Verwood
UK - History
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THIS
PAGE IS UNDER DEVELOPMENT WOODLANDS & DISTRICT About the
middle of the 19th century Knowle
Hill Farm was
rebuilt both in farm buildings and the farm houses replacing
old buildings. Until about 1920 Knowle
Hill and New Barn Farms were farmed in one unit.
It was mostly arable but the
Charlton dairy behind This was replaced in the
1920s when it paid better to sell the milk for domestic use
and as Horton North farm was at Old
Down before being replaced by new farm houses and buildings
Old Down was turned into five workmen’s cottages and the
water was obtained from a very deep well in a well house
nearby. The well had a big bucket let down through double
doors. When it filled at the bottom it was brought up by two
people one on each end of the double windlass. What is now known as Greenlands or Woodlands Farm on the Manor Farm was always known to the older people as `Woodlands House` and the farmer there, as at other farms, was looked upon in awe and was often saluted by the villagers and workmen. There were three holdings on
the Haythorne Road.
The one nearest Horton was restored in the
1950s` before which one end consisted of a huge kitchen with
inglenook and surrounded by six doors leading to other rooms
and offices. Owing to this, the occupants used to have main
meals there but light a fire in the sitting room in the
afternoon and spend the evening there. Going towards
Woodlands the next holding on the other side of the road was
the village blacksmiths' shop and
wheel binding forge.
This smithy was also a small holding and the farmers wife was very much the boss and rationed all the food for the animals keeping it in a back bedroom and letting it down to the centres. On the other side further up, down a lane is Ivy Cottage Farm, leased and farmed by Miss Weeks and helped by Sidney Keeping.
Woodlands Village in 2006. Verwood is 1.5 Miles to the right of the picture.
Around Woodlands Along the
footpath from `the Pound`
to Next door
again under a yew tree (still standing) stood a pair of
thatched cottages. In one of these lived Sarah Haskell who kept a small
shop in her porch where she sold half an ounce of sweets in
paper cones made by herself also tobacco and cigarettes, but
the 1914 war stopped this. The other cottage was the original Methodist Chapel built by Joseph Haskell. On his death the life lease ran out and the Methodists were turned out for quite a long period until they were able to find alternative land on which to build. Again the
next house on the common was occupied by Job Haskell`s sister and her
husband William Froud.
On the common he tethered his shorthorn cow which us
children were afraid of as, owing to teasing by older boys,
it was rather bad tempered. He used to sell the milk at four
old pence a quart and the children used to collect it on
their way home from school. William also worked for the Lord Shaftesbury Estate in the
forestry department. Between the
Pound and the crossroads in the new cottages (1912) lived Charles Miles and his wife Rosanna.
He was totally blind and had to be led everywhere. Under the
same roof lived David (Piper) Cutler who left
to live in Parkstone and afterwards Charles Steel lived
there. He too was a Carter on the Shaftsbury
Estates also his father Tom who lived in the ‘Round House’. Also in the Round House lived Wesley Cutler who was the
local grave digger. Next door lived Sarah
Barfoot who cleaned the church and school and
local washing. At one time the Round
House housed four families, and it is said to
have been built by the Huguenots
as a linen factory when they were expelled from the low
counties. In Back to
Woodlands crossroads and turn towards St.
Giles, on the right stood a thatched cottage
lived in by Ernest Barfoot (brother
of Sarah at the Round House) and his wife who
kept the village Post Office
for over 40 years. Ernie Barfoot
was a painter and decorator on St.Giles
Estate. Opposite was the Estate Stables for the heavy Percheron Horses, six of which were used to pull the heavy timber carriage from the woods to the timber yards at Woodlands and St. Giles with trees to be used for building and repairs. Next to the Post Office stands the Estate Bailiffs house and
office and behind the house stood a thatched shed with a saw
pit. Here trees were laid lengthways over the pit and one
man stood on top and another in the pit itself and pulled
the heavy pit saw up and down cutting out timber for use on
the Estate. This was done by two brothers, James and William Reed, but it
was discontinued about the beginning of the first war. By
the side of the stables is a lane and the small farm on the
right was farmed by William Hayter
who also had a slaughter house buying pigs, slaughtering
them and taking them to Bournemouth,
together with eggs and vegetables. At the top of the lane is a pair of cottages in one of which lived Sidney Keeping who managed Miss Week’s farm on the Horton road. He was a staunch Liberal, a Methodist local preacher and also composed poetry. Next door at one time lived William Lockyer and his family of five sons and four daughters. Back to the crossroads and turn left to the village. On the left are a pair of cottages built about 1912 and in one lived Mrs Kilford an estate foreman's widow and next door lived the headmistress of the school (Miss Ellis). Next came a
hall built for the Conservative
Association hoping to convert the mainly Liberal
inhabitants to their party.
