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Chilton
Chilton maps
Historic maps of Chilton and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Chilton maps
Chilton area books
Displaying 1 of 13 books about Chilton and the local area. View all books for this area
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Memories of Chilton
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Berkshire memories
Childhood in Helions Bumpstead
My family moved to Helions Bumpstead in around 1964. My parents renovated an old farmhouse which they named "Roslyns" because my Mum went to the Chelmsford Records Office and discovered that the place had been called Roskins Meadow in the 17th century. The first thing I remember is the smell of the house (dusty and musty) and the fact that my sister and I caught ringworm from some old toys left in a cupboard. The main thing, though, was the garden. We had nearly three acres of scrubby garden, meadow and a run down orchard. There was also a brick privy (the house had no indoor plumbing when we moved in) which Dad knocked down and then built a greenhouse on the site. When we first moved there, the garden seemed so big that we didn't dare go round the edge without Mum, but we soon got braver and built dens, camps, treehouses, etc. Our favourite trick was to sit in the old... Read more
First Day
We moved excitedly from London in my dads old Austin 7 to a country village we had never heard haverhill. we couldnt even pronounce it as we found out it still is unpronounceable by many. Arrived at our new house 118 Burton End. a four bedroom HOUSE (not a flat) which is all we had been used to. we had never seen stairs inside a house before and also a front door and a back door which we ran round and round until mum told us to settle down or someone will get hurt and they did., my sister banged her head on a downstairs window, that one of my other sister's had opened up while saying this one opens outwards yippie. It was the best day of my life so far. Sitting outside the old Standard pub which was in Burton end drinking our cherryade and eating smiths crisps with the bag of salt inside and we was served by Mr and Mrs Mc. Cleane. Happy times!... Read more
First Day at School
The only school in Haverhill was The Cangle. The new secondary modern, now known as Castle Manor, had not yet been finished. We arrived at school very bewildered being the first of the Londoners and feeling like aliens. I made a new friend in the short while I had been in Haverhill. His name was Michael Geagon, I didn't know at the time but his family was Irish, not that that meant anything. I was shown to my classroom and it turned out to be the same classroom as my older sister, they had got it wrong, I found out later that day. That upset me because now I was really on my own. First day in the playground Michael had told everybody I was from London and that I could beat anybody up, that was news to me, so he started picking fights with the locals for me to hit them. I had never hit anybody in my short life so far but I did just the once. I... Read more
Wixoe Mill
1958 My parents, my two sisters and I lived in Stoke by Clare at a thatched house called Thatchety, opposite the Red Lion hotel. My father's aunt, Maudie Firth, owned the mill at Wixoe. My twin sister, Lynda, and I would ride our bikes to visit her. We would stop at an old spinster’s home for lemonade and biscuits. I don’t remember her name. I too would fish from the bridge by the old mill. I remember catching perch. My mother called them “Muddy Fish”. We would have afternoon tea, in the front room of the house, at Wixoe Mill. The house was set back from the Mill Pond with a sweeping lawn that ran down to the water. A gardener kept ferrets, in cages, by the garage, if my memory serves me right!! There was a gazebo in the garden that one could turn to face the sun. The mill had not been used for years but was fun to explore. We moved to Bristol in about 1961 and I’ve... Read more
Potters Yard
Does anyone know where Potters Yard was in Exning, Suffolk?
Big Toe Stuck in The Drain...lol
I remember this paddling pool so well, when I was about 8 years old I would be there with my nana {in fact in looks like me in the pic}. She would sit on the bench in the pic and eat her rich tea biscuits. I begged her to let me swim every time we were there, I would mostly paddle though. One day the pool was empty and I was playing around the drain and I got my big toe stuck in it, I was really scared and started to cry, then to my horror the pool started to fill up, I was sure that I was going to drown. I remember screaming so loud, the man that tended the park came over and shut the water off ...' Whew'. Such wonderful memories though. In 1970 I was married in St Mary's Church and now live in the USA.
What I would do to go back to those day, there were swings on the other side of the pool... Read more
The Traffic Light Box in The Clocktower Roundabout
I was a policeman in Newmarket from 1962 -1970 and well remember having to stand in the glass tower in the middle of the roundabout controlling the traffic using the part-time traffic lights on each of the 5 entrances to the roundabout. This caper was mainly carried out on Summer weekends when the traffic coming back from the coast would be particularly heavy coming down the Bury Road and up the High Street. On really hot days, we would bake in the little tower and nobody carried bottles of water around then like they do now. I tend to remember that the older PC's would leave us youngsters doing the job for what seemed like forever. Happy days
