Our Wonderful Kingskerswell

Born and bred in Kerswell along with my 3 sisters and brother we were (are) the Nelson family of Carswells. Our mum Joan moved to Kerswell at the age of 3 months and was brought up in the bungalow of Resthaven on the Newton road behind Witpot Mill. She told us of the stories of the bombs hitting Newton and the troops in Torquay and Denbury camps from which she met her husband Gordon. They met in the Bradley pub in Newton Abbot, now the Jolly Farmer, and they would dance at the Courtney resturant, where Peacocks is now, as well as the 400 Club in Torquay. We first lived in Coles Lane next door but one to the Park Inn, ran by Des & Dot Hern and where cream cakes and fish & chips were served by their son Jimmy Hern. Other families from the estate were the Pughs and Blameys, Ray & Urines, the Howards & Giggs, the Giletts, Robbins, Williams and the Brays, the Moons and Evans, Daniels and Harleys and Tozers and Browns and Bullys and Parnells to name just a few. All of these above are one big family, a bond that can NEVER be broken... Starlight the donkey often used to get treats from the pinched bread from Milverton's pig farm. I remember beating the bounds with Mrs Horn and the Sunday school, through the downs and into the ajoining villages, even camping out at Compton windmill with a discarded loo pan to make our camp fire in. Every season gave us as children something to eat or do as we spent hours away from home with no fear of strangers! Everyone was called Auntie & Uncle. The old school was both mine and my mother's, the air raid shelters oppostite. With the smelly cow sheds the other side before Rosehill Gardens was built and the old haunted house where the doctor's surgery now stands. Birds bakery and the hairdressers along with the post office and the wool shop/flower shop and my favourite (because she sold sweets) Beer's? shop (where the Fore Street car park is now) up the steep steps into the dark shop that was an Aladdin's Cave of goodies. Vernalls camping site at Brookador, there has been so many changes...