Spoiled for three days; quite a bit of television; news from Germany; Jane safe home; a new coat; the Rome Olympics; a small boy’s delights; friends of Jane’s wed and emigrate, and a letter from a famous author.
Book 88
Gran takes the train to London on her way to Chipstead, in Surrey, to visit the Rowsells on August 12th 1960. “The train was very full’, she writes:
… and in my compartment was a family of four delightful children, one of whom, Margaret, became very friendly almost at once and I was soon involved in a game of “snap” which lasted until we reached Waterloo.
The Rowsells apparently intend to “spoil” their guest, for Gran is met at Waterloo by Mrs Rowsell and whisked off, by taxi, to Fortnum and Mason, for refreshment, before another taxi takes them to Charing Cross and their train to Chipstead. There, Gran finds “Hollymead Cottage” awaiting her, with “spacious gardens and trim lawns”. And, surprisingly, she pens this:
[The sun-room] was occupied by Tou-tou, quite the prettiest cat I have ever seen, soft grey her paws; underparts and face so pale as to be almost white, and the rest of her body “tabbied” with darker grey. A gentle animal…
So much for Gran’s furiously written wish of just a few months past, to throttle every cat she sees!
August 13th: “Mr Rowsell took us, (in a magnificent black Armstrong-Siddeley Sapphire car) into Chipstead this morning to do some shopping”. After coffee and Danish buns they undertake a tour of their part of Surrey, Gran saying it was a truly wonderful day. Colley Hill, a section of The Pilgrims’ Way, Chanctonbury Rings, and Box Hill (famous botanically) are all visited. They lunch at the Burford Bridge Hotel, lying at the foot of Box Hill, and Gran relates that Lord Nelson, “who was a frequent visitor, spent a night there in 1801, after his victory in the Baltic”, and she continues:
In 1817, from a room overlooking the garden, Keats wrote the last part of “Endymion”. George Meredith lived at [nearby] Flint Cottage for forty years and Sheridan, Hazlitt, John Evelyn, Wordsworth and Robert Louis Stevenson met their contemporaries there.
The following two days are spent in the Rowsells’ company, Gran revelling in their wonderful kindness and generosity, and, homeward bound on the 15th, she and Mrs Rowsell visit Harrods store in London, Gran saying:
Though I am not a shop-gazer in the ordinary sense of the word, I did thoroughly enjoy wandering in some of the departments of this truly fabulous shop. We visited the Italian Exhibition, in which all wares were displayed on the most enchanting Italian carts, with brightly coloured canopies and some complete with donkeys (stuffed). In the centre of the “market” was a replica of a famous fountain into which an Italian girl was being photographed casting a coin into the water.
There is much more in her description, and Gran ends, saying that Mrs Rowsell told her to take her time:
…to choose a “little gift to remember us”. Realizing the, to me, fabulous price of most things, I tried to make Mrs Rowsell choose, but she left the final decision to me. Knowing that I loved the little Del Marco Italian china figures, she selected two and left me to choose. In the end I found myself the proud and overwhelmed possessor of the exquisite little Count Angelo, as I call him, who cost close upon ten pounds!
Finally:
Mrs Rowsell had not allowed me to pay for a thing since I arrived at Waterloo on Friday, saying that I could take over when I boarded the homeward train, and now was chagrined at having to ask me for a penny for a platform ticket!! With the hope that we should see each other again soon, we had to part at last, and I was soon on my way home.
August 18th finds her delivering flowers on The Union Castle Line vessel Windsor Castle, due to sail on her maiden voyage that day. Gran thinks her a beautiful ship, noting that the first Class, “A”deck floors, are covered with cherry-coloured linoleum, and all the suites are, “named with reference to nature” – Peony, Tamarisk, High Summer, Green Leaves, Lavender Blue, Sea Holly and Dragonfly, for instance.
A letter from Barry that evening tells her that he is on an R.A.F. course in Germany, visiting Bonn, Cologne and Mayschoss.
He has seen a new bird, Crested Lark, which does not occur in Britain, and he has sent his mother a set of West German Olympic Games stamps in mint condition, and a specimen of a wild Cornflower, “prevalent in the cornfields” there.
August 19th:
This afternoon I went to Compton to have tea with Mrs Willis and Mrs Wethered, the daughters of Compton’s grand old lady, Mrs Cremer, who died at the great age of 102, and to see their mother’s paintings of wild flowers. As I was going out, I was amazed to see an Autumn Ladies’-tresses coming into flower in the crazy-paving just outside my front door. A most extraordinary habitat for this Orchid.
She has an enjoyable time with the two ladies, both of whom are excellent artists themselves, and Gran returns home with living parts of various plants collected from abroad, which she intends to grow on.
On the following day she collects a specimen of Carline Thistle on Shawford Downs, painting it in the afternoon before going, “over to the damp Malcolm Road to get some “greenery” for “Nibbley”, the Hockridge guinea-pig, whom I am feeding whilst they are away”. That evening, “A Red Underwing moth came into my room while I was reading and what a dance I had catching and releasing it. Beautiful creature!”
