St Andrew's Church c1955, Meonstoke
St Andrew's Church c1955, Meonstoke Ref: M304014A
Memories of St Andrew's Church c1955, Meonstoke
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Meonstoke & local memories
Read and share memories of Meonstoke and Hampshire inspired by Frith photos.
Farming at Stocks Farm 1957/58
Ernie Styles and I started work on my stepfather and mother's farm (Patrick and Annette Lawford) when we were both 17 (1957). There was also Reg Whittear (mechanic/tractor driver, John Spreadbury and George Langridge. Bert Tyrell did the pigs. Shep Frampton, who had known Patrick at Lichfield Farm, near Sutton Scotney, must have been in his 80s. He walked up from the village daily and was known to graft roses onto the wild roses in the hedge, on the way up. I helped him with the sheep. Often we made a pen on Peewhit Island, on Tom Parker's boundary. We seemed to be endlessly trimming sheeps' feet. At 17 I was big enough to catch the big Clun ewes for shep in the hurdle pens. A few years earlier I had been helping shep and one of the hurdles next to me was pushed over by the ewes wanting to make their escape, they hadn't cared that I was actually under the hurdle as they scrambled over me. Any sheepdog... Read more
My Old School
I went to Meonstoke School in 1976, soon after moving back to Hampshire from Cornwall. We lived for a while with my Gran Tricia Howe at Govers Cottage, who still lives there today! The School always smelt of Germolene!
Meonstoke And Its Surrounding Farmland
There are many people better qualified than I to write about Meonstoke, but this photo evokes memories of the Cooke's, who ran the village shop with cheerful kindness and where we shopped for essentials - and particularly for sweets which we took back to school in a biscuit tin (I have written about it here http://lawfordherry.blogspot.com/2007/11/st-ronans.html/). Opposite were (and still are) the quintessential Meonstoke family, the Biggs's and their magnificent thatched barn, scene of Christmas carol parties for over forty years - and below the village shop were the Harders - Paul and Anna- who I think were Danish. Below them was a house lived in by the Lushingtons - Betsy, Jane and John. And below that, Miss Apps ran a small private school. The Manor House stoood opposite below the Biggs's barn, and was lived in for a time by my cousin Ruth and her husband John Howard.
Some of this is mentioned in my Archive where Stocks Farm (signed from the triangle at the top of... Read more
Main Rd - Hill House
These are not really memories although I do remember my father talking a lot about Meonstoke with affection.
I have 2 old postcards and 2 old photos. The photos are of the building (I understand it was a Post Office at some date) in the picture above but when it was a private house. According to family tradition it was called Hill House and was built by William Cooper one of my ancestors. I do not know if that was true.
I do know from research that in the 1840s one William Cooper lived at Church Cottage while in the 1860s Mary Cooper (widow of one of the 3 Williams) and some of her children were living in Church Rd. She was a cordwainer (boot/shoe maker) as was her husband.
The younger William, her son was living at Gavdiff/Cardiff House at this time but I don't know where that was.
In the 1870s this younger William was living in Hill House with his wife... Read more
