Childhood Memories Of Belchamp Walter

A Memory of Belchamp Walter.

I was born in 1953 and lived at Largess Farm in Belchamp Walter. My surname then was Branwhite.My father was Fred Branwhite, a farmer. I went to the village school whenIi was 5 years old. It was a small school, with only two classrooms and toilets outside....very cold in the winter! Tables would be put up in the classroom for lunch...which was delivered in a van. I think there were only about twenty children in the school when I was there. I remember when, arriving at school on cold winter mornings, we would stand around the 'turtle' stove and warm our freezing cold hands before lessons started. The headmistress, also a teacher, was Mrs Pearson. I remember her as a lovely lady with white hair. The school closed when I was about 10 years old, and we had to go to Belchamp St Pauls primary school... by bus. There was a shop in the centre of the village then, where I used to spend my 6d (old money) pocket money......which would buy a bar of Cadbury's chocolate and an ice cream! I used to stop and look at the ducks on the village pond on my way home from school. There used to be a pub called 'The Eight Bells', my father and the other farmers and locals would often call in for a well deserved pint or two! I left the village when I got married, in the village church, to Frank Clark, in 1971. I have been back over the years, as my sister still lives at the farm.
Things have changed though....the school is now the village hall...the shop has been closed for years....and the pub also closed and is now a private house !
It is still a very pretty village though...the pond is still there....but i guess that all the older people that i remember from my childhood are no longer there.
It was a lovely place to grow up, and i have many happy memories.

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