But outside, adjoining the Oak-room, was the old bakehouse.  Apparently at first the bakery had been at the farm, with the bakehouse and the flour store above built on to the main building.  When we knew it, the ovens had long since been removed but my mother told me that the back wall of the old bakehouse, warmed by the heat from the ovens, had grown delicious peaches.

There were the farm buildings one would expect to find on a small farm.  In the 'back' yard was the cowshed, calf-pen, separator house, wash-house, chaff-pen, a pigsty used to keep coal in, and the inevitable manure-heap.  At the far end of the yard, near the lane, was the rick-yard where the hay-ricks were thatched by Joe Whately and later cut with the enormous (and dangerous) hay-knife and used for the bullocks.

Joe Whately, Dad and David by the Cow shed. Ages? Around 11 and 9? So around 1936? To the left is the separator house (what was this for ?). The calving pen was to the right, not visible.

In the 'front' yard was the stable and coach-house, then used as a garage for the car.  A sloping glass roof, known as the Verandah" ran along the back of the house giving a dry pathway from the back door to the bakehouse door and also a pleasant place to sit outside at the right time of day.  And right outside the back of the house was a large wooden building, the billiard-room.  This had two doors for some unknown reason, one being completely useless since it was covered by many years' growth of wisteria.  It contained (apart from the obvious billiard table and its accessories) a large number of books, two large palm-leaf fans, and a harmonium!  It was in the billiard room that David and I played our one and only duet 'O for the wings of a dove' arranged for harmonium and dinner-gong.

The fact that there was no running water and that all our requirements had to be met from the cast-iron pump outside the back door increased our delight, for the water had a taste of its own, very different from the insipid water of our taps at home.  I think we were even rather sorry that there was electricity, but the old oil lamps were still there, in a cupboard under the stairs.  There were other things there too which now I see in 'antiques' shops and museums - they were no longer in use but had never been disposed of.

The garden seemed to be enormous, with a large part given up to growing vegetables for the house, and two lawns.  One lawn had two great trees, a copper beech and a sweet chestnut which supported our swing, and was separated from the 'Front Field' by a holly hedge and an iron fence, the narrow space between the two being filled with daffodils.  The other was used for croquet and tennis and at the end was a little summer-house, used for the garden seats, tennis nets and other games things in the winter months.  Up at the top of the vegetable garden was a gate which led into the pig-field, where two sties usually housed three or four pigs.  In the rick-yard was an enormous tub, let into the ground so that only about a foot or eighteen inches were visible and into this went all the household kitchen waste. With a long-handled ladle, Joe Whately put the resulting 'soup' into buckets, mixed in sharps or middlings(3) and carried the buckets, with an old-fashioned yoke, up the garden to feed the pigs.  The mixture must have been a near-lethal brew of bacteria but the pigs ate it greedily and thrived on it.

The 'Business', as it was known, consisted of the bakery and shop at the junction of Meeting House Lane and Station Road, with a house attached and the necessary stables and cart-shed.  Although a motor van was bought just before the War, most of the deliveries of bread were done by horse-drawn high-wheeled vans and the heavy deliveries of corn and meal by flat drays with a little raised seat in front.  There were two coke-fired ovens in the bakehouse, one above the other, and by a clever arrangement of a pit in front of them and a large wooden box as a platform both could be reached easily when required.  Percy Briscoe was the head baker, a kind plumpish gentleman who was the Sunday School Superintendent at the Chapel on Sundays.  Above the bakehouse were the flour stores, so arranged that the ingredients for the bread could be sent by a chute down to the mixing machine below.  The horse and bread-van would be brought into the covered area between the shop and the bakehouse, the bread would be thrown up to the driver two loaves at a time, and then the big sliding door would be opened on to Meeting House Lane and off they would go.  I believe the rounds were quite lengthy in some cases, the two or three vans covering a wide area.  I can still remember some of the horses, the light van-horses Jim and Kitty and the heavier dray-horses Captain and Jewel.  These horses seemed to be always there but a horse called 'Butter' (a name inspired by his figure) appeared for a brief time.

There was one sad experience with Jenny, a little Welsh pony which Fred Elson bought so that we could learn to ride.  Delivered to the farm, she was left in the top field we knew as the 'blackberry' field for the night - in the evening of the following day she was writhing on the ground, obviously in great distress.  The vet was called, we boys were told to stay in the house, and Jenny was shot and removed.  I have no idea what was wrong, but sadly there was no second time.

