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Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 132)

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An old pal visits; no mail for months; unwelcome changes to the Lake; decimalisation disapproval; a schoolboy world record for Julian; “rest in peace”, cousin Nod; a useful legacy, and “our” new car.

Book 133

Although recorded in a surprisingly understated way, January 25th 1971 must have been a day of great import for Gran, for  Gilbert Whitley, long-term resident of Sydney, and valued, indeed loved, old pal from her early years appears at the front the door of The Ridge:

I was just preparing towards lunch when a knock at the door revealed Gilbert Whitley and Mr and Mrs Forson, with whom he is staying at Churt.  It was marvellous to see Gilbert again after over thirty years… I persuaded them to stay to lunch, which necessitated much scurrying round at the shops but I was able to provide an adequate meal at short notice, which was much appreciated.

I phoned Brother, who was having his lunch and he came early this afternoon… the two old school friends were delighted to see each other again.

The visitors leave after tea and much talk, but Gran adds, “Gilbert is coming to stay for a few days whilst seeing to some business in Southampton so Brother and I hope to go on an outing or two with him”.

Amongst Aunt Em’s things left to Gran, are two samplers, one dating from 1714.  Gran intends to frame them, backed by linen.  She hopes to use two gift tokens to buy what she needs in Southampton but ends up having a stressful time there:

About my efforts to get natural coloured linen to back the samplers, the less said the better.  But where, oh where have gone the willing and helpful assistants of old?  The one who eventually condescended to serve me did not even know what a sampler was, and I had to struggle to lift off the stand the heavy roll of material which I thought most suitable and carry it to the counter!  And the heat in those shops!  I was glad to get home.

She takes a bus to Church at Compton on the afternoon of January 31st, and:

On the way up Hiltingbury Road to the bus stop, I was surprised to see a small Hedgehog walking across the road and horrified to see a car coming.  I stepped off the pavement between Hedgehog and car… and when the little animal reached the kerb, I picked him up and deposited him safely over a fence.

She is delighted to see “seventeen Collared Doves feeding under the Beeches opposite the Church… the best views I have ever had of these birds”.  Later in the year though, these doves will become regular visitors to the garden, and Gran will have good views aplenty.

Collared Doves – soon to be residents of Hiltingbury. Image by hedera.baltica via Flickr.

The postal workers’ strike continues and Gran writes despondently that she feels “so cut off with no post”.   February 7th is a “lovely day almost completely wasted as far as I was concerned”, she says, because:

I had hoped to slip out for an hour or so this afternoon to see if the Lesser Celandines are out yet in Poles Lane, but Mother was unwell so I could not leave her.  I waited hopefully for someone to call, but no-one did so, and I felt rather miserably that I am losing all my friends now that I cannot go out with them as I used to.  However, I got through a good deal of knitting…

And developments at the Lake, noted on her way to visit Mary Harding next day, do not help matters:

It looked as though the Lake is being ruined, from a natural point of view, even though, now drained, it is supposed to be refilled later… a stone dam is being built across the marsh where the little wooden bridge was, and the stream which fed it is being piped under the road to feed it now, and the ground under the Alders built up.  Which means the Alders will die and we shall lose the Redpolls and Siskins.  And the Rhododendrons, which surrounded the Lake and made such beautiful reflections, are being cut down.  I suppose the vandals call it improving the amenities but I think they are destroying, as usual, what was a lovely area.  A Mistle Thrush was singing a distance away from where they were working… It was so good to see Mary again.

Joan Adelaide Goater - her journal about Chandler's Ford.

For a while now, Gran has been keeping a scrapbook of Julian’s cross-country running and athletics exploits, many of which are reported in newspapers and in the publication Athletics Weekly.  She reads in this magazine, on February 12th, that:

Julian is mentioned as holding the [world] record in 1970 for a seventeen-year old in the 3000 metres.  Also, in this evening’s “Echo” he is tipped to be the favourite for individual honours in the cross-country at Parliament Hill tomorrow.

Indeed, the following morning’s Sunday Telegraph, tells her that: “Julian won his race… and the reporter described him as a most promising prospect”.

