible,after dumping the rabbits in a safe place they would arrive at the pub justbefore Billy realised how late it was, apparently this little ruse worked for somelong time, but Billy was no fool and as long as the practise didn’t get out ofhand I’m told he turned a blind eye.With a mate of mine, Bob Langley, we decided we would try catching rabbitswith a ferret, so we saved up half-a crown ( 121/2 p ) and bought a nice youngferret, so with some nets borrowed from Bobs Dad we set off to the banks juston the edge of the wood which led up to Hughenden Manor, we carefully fixedseveral nets over the burrows and took the ferret out of the sack and placed itin a burrow, at first it just played about turning head over heels, and running

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around in circles, eventually we managed to get it to go down a burrow, andwe waited full of excitement for the rabbits to run out into the nets, we waitedand waited but we didn’t see one rabbit, and we never saw the ferret againeither.

Next to the Butchers shop was The Bricklayers Arms, this filled what is nowthe grass area, and Kanine Kutz shop, a very old building, surrounded by abrick wall adjoining Plomer Green Lane, there was a raised cobbled path atthe front about a foot or more high, and a couple of steps leading up to thedoorway, a dodgy exit if anyone had a drop too much; The landlords wereMr Dixon and his wife known to everyone as Bella, she was a very goodbusiness woman and even up to her latest years seemed to know everythingthat was going on in the village, they took over the new Bricklayers Armswhen it was built and ran it successfully until well after the second world war.,In the early thirties the only buildings on the opposite side of the road to the

pubs and shops were the Memorial Hall and Prospect Cottage which facedalong the common this was where a Mrs Harris lived, she was known asMrs. Lookout as she always appeared to be twitching the curtain slightly and“ looking out “ to see what was going on. Mr. Harris was the first person in thevillage to have what was called in those days a “wireless” these were poweredby acid batteries and needed a long aerial to receive the radio waves, itusually stretched over the longest length available in the garden, and I wastold that some villagers were so convinced that this aerial would so upset theweather that it would cause it to rain all the Time, eventually when thewireless was accepted Mr Harris used to charge the batteries for the localpeople, I think that he also organised an orchestra of local people, I seemvaguely to remember it playing in the village hall, it consisted mostly of stringinstruments.The other building in the High Street at that time was the War Memorial Hall,built in 1923 and dedicated to the men of the village who had died in the FirstWorld War, it was a tremendous effort by the residents of the village to savethe money for the building, and it has served the community well since it’sinauguration, more 0n this later.The 2 shops and 2 house were built in the later part of the thirties, and thiscompleted the “ infill “ of that side of the High Street.Before we wander to far around the village we must look at Moor Lane, knownin the thirties locally as “ Bugs Alley “ the cottages were in a bad state ofrepair, a row of backyard bucket lavatories in the garden, now with carefulrenovations and modern facilities they are very desirable properties, at onetime there was a communal wash-house on the opposite side of the road, agreat place for a village gossip, also the last cottage was the first post office inthe village as well as a small convenience store, it also had bottles built intothe front wall, and I wonder if it was built by the same builder as “ BottleCottage “ in Plomer Green Lane ?I must mention Moor Cottage which has “ lots of character “ which is how theestate agents like to describe these old houses, it is reputed to be the oldesthouse in Downley, and I would not like to dispute that also the other old houseis “Old Tiles “ whether this had any connection with the men that had a kiln fortile making in Moor Lane I’m not sure ;they must have been responsible for

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the Pits that used to be sited in various places on the common.

The next buildings were the Wesleyan Chapel and the houses on ButterflyBank, . The modern looking houses in between were built in the late thirties,and one pair after the war. Vale Cottage and Well Cottage are on theopposite side of Butterfly Bank and are quite old although I do not know thedates, Well Cottage has a really deep well in the garden and was a godsendto the villagers when they suffered a long dry summer, at such times a localsmallholder Mr. Jack Spriggs would go to the water board station in Mill EndRoad with a horse drawn water tank and bring it unto the villagers,somewhere in the village I’ve seen a picture of Mr. Spriggs with his horse andwater tank, it would be nice if it could be found.

Vale Cottage was always owned by someone “ Posh,“ in the thirties andforties a Mrs. Neynoe ? Lived there, she was a governor at the school, andduring late summer we would be taken out of school to go into her orchardand pick up “ Windfall “ apples, apart from the ones we ate I really do notknow what happened to them, but I know that we always had to show herthe utmost respect.

