Childhood At Stretton Under Fosse

A Memory of Stretton under Fosse.

Hi to all who may read this and maybe remember my family. My father was born in Stretton in 1920 and lived next door to a Granny Coombs in the centre of the village with his mother Niome, father Jack, sisters Doris, Gladis, Elsie, Pat, and Brenda, who sadly died at the young age of 18. The four brothers were Fred, Jack, Ernie (my father) and Jim. Sadly only my father remains at the age of 90.
The only school for them to attend was at Monks Kirby, they had to walk there and back every day. My father can remember the headmaster being a Mr Holden, but what sticks in his mind the most is his mother giving them a tin filled with hot fire embers to put in their pockets to help keep them warm on their way to school. They also only had their breakfast and had to go all day without any food till they got home.
The people he remembers living in the houses around the yard where he lived are the Colins, Mr Emery, Mrs Gefferies, then behind my father's house was the Manse.
On the main street there was only one public house and a post office shop run by a family called the Henleys, it was later run by a Mrs Bradford who I remember as a small child.
My father's first job as a lad was for a Mr Crofts, working in the fields and fetching in the carthorses that had ploughed the fields, he then went into the army when war started.
He came back to the village at the end of the war and went to work at St Paul's College. My mother came to live down at the college, with her family name being Sumner, her father worked also at the college. She met my father and they married in 1949 and had 3 children, Shelia, David,and Micheal. We all had a very happy childhood living in Stretton and stayed there till we moved with our own jobs. Mum and Dad stayed there until he retired in 1987.
My memories are of long sunny summers in the brook with a jam jar catching sticklebacks with my brothers and our friends Christopher and Theresa O'Sullivan who also lived at the college. We roamed for hours in the fields and in the grounds of the college, it was all very safe then.
I can also remember Anns Lane that we used to walk up to get to the fields and the Fosse Way we used to go up and open the gates for the passing cars (as it was then a gated road), sometimes to be given a penny for our trouble or on the rare occasion were asked "Does your mother know you're here?". The answer to that question was always "no".

I remember the Union Jack public house which was run by Jack Asbury and had an original skittle table. I also remember waiting for the school bus on the corner of New Street End where Mr Jackson the blacksmith worked in his forge. My great friend then was Jane Dowson, we had many great adventures together but sadly never kept in touch, are you out there?!
I went to school at the Convent, Monks Kirby, then on to Bishop Wulstan.
I married a Manx Man and we have one son, Jason, and have lived on the Isle of Man for the last 32 years
Shelia Deakin, nee Waudby.

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