Hurstbourne Tarrant, Hampshire

Granny Green's Shop.

The building in the middle of this photo was the village shop. It was owned by my grandmother, Hilda Green. It seemed to me as a child to sell just about everything I could ever have needed in my life. Granny was also the parcels agent for the Wilts & Dorset Bus Company. Upstairs was a room that we called the 'Toy Bedroom', and spread out on the floor were loads of very old toys, still in their dusty boxes. We were allowed on special occasions to select one from the pile.
Set back in between the shop and the cottage on the left of the photograph was a narrow tumbledown cottage. This served as the workshop for my grandfather, Maurice Green, who ran the local carpenters' shop, together with my father, Geoffrey Green.
Just inside the front door was the bike shed, where people could leave their steeds, when they took the bus to work.
Opposite was the Post Office with its two Esso petrol pumps and its repair workshop. In the early 1950s the building behind the ESSO sign was demolished by one of the several Tank Transporter crashes, when the vehicle ran away down the 1 in 7 hill. This is now a private house.
The left-hand cottage of the row on the left of the photograph, was lived in by my great uncle, George Green, who worked for Northants Builders, on the Newbury road, which was off to the right of the picture.
I lived with my mother, father and sister, up the Hill in number one, Rookery Cottages, opposite Rookery Farm, where I spent all my spare childhood time with my Uncle Reg, who was the farm manager, for the farmer Reginald Burder.

Hampshire Living Memories

This picturesque village featured in Anna Lea Merritt’s book ‘A Hamlet in Old Hampshire’, published in 1902, describing 19th-century village life. When Anna died in 1930, a memorial was placed in the local church. Thatched cottages in the village line the occasionally- running stream that meanders through the lovely landscape.

Andover Photographic Memories

A neat Austin Ten is here heading for Newbury. Blount had a horse called Tinker which could be hired to help carts up Hurstbourne Hill. Having reached the top, Tinker would be released and could be relied upon to return to the farm every time.

Petersfield - A History & Celebration

The cenotaph in the High Street commemorates those who died in battle but whose remains lie elsewhere. It is of unusual and classic appearance; it was designed by the architect Harry Inigo Triggs, who had travelled and studied in Italy. The detailing is borrowed from the eight blank panels in the Medici chapel in Florence; on these panels are carved the names of the town’s dead of the First World War. (Plaques were added after the Second World War commemorating the 54 young men who died on duty away from home during that conflict). After much deliberation over an appropriate location for the town’s memorial, it was erected by the mason Andrew Perryman of Dragon Street in its present position early in 1922 - a position in the Square was discounted. In the wake of the war, under the auspices of the Housing Act of 1919, the country set about building ‘homes fit for heroes’. The first of these were built in Noreuil Road, which was named after a little village of some 100 inhabitants near Arras in France. Petersfield had adopted the village to help with its reconstruction, and a letter thanking the town for gifts of parcels of clothing and coloured wall maps to brighten the schoolroom was signed by J Nicholai, the schoolmistress at Noreuil. The Electricity Supply Act of 1919 gave rise to an application by Dr R J Cross, Mr T A Crawter and Mr C W Seaward, who wanted to form a company to supply electric light to Petersfield. The plan was for a generator on land located to the rear of the Volunteer Arms (now Meon Close), with a frontage on Frenchmans Road. (Note that the company was only to supply electric light, not power). With houses having only 40-watt lamps, it is unlikely that a supply greater than 20 kilowatts would be required. Tom Crawter’s house, Clare Cross, was the first house in Petersfield to be lighted by electricity. Nevertheless, there was enough power to supply the Electric Theatre with the town’s first film shows. The first cinema stood at the corner between Chapel Street and Swan Street - in fact, the demolition of the Swan public house made way for the Electric Theatre. That first cinema was replaced by the Savoy Cinema in 1935, and is now a nightclub.