I was born, not in Chandler’s Ford, but in Tooting, South London, in 1947.
My father came from Lancashire, and my mother from Tooting.
We lived in Streatham, a mile or two from Tooting, but just before my second birthday, my mother died from influenza.
My father re-married, my step-mother hailing from Romsey, her mother having moved to Compton, south of Winchester, during WW2.
In 1954, when I was seven, and during our Easter Holiday at Compton, my father spotted an advert for bungalows, being built in Hursley Road, Chandler’s Ford, by N.R.Trickett, builders, from Ferndown.
The bungalows were in two service roads off Hursley Road, and of two types, 2 bed @ £1700 cost, and 3 bed, @ £1900 cost!!!
Autumn of 1954 in Chandler’s Ford
Dad put down a £5 deposit for a 2 bed bungalow, and we moved in during August 1954, on a particularly wet day, I remember.
Unlike the present day developments, the roads were built AFTER the buildings!
I remember that the Autumn of 1954 was wet, to the extent that the mud bath that was to be our road, was all but impassable, builders using the back gardens as an improvised roadway, until later in 1955, the present service road/s were built.
The “gaps” dug by householders in the bank separating the service road from Hursley Road can still be found, over 60 years later. These were used to avoid the mud, and gain access to the “bus stop”. (Very few people had cars in those days.)
Kings Road School, September 1954
I started at Kings Road School, in September 1954. Mr H. Mann was the headmaster (as they were called then), and he was quite strict. He was always quite keen to reinforce his authority with the use of the cane when he saw fit!
My first teacher was Mrs Stillwell, who was a lovely lady (Her husband later became Mayor of Eastleigh). Other teachers I remember were Mrs Elton & Mr Waldron.
Kings Road was THE ONLY school in Chandler’s Ford at that time, except for the private Sherborne House School.
With the post war baby-boom, Kings Road was bulging at the seams, with hundreds of children crammed into classes.
There was an annex, in lower Kingsway, used for the Infants (now called Reception Class).
Unlike nowadays, most pupils WALKED to school, there being only the option of the School Bus otherwise, unless one’s parents ran a car, which only a minority did at that time.
However, as the 1950s progressed, and people gained in living standards and the effects of WW2 were shaken off, more and more obtained a car, often a pre-war model though.
I-spy… American cars
We lads often gathered at the top of the “playground” at Kings Road, nearest Winchester Road. There, if a ship, or liner, had docked from the USA, we delighted in seeing American cars, of lovely bright colours, driving north towards London, up the A33 as it was then.
This was nearly ten years before the Chandler’s Ford By-Pass (the for-runner of the M3) was commenced in the 1960s, and Winchester Road was the only road from the Southampton area towards London.
Construction of A33 Chandlers Ford By-pass in 60s. Leigh Rd bridge and Oakmount Rd in the background. Now M3 J13 pic.twitter.com/yr0VfX2L4P
— Eastleigh History (@Eastleighistory) December 21, 2014
The colours of these American cars delighted us, as lots of British cars were plain black, or dull beige, dull green, or other colours, while these visiting cars were bright blue, deep pink, yellow, white etc., something you saw rarely otherwise.
We tried to guess & spot the unfamiliar makes (Buick, Pontiac, Cadillac, etc) and look them up in I-Spy or other boy’s spotting books of the time.
The first students in Merdon Junior School
The overcrowded school issue was being addressed however. In 1956 I was among about 300 pupils who were the first to move into the then brand new Junior School, built between Brownhill Road & Merdon Avenue (Merdon Junior School).
Mr Mann moved with us, and took over as Headmaster, and a new head took over at Kings Road, it now being used purely as an Infant School, although the annex continued in use.
Unlike at Kings Road, we had our own “in house” playing field. Previously, to play football at Kings Road, a “crocodile” of youngsters were walked up Winchester Road, under the control of just one or two teachers, to cross the Winchester Road, and then run through the woods where the Chandler’s Ford Methodist Church is now to access the Fryern Hill Playing fields.
