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Bognor Regis
Bognor Regis photos
Displaying the first of 120 old photos of Bognor Regis. View all Bognor Regis photos
Bognor Regis maps
Historic maps of Bognor Regis and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Bognor Regis maps
Bognor Regis area books
Displaying 1 of 24 books about Bognor Regis and the local area. View all books for this area
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Memories of Bognor Regis
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memories of Bognor Regis.
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Happy Holidays
My parents and my grandparents had their holidays on this caravan site from about 1961 to about 1967. I remember my grandfather taking me to the shop on the site to buy sweets. The owner had a green Ford V8 Pilot which we rode in to town once. I also remember the site next door which was bigger and the stream which I was told to keep away from and was covered with green algae. Sadly my wife and I went back recently, and there is now a big retail park. Happy day!
The Pier And Esplanade
I was born in Sudley Road nursing home, Bognor, and we lived in Nyewood Lane, but I used to stay frequently with my grandmother in her flat a couple of hundred yards from the Royal Norfolk Hotel.
One of my earliest memories was of her taking me out of bed one summer dawn for a walk down to the beach in front of the Esplanade Theatre. We both went skinny dipping, for it didn't matter to her that the classy hotels overlooked the shore!
The Bognor pier was on my parents' list of forbidden places, but my grandmother and my old aunts took me there after it had been rebuilt after the war. (The long deck had been cut so that it wouldn't be so easy for Hitler's troops to come ashore.) There was also a miniature train that took adults and children from one end to the other. As a young child, I also learnt that if I put a penny into the slot of one of those... Read more
Railway Carriage Memories
My wife Alma (nee Rodhouse) was evacuated as a child to Middleton on Sea, with her mum and another lady. They were billeted in a railway carriage in the grounds of a large house. The owners lived in London, and Alma's mum and the other lady acted as caretakers. Alma remembers little of that time, but she was told that this was the coach where the 1918 armistice was signed. Can anyone remember one A .Hitler visiting the area after the fall of France? As he was supposed to have signed a similar document in similar circumstances in 1940.
Rainbow's End at Hotham Park
Every year we would stay at my uncle's caravan in Bognor Regis. The highlight of my holiday was the visit to Hotham Park and the magical Rainbow's End. Even now 36 years later I can remember every detail, Mickey Mouse on the green chair with the empty chair next to him where every year I had my photo taken, Humpty Dumpty, The Three Bears' House, the winding paths, the pond, never knowing what was around the next corner. It was the most fantastic place ever. My own garden now has weird and wonderful things in it, I suppose I am trying to recreate my own Rainbow's End. 3 years ago I took my own children to the park. I cried when I saw what had happened to it. I actually climbed over the fencing and looked round, although it was derelict and unloved, for those few minutes I was 6 years old again.
The Sharing of Childhood by Two Very Elderly Persons
I was looking after two elderly residents and well known personage locally when alive, Mr Bert Munday and a "young" lady Mrs Hargreaves chatting away about their holidays when they used to catch shrimp and cockles off the Felpham beach. How it was all spoilt when the preaprations for the 2nd world war made the beach out of bounds , the families evacuated and the Canadians were billetted in the same houses. Another "young" man telling them about the worse bit of world war one at the Somme was not the persons, but the animals carrying the heavy loads of supplies and falling off the duck boards, screaming as they could not get up. On the wall of the flats I now live are plaques to a Dr and Mrs Feagan,who commenced the Fegan homes for Boys. On looking up in the local museum, he was looking out of the window at a homeless boy on the beach and took him in thus started the Boys home. I have a... Read more
Holidays in The 1950s
I can remember as a small boy having a holiday in Bognor and staying in an old railway carriage.
Peter Wilson.
Bognor Briefly!
My parents George and Phyllis Stroud ran the Hotham Club in Waterloo Square - now the HQ of the RAFA Bognor branch. After National Service I worked first for Lec Refrigeration as a welder and then as a porter at the War Memorial Hospital. I had a flat over the hydrotherapy pool and was also in charge of the mortuary. When the bell rang in the middle of the night, up I got, went to the mortuary and got the special trolley we used to transport the deceased from the ward to the mortuary. I was also expected to be present at post-mortems so I learnt a lot about human anatomy this way!
I also met a number of lovely lady patients on the wards, one in particular that comes to mind was a beautiful girl called Angela Scutt - I wonder where she is now?!
I still have contact with Bognor, my brother's family live at North Bersted and they operate the store called The Trading Post... Read more
Military Music on Promenade And in Park
My National Service was spent in The Alamein Band of The Royal Tank Regiment which for 3 seasons, 1949 to 1952 played at Bognor Regis for two months on the promenade bandstand in the afternoons and in Hotham Park in the evenings. On one occasion we played in the theatre as part of a midnight matinee held to raise money for relief work for the Lynmouth Flood disaster. I recall this concert vividly as it was compared by Chesney Allen of Flanagan and Allen and the star of the show was the great comedian Dick Emery whose genius carried the whole show. I was in the Band as a singer of Ballads and Gilbert and Sullivan and other light operatic items but I was disappointed that in this concert I was not billed to sing my usual songs but , instead became the vocalist for our Dance Orchestra where I sang several suitable ballads. I was jealous that Brychan Powell the tenor from the season... Read more
