The Gable House

A Memory of Droitwich Spa.

The black and white half-timbered building in the photograph was The Gable House, owned by my late grandmother, Nancy Hawkes and her sister, Hilda Cook. The house was run as a short-term residential home for patients staying in Droitwich for treatment at the brine baths. The gardens extended to about 3/4 of an acre and along the rear boundary was a timber built bungalow, where I lived with my parents and siblings until I was 9 (1951), when we moved to a house in St Peter's Road in the Witton area of the town. The Gable House, probably Edwardian, was only part of the property and mainly used as the private family residence. A much older house, known as The Annexe, which accommodated the lady guests, existed to the right of the main house (the porch is just visible in the picture). In the floor of the porch were some very old tiles, supposedly medieval and made by the itinerant potters that made floors for the nearby St Peter's Church. The male guests stayed in a relatively modern a wing, just off to the left of the picture, known as The Men's End.
The property was sold on my gran's death and all was demolished to make way for the a development of houses and appartments that you can see today.
In the background, just above the person in the road is part of the buildings of the original St Peter's School, attended by all of my siblings (4 of them) and myself over the years and all taught at some stage by our late father, Ben Hawkes.