Further up the common was “The Steam Bakery “ it belonged to Mr. Faulknerbut was run by Mr Fred Langley, there are few more mouth-watering smellsthan newly baked bread and many is the time that our little gang clubbedtogether to buy a cottage loaf then sit out in the common and scoff it all up,Mr. Langley had quite a large round in the surrounding area and made hisdeliveries in a peculiar little van which was like a three wheeled motor cyclewith a covered body, it is the only one I’ve ever seen and would be quite atrophy for a classic collector.;

Apart from the houses and the bungalow next to the lane that leads to “California Holdings, all the houses are originals , the oldest being “TheLe-De-Spencers Arms” which also had a bakery in the rear part, in the thirtiesit was just a beer house, and there were only two small rooms for the peopleto drink in, the room which is next to the common was a private room thenand was known to the pub locals as “ Ruby’s courting room “ Ruby was thedaughter of the landlord MR. Stan Batts, he also had a son and the familywere tenants for a long time.The bake house was run by Mr Stacy and his son Jack, they also had a goodround of regular customers,

Coming back to the village, In the first house past the old pub lived Mrs.Cross, she was a lady that a lot of people went to when they had a death inthe family as she would do what was known as “ laying out “ that was washingand preparing the body before it was placed in the coffin, an unusual but avery necessary task, people that had died were normally kept at home inthose days a period of some three to five days before the burial,Downley was divided by two parishes, West Wycombe and Hughenden,persons from the Hughenden Parish were buried in the Hughenden Churchgraveyard, they would have to make their last journey down through the valleyfrom Common Wood and pass by the Manor House, then to the cemetery, or

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via Coates lane and Hughenden Road, a poor person would be taken by ahorse and cart probably borrowed from the local farmer, or carried manuallyby friends, I can just remember the last horse drawn hearse that came tocarry someone in Littleworth Road, a Mr. Grey is a name that sticks in mymind but I couldn’t swear to this being reliable. there were two big blackhorse, complete with feather like head dresses, to a little boy of five or six theyseemed massive, the hearse was shiny black with glass windows all round,and very impressive.

For the people in the West Wycombe Parish their last resting place was in thegraveyard at St. Lawrence Church , “The Church on the Hill” their journey inthe old days was made by horse and cart by way of either the BlacksmithsLane route, or Kiln Pond , following the path down to The Pedestal at thejunction of the Aylesbury-Oxford Road, and through to West WycombeVillage, and then the long climb around the hill and up to the cemetery, whena person was unable to afford a cart, the route was the same for the peoplecarrying the coffin, but then they would turn along the road to Flint Hall Farmwhere a public footpath runs to about halfway up the hill, one of the oldvillagers Mr Joe Langley who used to live on Butterfly Bank said that he hadtaken part in a team carrying a coffin to St. Lawrence churchyard,I don’t have any reason to doubt his story.

Where Greys Lane starts there used to be the tiniest pair of cottages in thevillage I remember looking at the bases when they were demolished and theydidn’t seem any bigger than a small garden shed, but they housed twofamilies, the Redrups, and the Styles family, Mr.Styles was blind, and wasknown throughout the village as Blind Charlie, this was nor meant in anyunkind way, the family was very religious and could be heard chanting textsand verses at all times, a little bit scary for young impressionable children.In the same area was my granddads smallholding, about half an acre frommemory, in it was a magnificent Victoria plum tree, a bramley apple tree aswell as all sorts of small fruit trees, and a good sized vegetable garden, therewere lots of chickens and occasionally geese that used to chase anyoneround the large pen should they wander in there, one of the pleasing thingswas to sink your hands into the storage bin one half held wheat and the otherhalf corn, and just let the seeds trickle over your hands, it just seemed sorelaxing, it was also quite a thrill to see the young chicks running along aftertheir mother hen, and sometimes a brood of chicks would appear fromsomewhere where the hen had hidden her eggs in a secluded part of the plot,that was a sort of bonus I suppose, there was also granddads little workshopwhich I have already mentioned, full of special tools for chair making andalways a fascinating place to visit as a youngster.

