Halfway House

A Memory of Great Wakering.

I lived in Halfway House, Common Road, Great Wakering (near Potton Island), from 1957 to 1963. I lived there with my parents, two sisters and three bothers, all older than me.
The primary school was a small red brick building in the middle of the village and the County Secondary school was where the current primary school is now (near the post office).  As we had no lights or brakes on our cycles (not legal) we had to walk to school.  The winter of 1962/63 gave us a brilliant snow storm, and we thought 'great no school today', but my parents insisted we go, so we trailed along in the tracks made by a tractor.  The snow was 6 and 7 foot high in places where there had been drifts, especially along the common.  Once at school, there were just a handful of children who walked in from the village.

Just around the corner from the church was a small shop called Meads, they sold groceries and home made 1d ice lollies, they were wonderful, and the raspberry ones were my favourites.

Opposite the church there was a fish and chip shop, and on a Friday if there was any spare money we would have a treat of 3d worth of chips (about 1p).

Along from there in the main street there was a small paper shop - Goodchilds - we sometimes had a few pennies to spend and would pop in and spend an age choosing sweets.  How they put up with us, heaven only knows.

A couple of doors along was a shop that sold animal food.  As we had dogs, cats, rabbits and chickens we were often in there.  Our main shopping was done at the Co-op just a few doors along, near the fire station and opposite the doctors surgery (Dr. MacCrombie was the GP in those days).  

Mother would send me to the Co-op on a Saturday with a huge shopping list and four shopping bags, (I used my bike for this journey as I couldn't carry the bags).  There were two long counters - one each side of the shop and an office.  The butter, marge, ham, cheese etc was sold on one side of the shop and the tins, packets and soaps were sold on the other side.  Once the list was totalled up I would take it to the office and pay, not forgetting to give mothers divi number - 495330 (something one never forgets!).

There was a wonderful double window shop that sold anything from sweets, toys to knitting wools.  It was owned and run by a little lady Mrs French.  Again we would spend an age in there and most of the time we didn't have a penny, and she knew that we hadn't any, but was very patient with us.

Opposite was the butchers, where mother would ask me to go to on my way home from school to get meat for the next days meal, often it would be two breast of lamb at 9d (about 4p), and at weekends it would be a joint of beef for about 10/- (50p) and that would feed a family of eight.

My father worked on Bentalls farm, there were three farms owned by Mr Bentall.  Halfway House Farm, Little Wakering Hall Farm, and Home Farm at Little Wakering.  These were the days before tractors had arrived at Halfway House Farm, and my father would take the horse and cart down the track to the marshes to feed the cattle during the winter months when there was not any grass for them to eat.  During school holidays, we would ride on the cart with him and throw the mangolds and hay out onto the ground for them.

During the summer the milking cows were put on the marshes to feed the lush grass, and my father had to walk down to collect them, bring them up past the farm, along the sea wall to the Home Farm for milking.  This was done twice a day.  Again our holidays gave me the treat to walk with my father behind the cows to the milking parlour.  We would then walk back home and he would point out the wildlife and show me birds nests, including moorehen nests which are a sight to behold, perched just above the water line.

There were also pigs on the farm and we would help when the sows farrowed, it was part of our sex education, and we never questioned any of the mating of the animals, it was just part of life.

Since leaving the village, I have travelled far and wide, and lived in a number of countries around the world, but my heart has always been in Great Wakering, I would dearly love to come back there to live.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share this part of my life with others.
I have written a number of short stories, and there is one about living in that area.

Heather McPherson (now Heather Babb)

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