Memories of Smallfield

WW2

When I was about 5 years old I remember my mum picking me up from Smallfield school on her bike, I was in the back on a little seat when a doodlebug roared overhead, and the engine switched off ... My mum panicked, and pushed me off the bike behind a wall, we heard the bang towards Gatwick airport. We then continued the journey home. My dad later said the doodlebug went over our farm - Triddles Farm - and it went over Redehall Road and crashed into the ground beyond. I also remember the bombs being dropped on Gatwick, a series of them. The bombs went around the village, the holes were all over the farmland. From Horne to Smallfield, and north to south just missing Smallfield, just missing the farm, leaving huge holes. Around that time a landmine landed near Horley church.

The Smallfield Brickyard

I was born at 1 Kings Cottages in April 1931. I have two brothers, and as young boys we were close friends of the late Gerald Mitchel. Gerald's mum, nee Doris King, lived with her husband (Syd, who served with the RAF) in what was then called Brickyard Cottages. Their next door neighbours were the Gunn family. I have so many fond memories of our days spent playing, climbing on the brick kilns, swimming in the ponds (which must have been filled in in order to build houses), and adventures in the woods. The woods at that time were across the field from the brickworks. I recall the names of some of the brickmakers, there was one job, which had the title of 'OMICA', I think that's how it would have been spelled. The brickmaking work ceased, I believe, at the onset of war in 1939. There was a well-worn path past the brickmaking sheds and on through the woods which lead to the Ebenezer Chapel. I have so many tales to tell about those days. I am sure it must be well documented, the time the houses in New Road got bombed. I worked for A K & S, (Alfred King & Son), the firm of builders and undertakers, as a plumber's mate until Mr Henry King (Alfred's son) died, in I think 1948, it was there I met and worked with Reuben Pocock, Peter's dad. I knew Peter of course. I am hoping to publish a book with the many accounts of 'goings on' in the village, some funny, some sad, but all wonderful, the place where I spent my very happy childhood and teen years.
In 1953 I married my sweetheart and moved down to Devon, where we lived until 1979 when we emigrated to Australia. Please feel free to send emails as I feel I have so many memories to share.
I hope it's OK to include my email address:  ach13@tadaust.org.au
Thanks, Peter and Janet

Kingsmead

I was born in Horne but we moved into Smallfield when I was about 10 years old. The first two bungalows we lived in were built by my dad - Peter Pocock. They were called 'Pandora' and 'Saran'.
In Smallfield we lived at 10 Kingsmead. I remember that the shops shut at 5 o'clock and on Wednesday afternoons and that the paper shop only opened for a few hours on a Sunday for the papers. If you wanted chocolate or cigarettes after they closed there were a couple of machines on the shop wall. I do not remember them ever being vandalised for their contents. My dad would always fancy a bar of Dairy Milk after Sunday lunch and we would go down the shops on our bikes to get him a bar from the machine.
A group of us from Kingsmead used to spend hours on our bikes, riding around the lanes and going down the 'rec' to play 'The Man from Uncle', as I recall I was always the damsel in distress who had to be rescued.
I recall one year when the road flooded and the goldfish from an old lady's pond were seen swimming down the pavement. I also recall 'conkering' along by Smallfield Place - those conkers were enormous!
My mum and dad are both still alive (Peter and Janet Pocock) and they now live in Herefordshire.

Brickmakers Factory - New Road?

I don't suppose anybody knows anything of the Brickmakers Factory and the brickmakers' cottages in New Rd c1930, the cottages were built around 1929 I believe? I was told this about 10 years ago and I have not yet met anyone that can confirm this info. I was told that there was a factory at the end of the road and the brickmakers lived in the cottages...