At No. 47 lived Mrs Kearley, she ran the post office and the local telephoneexchange, she knew everything and everyone in the village, and it could be areal gossip shop; A Miss Beryl Plumridge and her mother also lived in thehouse, Beryl taught the piano to quite a lot of the local children, and I supposethis brought in some income and she was very well liked by her pupils.

At No. 38 at the time of this story lived Mr. Mendy ( Fadge) to everyone, and

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he ran a small butchers business from there all I can remember is the bigthree legged butchers block that he would chop the meat on, eventually hebuilt a house on land at the bottom of Narrow Lane, which once formed part ofLittleworth Common.

The house that form School Close were built around 1937, I think that theycost around £450 - £ 500 at that time, built by a Mr. Newell known toeveryone as “Hopper” they still look as good today as when they were built,

Opposite School Close lived Mr Hayter, he was an excellent carpenter andhad a very good woodworking business, he also ran a smallholding that tookin what is now Plomer Green Avenue, I can remember his mother sittingoutside the house selling toffee apples, it’s funny what small incidents stick inyour mind for years.

This journey around the village stops at the village green and the old farm, thegreen was much bigger than the present grass patch, it had a nice seat on itwhich was placed there just after King George V’s silver Jubilee, a pondused to be where the present Jubilee Green is, it had a low concrete wallalong one side ( just the right height to have a sit down) a tubular railing wasset into this wall, and it was a great plaything, swinging and hanging by yourlegs, silly little games but enjoyed and remembered by so many.

The farm dominated the entrance to the village, a tall black boarded structureabout sixty feet long, divided in to different sections, mostly used for storinghay and cattle feed, and one part where a small engine was used to drive amachine that chopped up straw, and sometimes mangles for winter feed,another small section was used to house new born calves, and it was alwaysdistressing to hear the mother cow crying out for her baby calf when theywere taken away,

In the farmyard was a stable which housed the two big horses and a smallpony which was used to draw the milk float ,I spent many a time riding in thisfloat with Mr. Cross also at times with his son Ken, it would be fitted out withtwo large milk churns which must have held at least five gallons, then therewould be a smaller container which held one gallon, and two smallmeasuring cans one holding one pint and the other half a pint, with whichyou would fill the jug or container usually left outside the front door with acover over to keep off the local cats or birds, eventually these were replacedwith bottles and the float was filled with crates of milk, it was more hygienic Isuppose but seemed much less personal, one of the drawbacks with bottledmilk was having to collect the empties, some people left them nice and cleanbut some could be green and smelly with dried milk around the neck, ahorrible job, and to this day I make a point of washing out everything that hasto be collected, bottles, jars tins etc.The dairy was at the back of the barn on the other side of the farmyard, thecows were fitted, up into halters which held their head steady, and feed wasplaced in a trough for them to eat while they were being milked, the troublewas that as fast as food went in one end it came out of the other, and unlessyou were very careful walking along the gangway between the two rows of

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cows you could soon be covered.Until the late thirties when a special milking parlour was installed the cowswere all milked by hand , Mr Austin ( known to everyone as Joby ) was incharge of the cows and dairy I can see him now, sat on his little three leggedstool, peaked cap turned front to back milking cow after cow, by hand, a reallylaborious job, the milk was then put into a container which allowed the milk torun over a water cooled corrugated panel and then into a churn or containerwhere it was hand filled into bottles, each bottle was fitted with a cardboardtop which had a punch-out centre for opening, the returned bottles werewashed ,again by hand in a big sink of hot water, a brush was used to cleanthe inner part, it was then rinsed and turned upside down to drain and dry, itall seems a bit unhygienic by today’s standards, but I cant ever remember anyillness being caused.There was always great excitement at harvest time, the cornfields would becut by Mr. Smith and his two horses, then it was collected by another machinethat scooped it up in sheaves and these were stacked up in “ stooks” whichwas about six sheaves stood up in the shape of a wigwam,When these had dried they were then taken by horse and cart to an area nearthe farm for threshing, that is shaking the corn seeds from the corn ears, thiswas done by big box like machine, where the sheaves were thrown up ontothe top of it and a man pushed it down into the working part, the seed wouldpour out into sacks, and the stems stacked in ricks, all this was powered by amassive steam engine, which had a large wheel around which a thick belt wasfixed to drive the threshing machine, it was all noise, smoke and steam,and very exciting to youngsters, the threshing equipment was worked by aspecial gang of men, they lived on the site in a wooden van which was towedby the steam engine at the back of the threshing machine, and they movedfrom farm to farm during the season.Another great event was when the hayricks were dismantled, gangs of uswould wait with great excitement as the rick got lower and lower whenalmost as if they had been given a signal dozens of mice would comecharging out, running all over the place, and all the boys and men would bearmed with sticks trying to kill as many as we could, the dogs would be goingberserk chasing the mice, and would be a job to calm down for days it wasduring one of these occasions that I found out that mice can turn by their tail, Icaught one and held it by it’s tail intending to drop it into a small pond to see ifit could swim, it turned up on it’s tail and gave me a nasty bite, and yes, theycan swim.

