When I Was A Boy

A Memory of Stonehouse.

Now a resident and Parish Councillor in Devon the Frith photos of Stonehouse took me instantly back to my early years growing up in the village. Not surprisingly one of my earliest memories is of the celebrations surrounding the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in June 1953. Little did I know then that some 51 years later I would stand before her at Buckingham Palace as she pinned an OBE to my chest. Having spent some time in a Gloucester hospital with TB, I convalesced at Standish then, having recovered somewhat by 1953, by now at the tender age of 7, I was dressed as a court jester along with all the local kids who, standing in drizzling rain, paraded around 'the Rec' behind the High Street and later in a Copner Close decorated in red, white and blue and arranged with a long string of tables laden with party food of the day. As it grew dark I walked up Doverow with my mum to watch as the Beacon Fire was lit, preceded by a torchlight parade through the village and up the hill.
Doverow was also the favourite sledging venue when the winter snow arrived. Hordes of kids would hurtle down the hill from three different directions all trying to avoid going into the bog at the bottom. In the summer the woods at the top were a a great place for playing 'Commandos' or simply sitting around a camp fire roasting potatoes.
Later memories are of working in that shop depicted in the photograph of the High St then known as Wilce's Newsagents, from where, very early each weekday morning, I would deliver the morning papers to the folk who lived around the edge of the 'Rec' in Laburnum Walk, including to the address of my former headmaster at Stonehouse County Primary, Mr Wright, then I would cycle or run to deliver in Ryelands Rd in the upper part of Oldends Lane and then on to school at what is now known as Maiden Hill. Stonehouse even had its own cinema then in Gloucester Road, known as the Regal, where we first saw Richard Todd as Robin Hood and other great post war epics such as The Dambusters. As time moved on and in keeping with the rock n roll mood of the day (early sixties), I found myself leaning against the Juke Box, Coca Cola in hand, in Sid's Cafe or the Trevi Bar (both in the High Street) listening to Apache by the Shadows, dressed in leather jacket and blue jeans where my brothers dubbed me with the nickname, 'James Dean'. Ah those were the days!