Rod Abbey's memories of North Marston

I was born at Winslow hospital on the 16th of April 1945. I spent most of my first ten years at 25 Quainton Road with my grandparents Winifred and Ezra Rawlings. Unfortunately my grandmother died in 1953 after a heart attack and a fall. My grandfather was a tailor, and with Fred Gowin made excellent clothes, especially suits.

Now my memories of the village. In the fifties, there were three pubs: the Bell Inn, the Sportsman's Arms, and the Wheatsheaf Inn. There were three grocery shops: Franklin's, the Bakers sisters shop – where most of us kids bought our lollies, four for a penny, and broken packets of Smiths crisps for one penny – and the Cox sisters grocery shop in Quainton Road, where I also bought lollies and Players Navy Cut and Players Weights, also Woodbine cigarettes for my grandfather.

Malcolm Holden had a service station with petrol pumps, a workshop and a taxi. Bernard Carter had a general merchant yard selling fire wood, kindling wood, and anything else you could need. I remember going around the district villages with him buying blackberries and other fruit. Then I would travel to Covent Garden fruit market at night with Stan Gurney where the fruit would be sold by agents. I remember going to London with Bernard, Stan, and Simon Carter, where we would load timber from demolished buildings, return them to North Marston where it would be sawn. In the shed at Portway there would be four or five people chopping the sawn wood into kindling and packing it into carrier bags, which would be delivered to shops all around Buckinghamshire. After the Cheshires finished in the Post Office Stan and Patricia Gurney took it over.

I remember going to the North Marston School, singing in the Church Choir, and being an altar boy. I was confirmed at St Mary's in 1957. I also did some bell ringing with my uncle Felix Gregory, and aunt Olive. The minister was Stanley H. Keene.

I spent a lot of time with farmers around the village. One in particular, Bert Price, used to double me on the cross bar of his bike to his little farm that was behind Braziers Farm. Bert had sheep but no sheep dog or motorised vehicle, so I was the sheep dog, and once we had them in the yard, Bert would shear them while I turned the handle on the shearing lead to the shears. There are none of these today, and I don't think anyone would stand there turning the handle for a full day.

The post office was run by Howard Cheshire and his father. They sold fireworks for Guy Fawkes night. I remember one day Howard had to deliver an urgent telegram. He always wore a crash helmet, but for some reason he left it behind, and he had a bad accident on Grandborough Road and was in a coma for quite a few weeks.

Tom and Derek Seaton ran the bakehouse that was in the village nearly opposite the Mill House, producing nice fresh bread. Harold Carter was the milkman who delivered milk to most of the outlying villages, and he would ladle milk out of his churns into your milk jug or small churn.

The local builders were Tommy Batson, who lived in Quainton Road next to Elsie Cox's shop, and Lawrence Young, also in Quainton Road; he had a large yard with building material everywhere, and a back paddock where us village boys would gather to play footie, or cricket. Lawrence was also the village cricket teams' umpire, where I spent many days as scorer, listing dot balls, fall of wickets, and all the figures needed for the result of a cricket game. I remember one Saturday a team from Swanbourne came over to play. On their way over, a couple of their players were involved in a car accident. One was their wicket keeper. I was only twelve but I volunteered to play for them, and, with permission from the captains, I played as wicket keeper. From memory I took two catches and one stumping, and by the end of the match I was not the most popular player in the village.

Fred Tattam had a small farm where he with his brother used to milk, I can remember having cherry curds, which I have not seen for fifty years or more. With Fred's son Jimmy we used to collect stamps, and we had stamps all over their lounge room. I don't know about Jim, but to this day I still collect stamps and have an online store called North Marston Philatelic Store.

On Friday nights we held a social night at the school where we all had a good time. There were games to play as well as Vimto and crisps. On Sunday I would meet the Red Rover double-decker bus at the start of Portway, where I would collect the Sunday papers then deliver them all around the village. I got to know most of the villagers, and at the end of the run I would be able to shout myself a Vimto and a packet of crisps at either the Sportsmans Arms or the Wheatsheaf Inn. I can remember being chased by the local policeman, PC Driver, on his pushbike, because I had painted my bike mailbox red and he thought I had stolen it. He never caught us when we went scrumping. I still believe they were the best days of my life. We always had something to do, from going on coach trips to the sea side or interesting places with Todd's Coaches from Whitchurch through the church.

