Salfords 1941 1966

A Memory of Salfords.

I was born in 1941. My family lived in Honeycrock Lane, Salfords. The name of the house was "Bethel", later numbered No.17 by the Council. We had a neat clipped hedge to the front garden and a white painted picket gate from Ryall & Edwards, the local timber merchants whose lumber yard was next to Salfords Halt, the railway station. My father came to live in Salfords in the 1930s. His name was Bert Horsnell and he worked as an inspector at the Monotype. During the Second World War he was an Air Raid Warden (like Hodges on "Dad's Army"!). Although quite young, I remember being taken to the air raid shelters during air raids. There were two lots of shelters in the village, one complex situated up the old Monotype Lane and the other one next to the station. I remember VE Day quite clearly. Flags and bunting were put up all along Honeycrock Lane and there was a children's party in a marquee set up on the car park at the end of the parade of shops next to the pillbox on the main road (now long since demolished).

In addition to the shops already mentioned, I remember the Wool Shop run by Miss Lyton, the fish & chip shop, the radio (& laterTV) shop, a hardware shop next to the Vicarage run by a family called May, Ballards the general store cum sub-post office and the hairdressers run by Mrs. Chisholm next to the newsagents which was next to the Village Hall built by the Canadians during the War in Honeycrock Lane.

Salfords was quite rural in those days with farmland all around. There was a lot of wildlife such as rabbits, hares, foxes, pigeons, pheasants, etc. in the fields and woods also deer in Petridge Wood behind the common. I remember "tattie picking" on the Monotype Farm in the school holidays, also the flower and vegetable shows put on in the summer in the Village Hall and by the Monotype Athletic & Social Club.

I did not attend the Village School but I went to Reigate Grammar School later. I was also a member of the 4th Horley (Salfords) Boy Scouts run by Skipper Goodman, the Scoutmaster. My brother was a choir boy at Christ Church. The Vicar was Father Whitlock. We both went to Sunday School there also confirmation classes.

After my father died I left Salfords but members of my family still live in the area.

Robert (Bob) Horsnell

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