My Young Days At Catherington

A Memory of Catherington.

MY YOUNG DAYS AT CATHERINGTON, RANDELLS COTTAGE, LINKHORN

Born in 1942 in Cornwall, my early years of school were at Clanfield. My holidays were spent at my grandmother’s house at Randells Cottage, my father was in the R.A.F and our family moved from Cornwall into a small house on the causeway. In those days the field opposite was used for the local fete, later it was moved to Catherington in the field beside the Farmers Inn. I remember that when my dad got posted to Egypt in 1950 mum had organized a party for my two sisters and me it was held in the old shed in the field next to the Farmers Inn once used by the Home Guard, all the family of my uncles and aunties came with my cousins, the day after we set off to Egypt from Southampton docks on the ship 'Empire Orwell'.

When I used to go to my gran's it was a long walk up Catherington Lane, especially at night with bats flying across the road and very little street lights, with my hand holding tight to my gran's it was really quiet, only the sound of my gran's walking stick tapping on the road, by the time we reached the corner of Crouch Lane we could see home through the field at the bottom of the cottage, by the time we reached the three steps leading to the house we could hear the accordion being played, by Peter I expect.

My mum came from a large family of brothers and sisters, 14 in all. During my spare time at my gran's only my uncles Peter, Jim, Bert and Frank were living there, it was some time later that Peter and Jim got married at Catherington church.
In Christmas 1958 my granny passed away, a big sad loss for me. This left my two uncles in Randells Cottage, in 1956 they both then moved into Tudor Cottage, the one next to the blacksmiths, in 1989 my uncle Bert Linkhorn was the oldest resident of Catherington and along with Charmian May unveiled the new Catherington Wheel beside the village pond. Uncle Bert passed away in 1991 and Frank then moved into Wisteria Lodge in Horndean, he passed away in 2003.

Although Randall’s Cottage has been sold and changed over the years I remember it as my holiday home with the old tin water butt outside the back door, the small gateway which led into the field at the side of the cottage where a old buster turf vehicle stood the toilet at the bottom of the garden. Across the other side was my Uncle Frank's chicken shed, it was his pride and joy, and Uncle Bert's shed where he kept his ferrets, he would often take me out on the downs with his gun and ferrets to get the Sunday rabbit, he was well known by all the landowners far and wide. Most of his life he worked at Hinton Farm. He was also part of Catherington Home Guard along with my Uncle Charlie who lived down on Lovedean Road in the thatched cottage which still stands today.

August time was always busy on the farms, my highlight of the day was riding on Uncle Jack's tractor and the combined harvester, sometimes running behind to catch the little rabbits that used to hide in the rows of spent straw. Another time was when I used to go potato picking up at Hinton Farm with all my aunties and their children, this did manage to raise a bit of pocket money to spend at Catherington post office when Granny and myself would go to collect her pension and I would decide which to get with my pennies and farthings, sweets or buns.

On the way back we would often call at the Farmers Inn for a lemonade and a bag of crisps, me making sure that I did not eat the small blue bag of salt. The Farmers Inn also was the place where I had my haircut, I didn’t mind, Iused to get a free drink of pop.

Summertime was great, always lots to do. The highlight was Catherington Show in August which was held beside the Farmers Inn, the old shed was used a village hall for the day, there were lots of stalls, games etc. Uncle Jim and his brothers would try and win the pig by bowling down wooden skittles, Jim would often win on darts. Uncle Peter was a very good shoot with a gun later when I was about 10 he taught me to use a 12 bore shotgun.

My holiday mornings would start getting ready to run down the path towards the road and wait for Charlie Sheppard the local milkman delivering his milk round by horse and cart, I would stand on the top step by the gate and he would hand me grannie's milk order and Mrs. Merrell’s milk, shouting back to gran "See you later". Then I would dash back down the path and join him on his round delivering milk and bread/eggs around Catherington houses and many times letting me take control of his horse, not that the horse needed guiding, he knew every stop all around the area.

My uncles always had cycles which they used to go to work on. Peter would go to Howe’s garden centre towards the causeway, Uncle Bert had a much harder and longer ride over to Hinton Manor Farm and Frank over to the garden centre on Waterlooville Road. There were always lots of spare parts of bikes in the outhouse, this also served as washroom where I used a long tin bath to scrub down. After collecting bits of bike I built one up, it wasn’t complete, only one front brake, but I did manage to travel around in the fields. My first trip was down Catherington hill toward Lovedean to where my Auntie Florence and Uncle Charlie lived with Linda their daughter, ,my cousin, she would often come up to grannie's and spend some time there and when ready to go home we would set off back to her house on this home-made bike. On reaching the long steep downhill run I would shout to Linda who was sitting on the crossbar "Get ready to pull the piece of string attached to the front brake if we are going too fast", care-free, we always seemed to get to the bottom ok. Reaching a speed about 25 miles or more, on arriving at her house my auntie would give me an apple or two and I would set off back home along Frogmore Lane towards Catherington Lane, this was quite a flat part of going home to grannie's, I did not fancy pushing the bike all the way up that long hill.

I was very close to my Uncle Bert, spending time going around with him when he went out shooting. He would show me where the best blackberries and hazelnuts were, he also could find the first primrose and violet, once he showed me a blackbirds' nest, sitting on it was a pure white one, to this day I have never seen another. Taking home to Gran's a large basket of blackberries, she would make up a pie and rabbit stew for Sunday lunch, this was my favourite.

On Monday morning Bert would set off to go to work up at Hinton Farm. I would sit on the crossbar, I felt much safer because this bike had good brakes, unlike my home-made one with string for brakes. On reaching the farm the first job was to let the cows out to the fields. I would walk behind them with my little hazel walking stick that Bert had made for me from a root of a hazel tree, it's funny how things get lost or mislaid because when Granny passed away in 1953 I never knew that all that time my Auntie Margaret had retrieved it from the cottage when it was cleared out, about two years before she too had passed away I went to visit her and she gave me the walking stick back, she remembered that Ialways treasured it, I still have it today after all those years gone by.

My Auntie Margaret Linkhorn, my mum's oldest sister, always liked picnics and we all would set off to the south downs behind Uncle Bert’s cottage. Sometimes we would go to the fields behind the church. She was the only person to have a camera, a box brownie, so what pictures I have given to me by her and mum are much treasured.
Next door to granny lived Mrs. and Mr. Merrell, both getting on with age, at that time she was a kind old lady and when I went to see her she often gave me a nice piece of gooseberry pie .Mr. Merrell's garden was on the right side of the garden with a path running down the middle, Granny’s was on the left, both had at the bottom of the garden a toilet and wood shed. When Mr. Merrell wasn’t looking I would go to the bushes and pick a few gooseberries until I heard him coming down the path with his brown spats, I could hear the sound of his studded boots marching on the gravel stones, this was my time to leg it over to Gran's side and hide in the shed, although looking back I suspect he did know but never minded me.
John Merrell still lives in Horndean, he is the grandson.

my email is chris.wisewood3@btinternet.com