The Following Pages Are Transcripts of Conversations That Were Recorded in the Late Eighties. They Record Some of the Details O
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The following pages are transcripts of conversations that were recorded in the late eighties. They record some of the details of life in Hadnall in the twentieth Century along with some of the “characters” of the period. My family used to live at Whitehurst in Astley Lane and later at 25 Shrewsbury Road and lived out there days there. I was born there; I left school on a Friday and started work at Hardwicke stables on the Monday as a groom. Jim Bowdler’s uncle was chauffeur to Mr Bibby; they em- ployed seven chauffeurs and about forty grooms. There were a lot of horses, they were the stables for the North Shropshire Hunt, but the hounds were kept at Lee Bridge. I was there for about four years and then I went to Leicestershire. My father was carpenter on the estate all my life, he made gates and rails. Everybody who left school in Hadnall always went to work on the estate. I should think a least two dozen people worked at the Hall; there were parlour maids, ladies maids, kitchen maids, footmen and also there was about a dozen men in Hardwicke gardens. When I was a youngster I hated horses and steam- rollers, then I left school and went to work at the stables. When I came back from the war, I went to work on Bradley’s van. My mother came from Lancashire, Widnes; my grandparents lived at Acton Reynald Lodge. Father was a bit of a mystery, to tell the truth. I suppose he was a Shropshire man but we never knew where he came from. I remember Moreton at Hermitage Farm; I was chased miles by him for pinching his apples and Williams, before Cecil’s family. Mr Mortimer was the vicar, he left in 1919 and then Mr Lee. He joined the navy as a chaplain when the war started. The two Miss Dones lived in Amstel House. I used to go there quite a lot and they told me tales. There was along path from the gate to the house and one day I saw a steamroller coming down Hadnall Bank and ran into the house shouting “Steamroller, steamroller.” She always used to laugh about that. I went to Hadnall School until I was eleven, Miss Hare taught me; she was a good teacher but she had her favourites. I remember Cis Tudor, we Towards A History of Hadnall Page 1 always called him Potty. He was a wild character. One old character was Jimmy Done; he lived in an old henhouse in Haston. We used to call him Sponger; he was always trying to borrow a halfpen- ny. He chased us kids many a thousand mile. He used to be the chauffeur at the Hall, Hadnall Hall before it was the vicarage. I remember Tommy the dead man, he lodged at Lockleys in Ladymas Lane and they found him dead in the chair two or three times. Then he came to life again. I used to deliver Shrewsbury Chronicles round the village; they dropped them at home about a dozen. George Rhodes was the baker at Bradleys. We lived then at number 26 and I used to help him in the bake house on a Saturday. It was really heavy work because they had no machinery at all. I would cut the dough out of the trough and weigh it out and George would mould it, ready to go in the oven. While we did this, the next batch would be proving. My first wages were twelve shillings and sixpence a week and this went up to 45/- a week. Then I went into the army and I had 7/- a week but of course I had food and clothes provided. Cigarettes were cheap, five for 2d, ten for 6d and twenty for 11 l/2d. There was a thatched cottage where Bradley’s warehouse is now and an old postman lived there called Bob Morris. We used to play some tricks on him. He down the garden had an old toilet and we used to push nettles up it. I was born in 1905. About 1920 we collected some money and started a netball team. We used to play matches with people from town and old Mrs Lee (The vicar’s mother) used to give a prize every week for the best table - we gave them refreshments you see. She used to lend us her silver teapot because we were in the choir and she wanted to be proud of us. Frankie Jones, the undertaker, made the goal posts for us. He lived on the corner of Ladymas Road and had the blacksmiths shop opposite the old post office. I went to chapel until I was about 10 but then I wanted to be in the choir like everyone else. The chapel was opposite Radcliffe’s farm, a Congrega- tional chapel. The vicar then was Mr Mortimer and he used to take us to his house several times in the summer and we had tea, it was very Towards A History of Hadnall Page 2 pleasant. For one choir outing we went to Birkenhead onto one of the Bibby ships, I think it was the Shropshire, and we had to go up a rope ladder up the side of the ship. I’ve never been so frightened in my life. It was the day before it sailed and so they were all busy. We went by train, the station was busy then, and you didn’t think about coaches then. Members of the choir were Joan Andrews, Miss Roper from Battlefield, Ethel and Lucy Mathews, Harold Evans; most of them are dead. Mrs Spargo was the organist but she went to Australia. Different organists came from town. One was Mr Smout who had a big furniture shop in town. Rowley’s was quite a thriving tailor’s shop. We made all the liveries for Hardwicke and for Shotton; the Duke of Cambridge came to Shotton. I lined many a jacket for the old Duke of Teck, Queen Mary’s brother. About 7 people worked in the tailors shop, Mrs Needham was one, Joan Andrews, myself, Miss Hatton, Cecil Tudor, Harry Bird (he went to keep a pub in town after Mr Rowley; he was the owner. Mr Rowley was the organist for a while, he played the organ right well. When his son came back from the army he had different ideas altogether, he let the business go down. Mr Rowley was not a keen businessman and his customers often only paid up once a year. There was often not enough cash at end of the week to pay the wages. I worked one year for nothing, half a crown a week for the next year and my dinner. This was during the first war and Mrs Rowley wanted my ration of sugar. My grandmother, who lived in Mill Lane wouldn’t let her have it, so we used to have stewed gooseberries or rhubarb without any sugar. I can remember Shawbury being built, the airfield, and the prisoners from Shrewsbury marching each day to work there. They walked from Hadnall station in the morning and back about 4o’clock. I can remember the planes; I used to go baby-sitting for a pilot who lodged at Rowleys. I think rationing was worse in the first war than the second but everyone had a big garden and were more independent. Eleven men from Hadnall were killed during the war, the first war. Every young man who was of age had to go and the horses from the farms all went as well. I think times were worse than the second war; people were stranded when their men had gone. In the second war there was more transport, buses and trains and farm workers were exempt. A Mr Livinns lived at Provi- Towards A History of Hadnall Page 3 dence Grove; he had a furriers shop in town. The shop was in High Street and was called Edwin Powells He had a wife and two daughters but he caught some disease from the furs and committed suicide on the railway line at Hardwicke. The station was very busy; all the farmers took their milk twice a day to the station in chums. In fact the station road was very busy. We used to sell poppies and Alexandra roses and I used to go to the station, the waiting room would be full for almost every train. My husband had been in the army during the war and was very friendly with George Rhodes who had been the baker here for about 22 years. Maurice went to bake for his father who was also a baker at Stanton. When George had saved up enough to buy the shop at Hodnet, Maurice took his job. We came here in 1927, just for the time being and Maurice worked here for nearly 50 years. Maurice was secretary for the Ancient Order of Forresters for about 40 years. The Forresters was a Friendly Society and provided some insurance, before the days of social security. It was almost a family concern as sons followed their fathers as mem- bers. Once a year they had a walk through the village following a banner, I think they called this hospital Sunday and when they had a club day with hobbyhorses, it was a field day for the village. This died out but to celebrate their centenary in 1951 they paraded their banner again through the village. The weather was bad, it was very windy, and the banner was badly torn.