A local greengrocer who also imported bananas used to take his bananastems up to Mr. Cross’s field where they would rot down as compost but therewould always be a few bananas left on them, usually black or rotten butsometimes edible, and when we saw the greengrocers van appear the wordwould quickly go round “ the banana lorry is here “ and there would be ascramble by those boys in the know to get across to the heap to see if therewas an edible banana to have.

Mr Cross was a character, always had time to chat and had a cure for everyillness once I caught an infection of ringworms which was prevalent at schoolat that time, it showed up as a red ring of small spots on the neck, of course

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he had a cure for this as well so I went along to the farm later in the day with asmall bottle into which he poured some strong smelling foamy sort of liquid, “take this home boy “ he said and put some on a piece of rag and rub it onyour neck tonight, which I duly did, and as soon as it touched my neck I nearlyshot through the roof, it stung like mad, and next day when we asked himwhat it was he told us it was horse liniment, but I tell you this, it cleared up theinfection and I never had anything like it again.

Around the area of the farm and pond were two more smallholdings, IngsFarm which is now No.2 Plomer Green Lane, and had land that took in all ofwhere Jubilee Road, and School Close and the old school field stand,The other one was “The Elms” I cant remember much about this except once Icollected some skimmed milk from there so they must have had someanimals.

Downley seemed to attract quite a few aeroplane that were in difficulties inthe thirties, I remember one just missing the top of the elm trees in LittleworthRoad before it landed on the path between Mr. Cross’s cornfields, roughlywhere The Pastures is now, all these planes were the old twin wing TigerMoth models, and came from Denham flying club or White Waltham, and hadusually run out of petrol, eventually another plane came to his rescue,bringing enough fuel to see him home, on another occasion a plane landed inthe field at the back of the houses in Littleworth Road, where it meets CoatesLane, again he was rescued by another plane bringing him fuel, becauseplanes were so rarely seen in those days anything like this caused greatexcitement, another plane which did actually crash landed on the hill whichdivides Cookshall Lane from the path leading to Brench wood, We know it as“Blue Hill”the , pilot was a Sikh and the only injury he had was a cut acrossthe bridge of his nose, he said that from the air the hill looked like a flat field,when I got to the site the plane was tipped up on its nose with the propellerstuck into the ground, there is another story attached to this though, BillBowler was in Granddads smallholding playing about with the airgun that waskept for shooting rats etc. when he heard this plane coming low overhead,and he fired at it just as the engine cut out completely, he was scared to bitsthinking that he had it shot down; f course the most famous plane to land wasthat of Colonel Bill Cody which landed in Mannings field in 1912,people camefrom all over to see this strange machine, I was told that the local farmer triedto charge every one a penny to go into the field, but the excitement was sogreat that the gates were broken down, and the people flooded in; Iremember being in the playground at the school when Sir Alan Cobham andhis “ Flying Circus “ came over the village, five planes all in different colours,causing great excitement among us youngsters, apparently he was giving ashow from the field where the modern Girls High School now stands and ashort flight around the area could be had for 10/- ( 50p); this was also thefield where the annual charter fair came to for a time, and I was taken therefor a treat when I suppose I was about 9, it was a fantastic sight, carousels,boxing booths, roundabouts with huge horse to ride on, stalls making all sortsof sweet things, all noise and music from the giant stem driven organs, somuch to take in and a truly magical place for a youngster.