There are more woes to add to Gran’s lack of mail and unwanted landscape developments at this time.  She writes on February 15th:

Today Britain changed to decimal currency, a stupid idea in my opinion, and yet another loss of individuality for our dear old country.  We now have only the pound, and new pence, of which one hundred make the pound.  No more L.s.d., as the new penny pieces are marked “p” and we have no more shillings, though the old currency can be used for the present with the new in sixpenny amounts, six old pennies or one threepenny piece and three pennies.

The old currency, gone – “another loss of individuality for our dear old country”. Image by Adrian Clark via Flickr.

The decimal stamps were issued today, twelve, from half penny to ninepence, but on account of the postal strike, first-day covers could not be posted.  However, the postmaster has decided that they can be posted as soon as the strike is over and they will be back-dated on the postmark to today’s date!  Into what a state we are getting!

Still starved of mail in mid-February, Gran runs in to the Hockridge’s next door to take a newsy call from Jane Elizabeth:

Gilbert had been to see them at the weekend, which was half term for Haberdashers’, and, as Eric Classey and his wife were also there they had an enjoyable party.  Julian won the Grammar Schools’ race yesterday and is going to Belgium the week after next to run in the race he won there last year.  Ricky’s team won their basketball match on Saturday, and he was first in the Oral English exam.

For the next three weeks, Gran’s journal is dominated by details of Gilbert Whitley’s movements, and outings undertaken by her, Norris and Gilbert together, renewing acquaintance with old haunts and Gilbert being shown new ones.  He arrives at The Ridge on February 21st and Farley Mount is their first destination.  Next day, it is the New Forest, via Romsey, to visit Osborne House, the school that Gilbert and Norris attended together. “Next”, writes Gran of an event long ago, “we went along the Ringwood Road to visit a pond into which Brother fell in youthful exuberance, complete with bicycle, and Gilbert helped to drag both out”.

“Brother had to return to Lyndhurst today”, Gran tells us on the 24th, “and it was really touching to see the two old friends, he and Gilbert, bidding each other farewell.  We had all enjoyed this wonderful reunion…”

Gilbert Whitley (standing left), who became the authority on Australian fishes, with other learned colleagues at the Australian Museum, Sydney, 1970. Photo from Joan Goater’s archive of “Gilbertiana”.

After organising ferry tickets, in Southampton, for a brief visit across the Channel, Gilbert treats Gran to tea and a pancake, “…opposite the ruins of the Holy Rood Church… and I showed him the new Edwin Jones, where his father had been a buyer in the old shop, which had been demolished by bombs during the blitz on Southampton”.

She continues:

At Smiths bookshop, Gilbert bought me Konrad Lorenz’s lovely book “King Solomon’s Ring”, which he later inscribed, ‘To all at 27 Hiltingbury Road from that old timer of the New Forest, Gilbert P. Whitley.  February 1971’, and made a sketch of himself, bent and bearded, in Wellington boots, leaning on a twisted stick and closely watched by a Fallow Deer lurking under a conifer!  What a memento of the last three days!”

Gilbert leaves some of his belongings at The Ridge, intending to return at some point, having visited museums and other sites in on the Continent.  A 60% eclipse of the sun occurs on the day he departs.  He returns on a snowy March 1st, having travelled abroad less than he had originally planned, and he and Gran, with Norris again, visit Alresford and its Pond, for some birdwatching.  They relish each other’s company in the evenings too.  On March 4th, for instance:

We enjoyed a stamp session together, and, on television, the presentation by Princess Anne, of the Television and Radio Awards.  Most of the winning films were to us, either sordid or utterly unfunny, apart from “Kes”, about a tame Kestrel and his young owner, the boy actor in it winning the award for best up and coming actor of 1970.

Kes – Gran’s kind of film. Image by Tommy via Flickr.

“This afternoon”, Gran records on the 8th:

I went to enquire about a book on the New Forest, which I had asked John Biddle, the newsagent, to try to get for me from the wholesalers in time to give it to Gilbert from Brother and me.  He had very kindly obtained for me, one by Brian Vesey-Fitzgerald, and had troubled to go to W.H. Smiths for it when he could not get it from his wholesalers.  How kind people are!

And on the same day, she discovers, reading the newspaper, that Julian, having been unlikely to run in a particular cross-country race:

…did run in the Nationals at Norwich and came a creditable second, only three seconds behind David Black over four miles which was good going after injury only a fortnight ago.

