Buses

A Memory of Great Tarpots.

I too remember our bus service in and around Tarpots, as I recall one that ran out of the bus station on the left going in to Hadleigh just after the turn off to Dawes Heath and Rayleigh, was it called the Benfleet bus company,they seemed to concentrate on that area and into Benfleet but not Canvey which seemed to have another service, you had to walk from the War Memorial to the station and over the crossing and along to the bus stand close to the bridge for service to Canvey.

At the junction of High Road and London Road one was able to get a National Bus to Grays, I think they were in green and the bus station was almost into Southend, and if my memory is right a second service though I don't remember who ran it but the buses were red, used to take that one to Grays and it always stopped in Stanford Le Hope before going on into Grays.

If one ventured up to the top of Bread and Cheese hill you could then get one of the Southend Corporation buses into Rayleigh and on to Hockley after a wait in Rayleigh itself, blue and White buses I think, or cream maybe, from Rayleigh you could also get into Hullbridge, they had to turn by the Pub before returning, does anyone remember the cafe by the side there where you could get ice creams, as a child we used to spend days down there during school holidays, you could even eat the oysters taken from the river in those days, later in the year we would go on to Brandy Hole and pick blackberries, great basketful's of them, I'm sure my Mother must have made jam from them so this took place during and just after the war.
Of course lots of swimming in the river and then back home on the bus, to Rayleigh, wait there by the monument to the Martyrs who had been burned at the stake, bus to the top of Bread and Cheese hill again and any bus going to Tarpots and the walk up High Road to Home, don't recall any bus stop between Tarpots and Wavertree Road opposite the Clinic, after that it was Cemetery Corner or a s one witty conductor used to refer to it as Benfleet Underground, next I think was Hopes Green or was it nearer the School? or the pumping station for the Water Works, then on to Benfleet and the War Memorial and it turned in the road that led on up to the Downs.

Well I haven't lived in Tarpots for more years that I care to remember but I don't suppose the Bus service is anything like that now, how does one get to Canvey now I wonder.

Have just read this again and I see that I'd forgotten the trolley buses that used to run from the Westcliff School right into Southend, I know we had a few trips on those in there day, brown and cream? and two arms the fitted on to the overhead wires which if they came off were some what restrained by tethers attached and the conductor had to retrieve a long pole from under the trolley I think, and then hook them and replace them in contact with the overhead cable, I've never given it any though until now but I wonder if that was dangerous if it was raining, the mind boggles at the thought of a crispy well cooked conductor served on a long pole.

Colin Mac

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