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At different times when required the council would repair the roads, this wasanother source of excitement to us children, there would be tar lorriesspreading lots of hot tar onto the road, being spread over the surface by menin big tar covered boots, using wide brooms, a lorry would follow behindspreading small pebbles all over the surface, and the came the steam rollerwhich had a massive wheel at the front the same width as the engine, and thiswould travel back and forth rolling in the stones to make a firm surface, nextday some men would come along with brooms and sweep up all the loosestones, nothing was wasted in those days, I remember when I was really tinyabout three I think Granddad had just bought me a new Cambridge blue outfit,little shorts and a matching shirt, the first time out in my new outfit I was on myown for a few moments and thought it would be great fun to sit down on thenewly surfaced road and pop the tar bubbles that had appeared in the heat, Iwas covered in tar all round, legs socks new shorts, poor Gran was reallyupset because the clothes were ruined, and the money they cost meant thatprobably something necessary in the house had to be foregone, I’ve felt badabout that ever since I was old enough to appreciate how tough times werefor them.

Occasionally a travelling Evangelist preacher would visit the area, going fromvillage to village preaching the good word, in Downley he would erect a largemarquee in the field where Burrows house now stands, he had a littleharmonium on which he played all the old favourite hymns, The Old RuggedCross, Shall we gather at the river etc. and we really enjoyed his visits, hewasn’t a tub thumping preacher, stories from the bible told in a gentle way andaimed at the enjoyment of the children, on one of his visit to Lacey Green Ithink, his marquee was struck by lightening, and I don’t remember him comingaround after that, perhaps he thought he was getting message from above tostop his travels.

..Among the other characters that visited the village was the MuffinMan, he carried a large board on head on which he had muffins andcrumpets for sale, these were covered by a black sheet of some kind,and he would advertise his presence by ringing a large brass bell andcalling out “ Muffins for sale, Muffins for sale”. all I can remember aboutthem was that they tasted wonderful and was a special treat.

Every year it seemed, an old tramp use to visit the village, “Santy” weuse to call him, he had a long beard, a trilby hat and a long coat, he washarmless, and people treated him kindly, I wonder what lay behind his life as atramp? Wartime experiences, domestic trouble, we will never know. Anotherregular was the scissor grinder, somehow he turned a grinding wheel from aconnection to his bike, and would sharpen knives scissors, shears etc, Isuppose he made a living at it because he called regularly.

One visitor who is always remembered was the “Onion Man“, OnionJohnny we use to call him, he came over from Brittany every year, and wouldtravel around the area selling the onions which hung in long strings on hisbicycle. .

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Our regular daily visitor was the Postman, dressed in his smart uniform withhis little flowerpot helmet, all the mail in a bag which laid in his redtradesman bike tray he really did look like a government official.

Well, how did we youngsters spend our spare time, a great deal was spent inthe woods, making camps, having a small bonfire and roasting some potato’swhich ended up more burnt skin that potato, climbing trees, and occasionallycamping out, I remember one summer night a gang of us camped out in a belltent in the field between Little and Big Tinkers wood, it all went well until abouttwo o clock in the morning when a herd of cows came over to investigate, theykicked the guy ropes, made the tent move about that we thought weought to make a quick get away, so, in the middle of the night we were alltrying to gather up our blankets, pull down the tent and make a move to thebank below the monument, first we had to get over a barbed wire fence, thentry to put up a biggish bell tent on the side of a steep hill not an easy joband in the morning I found that not only had I gashed my leg on the barbedwire but torn the backside of my trousers as well, that escapade dampenedmy enthusiasm for camping for some considerable time.,

We all enjoyed the two penny ” rush to the cinema on Saturday mornings, (until I started my job at the farm and grocery store ) there was always acowboy film or a detective film, the stars of that era were Buck Rogers, GeneAutrey, Tom Mix, and their horse Trigger and Silver which were almost asfamous as them Dick Tracy and Charlie Chan, were the detectives andmanaged to finish the film each week in terrible trouble so that you just had togo back the next week to see if they had survived, quite large groups wouldmeet up and walk down across the footpath known as the Bird in Hand field itwas an enjoyable walk with views across the valley, and at that time skylarkswould be singing, and all sorts of birds would be in the fields and hedges, nowthey are so rare which is a great loss to everyone.

As we got a bit older several of us had bikes, and would sometimes go forlongish rides taking a packet of sandwiches and a bottle of lemonade, Iremember several times cycling over to Henley to sit by the river, and onetime during the early part of the war riding through Amersham Chesham, ontoBerkhampstead and Aylesbury, where we had a meal in the British Rest auntfor 1 shilling and three pence, about 61/2 pence in today’s money.

