Ide Hill memories
Here are memories of Ide Hill and the local area. You can start now: Add your own Memory of Ide Hill or a Ide Hill photo.
Early Years
My father was born in Ide Hill and, when he left school, worked as delivery boy for Pierce's shop. That's how he met my mother, delivery goods to the large house Emmets, where she was a housemaid. When, eventually, I was born we lived about a mile outside the village, beside Sundridge Hospital, or The Union as it was known as then. In the autumn of 1945 I took my first, faltering, steps in my education at Ide Hill C of E school. Stayed there until moving to Westerham Secondary Modern School in 1951. After that I joined the Navy, then in 1967 came to Northern Ireland where I have lived since. It has been many years since I was home but the memories of growing up in that lovely area of Kent stay with me.
Memories of Kent
Early Years
From birth until I joined the Royal Navy, at 15 years of age, I lived in a very rural area about a mile outside of Sundridge. The cottage we lived in was about 1/2 way between Sundridge and Ide Hill, very near Sundridge Hospital. It had the, almost, unbelievable name of New Batney Brooms. We were surrounded by open farmland and woodland so I spent the school summer holidays running around these ideal play grounds. Ah what memories!
Manor Road
I was 8 yreas old when my father was killed in London and my mum, brother David, and sister Margaret came to live in Sundridge to live with my dad's brother's family in Manor Road. We all attended Brasted School. In my final year (age 14 years) I won a scholarship to Tunbridge Wells Technical College, and as there were no freebies or handouts then, my mother being a widow could not afford to send me! Married and with a daughter we were allocated a new flat in Chapmans Road, to cut a long story short we made a swop with our flat, to guess where! 5 Manor Road where I used to live. Eventually we were able to buy the house, I remarried and moved to Edinburgh for 7 years. After two minor heart attacks and 2 mini strokes we thought it better to move back south and thus finished up at Boscastle, just in time to experience the floods. I now live in Bude. As the saying goes,... Read more
Farleycroft
I was in Farleycroft in the late 1950s. I agree it was a beautiful house with a lovely winding wooden staircase. I didn't go to school in Westerham as I left there when I was 5 to be fostered out, moving to Bromley. I went there once hoping to see the house, but apparently it no longer stands. But I did acquire a photo from Barnardos later. I remember Mrs Gunn too. Kami
Early And Later.
"Come on children, all in the shelter." The air raid siren was the initiator of this quiet but determined order. It meant an enjoyable singing session with (I believe it was) Miss Smith on the old upright. Collecting empty aircraft bullet cases, which had been distributed over Four Elms by the aircraft from Biggen Hill was another wartime occupation. The only serious occurrence was the Doodle Bug that blew the side out of the cricket pavilion, I believe this was on a Saturday morning, because it frightened the two girls that were feeding the school rabbits to death. Born in the village in 1939, the son of Francis and Jack Cole, who lived in Brookfield, I had the luck to be raised in Four Elms, in the most, a one big family village. The cricket field was our teenage growing up club. We learnt to smoke, tell jokes, how to mow a table, and of course how to play cricket. And later when we had reached the correct age, we were introduced... Read more
Our First Home Was in Robyns Way, Riverhead
Elizabeth and I married in 1971 and moved into our first home which we bought together at 21 Robyns Way. From our house we could walk round Pontoise Close and along a path at the edge of a sandpit, past a ramshackle village hall and into this church which we attended frequently. We lived in Riverhead for more than four years and loved the town of Sevenoaks, the local Scout Troop and Cub Pack where we were both leaders, and the Bradbourne Lakes at the end of our back garden. Evntually business took us away from this lovely place and we went to live and work near Glasgow in 1975.
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