You are here:
Ruardean Hill
Ruardean Hill maps
Historic maps of Ruardean Hill and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Ruardean Hill maps
Ruardean Hill photos
We have no photos of Ruardean Hill, although we do have photos of these nearby places:
Mitcheldean| Cinderford| Lydbrook| River Wye| Littledean| Welsh Bicknor| Longhope| Flaxley| Forest Of Dean| Weston Under Penyard| Goodrich| Soudley| Newnham| Berry Hill| Christchurch| Ross-On-Wye| Symonds Yat| Huntley| Wilton| Parkend| Coleford| Whitchurch| Blakeney| Brampton Abbotts| Peterstow| Newland| Newent
Ruardean Hill area books
Displaying 1 of 13 books about Ruardean Hill and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Ruardean Hill
No memories of Ruardean Hill have been shared yet - be the first!
Add your memory of Ruardean Hill
or of a photo of Ruardean Hill.
Gloucestershire memories
Living at Wigpool After The War
I lived in Wigpool after the Second World War with my new wife and baby son. There were no proper roads to the village, just mud tracks which became impassable in the winter for vehicles. This meant we had to buy our coal in the summer and store it - if we ran out we had to burn wood. We had no bathroom and no flushing toilet. There was no running water either. We had a well a good couple of hundred yards or so down a track where we filled up our buckets and carried them back to the house. I spent months planting seed potatoes hoping to sell the crop, only for the whole lot to be eaten by sheep. I've written all my memories in a book "Dropped In It" available as a paperback and as an ebook on Amazon.co.uk. It wasn't all bad - the view from the hill was magnificent!
Lion House Youth Hostel 1957
I stayed one night at this hostel in early April 1957. A friend and I had set out from our home town of Reading on a 5 night circular cycle trip - our first such trip. Mitcheldean was our second night's stop, the first being at the then Inglesham hostel north of Swindon. We then went on to hostels at Clifton-on-Teme near Worcester, Broome, Warwickshire and Charlbury, Oxfordshire before returning to Reading. We were only 14 at the time. I can remember little of the hostel at Mitcheldean but the pictures on this site strike a chord. I remember the yard and in the part of the building where we slept the two-tier bunk beds and the sheet sleeping bags we had to take to go between the blankets that were provided - the standard deal at the time. At the time of writing I have just revisited Mitcheldean for the first time since 1957. I could not recall the exact location of the... Read more
Working at Rank Xerox.
As a 16-year-old, I started work in the wages office of Rank Xerox. There were 6 of us in the office, the boss being Fred Pearce. The other colleagues were Roger Dymond, Mary Evans, Connie Waits, Jean Short and myself. The company used to make cine cameras and projectors and was just begininig to make photocopiers. We used the Kalamazoo system for the doing the wages (no computors in those days), everything was done by hand. We spent the week working out what bonuses the workers had made and transfering the data onto their clock cards. The day I liked the best was a Friday when the cash was delivered, the door locked, then we spent the morning making up the wage packets. In the afternoon I would have to go around to all the departments and hand out the wages. There was a small shoe shop in the village of Mitcheldean and I would love to go there and choose shoes. The owner was good enough to... Read more
My Time in Mitcheldean in The 60s
I met my first wife - she was from Mitcheldesn - she also worked for Ranks in the office, her name was June Cowmeadow. Her Father was a polisher at the same factory - Bert Cowmeadow - during the early 60s. I have such a lot of happy memories of the area trips to Cinderford and all through the Forest of Dean. I was living in Pontshill at the time and rode my Lambretta scooter to see my girlfriend. We both are now remarried and live in Perth, Western Australia.
Stepping Back in Time
It started when my mother was dying, when we asked her about the family history, and she gave us names and dates. Her family came from France in late 1500. They were Hugenots and they were Puritans, and were chased out of France because of their beliefs. They went to live in Gloucester, where they helped to rebuild the church in Taynton St Lawrence. We went to visit the church and it was the most exciting thing to experience. All our early ancestors are buried down the aisle of the church. One could not be found - the last one - so when we went and spoke to a man who was writing about our ancestors (she had written a book), and they confirmed we had the right family. His name was Douglas J Parker. He wrote the story of the two churches, the old and the rebuilt one. He told us they were looking for the last to be buried there and how they came to find her.
Let... Read more
Cinderford Square
I was born in Cinderford in 1962 and lived there until the mid 1980s. Through my childhood the town centre around the Square (now called the Triangle!) was busy and prosperous with all sorts of shops, my favourites being Woolies for my huge Airfix collection and James (now Merretts) for comics, toys and Standard fireworks. It's sad to see the town centre run-down now, my mum and sister still live there. However I accept it was partly due to me and many friends from that generation moving away to get jobs that directly contributed towards this, Catch 22 I guess. I moved as my job at Ranks (Xerox) was in doubt, they'd just started running this main local employer down, my friends had to move to get teaching jobs. We all still have family living local though and really enjoy occasional get togethers in our old local, The Miners. The shops in the centre of this pic behind the War Memorial (still there of course) were demolished in perhaps... Read more
Boyhood Memories
I have great memories of Cinderford [Bilson Green areas] from 1953 to 1961 when I was growing up. I remember riding go-carts down the hill. My mother was born in Cinderford [Margaret Hale, married name Hancox and she worked at Rosedales]. My grandfather was Milce Hale. This is a great site that brought back memories now that I live in Lake Wales, Florida, USA. If anyone remembers my parents or myself, it would be great to hear from you. Phil