Similarly, who could picture nowadays, youngsters being allowed to take “PE” lessons (Physical Education), stripped down in shorts and a singlet/vest, running around the playground, separated from Kings Road only by low iron railings! How times have changed!
Merdon was, of course, a much more modern school, and we received a good, broad based education there, although I can recall falling foul of Mr Mann and his cane on one or two occasions, mostly for talking when told not to!
In the meantime, Chandler’s Ford was growing apace. Tricketts the builders, having built two service roads of houses and two bungalows off Hursley Road (one later bought up and demolished by Drapers), moved onto the infamous “Springhill Estate”!
This area, between the present day Central Precinct and the bottom of Fryern Hill, was well named. It ran with water most of the year, and it took Tricketts over a year I think to effect enough drainage to commence building.
Bodycoats Road, at its Winchester Road end dates from this time.
Hiltingbury Road: gravel pit, Polish Camp
Meanwhile other builders were also developing other areas of Chandler’s Ford, such as Hiltingbury.
In the mid 1950s the western end of Hiltingbury Road was largely undeveloped. Where the playing / recreation field is now, opposite Ashdown Road, there was a large gravel pit with digging and refining machinery. This was a great attraction for young lads, and we gathered there often watching the work. The pit supplied much of the building works in Chandler’s Ford.
Next to the pit, where the school stands, between Pine Road (Then totally un-made) and Hiltingbury, was the Polish Camp. The families living here in Nissen Huts had escaped from their country when Hitler’s armies invaded in 1939 I think.
Many children of Polish descent attended school with us, and there are many of Polish descent still living in the area.
The “Seventeen Families Camp”
On the opposite (northern) side of Hiltingbury Road, where Ashdown Road is now, there was an ex-army camp, built again of Nissen Huts, to house troops prior to D-Day I think.
In the 1950s it was called the “Seventeen Families Camp”, the area around it was a playground for we lads, including an area we called “The Bumps”, where you could ride a bike up and down the uneven area, and through the trees.
Soon building work started in these areas. In Baddesley Road there was “Mr Hatley’s Yard”. Uvidale Hatley had the yard, which still exists, where he dealt with timber.
Most of the trees felling in the course of the building all around the area, were felled by Mr Hatley, using his pre-war Crossley mobile crane, (without an enclosed cab), and his ex US Army articulated lorry.
In the yard the trees were sawn into various types of timber, with the thinner branches being sold off as “bean poles”, “pea twiggs” etc to local gardeners, like my Dad!
Newcomers invading the peaceful area?
I think that the older residents of Chandler’s Ford mostly accepted the legions of newcomers who invaded their peaceful area from the mid 1950s onwards.
I probably had a few comments made to me as a seven year old, about coming from London, but we all assimilated into society and were well received.
I am still, after over 60 years, in contact with two school pals, with whom I established friendships back at Kings Road School, in the mid-1950s.
Hiltonbury Farmhouse, photo taken on 9 Jan 1975 pic.twitter.com/Ny67xLFyBd — Eastleigh History (@Eastleighistory) April 23, 2015
Collecting bird eggs
Certainly, it was like heaven, after living in built up South London, to have woods, trees to climb, and fields and marshlands to explore.
Our Bungalows backed onto farmland, the farm being Mr Vinings (rented from the Chamberlain estate), and where The Hiltonbury (Note the different spelling from Hiltingbury) Farmhouse pub is now, in North Millers Dale.
At weekends and in school holidays, groups of us would roam around, our parents were only vaguely aware of where we were, but little harm ever came to us, apart from occasionally falling from a tree, or cutting or grazing ourselves. Not acceptable now, but many of us accumulated collections of bird eggs.
We became proficient at “blowing” the eggs, to remove the yoke and white liquid, and “swaps” were done, exchanging duplicates for one of a type you wanted.
I remember finding pheasants eggs in nests in the marshy area, just west of the railway bridge on Baddesley Road, where the northern part of Valley Park is now.
Disturbing wild birds was not frowned on then, and it was a recognised activity for youngsters living in country areas.
It was an idyllic existence, and country walks with one’s parents to collect blackberries in the Autumn were a regular activity.
