Westward Ho! memories
Here are memories of Westward Ho! and the local area. You can start now: Add your own Memory of Westward Ho! or a Westward Ho! photo.
Holidays
I lived in Bideford from 1944 till 1947 when we moved back to London, but I spent every Easter and summer holiday back in Bideford and nearly every day at the beach in Westood Ho!. Such happy times spent there.
Happy Days
My father was in the Home Guard during the Second World War, and we three children spent our school holidays with him at Westward Ho!. My sister says we travelled to Bideford and then by gas bus to Westward Ho!. Daddy had a flat in the old naval officers school. We spent glorious days on the beach, although you could only use part of it, because it was mined. Sometimes a siren went off, and we would have to run home and open the windows when they were exploding a mine, this was to prevent the windows shattering. There was a swimming pool built in the rocks, which is still there. The tide would go out for miles, and people often lost the clothes they left on the beach as the tide swept in so swifly and caught them unawares. A firework factory blew up one day, and the fire was horrendous with fireworkds going off and loud explosions. We stood on the balcony of our flat and watched for... Read more
Memories of Devon
Burrough House
My grandparents lived here from the 1960s until 1998, living in the flat. We used to spend our summer holidays here and had great fun!
Abbotsham School In The 1960's
Growing up at Fairy Cross, Alwington and as our village school had closed in the late 1950s we had to catch the school bus daily morning and afternoon to Abbotsham Primary School. (Shown in the centre back of the picture next to St Helens Church). I started in 1963 in the "little ones class" of the two roomed school. Mrs Elston was my first teacher there and she had also taught at Alwington School before it closed - Miss Ball was the headmistress throughout my time there. I can remember the outside boys toilet block in the playground (no flushing then) before they were replaced later in the decade and also there was an old victorian cloakroom (never used by us then - complete with all the hooks and very dusty and dirty because nobody went in there but we could look in through the locked gates) and after one summer holiday break we came back and found that Miss Ball had a new office thanks to the old cloakroom... Read more
Childhood Holidays in Fairy Cross
This photo has brought back so many memories of when I had my summer holidays in the last house before the white houses. There was a gate to the side of the house which lead into a large garden where my grandad grew veg and fruit, and the chickens from the farm behind walked around the garden. I loved to play in the sheds in the garden and pick the peas for dinner. The days would be filled going down to Westwood Ho beach and the swings by the big sea wall; building up all the pebbles so it makes a wind break, and not to forget the icecream which was to die for. Fantastic times! That cottage and surrounding area is so magical and relaxing. My grandparent's names were Fred Cousins and Stella Cousins and her sister was Helen. But it's great to see all this again - I wish I could go back.
Family Connections.
This picture was actually taken in the early 1960's and later turned into a postcard. The man on the motorbike is my late father, John Ridd, who was a local farm manager at the time. The motorbike by the way is a BSA Bantam - he was the only person in the village who had one like it!
My Many Walks to And From Abbotsham 1957
At the side of the Post Office is a single track lane that leads to the cliffs, half a mile along the lane past the farm was a large thatched cottage named "Rixlade". In 1957 our father Major William (Bill) Hay was stationed as O.C. at Fremington camp near Barnstaple, from our home town of Aldershot in Hampshire. As a southern townie from the London commuter belt moving to the quiet but beautiful south western village of Abottsham, in a cottage almost at the cliff edge over looking the sea, was kind of lost on a eighteen year old teenager with girls on his mind. Bearing in mind in those days of fewer motor cars, the only car in our family belonged to the head of the house, and the fact there were only two buses a week, one Wednesday and one Friday, from the village to Bideford. My feet soon learnt to pace out the three miles from the cottage to the bus stop in Bideford to catch the bus to my... Read more
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