The office at the 'Business' was a very old-fashioned 'counting house' type of room, with a sloping desk running along the length of the wall and high stools to sit on and it was the domain of Elson Howell, who I understood was some sort of cousin of Fred Elson though the relationship was never explained - and in those days I was not really interested.

He and his wife Kitty lived in a little cottage in Meeting House Lane opposite the yard gates of the farm.

On Sundays we would go in the car to the house of a Mr.Hallam in the Kenilworth Road, park the car there and walk the remaining short distance to the Chapel, which is now demolished.  A plain building with a school-room behind and a little porch to shelter the entering worshippers, wooden pews and a central pulpit, it was the typical village Methodist Chapel.  On the left as one faced the pulpit was the harmonium, played every Sunday by Fred Elson.  The story had it that the organist had failed to arrive one Sunday morning.  Eli Elson, his father, said to his son Fred, then a boy of fourteen, "Go on, you can play." and, after a consultation with the preacher to select some hymns young Fred knew, he did exactly that - for the next sixty years.  In 1934 he was presented with a copy of the Methodist Hymn-Book with Tunes, then newly produced after the union of Wesleyan and Primitive Methodism, inscribed "Presented to Fred W. Elson by the Members and Friends of the Balsall Methodist Church and School.  An appreciation of his services as Organist of this Church for over fifty years. March 11th 1934" I still have the book, together with a small newspaper cutting recording this occasion.  It was about this time, I believe, that Norman Cooper began to play more frequently as deputy organist.

Frequently on Sundays when the preacher was "planned" (4)to take both services he would come to Sunday dinner and tea.  Most of them spent the afternoon in a comfortable chair (meditating?)(5) but there was one younger minister who played ferocious games of croquet with no strokes/barred.  Fred Elson's connection with Methodism was considerable.  Both in the affairs of the local chapel and in the life of the Coventry Circuit he took a very active part.  I remember seeing a photograph (now unfortunately disappeared) of a Fete in the 'Front Field' and I have another newspaper cutting which tells of the Centenary Celebrations of the Chapel held in 1925 at the Balsall Institute, at which he spoke of the Chapel and its history.  He also took a part in local government, being a Councillor and a J.P.  I know that many people came to him for advice and help, valuing his knowledge and wisdom.  To my brother and myself he amply made up for the real grandfathers we had never known and Mary Jane Elson was the perfect grandmother.  Equally devoted to her Chapel, I well recall her singing hymns in a firm contralto while about her housework.  She claimed that the Lidgates originated from Scotland and she had a great love of Scottish metrical psalm tunes.

The farm was on the boundary of two civil parishes, which is why the house and half the farm was in Berkswell and the business and the other half of the farm was in Balsall Common.  David and I used to cycle or sometimes walk to Berkswell village where a set of stocks stood in the village green, with four gigantic elm trees.  The trees were felled because they had succumbed to Dutch Elm Disease but at least four more trees have now been planted to replace them.  In the middle of the village is a large square walled pool where a spring bubbled up and the local cottagers used to collect their water and in those days the water in the well was drinkable (even if it did have caddis-worms in it!).  The last time I went to Berkswell, many years later, there was rubbish thrown in and the water seemed to have dried up. I hope things have been altered for the better again.  In those days the Church was unlocked; this is no longer so.  I think my first ideas of church architecture sprang from wandering in Berkswell Church.  In my year at Leamington College I did a little project on Berkswell Church - now like many other documents, lost.

[This chapter is based to some extent on an article I had published in "Berkswell Miscellany Volume VI" by the Berkswell Local History Research Group in 1990.]

In 1928 my brother David was born, not at home put in a nursing home at New Southgate.  Like all brothers we had ups and downs; we played together happily and we quarrelled.(6)  Some of my happiest memories are of times when there were just the two of us engaged in our own private games or adventures with no-one else to intrude on our enjoyment.

So time passed and it was time to go to school.  I can remember vividly going with my parents to Bowes Road School and running across the school hall to the table where Miss Wills,the elderly headmistress, was sitting.  She spoke to me and I turned tail and fled back to the security of my mother!  Once having enrolled, my academic career had begun.  In turn Mrs.Newman, Miss Hawkins (who couldn't pronounce her 'r's and addressed me as Fweddy), and Miss Alard took me under their wings.  There must have been at least one other but I can only remember those three.  It was in Miss Alard's class that one wet play-time when we were allowed to stay in the class-room I was tackled by Edna, a large girl, bent backwards over a desk and forcibly kissed - an experience which must have left its indelible mark on my personality.  It may have affected Edna too, for later she became a nun.