What’s next: My time at Secondary School
Time moves on though, and my next “episode” will cover my time at Secondary School, more changes in Chandler’s Ford, and working, as a Saturday boy, helping a greengrocer, and then as a “paper-boy” at the infamous MacMahons Newsagents!
Note: Don’t miss Martin Napier’s article series: Part 2, on Monday 22nd June 2015.
Related Posts:
- Hazel Bateman: An Interactive Local History Talk by Martin Napier
Article Series by Martin Napier
- Part 1: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s
- Part 2: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: Paper Boy; North End School
- Part 3: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s Bonfire Night
- Part 4: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: North End School
- Part 5: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: Bicycle, Bicycle!
- Part 6: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: A Summer of Hope and Sorrow
- Part 7: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: The Big Freeze in 1963
- Part 8: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: Breaking Free from North End School
- Part 9: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: My Passions with Bikes and Boats
- Part 10: Martin Napier: Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: Bikes, Boats, and Adventures (Part 10)
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Related posts:
Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: Paper Boy; North End School (Part 2)
Chandler’s Ford School Days: 1970s – 1980s by Betty Brooking
Hutments
Growing up in Chandler’s Ford: 1950s – 1960s: The Central Precinct; Bonfire Night (Part 3)
Oh Happy Days! Fond Christmas Memories in Chandler’s Ford 1950s – 1960s
Although living in the Hills to the east of Perth, Western Australia, since 1966, I am still in contact with a few people still currently living in ‘the village’ … Indeed, as I remember it, and, I suspect, as Martin Napier remembers it in his younger years, Chandler’s Ford WAS a village !!!
Although born in Southampton in 1934, the family moved to Meadow Grove, C/Ford, in 1937, and it is the memories I have from about 1938 ’til 1966 that I hold dearly, many of which I share with Martin Napier.
I too went to King’s Road school, at the time it was the only school in the village (apart from Sherbourne House), but Mr. Mann had not arrived at that point, and the head mistress was ‘Granny’ Goulding (maybe Golding), with support from Mrs. Drover, Mrs. Empringham and Mr. Lush … Mr. Mann was later appointed as Head of the new Merdon Avenue School, and my first wife to be, Dianne Wilmott, was one of two teachers at the ‘Camp School’ in Hiltingbury Road, the other being Jean Wingate (later to become assistant/deputy head at Merdon Avenue).
I look forward to reading ‘Episode 2’ of Martin’s memories … Thank you Martin for your input.
Keep smiling all …
Doug Clews
Western Australia
Dear Doug,
I was interested to hear that you lived in Meadow Grove up until 1966 when you moved to Perth, WA.
I wondered what number as I have lived at No22 since 1975. My son moved Perth, WA 7 years ago and is now living the Alfred Cove area. Small world isn’t it.
Hi Sylvia …
Yes, a small world indeed …
We were in No. 17, my parents ’til 1968, when they came to W.A. … as I remember it, 22 was at the end next to Leigh Road, and when we were there, was occupied by a Miss/Mrs. King.
The houses don’t appear to have changed much (looking at ‘Street View’ in Google Maps), apart from new windows, but nobody seems to have a front garden these days … they all seem to be full of cars !!!
Cheers !
Doug
Hi Doug,
Yes you are right No22 is the house on the corner, also very pleased to say we still have our garden. It’s just unfortunate due to the road being quite narrow that people have had to pave their gardens to park their cars. Over the years I have known some of the people living at No17.
We have records of our house going way back so I will look out for the name King.
Lots of changes in the area since we moved here from Liverpool in 1971 which was due to my husband working for Pirelli/Prysmian.
Regards
Sylvia
Hi again Sylvia …
We too (my Father and I) were both ‘Pirelli’ people, and Dad’s employment there in 1937 was also the reason for our move to ‘The Grove’ from Passfield Avenue, Eastleigh…
It was Pirelli General Cable Works in those days (‘Pirelli’ from Pirelli Milan in Italy and the ‘General’ from the General Electric Company {GEC} in Witton, Birmingham) … I was an Electrical Engineering Apprentice and Dad was Head Cost Clerk in Cable Accessories (a.k.a. Joint Box) …
Meadow Grove was known amongst its residents as ‘Pirelli Grove’ as Jack Lewis (No:4), Jack Hall (No:12), Enid Le Prevost (No:16), Us (No:17) and E.C.D. (Ed) Hale (No:18) were all Pirelli people … Dad retired in 1960, and I am not sure how many of the others were still at Pirelli’s in 1968.
