POST OFFICE

I was born in Hereford in 1952 to Roland S G Hodges and Doreen his wife. I have fond memories of Kings Caple and Fawley. My grandmother ran the village post office for nearly 40 years right up to decimalization. She ran her Post Office from an old wooden greenhouse in the garden at Bridge House, Fawley and used to trundle up and down the garden path from the house a good fifty feet away and unlock door to serve whoever, during the day stamps, postal orders etc plus fags used to be left in this greenhouse all day and never was she robbed. At night everything was marched into the house. In the early 1960s she and my grandfather moved up the hill to Upper Penault. Edith Hodges died in 1979 aged 87 and Arthur her husband died 11yrs earlier in 1968 aged 77, an agricutural worker at Poulston Farm.
The mail used to get to Fawley in the early days from Hereford - Ross or Gloucester Stations - until the introduction of mail van service.
I met a lady last September, a Dorri Preece, who told me she used to collect the mail from nan's Post Office and deliver all round the village on her bike. Dorri still lives in her cottage at Selleck Boat.
When decimal currency came in the Post Office was taken over by a Mrs Marleen Pember I believe, at the Lion pub. This I believe lasted only 8years and now the nearest Post Office is Hoarwithy, a good 3 miles away.
Many happy days were spent in Fawley and Kings Caple as it's now known, playing with the Bellamy children and the Brook children on the farms at Upper Penault and Lower Penault. You felt safe, everybody knew you and looked out for you.
When I go back not a lot has changed except the people have grown older and wiser, but sadly the outsiders are creeping into the village and doing their utmost to take over and change a beautiful little village into the 21st century instead of leaving them alone. Now the local kids are having to move away which is a shame as they can't afford to live there. The railway has gone, so has the pub, and post office.
I am proud to have ancestral links with this remarkable village and vow one day when money permits to move there, not to take over but keep up the old traditions.
Andrew Nicholas Hodges, Hereford.