My Early Days At Stokesby

A Memory of Stokesby.

Ruby Gowen born Stokesby 1933 now known as Elizabeth Robinson.
Among my early memories is being taken “down the Ferry” to see the steamship the Queen of the Broads go by. First in the distance the smoke would appear and gradually get closer until eventually the whole craft would come into view as it rounded the bend in the river. Then would come the excitement of waving to the people on board and having them wave back. My Dad, Bertie Gowen who was born in 1902, told me how he and the other local boys would dive into the river to collect coins thrown to them by the passengers of this same craft, which I understand was launched in 1889. It was still in service in the 1950s when I enjoyed taking my children to enjoy the experience that had so delighted me. My father, my grandfather and my great-grandfather were born in Stokesby. As yet that is as far as I have got in researching my family history. My Dad told me that as a young lad he would go with my grandfather in a horse and cart to Breydon Water, to cut reeds. My mother was born in Acle, but moved to Stokesby when she married my Dad in 1933, and remained there well into her nineties. She lived to celebrate and enjoy her hundredth birthday.
Other memories of “going down the Ferry” included sitting on the low wall fronting the bowling green, eating Smith’s crisps while my Dad played bowls. I remember, too, sitting with my mother and her friends under the large sycamore tree where now there is car parking, when war was declared.
On Saturday nights we used to go across the green to the small shop kept by the Smith family, where we would buy among other things the week’s supply of Corona drink, and Double Six chocolate bars. As we crossed the green on winter nights, searchlights would be sweeping the sky. Often we would see a plane caught in their beam, and would know from the sound of its engine whether or not it was one of ours. The German planes had a much heavier, laboured sound.
When I got together with some friends recently, all of whom are the same age as me give or take a year, we recalled the meat pies that were given out during the war, one for each household in the village. “Thursday afternoons” two of us recalled. We all agreed that we had found them delicious in that time of food shortage.
Throughout my childhood my aunt, Emma Gowen, kept the post office in her cottage on the smaller area of green. Further down the street was the butcher’s shop owned by the Cumby family, and next to this a small shop run by Mrs Earle whose husband has his blacksmith premises next door. I remember buying Birds custard powder from Mrs Earle, as well as such items as aspirin and hairnets.
We lived in a cottage half way up The Hill. At the top of the hill was a slaughterhouse, from where the squealing of pigs could sometimes be heard. I think this disappeared when the council houses were built.
I remember, too, the hut of Roly Starkings the shoemaker down at the school end of the village, next door to the garage. While he trimmed and fixed soles in place, the shoemaker would chat to the village men who congregated there. Thus it was sometimes referred to by local people as The Gossip Shop.
These are just a few of my memories of Stokesby. On my most recent visit I drove into the village, parked by the river for a while to enjoy the scenery, then carried on to the churchyard. Then I drove back through the village. In my mind’s eye I was seeing we children playing rounders on the village green, and the women of the village chatting in companionable groups as they went to and fro between the various shops. In reality in all this time I saw just one person. It is so sad to see a village dying like this.

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