There was so few cars and lorries in the village that we could play all sorts ofstreet games without fear of danger, there was a game called tiles, whichconsisted of a stack of small tiles or boot polish tins, the idea was to knockthem down and see how many could be replaced before the opposition hadcollected the ball and hit the tile man with it, at least I think that is whathappened, another game which could be quite dangerous was called “ catand stick “ a small piece of wood tapered at each end was placed on theground, and the idea was to hit one end of this with the stick to make it jumpinto the air, then to hit it again as far as you could, then run as many times asyou could between two set points before the cat was returned to the start

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position, there again I cant guarantee the accuracy of the way the points arescored but the hitting of the “ Cat “ is correct.

When the daytime schooling and playtime was over we had time to enjoy theindoor pleasures of reading, playing board games like draughts snakes andladders and a card game called “ snap “ but perhaps the most interesting pasttime was listening to the radio, “ Dick Barton.. Special Agent along with hisassistants, “ Snowy and Jock “ and left us every night worrying if they wouldget out of the traps that the evil villains had set for them, The other famousactor on the Wireless was Valentine Dyall The Man In Black, who broadcastthe most frightening stories in a deep voice, really scary , that made youwant to look under the bed before you went to sleep, the wireless was somuch more entertaining than television you could create your own mindpictures ,and stretch your imaginationSaturday night was always a big night for wireless fans, one interview showwas called “In town tonight “ and would start with the command, “ Once againwe stop the might roar of London’s traffic to bring you some of the interestingpeople who are “ In Town , Tonight” this programme was followed by avariety show, which at times included all the old favourites of the day, JackWarner, Elsie and Doris Walters ?Tommy Handley and the ITMA gang,Ted Ray, Max Miller, and so many more, all good clean humour and nevera dirty word to spoil ones pleasure.

The village hall was a fairly regular place of entertainment, the local youngpeoples string orchestra would play, and I remember Ken Cross the localfarmers son playing his piano accordion, looking red with shyness in the glareof the spotlight; There was also a local choir which put on a showoccasionally, and every so often the Co-op entertainment society wouldappear and they had all sorts of acts, comedians, singers etc. I suppose bymodern standards it seemed amateurish, but we thought it was great fun andmade more enjoyable because the performers were all local.Another place of entertainment was the Wesleyan Chapel, members wouldput on a show for the youngsters, and I still remember a little ditty from asketch given by Miss Youens and Miss Stratford (? )both dressed as yokels,complete with smock and Wellingtons,) “Come Daisy come Dandelioncome Daffodil, you surely will come to no harm, if you think of the cows in thecowshed, that live down on Mulberry Farm”; I also remember a magic lanternshow being given by a retired priest Rev. Hinds ? who lived at the brow ofPlomer Hill, he had been a missionary in Africa, and had a wonderfulcollection of coloured slides to show, we thought it was marvellous to see allthese wonderful sights in colour ,and it was a lovely way to spend an evening.So, our pleasures were simple, but fulfilling, little did we know what thecoming years would bring, but the fear and apprehension was on reflectioncontinually with the parents of the young people of service age, rememberingthe terrible toll that the Great War of 1914-18 had taken in the village

Being young we didn’t appreciate all the talk of a coming war that dominatedthe news of the day, we had heard of Hitler and Mussolini but did not pay too

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much attention to it, we had our games to play, pictures to see, even a youthclub to go to in the village and in Wycombe as well,

We still played in the woods, and one evening made a fairly big campensuring that the boughs covered the top, more like an igloo, this was to makesure that when we lit a little bonfire in there any German planes flying overwould not see us, what we had not reckoned on was that the boughs werebone dry, and by now it was really dark, when all at once a spark must haveset fire to part of the hut and in a few seconds there was probably the biggestbonfire that we had ever had, this brought the special police and air raidwardens running down to the scene, at first thinking a plane had crashed, butafterwards promising all sorts of retribution to whoever was responsible, ofcourse by that time we had dispersed all over the area expressingwonderment at the incident.