Some of the houses in the Grove had Gas Lighting (from memory, 2, 9, 14 and, I think, 21 and maybe even 22) … although most had electricity, all had gas cookers, with a ‘shilling in the meter’ supply point in the cupboard under the stairs in the hall … as a kid, I used to look forward to the gas man coming to read and empty the meter, because Mum always got money back due to the fact that the shillings put in were always more than the cost of the gas used, so it was off to the corner shop at the top of Leigh Road, opposite Castle Lane, which in those days was a grocers and tea rooms, known as ‘Castle Stores’, to get some sweets, or an ice cream if it was summer … the Wall’s ‘Stop Me And Buy One’ trike was often parked on the grass outside the shop, and I remember clearly getting a triangular ‘Snow Fruit’, which was basically fruit flavoured ice, wrapped in a cardboard sleeve and you pushed it up from the bottom and sucked/licked the top part that protruded …
I could go on (and no doubt will), but enough for now …
Keep smiling
Doug Clews
Western Australia
Hi Doug,
Do you remember another family in Meadow Grove – The Goodalls ?
Michael Goodall was in my class at North End School from 1958.
Small world as you say !
Regards,
Martin.N.
Hi Martin … Once again, thanks for your posts … FANTASTIC !!!
Yes, I do indeed remember the Goodall’s in Number 19 … there was a daughter too, Sally from memory, or was that Mrs. Goodall’s name ? …
As a longstanding friend, and school mate, of Peter Smith (he lived at 5 Hursley Road over the Greengrocery and Grocery shop) it was, in fact, Peter’s dad who owned the shop at 84, Bournemouth Road, opposite The Hut, and formerly Cowley’s … after Peter married Muriel Elliott, they lived, for a while, over the Bournemouth Road shop, so not sure if it was Peter or his dad you worked for, but I suspect his dad …
I also remember well the cycle shop on the corner of Keble Road and Bournemouth Road, although I seem to remember the owner as being ‘Bill Eckott’ (nor sure of the spelling) … I used to get all my tubes, tyres, valves and valve rubbers there, and we used to get our accumulators for the old ‘steam’ radio recharged at Eckott’s …
Do you remember the little shop in the front half of a bungalow between Keble and Shaftesbury Avenue ? … Watton’s it was called … he, Mr. Watton, was always in trouble, because he insisted on selling things on a Sunday which he wasn’t supposed to sell in those days, due to ridiculous restrictions of the time !!!
Enough for now … hopefully have prompted a few more memories …
Keep smiling …
Doug Clews
Western Australia
Hi Doug,
Thank you, it’s brilliant having this information from you. Unfortunately, most of what you are talking about has long gone to be replaced by other buildings. Shame to say it but life as it was will never be the same again. Thank goodness people like you have memories.
Interesting that you remember Meadow Grove being known as ‘Pirelli Grove’. Harry worked in the Eastleigh factory till it closed in 2000 then moved to the Bishopstoke factory. He retired last May after working for Pirelli/Prysmian for 43 years.
The only name that rang a bell with us was Le Prevost who lived at No 16; she was still here when we moved in. We still had the gas pipes when we came here in 1975, discovered behind the wall when we started to decorate.
Meadow Grove is still the same with 22 houses and two in the middle but land around is fast disappearing with lots of new houses needing to be built. It’s still a lovely area to live in though.
I enjoy your memories Doug, please keep them coming.
Sylvia Borgerson
Hi Sylvia,
Please keep your stories coming too.
I’ve enjoyed reading these fascinating exchanges. Do you have old photos that you could share with us?
Thank you.
Many thanks Doug for your comments.
It’s wonderful to know that readers from Western Australia are reading Chandler’s Ford Today about this humble little place!
