During the war years my brother and I attended Sunday school at St Michael’s Church, later when we were old enough moving up into the choir. We also joined the Highworth 1st St Michael’s Scout Troop under Scoutmaster Mr E. Tanner. At our scout meetings in the hall at the bottom of Eastrop Hill Mr Tanner taught us first aid, and how to tie knots. He was quite religious and each Sunday attended church at St Michael’s. He was always telling us to be good Christians and to help people as much as we could. We always finished our meetings with a hot cup of coco and prayers. As I got older I became more interested in cricket and football, and in those days you were able to play these games in the street. We had chalk marks on the wall by the front door for cricket stumps. One of us used to bowl from the Vicarage Lane end with the result that the batsman sometimes hit the ball against Miss Huckson’s side windows. Luckily the ball always glanced off without doing any damage, and I can honestly say that I never once broke a window. Although our cottage had no garden we did have the churchyard nearby which had lots of wild birds in. There always seemed to be an owl in the tall trees at night, and it was on the church wall that I saw my first red squirrel. From my bedroom window at the back of the house I could see part of the churchyard. On one occasion while looking out after dark I saw a silent ghostly figure in white which looked as though it was floating along; I thought it was a ghost, but there was a simple explanation to this, for I later found out that it was Clocky Davis taking his nightly exercise. He lived in the High Street by the “Winding Hatch” and after working late mending clocks and watches he walked around the churchyard for some fresh air. He always wore his long white apron which ended about six inches from the ground, he always had carpet slippers on, hence no sound. Quite scary at the time.
While we were in the church choir each choirboy had to take their turn in pumping the organ bellows. There was usually two of us if we were small which made light work of it. Mr Bob Harris from Lechlade Hill was choir master, and the vicar was the Rev Webb. Each Christmas the choir boys had a party in the Vicarage with lemonade, jelly, blancmange and fancy cakes. We must of had these parties in the large vicarage kitchen because I can remember the long row of servants bells on the wall. Each year we looked forward to the fun fair coming to the market square because we always had a steam engine parked by the standpipe near our front door. From the front bedroom we were able to look down on it and listen to the sound of its engine chugging away; to the present day I have always liked the sound of steam. This is probably due to the fact that we were brought up in the age of steam trains and were able to travel by train to Swindon quite regularly.
When I was eleven years old I moved from Highworth Primary School to Kingsdown Secondary Modern School at Upper Stratton. During my last two years at school I played cricket for the school 1st eleven. After school I had to go down to the family market garden and poultry farm in Station Road to help my grandfather to either feed, collect eggs, or clean the chicken houses out. When we had day old chicks I had to get them out from under the brooder and feed them. After they were fed I had to put them back under the brooder before they were cold.
During the winter of 1947 there was heavy falls of snow and sharp frosts. The snow drifts were deep and over the top of the hedgerows, and when they were frozen you could walk along the top of them. The snowdrifts had nearly covered the Black Bridge over the railway lines near Bydemill brook so we were able to jump off the top of the bridge on to the railway lines without hurting ourselves. This was great fun but hard work digging yourself out of the snowdrifts. Most winters we seemed to have snow, and one of the main places for sledging was on ‘The Butts’ at Hampton. Another favourite pastime of ours was Hoop racing; we had a track on some waste ground at the bottom of Quarry Crescent, and had race meetings against Park Avenue, and Cherry Orchard. We also had a marble pit near the track and spent many hours playing marbles during the summer holidays. In between times we did quite a lot of pole vaulting across the Bydemill brook, from the railway lines right down as far as Pentylands. We also fished the stream with jam jars for minnows and sticklebacks. We also had two bathing pools in the brook near the one-man bridge just off Pentylands Lane; one was called “The Big Boys” and the other “The Little Boys”. Not far away was two large ponds called “Whites Ponds” with a legend saying that years ago a horse and waggon had driven into the pond never to be seen again. This may have been a story to keep us away, because they were dangerous.
On Saturday evenings Ivor Hawkins played hymn tunes on the chiming bells in St Michael’s church tower. The chimes were dismantled when the two clocks were fitted on the north and west sides of the tower, in memory of the men of the town who lost their lives in the Second World War.
Our nearest neighbours in Sheep Street were Miss Mabel Huckson, and her sister Miss Evelyn Huckson at Church House; Miss Bessie Smith, and her sister Miss Clara Smith lived at number 8, with Mrs Elsie Head at number 12 whose husband had fought with the Wiltshire Regiment at the Battle of Mons during the First World War. At number 11 Vicarage Lane was Mrs Clara Avery and her daughter Dorothy and her husband George Durling, who was one of Orde Wingates Chindits in Burma in WW2. Next to them lived George and Jesse Midwinter and their daughter Rose, and sons Alec, Bill and Chris. Mrs Midwinter was my mothers best friend. At the back of Church House lived Mr and Mrs Ivor Hawkins, and in the big house which was number 1 Vicarage Lane, lived Mr Walter Avery and his wife Kath. He was a Painter & Decorator by trade and I remember him painting St Michael’s church clocks while hanging over the side of the tower in a basket. Living with them at the time was their son Len who built a caravan in the garage at the back of Church House. He used to let me watch him while he worked on the caravan. Len served in the R.A.F. during the war. I also ran errands for Mrs Avery and was always given a few pennies afterwards; she always seemed to me to be a very kind person, and a good friend of my mothers.
The Archer Family Tree 