By now most of us were eleven and twelve years old, attending the Mill EndSecondary Modern School, it seemed massive after our little village school,but I loved my time there, although I think I got the cane off of every master Ihad, but I still ended up as vice captain of the school, so I could not havebeen too bad a pupil. The lessons were many and varied the three Rs, art,geography, history, woodwork and metalwork, our master for this was alsonamed Bowler, he had a small cane about 12” long, but it used to reallysting, he was a wonderful story teller, and one time I had made an iron pokerofof which I was really proud, however Mr. Bowler thought it needed a littlemore attention to the pointed end, so back into the forge it went, but I was sointerested in the tale he was telling that I quite forgot about my poker, andwhen I remembered about it was too late, it had been in the forge fire too longand had burned right off, misery for me plus another dose of his little cane, butI can never remember anyone holding grudges for being caned, it almostbecame a badge of pride, the biggest disgrace was having to go to theHeadmaster to have the cane, this was usually for non-class things like beinglate or scrapping in the playground, one day three of us were sent to him ( Mr.Green ) Johnnie Green Jack Chilton and me, Johnnie Green had two strokesfrom his six foot cane across the backside, Jack Chilton ran out of the room,and Mr. Green swiftly shut the door and blocked my escape so I ended uphaving six of the best to make up for the others that got away, the other thinghe was very annoyed about was that on the walls of the newly built shelter wethought it would be patriotic to write in thick white chalk V --- ----- dot dot dotdash, this was our bit of support for the propaganda war.

Two dates that with hindsight showed that the so called civilized world hadgone mad, on September 1st. 1939 Germany invaded Poland, andSeptember 3rd.Great Britain declared war on Germany, I remember being inthe front room that Sunday morning, just me and my Grandma, when Mr.Chamberlain made the official announcement, tears streamed down her faceand now I know she was thinking of her sons who would be called on to servein forces, and thinking of the terrible toll that the previous war had inflicted onthe village,

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It was not long before the young men and women were being “ called “ up,a few in the Navy, but most into the Army and Air Force, they served inevery theatre of the war, and the photographs of the “ Welcome HomeDinner that hang in the village hall show that over a hundred villagers servedtheir country. Sadly there were five men who lost their lives, three membersof the Air Force, William Harvey, Kenneth Mullet, and Percy Stratford, CecilAvery was a soldier, and Roy Carrington was a dispatch rider with theNational Fire Service, who tragically was killed in a road accident. Theywould all have been in their eighties now had they lived, but the phrase thatis part of the Remembrance Day service which says, “They shall not grow oldas we that are left behind grow old certainly rings true, as I remember them allas bright faced young men just starting out in their chosen professions.

In the early months of the war the great evacuation of children from Londonbegan, our house was very busy at that time because granddad wasresponsible for placing as many as he could in the village, the woman camedown with their children from London begging to be taken somewhere,anywhere in fact to escape from the “ Blitz “ which was just beginning, wecould see the fires raging over the city from several places in the village, andone can only imagine the horror of, living in London during that period . Therewas even a complete school evacuated to Mill End School, this was theLatimer School, and included lots of students and several masters, one tookover our class which was the senior one at that time, his name was Mr.Carter, a big man with cropped hair and he wore those small glasses calledpince-nez and looked just as we imagined a German would look, and we wereconvinced he was a spy, he also had a habit of picking his nose causing muchsniggering behind the hand from the class, another teacher was Mr. Goodwinwho taught music and some other subject which I can’t remember, we alsohad our first lady teacher at that time, she was only small, but we soon foundout she would not stand any nonsense.The school was formed into four “ Houses ,“ in my last year I was votedCaptain of “Shelburne , Sport played a big part in our schooldays“ cricket,football, but the two big events of the year was the school marathon, and theannual sports day when we had all the races up to 880 yards, the team relayrace, and hurdles and high jump and long jump, I was never any good atdistance running, but managed to win the 100-220 and 440 yard shorterraces, I also won the hurdle race but the general opinion was that I wouldprobably have got round quicker if I had gone underneath the hurdles insteadof over the top, in our last year at school Shelburne won the prize for mostsporting events, and I was quite proud to receive the trophy from theheadmaster.

Well of course the happy days of youth were fading fast ,we were all busyfinding work, tanks drove over many of our old routes, and troop and securitymeasures restricted our usual activities, while the period had been very hardfor the older generation, still suffering the aftermath of the first great war andthe great depression. for us youngsters it had been a golden time, and the likeof which would never be repeated.

This ends part one of my story.