My aim with this site is to help people connect better – connect in a meaningful way, through stories, history, and our shared experiences.
I’m pleased these stories have travelled far and fast and help connect all of us despite geographical distances.
Thank you for sharing your own childhood memories about Chandler’s Ford.
These stories from you all are particularly precious to school children today. Hope they get to get a sense of what life was like – before Facebook and mobile phones.
Thank you for this post – so interesting! How times change. We came to Chandler’s Ford in 1987. This morning, I was walking with my dog behind a girl in the Merdon School red jumper and her sister in the blue King’s Road jumper, who was carrying the King’s Road blue book-bag. It took me back 28 years to when my children were pupils at these schools!
When we bought our house in Heathlands Road, we were told that it was built in the ’60s on a marshy, swampy area and we had to have extra-deep foundations put it when we built the extension. A friend remembers that an area close by was used for geese and had a pond.
Not sure how I ended up reading all these; I remember an Andrew Bateman when I was at Merdon. Would this be your son?
Hello Laura,
Yes, my son is Andy Bateman who was a Merdon and then at Toynbee. He is now a manager working in an IT company near Oxford. His younger sister Helen is married with three girls and lives in Sholing. If you would like to get in touch with him, email me at hazel.bateman@ntlworld.com and I will let you have his email address.
Thank you Eastleigh Borough Council for tweeting this story:
What a great blog…inspired me to carry on writing my “life story” including growing up in the East End of London in the 50s and 60s…definitely worth passing on to our offspring for when they are interested and we cannot remember any more!
Only came to Chandler’s Ford in 1993 so you never know if anyone reading it will have memories from you old stamping grounds too.
My wife, Pat, and baby son, Timothy, moved to Hampshire from Weymouth when I was offered employment at IBM’s Development Laboratory in 1960. Three more children later, we moved to Chandler’s Ford and still live in the same house, built on ground previously owned by Hilliers, I believe, and covered with trees.
Our two eldest children were of school age, and Timothy spent just one year at Merdon before transferring to Mountbatten School near Romsey for his secondary education. Thornden and Toynbee had not yet been built, and pupils from Chandler’s Ford travelled daily by special coaches to and from Mountbatten School. I recall that Mr Mann was very strict and feared by most pupils who attended Merdon Junior School.
During our daughter Sue’s, final year at King’s Road, Mrs Stillwell, asked her to write to Mr Mann to thank him for his hospitality during the visit of the pupils who were to transfer to Merdon after the summer hoiiday. On her first day at Merdon, Mr Mann summoned Sue to his office. Sue was terrified, but Mr Mann merely wanted to thank her for her “very nice” letter.
I spent four years as Chairman of School Governors in the early 1990’s and managed to get the school partially re-built. Shortly afterwards, I met Mrs Stillwell who asked if I was Sue’s father. Mrs Stillwell said that she would like to see the ‘new’ school which I happily arranged.
Sue’s elder son, Nasser, attended both Kings Road and Merdon schools, and is now in Year 10 at Toynbee School located at the junction of the Bodycoats and Oakmount roads. Her younger son, Amir, is in Year 5 at Merdon School. Sue is a governor at both schools.
Hi Ernie,
Many thanks for your contribution about your family and our local schools.
My son also went to Kings Road (Chandler’s Ford Infant School), and later Merdon Junior. When my son was in Year 6, Ofsted came, and prompted a drastic change. Mr Sergeant retired.
It’s interesting to see the changes of our school, and also share collective memories about Chandler’s Ford.
My son wrote about his Final Friday at Merdon in his blog.
In that summer, the Year 6 also performed Titanic, which was a powerful and outstanding performance.
My son is now at Toynbee School, and if I’m lucky, with extra pocket money, he may write about his school life and share with us one day.
Amazing comments.
I remember when people used to emigrate to Australia. It was like a bereavement as travel to and communication with folks back home was next to impossible. CFT brings these people together.
Janet, you have to be proud of what CFT has done and continues to do.
Apparently in Ireland (and maybe parts of Britain too) a Wake would be held when people emigrated. It was indeed as if they had died as they would never be heard from again. Inability to read and write meant that even letters were impossible.
