Dartmouth memories
Here are memories of Dartmouth and the local area. You can start now: Add your own Memory of Dartmouth or a Dartmouth photo.
Warfleet
I first came to Dartmouth in 1966 as a member of the Vancouver Boys Band. We were a 39 piece military style marching/concert band. All of us in the band fell in love with Dartmouth. We were hired to play for the Carnival in June and the Regatta in August. I returned with the band in 1968 and 1970. On one of the trips, a Mr Dwyer gave Arthur Delamont, the conductor of the band, a history book on Dartmouth and he passed it on to me. It sat on my bookshelf for years, years that saw me become a band conductor and later a writer. At some point I picked the book up again and couldn't put it down, absorbing all the names and the lore from John Hawley to Francis Drake to Thomas Newcombe. I knew all the roads and high streets and low streets from my adventures in the band and made the trip up the Dart often, past Agatha Christie's house, all the way up to... Read more
Britannia Royal Naval College, Dartmouth
I joined the College in Sep 1965 at the last moment so they were not really expecting me despite the fact MOD Navy told me to proceed. I was not a brilliant pupil, but ready to give it my all. I was not the pattern that they were hoping to mold into the standard officer material. Despite the fact that I had swum all my life, I turned out to be a 'backward' swimmer. I was also a 'backward' flasher as it applies to reading morse coded flashing light messages. I was also a 'backward' sailor when it came to passing proficiency tests on the navy's boats. and so on. I did graduate the Basic Training, but had to put considerably more effort in these tests than did the average recruit it seemed. I 'enjoyed' the rest of my five years afloat with the Survey Navy, until other things called for my attention ashore.
Memories of Devon
Living in Kingswear
My mother Mary Dart was brought up in Kingswear, where she lived with her mum, dad, and brother Edward until she married my dad Les Witty who was in the Army at the time. She had to move away as Dad was posted to Germany in 1953. I was born in 1955 and came to Kingswear when I was about 18 months old to stay with my grandad and uncle. Many years passed and I came to live in Kingswear at the age of 12 years old. We had a flat on top of shops overlooking the River Dart, there were quite a few shops. People were always friendly. As years went by my dad became the caretaker of Kingswear cemetery and we moved into the lodge, by this time I had left school and had got a job in Dartmouth Potteries then later moved on to hotal work. I left Kingswear when I was 17. I went back 11 years ago to scatter my mum's ashes, it was a... Read more
Sailor Boyo!
I remember my parents swinging me between them along a fir tree'd lane to the sea, singing 'Sailor Boy-oh'. We were camping at a site run by a man called 'Roly' (Rowlandson perhaps). Imagine my parents' delight at camping under the stars after the Blitz and London. Their happy memories stayed with them always. And I remember my first experience of the smell of the pine trees - I was three!
Best Holiday Ever !
My family come from the East End of London. My mum and dad took us on holiday from Chingford on a Grey Green coach to Stoke Fleming for two weeks, we stopped en route in Yeovil for tea.... My parents had booked a caravan (one of three) behind the London Inn in the gardens, the landlord had a daughter who my brother and I used to play with. There was also a dog.. and a little spring outside the pub where we caught a newt which we kept in a bucket under the caravan until the dog ate it !!... We used to go winkle picking down in the mud at Dartmouth. I remember playing outside in the pub garden whilst mum and dad went inside for a meal, mum told us that they had had lobster !!! I'd never even heard of it before ! The sun shone continuously throughout the holiday and we all got burned! We would walk down to Blackpool sands during the day and I taught... Read more
Happy Days
In Sept 1968 I and my five children arrived and fell in love Dittisham, just too late sadly to save the village school from closing. Eventually after renting first Dunedin Cottage and then Red Rose Cottage we were given a council house and lived there for the next 17 years. We have so many happy memories and all the children, now grown up with children and even grandchildren of their own, like to revisit Dittisham with the own families and friends. They have many stories to pass down and still appreciate the freedom they had living in this idylic riverside village, the wonderful people they met during those years, the good start they had at Blackawton village school with headmasters Brian Gerry and Mr Kemp (Ian?), including the many great events that were held over the years including "The Pied Piper of Dittisham", Dittisham's first Pantomime which, with Brian Fricker's help I wrote to boost the funds for Blackawton school's swimming pool. Despite a roller coaster life as a... Read more
Dittisham Family Connection
My family (Hall) took the lease out on Greenway Farm in the 1850's. I visited this, and Galmpton (3/4 of a mile away) which were Hall "haunts" for many years until the 1890's, when the family seems to have headed to 'all parts'. I would love to know why they left such a lovely area - was farming terrible during those years? I visited in March 2011 and found the area still was 'in the time period' - not ruined by crass development, and extremely tranquil. Good to see the Census results pointed to lime burning, and sure enough, on the river foreshore at the bottom of the farm, the original lime kiln is still there to this day. Truly a magical area if there was ever one.
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Places this week
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- Weaverham, Cheshire
- Patshull Park, West Midlands
- Shelsley Walsh, Worcestershire
- Netheravon, Wiltshire
- Knaphill, Surrey
- Easington Colliery, County Durham
- Eastleigh, Hampshire
- Bethesda, Gwynedd
- Greystoke, Cumbria
- Parkgate, Merseyside
- Ribbleton, Lancashire
- Souldern, Oxfordshire
- Aveley, Essex
- Croydon, Surrey
- Dartford, Kent
- Helsby, Cheshire
- Thurstaston, Merseyside
- Beverley, North Humberside
- Luton, Bedfordshire
- Chedworth, Gloucestershire
- ... and lots more - Browse this week's memories now.
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