Escrick Park Gardens - Market Gardens - 1950 - 1966

My aunt and uncle - Mr and Mrs George Pratt - used to manage the market gardens in Escrick. We had many happy holidays there, and I remember the peaches and apricots growing up the wall, rows and rows of runner beans, greenhouses full of tomatoes and cucumbers etc. They lived in the large house (it could have been a tied or rented house with the job) with 7 of my cousins, who used to work for their father.
My earliest memory is going up on the train and alighting at a small level crossing 'somewhere' (it may have been Saltmarsh) and my grandmother (the only time I remember seeing her) meeting us with other family members. At that time they all lived and worked at Saltmarsh. I still have relatives in the area around York and Wheldrake etc. My grandmother Hannah Richardson nee Gamwell is buried in St Helen's Churchyard, Escrick.
My surname before marriage was Richardson, I can trace my family tree back to 1605 and Mathew Brunyee, who was imprisoned in York for a few days in 1647 (in the building now known as Cliffords Tower). He lived at Scalme Park, Wistow, near Selby.

I also remember the girls from the school next to the market gardens coming by the house with their cloaks on and I think they were wearing clogs! - but cannot be 100% sure. There were large wrought iron gates to the estate. I can picture cricket being played on the green there, and my cousin Don Pratt taught me to ride a bicycle on the path along the large herbaceous border within the market gardens.

My aunt was a very good cook and used to bake pies and cakes and jugged hare! Their house seemed massive to us small young children and the dining room had a large range in it. There were 5 of us, Mum, Dad, my sister Trixie and us twins going there for holidays, so, along with my aunt and uncle and cousins there was always a large meal for my aunt to cook.

Happy Memories.
Shirley Spann, nee Richardson