Postwar Childhood In Knypersley

A Memory of Knypersley.

Born in 1940 at Tunstall Rd, I spent hours of my childhood at the edge of Cowlishaw Walker's pool, reached through our neighbour, Mrs Sargent's garden, which sloped steeply up to the railings round the pool. I only had to put a jam jar among the rocks for a stickleback to swim into it. Pussy willow and hazel catkins hung around the pool and in spring it was a mass of frogspawn. The tiny froglets would find their way down the bank and into our gardens and even into Mrs Sargent's kitchen. I heard that there had been a tragedy in the winter I was born when 2 boys fell through the ice on the pool and one of them drowned.

At school we skipped to a rhyme unique to the area: 'North Staffordshire Railway Loopline! I call number 1'. On the word 'Loopline' the rope was held aloft until the next skipper ran in. Another rhyme was 'I am a girl guide dressed in blue, these are the actions I must do, salute to the king and curtsy to the queen and turn my back on the dirty margarine!

My sister and I and friends had freedom to roam and would walk up to the source of the Trent and paddle in it, once falling over the little waterfall and returning home soaked. Another walk was through the cricket ground and Farmer Brough's field to Mill Hayes then back through the kissing gate and across the field below Knypersley Hall. I remember meadows of wild flowers and we would pick them to take home and identify and press between newspaper, before mounting them on clean white paper, carefully writing the name and family of each one. In spring there were bluebells, wind flowers, and celandines followed by meadowsweet, ladysmock, red clover and so many more.
I remember playing in the footings of the school on Park Lane on which work had stopped during the war. We held our school sports day in the field beside it and dug for pignuts which we rubbed clean before munching.
In the harsh 1947 winter there was a chance to sledge down the hill behind the houses opposite.
Our imaginary games were very involved with fighting the Germans. The air raid shelter across the road and large concrete blocks were physical evidence of the war and rationing was just a normal state of affairs. Nobody had much and people made the best of things. Orange juice and cod liver oil were daily treats and we took sixpence to school to buy a National Savings stamp each week.
I remember seeing the miners on their way home with faces blackened with coal dust. It seems outrageous now that there were no pit baths for such a long time. My father had been a safety officer at BlackBull but sadly died in 1941. We were fortunate to get free coal delivered. It was often dumped in a pile on the footpath outside the miner's house and he had the job of shifting it all again into the coal hole.
I was allowed to help the farmer's daughter, Sylvia Brough deliver milk sometimes. She had a car with the passenger seat removed. In its place was a milk churn with gill and pint measures with curved handles that hung over the edge. Sylvia measured the milk for each household into a can with a wire handle. It was my job to carry this up the path to the doorstep where a jug was waiting with a saucer or cloth over it. Removing the cloth I had to pour the milk into the jug. Too tentative and it trickled down the can. Too eager and it overshot all over the doorstep. When the car wouldn't start Sylvia did the round with the horse and cart which I loved. I hadn't realised then that we were related to the Brough family and Sylvia and I shared Ralph and Ellen Brough who lived at Red Cross farm as ancestors.
Looking back on Knypersley now I realise what a delight it was to grow up there. Friends I remember are Joan Sargent and her brother, Maureen Adams, Pauline Ault, Molly Heath, Margaret Bailey and Eric and Margaret Knight.
As teenagers we had to go to school in Tunstall and were taken there on the school bus. Gradually the ties loosen but the memories are strong.

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