St. Marys Street

A Memory of Bridgnorth.

I was sent to Bridgnorth at the age of 5 from our home in Birmingham to stay with my aunt and uncle (Doris and Arthur Howse) during 1942 due to the bombing in Birmingham.
We lived in St Marys Street, about 100 yards down from High Street on the right, where an alley ran to a yard alongside a bakery. Our house was on the left hand side of the alley opposite the bakery and my cousin and I enjoyed ginger bread men given to us by the baker, the only drawback was the cockroaches scuttling everywhere, but I loved it there.
I went to the local school for 2 years, and never forget the American airmen whose jeeps we used to chase, shouting 'got any gum chum'? We found them generous and they threw us chewing gum and oranges.
There was a pear tree in the yard at the back, and the remains of a piggery, which my cousin and I used as a den, and against which I have a photograph of the two of us. Upon a visit in 2002 we posed against the remaining piggery wall for a picture in the same position, which shows some paint on the wall which was there 60 years previous.
We attended St, Leonards, went on rowing boats from a yard and tearoom by the bridge, and remember little shops opposite our house run by a blind man.
My cousin's new born sister died just after birth and is buried in the cemetery, and a place called The Rock sticks in my mind, but why I dont know.
I returned home in 1944 but since that day I have been in love with Bridgnorth and still would like a little place there. (I know it has been developed since).
Anyone remember the bakery? I cannot recall its name, but somewhere I have the names of neighbours and school friends which I will forward when I find them.

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