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Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 159)

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Buckler’s Hard – disappointingly changed; “I am to be a Great Grandmother”; painting for others; The Queen on Burmese; impressive eyesight at seventy-five; some entertaining Blackbirds; a death at Wimbledon; a 10,000m at Crystal Palace, and Robin comes of his bike.

Gran’s albums of newspaper and magazine cuttings about her twenty-six year old grandson Julian’s athletics career are getting thicker and thicker.  She writes with considerable pride that he has quite a following amongst her aquaintances in Chandler’s Ford. On May 9th 1979, she says:

I scurried round this morning to get the new stamps for the election to the European Parliament and to take my “Julian” albums for Mr Biddle to see before Sheila came for me at half past ten.  We went to Buckler’s Hard, via Ibsley, where we saw a Brimstone and the first foal of the season.

Buckler’s Hard, alas, is almost completely spoiled, being completely commercialized and only the little main street just about its old self.  To begin with we had to pay 40p each to leave the car in the car park.  There is a new, modern restaurant with concrete forecourt and iron tables and chairs and a new, large museum, and one cannot walk down the old street from the top but has to go between these new buildings and enter the street halfway down, thus losing the old, familiar, breathtaking views from the top.  The waterside has become a marina, full of yachts and after passing my “dream cottage” one cannot follow the track by the river because a huge boatyard has been built.

Buckler’s Hard admission tickets and leaflet kept between the pages of Gran’s journal.

Two days later:

This evening Jean Wingate phoned to tell me that her colleague, Mrs Wade, thinks that a Wryneck is frequenting her garden but she cannot get a sight of it.  The three woodpeckers come regularly but the call she hears is not quite like either, nearest to the Lesser Spotted.  Jean gave me Mrs Wade’s phone number and I spoke to her.  She heard the bird just before eight o’clock this morning and has promised to keep me informed as to developments.  I later phoned Julian and was surprised to hear that he had won two road-races in Jugo-Slavia this week, one in Zagreb and the other in Ljubljuna.

She phones Jane on the following day: “My dear Jane’s forty-fifth birthday”, she records – and discovers that “both Katie and Andy have concert engagements, and Andy, with the school choir, is singing in Bath Cathedral whilst the regular Choirboys are on holiday”.  Gran is herself entertained by a choir on the 16th, when the entertainment provided at “the Club” during the afternoon is by Sherborne House Choir.  “I had a chat with Miss Wise”, she writes,  “and said how much I enjoyed the children’s singing, but it rather shook me to realize that she taught Barry to read and now his youngest child, Robin, is older than any of the girls in the choir”.

The interior of Bath Cathedral, where Andy sang. Image by Jason Mientkiewicz via Flickr.

On the 22nd she writes, “Post brought me my greatest pleasure today”:

… with eighteen beautiful Tristan da Cunha stamps depicting four endangered species; ships, from an early Tristan one to the “Queen Elizabeth II”, and the commemoration of one of the visits of the “QE II” to Tristan.  This last was of special interest to me as Southampton is the home port for the ship and I often delivered flowers for passengers on her when I was helping Fowlers.

And on the following day:  “Barry phoned this evening to tell me the exciting news that I am to be a Great Grandmother early next year.  Ricky and Beverly are to give me this great joy…”  Three days later she remembers her own Mother, who, “… would have been one hundred and two years old today. Requescat in Pace”, she writes.

Barry is staying at The Ridge for a few days at this time, looking for particular moths in the New Forest, where he takes his Mother on May 26th.  She enjoys looking for plants and birds, hoping to see Honey-buzzards, near Bishop’s Dyke while he “bug-hunts” but the weather turns cold “so”, she says:

Barry left me in the car whilst he went for another look at some Pine Trees and he met two other Entomologists whom he introduced to me, Dr John Langmaid and Teddy Pelham-Clinton, who is heir to the Duke of Northumberland [sic].  A very pleasant pair though their Latin conversation about “bugs” was over my head.

Teddy Pelham-Clinton was actually last in the line of the Dukes of Newcastle-under-Lyne, a title he inherited and held for less than two months, before his untimely death on Christmas Day 1988.

Gran has few new flowers to paint for her collection these days but she sometimes receives a “commission” to produce something for a friend or family member. The daughters of the Hockridge family, erstwhile neighbours of Gran’s, are the latest recipients.  She writes on May 31st:

Later Ruth (Bedford) [née Hockridge] came with her husband, baby Laura, and sisters Anne and Claire, to collect her pictures of Primroses and Cowslips, which were received with enthusiasm by all… They all walked round the garden and looked over the fence at Kingston’s, still regarding their house as home.  Anne tentatively asked (“grovelled”, she said!) if I would paint her a flower and suggested a Dog Rose, so how could I refuse?