Very interesting Martin, brings back many memories of our childhood in Chandler’s Ford. Look forward to future blogs.
My parents moved from London to Otterbourne initially and then, similarly to Martin’s parents, purchased a bungalow in Hursley Road. We lived at No 206. I was aged about 2. It was of course, very rural with a view of a farmer’s field beyond our back garden. My parents absolutely loved it. My brother and I subsequently went to the Pixie Kindergarten and then for a term or so to Hursley School. By the time I was about 8, our family had outgrown the bungalow and so we moved to a larger property in Hythe, which, at the time, was even more rural.
We moved to dear old Chandler’s Ford in summer 1963, to a dilapidated bungalow in Shaftesbury Avenue that took my poor parents about 15 years to rebuild from the footings up. Its original cost was £2250.
It truly was an idyllic childhood and my overriding memories are of the scents of the countryside in those hot sunny summers, and the wonderful thrill of going nesting or scrumping. The alleyway behind our gardens was lined with wild hedgerows which every spring contained many nests of blackbirds, thrush, robins, chaffinches, sparrows etc, and we would collect eggs and ‘blow’ them as described earlier. One day I remember a dead blackbird chick on the ground below a nest, for which the parents seem to blame me, and repeatedly swooped at me getting their spiky little feet caught in my hair. This went on for two or three weeks, until the remaining young birds fled the nest. Even today the sound of an angry blackbird sets off a slightly fearful adrenaline rush, though there will always be no sweeter sound in the world than the blackbirds merrily singing their springtime songs.
We used to go minnow fishing in the brook at Knightwood, then lovely farmland but now a housing estate, and also in a pond we called Bundy’s Lake, nowadays underneath the School Lane industrial estate, somewhere a few hundred yards down the Keble Road end of School Lane on the left hand side. It must have been connected with the old brickworks, as presumably were the rectangular ponds in the woods about where Renown Close is now. It was a sad sight to subsequently see Bundy’s Lake being filled in, still full of perch, roach, rudd etc, to make way for a factory. Us children tried to rescue as many of the fish as we could, and many of the roach lived for years in my garden pond.
One of the rectangular ponds was called the Lily Pond, and contained some very large newts basking on the many lily pads safe from us amateur naturalists.
Talking of newts, we used to frequent a very uneven, muddy field at the end of the newly built and unmade Pennine Way, where nowadays is a recreation area by the brook and railway line. There was a very old grey horse living there, and in the many ditches we would stir around a tree branch which when lifted from the water would have newts clinging to it. We would brave going through the tunnel under the bridge and wade all the way up the river to the shopping precinct lifting rocks to reveal bullheads, eels, lamprey and catfish. I once unearthed an old stone bottle (from G.W.Piper’s Steam Mineral Water Works in Winchester), which I still have. Parts of the river banks were old Victorian bottle dumps, so I suppose that’s how the bottle got there. I would spend hours sifting through the composted rubbish, finding all sorts of weird and wonderful discarded artifacts from around the time of the Great War, including old milk bottles, old medicine bottles, Shipphams paste jars, tins and even a disintegrating piece of newspaper.
There were pike and trout in the river, and just standing there in bare feet taking in the scents and sight and sounds of the countryside was pure bliss. My only unfulfilled wish was that we could have enough money for the Corona lorry to stop at our house with its cargo of wonderful fizzy drinks.
We would put stones or an occasional old ha’penny on the railway lines, and relish the results, the coins being flattened and the stones exploding. As mischievous boys did back then, we would use the dark brown porcelain telegraph insulators high up on the poles that lined the railway for catapult target practice, often smashing a few before stumbling laughing into the linesman’s mysterious and empty little brick hut, and marvelling at the fireplace and big iron kettle.