“The highlight of today”, she writes on the 22nd, “was, of course, Jane’s return from Italy and it was incredible that yesterday she was in Rome, this morning in Paris and, soon after half-past three this afternoon, here at home”. Gran had spent a restless day, “unable to settle to anything properly until she arrived”, and she thanks God for her safe return.
After a final visit to the physiotherapist for treatment to her left shoulder on the 23rd, she settles in front of the television to watch a Peter Scott Look programme, filmed by Chris Mylne, on the reedbed inhabitants of the R.S.P.B. Reserve at Minsmere. She is much taken by the rare Bearded Tits, “which I have yet to see in the flesh”, she records. The time must soon come when a television appears at The Ridge, but I assume that next door is still the location for this viewing.
In spite of her dislike of shopping, Gran often seems to gain considerable pleasure when finding something that is “just right” for herself. As, on August 24th:
Jane and I went to Winchester this morning to buy a winter coat for me. I had set my heart on a blue tweed one and was lucky to find exactly what I wanted in the first shop we entered. I tried on two, but the one called “Glenhaze” was my coat. A delightful “Cairngorm” blue, with a little dark green and violet introduced into the weave. I felt absolutely right in it.
At this time, Barry, Jock and the boys are holidaying in a caravan at Mill Farm, Pagham, and Gran and Jane visit them there, Jane apparently driving. It seems they are not expected, for it is only after much searching among the lagoons and along the shingly shore that:
Scanning the distance with my binoculars, suddenly I saw them, having their lunch in a secluded spot by a small lagoon and it was not long before Barry recognized us and came bounding over the shingle like an antelope, closely followed by Julian.
They botanise together for much of the afternoon, though I particularly remember on this day, with Julian, sailing our two newly received toy yachts on one of the lagoons, and also treasuring a light-coloured wooden mouse brought to me by Dad from his recent trip to Germany. I was not aware of the excitement caused by Gran discovering four plants of, “the very rare Yellow Vetch”, as she describes it, nor, also new to her, the Proliferous Pink, discovered as they walk back to the caravan for tea.
The Summer Olympics are taking place in Rome, and Gran watches them avidly on television. She relates, having watched coverage at the Fowler’s house on the 27th, the good news that “Britain has won her first gold medal, represented by Anita Lonsborough in the 200 metres breast-stroke in the record time of 2 mins: 50.3 secs. Elizabeth Ferris won a bronze medal for diving”. Swimmer, Dawn Frazer wins gold for Australia a couple of days later, and some days after that, Gran is pleased to see Britain’s Dorothy Hyman win a bronze in the 200 metres final. She notes other results over the Olympic days: American Herb Elliot’s world Record of 3 mins: 35.6 secs for the 1500 metres; Don Thompson’s gold for Britain in the 50 kilometre walk; and a bronze for David Broom, riding Sunsalve.
On the last day of August Gran and her friend Hilda Pheby cycle out to Old Winchester Hill and its environs. They complete a thirty miles round trip, noting a large range of plants in flower, and especially, after a bit of a search at Brambridge, the degenera variety of the Isle of Wight Helleborine:
…which has occurred by the river under the huge leaves of Butterbur for several years now. The area has now been fenced in, which is, perhaps, a good thing for the Helleborines, but it certainly made it more difficult to locate any. However, we did see one good specimen…
Near Bishop’s Waltham they find a tree laden with Crab Apples and, she says, “had no difficulty in filling Miss Pheby’s large bicycle basket”. And later that evening: “I boiled the Crab Apples and set the juice to drip before retiring to bed”.
Summing up the Rome Summer Olympics on its final day, September 11th, Gran, applauding good sporting behaviour as ever, writes:
This evening we watched the moving and impressive closing ceremony of the Olympic Games, in which eighty-four nations had competed in amity and sportsmanship, and, though Russia and America won the largest number of medals, Britain came twelfth, which, I think, was very creditable considering the size of our country in comparison and the fact that our athletes have to work for their living and confine their sport to spare time, mainly financing themselves as well.
September 12th: “Remembering Robin de Crespigny Eastwood, who died six years ago today.” Each year Gran notes with sadness the anniversary of his death and also his birthday. Not only had he been close to Jane, but he had won Gran’s heart also by searching for and presenting her with a book illustrated by her beloved Arthur Rackham.
On this day, Jane and Gran meet Barry and Julian off the train at Southampton Central, Barry continuing to Beaulieu Road Station with some of his schoolboys for Camp, while Julian, with his precious stamp album, accompanies his Godmother Aunt and his Granny back to The Ridge. That night, Gran reports that he went to bed happily enough. “A relief to me, since this is the first time he has been away on his own”, she writes.
