Hook Hill

A Memory of Freshwater.

In 1960, when I was 6, we moved into Longhalves, a detached house on the left of Hook Hill going up, and just on the brow of the hill. The road then was narrow and dangerous, and in about 1964 they took 3 - 4 yards off our front garden to widen the road and make a footpath. Opposite the main gate to Longhalves was Asher's field. Mr Asher kept cows on there, and we used to walk through the field across the marsh and the old railway line (closed even then), and onto Afton Road. The railway station was derelict when we moved in, but within a few years became a spring factory. Next to Longhalves on the uphill side set back, the builder, George Weeks, built a bungalow to live in. Our garden went back quite a way right up to a row of firs boardering Weeks' yard. My father dug that garden out over the years and uncovered yards of flag paths, with some square rose gardens boardered with brick paths toward the back. The house had an amazing, rickety wooden conservatory on the front.
I went to school at All Saints, and walked to school daily - and home for lunch! We walked down the hill and along Station Road if my mum took me, but I went up the bridle path and along the back if I went on my own. Next door on the downhill side was Major McCormack's paddock. I don't believe I ever saw the Major, but he had a fearsome reputation and you just didn't get caught in his paddock or anywhere else on his land.
On Station Road a chap had an enourmous aviary, which always fascinated me. Honours, the coal merchants, were on Station Road and they had a Chow dog, a weird looking thing with a blue tongue. Our dog, a Standard Poodle, was scared of it and used to cross the road whenever we approached their shop. Over the road from them was the Rec. It seemed huge then, but probably only had a couple of football pitches and some swings at the far end. The Circus used to pitch its big top on there. At the village end of the Rec the path off it came down and finished opposite the school entrance. There was a lovely cottage just there where Pauline Bilson lived. I was deeply in love with her for a while, but she studiously ignored me for the 6 years I was at All Saints - as did most of the girls, come to think of it!!!
Further up Hook Hill lived the McCulloughs. He was a solicitor. He had twin girls who I went to school with. Angela and ... (I can't remember!). And right at the end of the road was the church. I was in the choir from 1962 - 1965, and was often in trouble for either missing practice, or eating sweets during the service. I remember we all got an easter egg at Easter, a shilling (5p) at Christmas, and half a crown (12.5p) for a wedding!! To the right of the church the lane swung away and down until it crossed the river and the railway line - the same railway that started at the bottom of the hill a mile or so away. The disused railway was a favourite Sunday walking place for our family, particularly during blackberry season - there were endless brambles along there. You could walk all the way to Yarmouth, though I don't think we ever did.
My parents ran a stationers shop in the main shopping street - near Mac Fisheries as I recall. They had a private lending library within the shop, which people don't believe existed when I tell them. It was all Romance and Westerns - nothing erudite, and certainly nothing my mum would ever have read (she was a bit above herself, my mum!). In 1965 Dad opened a second shop a few doors up and expanded the business into office furniture and machinery. I don't know if his timing was wrong, or his business sense poor, but it didn't work out, and they had to sell the shops and the house, and we moved out to Ningwood in 1965/6.
We left the Island in 1968 and I didn't go back until a brief holiday in the spring of 2005. I was delighted to find how little had changed, and shocked to find how small it all was. Longhalves is still there, but didn't look the mansion I remembered - I don't even know if it's still called Longhalves.
I've lived in probably 25 homes in my life so far, but Longhalves is the one I remember with most fondness.

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