Over the next few days she paints a Burnett Rose for Anne, adding “Dwarf Gorse, as I wanted some yellow in the picture”, she says.

Gran has also recently painted a Camellia for Bill Kingston to give his wife, Ruth, on the occasion of their wedding anniversary on June 3rd. He shows it to Gran, on the day before, newly framed, and she is modestly “surprised to see how nice it looked”.

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

Book 179

On June 16th:

I scrambled with shopping and household chores this morning so that I could watch, on television, the “Trooping of the Colour” on the occasion of the Queen’s official birthday, and this beautiful spectacle and the precision of our marching soldiers in ceremonial dress, and our Queen riding “Burmese” in so regal a manner made me proud to be British in spite of the shameful behaviour of some of her subjects!

Gran impresses her friend Sheila Moody near the end of the month, with her “tuned in” eyesight, when they drive to the New Forest in another failed attempt to find a Honey-buzzard.  They park at Beaulieu Road, “now named ‘Shatterford’”, Gran writes, and are somewhat dismayed to find “hundreds, yes, literally(!)of schoolchildren… on a sponsored walk in aid of Hardley School”.  However, their routes diverge and Gran says:

I saw a perfect Pine Hawk-moth at rest on the trunk of a small pine tree and pointed it out to Sheila who was amazed that I had distinguished it from the bark at the distance.  We only looked at it through binoculars because I did not want to attract attention to it with so many children passing at the time.

At 75 years of age, Gran still has acute eyesight!  Image by Charlie Barnes via Flickr.

Blackbirds entertain Gran on June 30th and July 1st.  She watches Wimbledon on television, saying, “… a great diversion was provided by a Blackbird which raided the court and mingled with the spectators, even alighting on the head of one! And on the second day, in the garden:

… there was a very small fledgling Blackbird outside the kitchen window where I always put some [food] down and it did not move when I approached.  When I spoke to it and gently touched its head, it opened its beak and I offered it a crumb, which it swallowed when I put it inside its beak, and squawked for more.  I gave it some until I noticed the anxious parent nearby and moved away, and she immediately fed it.

July 5th:

Barry phoned later this evening to know if I would let Robin and his friend [John Hollins] sleep here as a base for cycle trips to the New Forest and other areas the week after next, and not worry about them.  Barry thinks it is time that Robin takes on responsibility for such excursions and said he and his friend are very sensible and would do their own sandwiches etc. for their lunches.  I have agreed, providing the boys agree to phone me if they are to be later home than arranged and promise to be very careful.  If their parents think it alright for them to do it, I am content to let them come.

Gran enjoys the televised Men’s Singles Final at Wimbledon on the following day, Borg beating Tanner in a superb five set match.  She comments, too, on the Ladies’ Doubles and Mixed doubles, after which she writes:

A sad note was struck when it was learned that Miss Ryan, nineteen times a Wimbledon Champion in Doubles, collapsed and died yesterday at Wimbledon whilst watching the Final of the Ladies Singles.  She was eighty-eight (and I once played her and Mrs Satterthwaite at the Winchester Open Tournament, with Joan Sheppard as my partner.  We lost!).

July 11th:

Julian rang up just to make sure that I had received Sue’s letter with instructions on how to meet her at Brent Cross tomorrow.  He said he is running quite well and I am looking forward to seeing him at Crystal Palace on Friday.

Neighbour Ruth takes her to Winchester to catch the 11.15 coach to Victoria on the following day and she enjoys the rest of the day with Sue, who works at Brent Cross, and later, Julian, taking a:

… picnic supper to Hampstead Heath, where I had not been before and which surprised me very much.  We found a seat in the sunshine overlooking and open area where cricket was being played and enjoyed chicken and salad, peaches and chocolate biscuits.

Gran enjoyed and was surprised by the habitats of Hampstead Heath and was impressed by the views from there of London City. There have been some changes to the skyline since her day. Image by Roman Hobler via Flickr.

Julian’s race takes place on the afternoon of the next day, both he and Sue having to work in the morning, leaving Gran to mend tracksuits and visit the R.A.F. Museum at Hendon.  Gran says:

I went over it and found it very interesting and then went across to the recently opened “Battle of Britain” Museum, which, naturally brought back unpleasant and poignant, albeit proud, memories.

Later:

It was very nice to really be at Crystal Palace after seeing it on television so often, and to see in the flesh many of the well-known athletes, including Geoff Capes, Sebastian Coe, Alan Wells and Berwyn Price.

Seb Coe.  Gran would have been impressed by him. Image by Vinod Divakaran via Flickr.