The whole of that Bodycoats area (apart from a no-through section of Bodycoats Road from the precinct end down to about where it starts to go uphill) was just sand hills and stepped cliffs, used for nesting by thousands of sand martins. For some reason the large green there, now Toynbee school’s playing field, was already flattened and grassed many years before the school was built, and there was a trig point at the side near the railway line. Oakmount Road was the last road before Price’s bakery (no by-pass or M3 then, and Leigh Road was just a narrow concrete two way road)), the place that wafted the scent of baking cakes and bread towards many a hungry North End schoolboy, forced to stand around and pretend to be playing football when he’d rather be getting outside of a six-pack of jam tarts and some sugary donuts.
Jock Graham was the endearing Scottish headmaster of North End back then, and would wear his terrifying black gown and mortar board hat into assembly. His sidekick was Mr. Cooke, mentioned by Martin. He was a softly-spoken madman to us kids, and reputedly put youngsters in hospital if they were unfortunate enough to get ‘the cuts’ from him on their hands. It was said that he’d been a prisoner of the Japanese during the war, and this had apparently badly affected him. Equally terrifying were the numerous school bullies, who would enjoy inflicting such initiation ceremonies on new boys as pushing their heads down the revolting toilets in the outside block, then flushing them. Fights regularly broke out in the playground, and a crowd would quickly surround the participants shouting “BUNDLE!”, then “FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!”. It was indeed a tough school, not just for the ‘students’ but for the poor teachers, although in those days they were allowed to dispense immediate revenge with projectiles like a wooden board rubber, or weapons like canes and slippers. If you caught a well-aimed board rubber in the head it could knock you out, and left a terrible lump. I doubt the instant reprisal helped the teachers a great deal though, and some of them really did seem to suffer badly with their nerves. I wish we had been kinder to them.
Growing up in old Chandler’s Ford I always puzzled over the strange dichotomy between the sheer bliss of time away from school, and the absolute horror (to me, anyway) of time spent at school. I’m sure those poor teachers felt the same way too.
I have been reading your History and all the comments. my family moved to Chandlers Ford in October 1951 to Pine Corner 1 Lake Road. Doug, I remember you in the Mid 50s at The YC’s. Jack Hall was Scout master of my Troup. It is now September 2019 and I live in Oakfield, Nova Scotia (Part of the Regional Municipality of Halifax) Along with other major personalities I knew in my time in Ch’Ford were Godfrey Olson who very recently passed away. Guy Garrett. Rev Clisby Green, Etc. I went to Southampton Secondary Technical School. I have been married for nearly 60 years to a girl I met through YC’s. She lived on Passfield Avenue. I could write more but the years are moving on. I hope there are a few still in contact with you that can connect with those names and associations. Cheers.
Hi young David McGrath …
I do remember you from YC’s … I am sorry to hear Godfrey Olsen recently died, but I am surprised I hadn’t heard … Godfrey was my best man at my wedding back in 1954. I also remember Guy and Genie Garrett very well, Guy from Pirelli’s and The Odd Bods of course, Genie from McMahon’s and Guy’s wife … Jack Hall lived at 12 Meadow Grove, and I at 17 … funnily enough, I am in internet contact with the current residents of nos: 12 and 17 … might I be rude and ask your wife’s maiden name please ? … We were thinking of emigrating to Canada ourselves at one time, but ended up in Western Australia, although, now a widower, I have very recently moved to New South Wales (Sydney) to be near my daughter …
Keep smiling, and take care.
Doug Clews
Hello, I grew up in Chandlers Ford from 1964 in Wells Road, then Lakewood Road from 1967. I went to both Hiltingbury schools. I was just remembering some of the teachers there and wonder if anyone has any photos. The head teacher at the infants school was a Mrs Weeks/Weekes. She thought my name was Theresa – it’s not – and my poor Mum had quite a battle with her to change all my labels to my actual name. I also remember a Mrs Swords and a Mrs Brett from the infants. Then at the juniors, Mrs Pinnell, Mr Dobson, Mr Long, Mr Curtis (who I had in the 4th year) and Mr Gubbins was head teacher. Living on Lakewood Road, I ‘hung out’ ‘down the lakes’ or sometimes at the rec. But also went to RamAlley on occasions. I am in touch with many of my classmates from school still, but just wanted to see if anyone on here had any photos of these teachers, Mrs Weeks in particular. Many thanks. Tessa Burbridge