Kings builders

I started school in Smallfield in 1934. In those days there were bucket lavatories. The sewer was laid in 1938 and then most of Smallfield was able to do away with the buckets. There were 3 teachers, Miss Kempshall who came from Betchworth on a 250cc Panther, Miss Cottle who had attended the school and became a teacher (she ran the Cubs as well) and Miss Power. There were only about eighty children untill 1939 when lots of evacuees came from London. We were then crowded out and some had to sit on the floor. In 1940 I moved to Horley School. We were taken in a coach, and I remember having to get into the ditch with an air raid going on above.
Alfred King & Son were fairly large building firm in Plough Road, established in 1856 and finished in 1952. Most families had someone who did or had worked for Kings. My grandfather worked as a bricklayer, my father and myself as plumbers. I started there in 1945, having worked at Eades in Horley. Some of the names I remember are Fred Coutes, Bert Howick, Perce Brown, Ron Stiller, carpenters Fred Harman, Rubin Pocock, his son Peter, Stan Jenner, bricklayers Jack Tozer, Gerald Attwater, Tony Harper, myself and father, plumbers Maurice Slater, undertaker Arthur Harman, lorry driver E Wright, H Wright, P Wickens, G Langdridge, A Stringer, G Harris, painters G Shirley, W Northeast, labourers. These are just some of the names I can remember.

Mr Henry King lost his only son after a motor cycle crash in 1931, he had room built on the back of the house and kept him embalmed in there until he died in 1950, then they were both interred in the family vault.                                      

Smallfield

Does anyone remember the mobile library that was parked near the parade of shops? I think there is a house on the land where it used to park.
I have memories of hanging my beret up on my named peg; my double-breasted dark blue rain coat two times bigger then me; the boys trying to pull me over the yellow line to the boys playground; the huge black spider webs in the outside toilets; the hopscotch on the floor of the girls' playground; walking two by two down to the village hall for dinner; being made to eat roast potatoes and ending up in tears; being in a play at the school dressed in pyjamas? Mr Johnson, ahhh, he looks like my dad now. I remember my dad taking me across to the playing fields for the swing and the slide, and me with my friends, sitting on the wall of Orchard Road. Would we allow 6 year olds to do that now? Ialso remember playing in New Road around the (I think) Conservative Club; the light going off at the top of Orchard Road; the sweety shop on the corner, which was always a hangout for 8 year olds; the butcher's shop where my mum would never pass on a Tuesday as he slaughtered his own sheep out the back!  Then I moved to the New Town Crawley and stopped saying "I say" at the begining of a sentance. So it then became "OY"!

Childhood bliss

I lived at Triddles Farm and rode my bicycle all the way to school at Redhall Road.  At lunchtime we all had to walk all the way back to the village hall for lunch and all the way back again after. We played marbles in the drains in the playground and slides on the snow in the winter (all against Health & Safety nowadays).  I remember a Mr Joss, one of the teachers, who would rap you over the knuckles if we got anything wrong. I remember learning to knit, and writing with a pen which you dipped into the ink, maypole dancing and school sports day. We cycled for miles around the lanes and must have been away from home for hours. I can't remember any rainy days although there must have been plenty.   

Later on I can remember the youth club in the late 1950s in the hall where we would all get together, and catching the bus to the cinema in Horley. The last bus home was at 10-ish so if we missed that we had to walk.

Wonderful days, wonderful friends. What a shame it had to end.

Mary Rutter (nee Wright)

Boyhood memories

I lived here, Woodside Crescent, from 1958 when I was 2 yrs old to 1967 when our family wanted to see more of the world...so we moved to Horley...oh yes, we got around! Went to school near the village centre and further down Redehall Road. We had walk down to the church hall to have our school dinner. Hartnell's the sweet shop (8 fruit salads for an old penny). The woods seemed vast...gone now. Collecting conkers, hundreds of them, from the trees in Smallfield Place. Walking down to the duckpond with my mum and a slice of bread. She wouldn't stop eating.
The bus-stop near the hospital where there was always mountains of gravel to play in. The ditch where our cat always used to catch the water voles and bring them home. The Cafe opposite the bus stop. My parents always used to send me there to get their fags...Players untipped....was it allowed? No motorway then. The recreation ground. Just a couple of swings, a slide and a roundabout but to us, it was like Thorpe Park.
My most vivid memory is school.....walking to school in the summer. No blazers. Hazy early morning sunshine as all the kids walked up Redehall road in complete safety...hardly any cars on the road.