Horne memories
Here are memories of Horne and the local area. You can start now: Add your own Memory of Horne or a Horne photo.
Great-Great-Great-Grandmother Amelia Creasey (nee Stone)
My Great-Great-Great-Grandmother Amelia Creasey (nee Stone) was born in this little hamlet around 1788 yet somehow she was married in Southwark in 1813 to my Great-Great-Great-Grandad Edward Creasey who was a local man from East Grinstead. I am very interested in my family history and have been greatly helped by research published by the Felbridge & District History Group who discovered that my Creasey family farmed at Gibbshaven Farm. It is a beautiful part of the country.
Memories of Surrey
Smallfield
Does anyone remember the mobile library that was parked near the parade of shops? I think there is a house on the land where it used to park. I have memories of hanging my beret up on my named peg; my double-breasted dark blue rain coat two times bigger then me; the boys trying to pull me over the yellow line to the boys playground; the huge black spider webs in the outside toilets; the hopscotch on the floor of the girls' playground; walking two by two down to the village hall for dinner; being made to eat roast potatoes and ending up in tears; being in a play at the school dressed in pyjamas? Mr Johnson, ahhh, he looks like my dad now. I remember my dad taking me across to the playing fields for the swing and the slide, and me with my friends, sitting on the wall of Orchard Road. Would we allow 6 year olds to do that now? Ialso remember playing in New Road around the... Read more
Kings Builders
I started school in Smallfield in 1934. In those days there were bucket lavatories. The sewer was laid in 1938 and then most of Smallfield was able to do away with the buckets. There were 3 teachers, Miss Kempshall who came from Betchworth on a 250cc Panther, Miss Cottle who had attended the school and became a teacher (she ran the Cubs as well) and Miss Power. There were only about eighty children untill 1939 when lots of evacuees came from London. We were then crowded out and some had to sit on the floor. In 1940 I moved to Horley School. We were taken in a coach, and I remember having to get into the ditch with an air raid going on above. Alfred King & Son were fairly large building firm in Plough Road, established in 1856 and finished in 1952. Most families had someone who did or had worked for Kings. My grandfather worked as a bricklayer, my father and myself as plumbers. I started there in 1945,... Read more
Shops And Services in Smallfield During The 1930s
bill.haylor@btinternet.com Resident in and around Smallfield for 81 yrs.
Shops and services were limited but adequate. Village hierarchy although unwritten was arranged in a manner that suited most people; the traders held most sway by the nature of their businesses, builders and farmers controlled most of the land.
Starting from the centre of the village. The first shop in Smallfield was on the corner of Wheelers Lane, in the 1930s it was owned by McKenzie the Grocer, the Post Office was first located here. Outside the shop on the wall were machines for Nestles Chocolate and Woodbine cigarettes in thin green packets of fives. The next shop going upwards and south was Warnett the Butcher, the daughter was cashier in the small office to the rear, the men would select a carcase of meat from a large walk in fridge which they sawed, chopped and cut on a large wooden bench. During the summer there were flies!
The Church Hall was next, then across the drive... Read more
Smallfield Prepares For War 1939-45
bill.haylor@btinternet.com Resident in and around Smallfield for 81 yrs.
One of the first indications in the village relating to war was the erection of a telegraph pole, on the top of which was a platform and a circular metal object about the size of two buckets, called a siren, at each end was a circular slotted opening out of which came the creepy but familiar wailing sound. This siren was placed opposite the (old) school in School Road (Redehall Road) and just within the entrance to Gonville Laundry. During use the indication of an imminent air raid was a warbling sound, when all danger had passed a single tone was sounded. During the war all church bells were silent, the sound that everyone most feared were the church bells ringing again for this meant England was being invaded.
During 1940 and to counter enemy movements across Southern England deep gullies were excavated and referred to as Tank Traps. Smallfield had its own section; they crossed Chapel Road... Read more
Small Boys''toys And Other Pastimes. 1930s
bill.haylor@btinternet.com Resident in and around Smallfield for 81 yrs
A large number of our toys were made from wood, dependant on what tools were available in fathers shed, if it was unlocked! The only tools needed were a saw, a hammer and some nails. There were two basic things a home made wooden toy was required to do: (1) Be able to be pulled along by a string, provided it had wheels; (2) To float in a pond or stream. The shape was unimportant, imagination made it realistic.
Our play area was usually the road surface itself, footpaths for pedestrians were only just becoming necessary, car movements were reasonably slow which gave plenty of time to move out of the way. Few footpaths meant more ditches with running water so floating boats along them was popular. A boat consisted of any shaped object that would float from the smallest twig to a chunky piece of wood; penknives were popular in order to shape the wood so that... Read more
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