Jane is seen off back to Nottingham from Winchester station on the following day. Julian is evidently still keen on trains:
After Jane left, Julian said he thought the “Bournemouth Belle” would soon be due, so, after asking the ticket collector, who verified this and told Julian the best place to see it dash through at eighty miles an hour, we waited for it. In the meantime, Julian gave an apple to the smiling driver of a diesel train, and saw the “Ocean Line Express” go through to London. After this excitement we took a bus down to the Broadway… and then went on to see the ruins of Wolvesey Palace. Here Julian was curious about some digging that was in progress so we went to enquire and discovered that some archaeologists had unearthed a Roman wall under the walls of the Palace.
The archaeologists give the two of them a short private lesson on the Roman buildings discovered there and also on the evidence of a pre-Roman settlement below this. Gran and Julian move on, buying books with holiday pocket-money, taking a bus to the Wayside Cross at Compton, and spending more time train-spotting on Shawford Downs. The day ends. Gran is exhausted and Julian is in bed early.
The following morning is equally filled with “all the things dear to a small boy’s heart’ as Gran notes at the day’s end. They tour Southampton Docks, first to the Old Docks, seeing the Queen Elizabeth:
…at close quarters from the Spectator’s Gallery on the Ocean Terminal, the “Athlone Castle” in dry dock, the “Dunera”, “Ivernia”, “Fairsby”, a minesweeper, numerous tugs and a dredger.
Then to the New Docks, “where”, she continues, were:
…the “Pendennis Castle”, the “Carnarvon Castle”, the “Oxfordshire”, embarking troops, numerous smaller craft and thousands, literally, of Renault cars awaiting export.
I presume that Gran was in error here and that actually, these vehicles had been newly imported to the UK.
Following an afternoon of note-writing, mounting of stamps and a short television film, “Julian was soon asleep, after I had read The Roly-Poly Pudding, by Beatrix Potter, whilst he had his supper”, writes a weary Gran at the end of the day.
September 15th is spent in similar fashion, the main goal being to watch, from the pier at Hythe, the sailing of the Pendennis Castle. Train-spotting takes up much of the next two days, and on September 19th Julian and his Dad are re-united at Southampton, and home they go, to Mill Hill, Julian ready to start at Haberdashers’ Prep School two days later. Gran’s last note for the day is:
A card from Enid Dennis from Aviemore filled me with an almost unbearable yearning to go back, and the fact that she was full of praise for Alt-na-Craig increased that longing. I wonder if I shall ever see it again?
There is a wedding on September 24th – that of Jane’s friend Betty Hoskins – and Gran attends the Service with Jane, briefly down from Nottingham, recording that it:
…was very pretty indeed and I have never heard the vows so clearly spoken by both parties. The Church was decorated with garden flowers… Betty, a pretty girl at all times, looked really beautiful in her long gown of ivory brocade and carrying a bouquet of autumn-shaded Roses and Carnations.
During the Service, Pat Littlecott sang, as a solo, “God be in my head”, and her voice is the purest and the most like that of a boy, of any that I have heard since Isobel Baillie delighted with hers.
Gran has referred to Pat Littlecott often in her journal. She was one of Jane’s contemporaries, and her time in Hampshire is about to end, Gran writing, “Pat Littlecott came in to say goodbye to Mother and me, but, as I have a pass to board the Saxonia tomorrow, when she leaves for Canada, I shall see her once more”.
And on September 28th, Gran makes her way to the docks to bid her goodbye:
The weather could not have been more dreary. Pat was full of excited anticipation, and it must certainly have been easier to leave England on such a day rather than on a glorious blue and golden one! The “Saxonia” is a nice ship…
The morning post on September 30th brings Gran a pleasant surprise:
…a letter from Elizabeth Goudge, my favourite authoress of today. Reading of her new book, “The Dean’s Watch”, and something of her life and character in a recent newspaper article, I wrote to her a brief letter of appreciation and thanks for the beauty and serenity which her books have brought to me, but I did not expect a reply. Her letter of thanks regretted her inability to reply fully, a fact which she said, saddens her, but she is now much troubled with rheumatism, which makes writing difficult. But, though the letter was typed, my name and her signature were written by her and she had addressed the envelope herself. I shall treasure it always and I shall put it in her new book when I obtain it.
Article series
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 1)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 2)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 3)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 4)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 5)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 6)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 7)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 8)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 9)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 10)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 11)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 12)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 13)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 14)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 15)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 16)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 17)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 18)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 19)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 20)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 21)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 22)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 23)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 24)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 25)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 26)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 27)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 28)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 29)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 30)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 31)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 32)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 33)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 34)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 35)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 36)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 37)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 38)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 39)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 40)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 41)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 42)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 43)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 44)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 45)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 46)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 47)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 48)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 49)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 50)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 51)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 52)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 53)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 54)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 55)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 56)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 57)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 58)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 59)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 60)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 61)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 62)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 63)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 64)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 65)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 66)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 67)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 68)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 69)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 70)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 71)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 72)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 73)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 74)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 75)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 76)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 77)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 78)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 79)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 80)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 81)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 82)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 83)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 84)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 85)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 86)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 87)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 88)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 89)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 90)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 91)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 92)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 93)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 94)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 95)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 96)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 97)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 98)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 99)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 100)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 101)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 102)
- Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 103)
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