You are here:
Petworth
Petworth maps
Historic maps of Petworth and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Petworth maps
Petworth area books
Displaying 1 of 24 books about Petworth and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Petworth
Displaying a selection of personal
memories of Petworth.
Add your memory of Petworth
or of a photo of Petworth.
Petworth Mill
My grandparents Hylands live in the millhouse at Petworth. When I was a child, after moving from a farm at Sutton my grandad Bill worked for the mill driving a flour lorry and nan Olive used to sell tickets to men wnting to fish along the the river. I loved staying there, trying to catch fish in the big millpond with our nets. I remember the millpond used to swell and come up over the road, sandbags were put up to stop it going into the cottage. There was a man who lived in a caravan a bit further down from the mill cottage, I used to think it strange he would empty a bowl into the millpond every morning, lol. When Nan and Grandad moved in there wasn't a bathroom and we had to go down a corridor at the back to use the loo, a wooden seat with a hole in it, and chamberpots at night, until a bedroom was turned into a bathroom. I remember roaming the... Read more
West Sussex memories
The Old Bakery
The building in the distance is the old bakery. When I was a child/teenager (in the 1960s) my grandparents (Bert and Annie Hurd) lived in a cottage just behind where this picture was taken, and whenever we visited them we would go down to the bakery to see their friends Mr and Mrs Shoubridge (and Joyce Gumbrill who ran it and the little shop. Mr Shoubridge used to bake fresh bread daily in the oven which was heated by burning bundles of small branches called faggots. Then the ashes were raked out and the bread/cakes were baked in the oven by the residual heat. My memory says that one of the houses on the right of the picture was occupied by one Dr Death, but I cannot swear to that.
Mother's Memory
Thinking that my mother always lived in and around Kidderminster, I was surprised to discover her mother had died in West Sussex. I did some research and found Mum and her siblings attended Tillington school. The school register was interesting reading, on 22 September 1927 the school nurse visited and Frances (my mum) and her sister Edith were sent home for having dirty heads. I remember Aunt Edith and Mum telling me they were sent home because they had nits and the walk home was up a big hill and it took ages to get home. My mum was 8 and her sister 10, not somthing we would do today. It does seem strange that nits are reported in the school register but not their mother's death 4 weeks later. Their mother died in the workhouse, Budgenor Lodge, Easebourne.
Swan Hotel Corner
I nearly died here when I was seven years old - over-excitement on the cusp of our holiday on IOW. An errand for a quarter of ham from the village shop, and dodgy brakes, led me to come down the hill from Picknells, the shop at the top of the hill above the Swan corner and to emerge from the blind corner created by the hotel across the main road without stopping. I coincided there with Mrs Morley Fletcher who was moving probably at 20 mph in her grey A30, so I was saved. [more later... I bet you can't wait!]
H N Hussey
My husband inherited a watercolour of a barn entitled 'Fittleworth 1882' by the artist named above - it could read Hry N Hussey for Henry - but not clear. We wondered whether anyone could shed any light
1950's
In 1956 we lived in Fittleworth (Orchard House) while I attended Midhurst Grammar School. I could listen to the church clock chime the hours if I woke up at night.
I would like to hear from anyone who was there then.
David Morris
Victoria, B.C.
Canada
1950''s
My friend & I used to make camps in the top room of the old mill - health & safety didn't seem to exist then! Groups of us also spent days swimming in the river, having first collected egg sandwiches from the Swan. We even once made our own raft (or the boys did) on which we were subsequently photographed by George Garland, a noted local photographer.
