Evacuee In Bason Bridge

A Memory of Bason Bridge.

My mother and I lived in a cottage opposite the pub, Rose Cottage, which is not there now - I believe the site is now someone's garage. I was born in 1940 and am not sure what age I was in Bason Bridge but I do remember being told that I was to keep away from the river or "Old Man River" would get me. I remember looking through the balustrade of the bridge watching children playing on the banks and wondering why Old Man River didn't 'get' them, he only wanted me. It certainly kept me away from the river though! I remember the road was white, not tarmaced as now. The farmer up the road didn't like evacuees but his wife was very kind - when he went to market, she used to put pieces of paper under the hedges where the chickens had laid eggs, so my mother could find them. He was never to know! Apparently, when we first went there (my grandmother and two of my aunts were also living in Bason Bridge in other cottages, one next to the post office), my mother was terrified by the noise of bombers dropping bombs (the family had been bombed out in London) - only to discover it was the noise of the wooden skittle balls rolling down the alley in the pub opposite and hitting the skittles! She had never heard that before. I can remember going blackberrying in the fields and mushrooming with my grandmother. It seemed to me to be permanent summer and I have loved the countryside ever since.