The school was of the same style as many London Schools.  Three floors, Infants on the ground floor, Juniors on the middle floor and 'Seniors' (about whom more later) on the top floor.  There were two playgrounds, one for girls and infants and one for boys, the whole school and playgrounds encircled by a wall with tall iron railings (I think to stop us getting out).  In the girls' playground there was an open-sided structure which was intended to shelter us from the rain - I don't recall one in the boys' playground, perhaps we were allowed to stay in the classrooms in wet weather.  There was a large assembly hall on the ground floor in which we sat on the floor and were addressed by the Headmistress.  I remember Mr.Gooding, the caretaker, coming in as the light faded in the winter afternoons and lighting the large gas-lamps with a taper fixed on the end of a pole.  In those days we celebrated Empire Day, for we had an Empire to celebrate.  Usually we had some sort of play-cum-pageant involving the whole class, followed by a half-holiday.  In one of these I was playing the part of a judge and my mother performed a minor miracle and made a very presentable wig out of cotton wool.  One of my most vivid memories is of marching out of the Friday afternoon school assembly to the tune of 'Old Father Thames' or Percy Grainger's 'Country Garden' played (week after alternate week) by Miss Hawkins at the piano.  So infant and junior school days passed, and eventually I was in the top class under the first master, Mr.Sinden.  Then the time came for 'the Scholarship'.

This was, of course, a misnomer. It was really what was later (and probably at the time) known as the ll-plus, an examination in English and Arithmetic to see whether we were destined to move to the Secondary Schools or to go to the top floor of Bowes Road School and be the 'Seniors' I have already mentioned.  I passed and chose to go to Minchenden and so I ended my last term at Bowes Road.  Some two or three years earlier, Miss Wills the Headmistress had retired and her place had been taken by Mr.Isaac as Headmaster.  During the Summer holiday after I left, Mr.Isaac was apparently playing golf when he was stung on the eyelid by some insect - and developed an infection and died.  I believe that Mr. Sinden took over as Headmaster at the start of the following term but I was then at Minchenden.

Minchenden was a County Secondary School. It was not free - my father had to pay £5 per term, which in those pre-war days was quite a lot (probably about £100 in today's monev).   Equipped with all the necessary impedimenta and dressed in green blazer and cap, with appropriate badges on both I took the next step up the ladder.

Minchenden was housed partly in an old house at some time the property of Lawrence of the Punjab.  A modern and architecturally very different building was connected to the old house and only staff and prefects were permitted to ascend the steps to the front door.   The connection between the two buildings was by the room (I seem to remember it was hexagonal) known as the old dairy and each morning at the top of a short flight of steps leading out of the dairy Mr.Bromley would tug at a wire rope to sound the bell.   Signals during the day were by electric bell of course but the tradition of the hand-rung bell to start the school day lingered on.

Whether Minchenden was a good school or not is a matter I have often thought about.  Certainly it had good examination results in the General School Certificate and Higher School Certificate examinations of those days and a respectable number of its pupils went on to universities, but in some respects I feel that true education, in the sense of preparation for life, was lacking.  Of course much depended on the quality of the staff.  I remember the names of those with whom I came into contact: Miss Smith for French, Mr.Hayter for Maths, Miss Crossley for English, Miss Nolan for History, Mr.Stewart for Geography, Mr.Rooth for Physics, Miss Richards for Chemistry, Major Hedlev for P.E., Mr.Gooch for Woodwork.  In Art and Music, two subjects which were not pursued above the lower forms, I would say that I received nothing.  To draw, very unsuccessfully, a daffodil and to sing, very feebly, 'Linden Lea' left me completely ignorant of art and music in the wider sense.

I was put into Form 1Q.  Although the normal entry went for five years through Forms 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 one group who were considered to show promise did the G.S.C. course in four years, in forms 1Q, 2Q, Lower 4 and Lower 5.  As things turned out in my case, neither of these routes applied.