Simon Carter and I used to ride our bikes to the Calvert Brick pits at Middle Claydon where we went fishing. We had some good catches, and we brought some good feeds home. They were the days.

I remember going to all the district farms where I learnt a lot of things. Thank you to all the people who helped me get wise to the world at a young age.

The Rose family fun fair used to come the field behind the Village hall every year. There was Mr and Mrs Rose, the twins Bobby and Joey, their sister Violet, and of course the man the girls all loved, Johnny Eldridge. I also helped out at times, The fair was homed at Whitchurch where I believe the twins still live today. The fair would travel all around Buckinghamshire during the summer, then park up at Whitchurch through the winter when the boys would work for Bernard Carter, cutting up fallen trees and bringing them back to Bernard's yard in Quainton Road, nearly opposite the entrance to the sewerage works, where they would be cut up for firewood and delivered around the local villages through the winter. Simon and I would go with Stan Gurney on a Saturday delivering the bagged wood. When we got to Swanbourne,we would buy a loaf of fresh bread and a bag of hot chips. They were the days.

My memories go back to the dairies in the village where I would go and help with the milking, and also learning the ways of life, seeing the bull doing his job, the cows having their calves, and the new born lambs. One I can remember was at the Moreton farm; there was heavy snow, and the dog would go out and bring back new lambs that were in trouble. That has stayed with me all these years. I remember going to Archie Higgins farm on Granborough Road, and he was a real good fellow. I spent a lot of time at Ewart Dancer's farm. Their house cow was called Favourite. I learnt a lot from Ewart. Then there was the Aldermans farm, where my uncle David worked with Gordon Alderman. They did a lot of contracting. A lot of days were spent with the Franklins at their farm, nearly opposite the old Holden's work place.

A time I liked was haymaking. It was work from daylight till dark. I remember taking the horses for a drink when the work was over. I have always loved the smell of sweating horses, it brings back some fond memories. I seem to think it was Braziers farm where the horses were.

I remember the day Guy Holden came home from the Korean War, it was the first time I had seen him. When the Vietnam War was on I was working for the TA and we had to unload the dead soldiers off the planes coming from Darwin – not good times.

One bad day I remember was when a motor bike was travelling from the bottom of Oving Hill towards Portway. It came up behind a double-decker bus, pulled out to overtake the bus, and ran head on into a tractor coming the opposite way. There was a man and woman on the bike. It was a real mess, one death and one severe injuries.

Lawrence Young bought a new light truck. I remember being there when he and some of his staff, Sid Parker and Norman Higgins (known as IKE) built a tray for it. I was given a paint brush and red lead paint to paint it. Well my fingers were like balloons after getting the paint into my fingers. It is what I always tell the medical staff when asked if I am allergic to anything. IKE also played cricket for North Marston. I was privileged to ride on his motorbike to cricket matches.

I can also remember the day that Ray Lawrence came home from Stone Hospital after a long time in there. He lived next to his brother Lawrence, and two doors from him lived Tommy Keene, who was a road maintenance man.

I left England on the 18th of February 1961, and arrived in Australia on the 1st of April 1961. I had £2 in my pocket. I ran a pig farm for a couple of years, then moved into transport, driving road trains and large machinery until I had enough money to start my own transport company. By 1990 I had well over a million dollars of assets, with sixteen trucks on the road and a staff of twenty.

Then in 1998 a lawnmower blade tried to take my right leg away. While they were trying to put me back together they found that my left kidney was full of cancer, and gave me three months to live. So far I have cheated it, but I had to give up my business. My wife has been my rock, but she had breast cancer five years ago, so now we keep the medical people in work.

Wishing all North Marstonians the very best
Kind regards
Rod Abbey
January 2011