Of Julian’s 10,000 metres race she writes:

The race was late, and towards the end, only four were in contention: Irishman Treachy, American Salazar, Julian, and British David Murphy.  Treachy won in 28.12.1, there was a photo-finish for second between Salazar and Murphy, 28.12.4 and 28.12.5, and Julian fourth with 28.12.9.  He was disappointed, having hoped to win, but the finishing sprint deprived him, though this was his best time this year and puts him third on this year’s list…

Arriving home late that night, having been given a lift by Joanne, Sue’s sister, she finds Barry’s car in the drive and he fast asleep in bed.  The next few days are busy ones for Gran, providing tea and other refreshments for a group of entomologists convened by Barry for day and night expeditions to the New Forest and other Hampshire localities, and also hosting Robin and John Hollins, both thirteen years old, on their cycling holiday.  “The boys arrived about three o’clock”, she writes on the 15th, “Robin having rung up earlier to say that they were eating their lunch at New Alresford.  They were rather tired and thirsty”.

Next day: “The boys were up at 5.30 this morning and away to Hythe by 6 a.m. but they had got their own breakfast very quietly, washed the crocks and laid my breakfast before departing.”

The two lads undertake a number of outings by bicycle over the following few days, meeting Gran for a visit to the Hostel at St Cross on one of them, and consuming quantities of food provided at The Ridge.  Finishing an evening meal on the 19th, Gran reports that, “John said, ‘I have never had such food’, and though what I dish up is quite homely, I found this remark very encouraging and making any effort well worthwhile”.

“The boys had set off earlier for a trip round Itchen Abbas and Exton, back to Old Alresford and then home”, she writes on July 24th, but, she then adds: “A somewhat alarming phone call soon after half-past one, from Lady Osborne of Itchen Abbas!:

Robin had fallen off his bike and badly cut and grazed his elbow, and he and John had gone in to her for help.  She had cleaned the elbow with Dettol… The boys were on their way back here.  I thanked Lady Osborne for her care and rang Dr D’Arcy, who said Robin must certainly have a Tetanus injection, so after a quick cup of tea, Bill took Robin and me to the Eastleigh surgery at five o’clock, whilst Ruth remained at home to prepare their meal.

“She sounds a very sweet person”, says Gran of Lady Osborne, having updated her about the boys, and she adds:

… after the lads had been fed and had baths, I was only too glad to retire and write.  I am rather tired and Robin and John hope to leave for home at 6 a.m. tomorrow so I have set my alarm for five!

The boys are ready to go by six o’clock.  “ I returned to bed and slept until half past eight, so a late start to my own day”, she writes.  It is no surprise that she feels tired: it is her is seventy-fifth birthday on the following day! It is a Sunday, so no post arrives but she enjoys opening the presents that had already arrived, including, “… paper napkins in the colours of dear old Swaythling Tennis Club (green and gold) and stationery from Joan Sheppard”.

July 29th:

Early this afternoon there was the heaviest rainfall of the day and I have never, in all the fifty-one years I have lived here, seen this garden so flooded, not in patches as sometimes, but the whole of the back, and water pouring down the drive into the road.  Yet, in the bright sunshine that followed, it had all drained away.

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Comments

  1. Hi Rick …

    Gran reports ‘there was a very small fledgling Blackbird outside the kitchen window’ … I can relate to this, but in my case an Australian Magpie (larger than the English Magpie with 70cm wing span)
    …
    Amongst other birds, there are 2 young magpies that frequent my garden area, one of which is very tame, ‘talks’ and sings to me through my window, and I am sure it looks upon me as its mother, as I am able to put small pieces of bread into its mouth which it holds open for me and squawks … I have seen the mother nearby in the early days of my feeding, but it is about 3 weeks now and mother no longer comes … I am only feeding it on the odd occasion now as it must not depend on me for its food.

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  2. I am loving reading this. I lived on the corner of kingsway and lake road in chandlers ford from 1965-1976, so just round the corner. I always loved the bank with flowers on outside your grandparents house and think I recognise her. My mum worked for Mr Biddle in the newsagents. My grandparents also lived with us and spent a lot of time doing similar things to your grandmother. I only live a mile away and still work in Chandlers Ford. Keep up the good work.

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  3. My wife, who is ‘Hardly educated’ but would not have been one of those 100 schoolchildren, was also disappointed at the development of Bucklers Hard into a theme park. She and her friends used to visit on their bikes and mess around as youngsters do until the new order prevented them. She used a stronger word than disappointed but one not suitable for CFT.
    She did some babysitting for the extended Montague family. Apparently, someone was concerned about the proximity of the prison so babysitters had to sit in pairs. The prison being Parkhurst on the Isle of Wight. The fear was that and an escapee might swim across to Inchmary.

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