I started in Form 1Q in September 1937(7) and in 2Q in September 1938.  I did well in English, Maths, French and the Sciences, with less success in History and Geography.  The reports are full of 'Good', 'Very Good' and even ''Excellent'.  It looked as if things were set fair for steady progress.

In the Summer of 1939 we were all at Berkswell as was our custom. We had been to Felixstowe for a seaside break (whether a week or fortnight I don't remember) but for the rest of the time we went as usual to the farm.  While we were there war was declared.(8)  It was decided that my mother, David and myself should stay at Berkswell and that my father would visit us as and when he could.  Two or three years earlier he had bought a car, a £115 Popular Ford, but we had not yet realised that petrol rationing would limit the use of it.

Mary Elson had died the year before and so my mother was also housekeeper.  With Fred Elson and the three of us we were registered as one household when identity cards were instituted - I can still remember my number, OFEO 143/3.  (This card, incidentally, was taken away when I went in the army and on demobilisation in 1947 I was given a new one with a new number - and I have never been able to remember that one).

It was decided that David and I would go to Leamington College for Boys, in Binswood Avenue, Leamington Spa.  This meant travelling by train morning and evening and several factors affected our journey.  To start with, we had to catch an early train which went to Coventry and there we had to change trains and wait, sometimes for a very long time.  For various reasons about which we knew nothing the times were frequently altered.  I remember standing on Berkswell station one day as a train full of soldiers went through - later we realised they were troops evacuated from Dunkirk.  It was possible on one or two occasions to get a through train from Berkswell to Warwick Milverton but usually our connection from Coventry deposited us at Leamington - in either case we then had a walk from the station to the school.  We always arrived late, after the lesson had started and similarly in the evening we had to leave early in order to catch a train home, with a probable wait at Coventry.

This state of affairs gave opportunity for various other activities too.  It was on a train to school one day that I tried my first cigarette (in those days cigarettes were cheap and were obtainable from slot-machines on station platforms).  I don't remember if I enjoyed it but my companions scared me by saying I had singed my eyebrows - I lived that day in fear of being found out until I managed to get to a mirror when I discovered they had been pulling my leg.  I did not enjoy my time at Leamington.  Apart from the disorder of arrival and departure there were other factors which affected school life.  Because we came from a distance it was impossible to have any friendships.  The form I was put into, 4a, had already done two years of Latin - I had only done one year and I never caught up.  In French however I found I was a year ahead so that I was repeating the text-book I had used at Minchenden.  Not surprisingly I did very well.  A few names of the staff stay in my memory - Mr. Olorenshaw who taught English and History, Mr.Davey for Latin, Mr.Austin for French and Mr.Foss for P.E. (he sported a Hitler-type moustache which was unfortunate in 1940 to say the least).

Leamington played Rugby football, Minchenden soccer, so we were excused.  'Dig for Victory' was the slogan then and part of the school field had been measured off as small allotments.   David and I took one of these and grew potatoes, cultivating the plot during games afternoons.

Then, as the summer term drew to its close, Fred Elson died and we returned to London.  At least, I returned first, Mother and David staying until the farm and business were sold and Berkswell, as we knew it was no more.  And that is now literally true.  The house has been pulled down and three or four houses have been built on the site.

I went back to Minchenden, was placed in Form Lower V and started the preparation for G.S.C exams.  The syllabus was more restricted and I dropped Geography, Latin and Biology, together with the Art and Music mentioned earlier.   Those war-time days in 1940 and 1941 were often interrupted by air-raid warnings when we all went to the shelters, excavated on the playing field near to the old building.   At times these were [?long?] intervals until the All-Clear sounded and we could go back into lessons.  There was a period, also, when we attended school only for part of the day, another school from Wood Green using our buildings in a shift system.   All in all, the conditions under which we prepared for examinations would have horrified the educational 'experts' of today.   Still, we managed, and I passed G.S.C. with the requisite standard for Matriculation.

In Lower VI Science I concentrated on four subjects - Chemistry, Physics, Pure Maths and Applied Maths.  Once or twice a week we had an English lesson in which Miss Crossley attempted to give some culture to the (presumably) uncultured Scientists.  As far as I know the reverse was not tried with Lower VI Arts.  I don't think this effort to civilise us was very succesful since it was almost entirely given over to reading the plays of George Bernard Shaw - an author I was not attracted to then and find even less attractive now.   We did vary this for a short time by reading plays by Galsworthy; even then I could see that they dealt with an era that was past.