Leaders in the Youths’ race after two miles.  Left to right – Julian Goater (2nd), Barry Smith (6th), Dave Black (1st) and Dave Moorcroft (7th).  Photo by Mark Shearman and Peter Tempest.

The postal strike ended on March 8th, and Gran, much relieved, begins to receive letters again, some almost two months after their posting.

On March 15th:

Post brought an Australian letter for Gilbert and two for me, one containing the sad news that cousin Norah has had a stroke and is in hospital, and Marjorie, who wrote, is staying with Fairlie.

And second post that day gives welcome news of the Brenan family, including that “Andrew is the first in his form to finish the reading scheme up to 10+ age (he is 6½!), and Katherine has another Brownie badge and is to be Gretel in a Brownie play…”

Two days later Gran receives the inevitable but unwanted news that Gilbert Whitley is about to begin his journey back to Sydney:

A letter from Joan Forson this morning told me that Gilbert had rung to say he had booked a flight to Johannesburg for this evening and asked me to hold letters for him until I hear from him.  I felt saddened, for I hardly suppose I shall see him again and he is such a good friend…

Gilbert makes his way home over the next month via the Cape Verde Islands, Johannesburg and Grahamstown in South Africa, and Mauritius. And sadly, Gran is right; she will not see her great friend again.  He is taken ill in Greece in June 1975, is hospitalised in Sydney and dies quietly at home in mid-July on the day he is discharged.

More mail on March 20th:

…brought an exciting letter from Anne Mallinson at Selborne.  She had shown a copy of my Selborne notes to the proprietor of the Queen’s Hotel, who bought my flower paintings at the Exhibition last July, and he wants me to do him some more to complete a series.  He has asked if I will call and see him next time we are in Selborne.

Parcel post brought the promised sarong material from Phaik Har, pretty blue for me and brown for Mother.  There were beautiful Malaysian butterfly stamps on the parcel too, which will be a nice addition to my collection.

The post also brings some slides for Gilbert, to be sent on to him.  They include, she says, “some very nice ones of St Cross, Brother trying to hoist me up to look at a plant on the wall there”.

At the Hospital of St Cross. “Brother trying to hoist me up.”  Photograph by Gilbert Whitley.

And yet more interesting mail on March 22nd:

…brought a mixed bag, which accounted for my varied feelings today.  Marjorie had written to tell me that Norah had died on Friday after her stroke three weeks ago – a blessing perhaps, for if she were only to return home an invalid for an indefinite time she would have hated it after a very busy life, forty years of which she had devoted to service in her church, so I can only say “’Requescat in Pace’, dear Nod”.

Second post brought a card “For Grannie on Mother’s Day from Jane, Stuart, and the children”, which, of course, warmed my heart and cheered my soul.  I also received Gilbert’s Christmas card, posted on November 30th last year!

And on the 23rd: “Post brought a cheque for £900 from the Solicitors, my legacy from dear Aunt Em, bless her.  Brother came to lunch.”

“Brother came to lunch” again on April 4th, Gran writes:

…and I was introduced to our new car – a pale green Ford Anglia Super, with darker green interior upholstery.  She looks great, and Brother has christened her “The Squib”, because she was reluctant to start until he had made some adjustment.

A Ford Anglia – “She looks great”, said Gran. Image by Michael Gaylard via Flickr.

They drive out to Downton that day to see if there are early signs of the Lizard Orchids there, and they find the leaves of two plants, and also, in the Wild Tulip colony nearby, a single Tulip in flower – the first Gran has seen after twelve years of searching.

Tulips – probably not a truly wild native plant in the UK but much enjoyed by Gran.  Image by Bjorn S… via Flickr.

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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 61) Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 111) Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 126)
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  1. The old money had as many varieties as your Gran’s plants. Tanners, Florins, Thre’pny bits, Farthings, Bobs, and I have even got a Groat and a Crown somewhere. Groats were equivalent to four pence and went out of circulation in the mid 19th century.
    The Sovereign I had was sold for £40 at a time when I was broke. I have never seen a Guinea but I was once paid a fee of Three Guineas for something.

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