A further attempt was made to give us at least the rudiments of musical culture by taking the Sixth Form up to London to a performance of 'Traviata' and to the ballet.   From 'Traviata! has developed my enjoyment of opera but I'm afraid the ballet left me cold (they were 'Sylphides' and 'The Rake's Progress').

To some extent the 'black-out' affected our lives but we learned to put up with the inconvenience.   Cars and cycles had shields fitted to their lamps so that as little light showed as was consistent with being able to see where we were going.   All windows in houses had to have curtains which stopped any light escaping and in some cases windows which were not accessible (such as skylights) were painted with black paint.  Street lamps were not used and we had to be careful of obstructions like trees - they had white bands painted so that we could avoid them.   Quite often on a Friday evening I cycled over to Enfield where my uncle George lived and we played chess.  I was able sometimes to help my cousin Michael with his chemistry homework.  They were more worried than I was about my journey in the dark - I quite enjoyed it.

In the Sixth Form we took our turn at 'fire-watching', two pupils and a teacher sleeping at the school with the idea that we might be able to tackle incendiary bombs should they fall on the school.   Fortunately we had peaceful nights.  In 1943 I sat the H.S.C. exam and was successful in all four subjects, giving me in addition to the H.S.C. my Inter-B.Sc exemption.   What would come next?

Here, I am afraid, we have to expose a serious shortcoming in information.  What I wanted to do was to go to one of the Universities to read Chemistry with a view to teaching that subject later.  At that time conscription had been introduced and at the age of eighteen I would be liable for call-up unless I was given deferment until an approved course of study was completed.  When I enquired about this I was told by whichever of the staff was dealing with the matter that I would not be given deferment for Chemistry but that I could be deferred if I read Physics - which I did not want to do.  What was I to do?  To my great annoyance I discovered after the war was over that I could have been deferred to read Chemistry -_the information I had been given at school was not correct.

However, I didn't know that then, The future seemed completely empty with no discernible path.  I began to make enquiries and I discovered that there was a scheme in operation which involved a six-month University Course followed by a commission in certain Corps.  This seemed promising and I applied.  It involved joining the Army first, which I did on 26th May at Holloway, enlisting in the General Service Corps, and then being interviewed at Horse Guards Parade on 21st July.   But I was not accepted.  Instead I was told to go home and wait to be called up with my age-group.  Again my plans had fallen through.

I left Minchenden in July 1943.  Looking around for a temporary job I joined British Drug Houses in their packing and labelling department at Islington where at least I was dealing with chemicals and knew what the names meant!  It was not for long.   In November I was told to report to No. 9 Primary Training Centre at Maryhill Barracks, Glasgow, before 6 p.m on 17th November.  A railway warrant was enclosed, together with a Postal Order for five shillings, an advance of pay.

And what happened then is found in the next chapter.

(1) back to text    In his 1990 Berkswell article and the original text of this document Dad said sixty - but he later amended his typewritten text and added sixteen in handwriting, albeit with a question mark.  This is almost certainly the correct figure.

(2) back to text    Bezique is a card game.  Even by the 1960s (when Mum and dad still played) it was already something unusual.  It had its own special box and scoring card and the pack was different to a regular pack.

(3) back to text    In the process of milling wheat, to produce flour, the wheat kernel is ground and sifted.  The larger particles are separated as bran, while the finer particles are classified as middlings or sharps, which are often used in animal feed due to their nutrient content.
'Pigswill' survived as a recognised way of using up old food until 2001 when a foot and mouth outbreak finally put paid to it, though it had been subject to increasing regulations about 'treatment' before being fed to pigs.   I can clearly recall waste food from school dinners in the 60s going into big metal swill bins and then collected by a lorry.

(4) back to text    The 'plan' was very much a part of Methodist life - certainly as I remember it from the sixties.   Produced quarterly (I think) it listed all the services across the circuit of churches and which minister or local preacher would be preaching at each service.

(5) back to text    The phrase 'meditating with the eyes closed' was frequently used by Dad when I was a child - mostly describing an after lunch nap.

(6) back to text   Lizi told me, many years ago, of a poignant memory of Dad discouraging her and Nicola from quarrelling and expressing his regrets for quarrels with his much missed brother.

(7) back to text  starting secondary school at age 12, rather than 11 as it is now.

(8) back to text  3rd September 1939.