This was not a great success as when they held a
dance or party, the young men of the village thought it
great fun to use their catapults
(forked weapons with rubber strings and a pouch to hold the
stone) to shoot out the lights in the entrance hall. These
catapults were deadly if anyone got in the way of a stone
and they were mainly used for poaching game and rabbits as
they made scarcely any noise only a swish. All this ceased
in 1914 when the great war came, as most of the young men
joined the armed forces, many never to return. Looking over
the village green stands 2 pairs of cottages built by the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury. In the one nearest
the crossroads lived John (Jack)
Kerley and family, he worked in the estate timber
yard at St. Giles going on a very old fashioned bike. During the summer
months he used to come back from work to his allotment and
his wife had to have his tea (cooked) in time for his
arrival so that no time was wasted going home. Next door
lived George Haskell (Georgey
Jimmy) and his sister. He had a small holding and
used his horse and van to take parties to various events.
The next house housed William
(Billy) Coles who worked in the gravel pits and repairing
roads which caused his back to be bent almost double. He was a class leader
and worked in the Sunday school all his life. His father lived in
the same house before him and when the school come church
was built he used to ring the bell calling the people to
worship then leave and go and worship with the Methodists. Under the same roof
lived Jimmy Reed and family,
he worked for the estate, first in the hand sawpit,
afterwards cleaving piles and erecting fences and gates. (PICTURE OF SCHOOL HOUSE) Next came the school and school house where the teacher lived. My first memory of school was Miss Palmer 1913. She was about 5 feet tall but us kids were scared stiff of her. She used to leave her classroom to see her dinner was cooking and when she came back there was pandemonium, which made her go mad and say “the very idea, its preposterous, its absurd”. Of course us kids never knew what these words meant but as she also didn`t mind using a ruler across your knuckles as well, we were awed until next time. In the wood at the back of the school we used to play foxhounds and in the winter the ponds froze over and were used for sliding and falling in. Next down the road was a brick bungalow lived in by widow Annie Thorne and her eight children. Behind her was a workshop of Jackie Loader who repaired clocks and metal work. He was entirely self taught and if trained, would have been a mechanical engineer. The site of his workshop was fenced in by his grandfather, Stephen Hiskock, who built his own abode of cob walls and thatched roof. Inside, a ladder led to the upstairs but the roof was never sealed or plastered, only just thatch. Is it any wonder so many of these old buildings were destroyed by fire. When he took in this garden if a person could put up a fence and bank, build a chimney to his future home and have smoke coming out in 24 hours, he had squatters right to the property. Little did Steve Hiskock and others know when the steward of the Estate offered them a feast at Horton Inn with plenty of booze for one shilling a year, they were starting to pay rent and at their death, the property would become part of the St. Giles Estate. Behind this
again was Tommy Miles
cottage, us kids were afraid for our lives of him. He was afraid his
wife would overspend, so he kept everything locked in
drawers carrying the keys around on his belt. One day when he was
ploughing a field, to his dismay he found the keys were
missing so he had to spend hours turning back the furrows
until he found them. Tommy
kept bees and Annie his wife bought a gramophone, which she
was very fond of playing.
One day the bees swarmed and flew away and Tommy was
in a rage because the gramophone drowned the sound of the
swarming bees. His
young son laughed at him which made him angrier than ever
and as he had rheumatism, when he went to chase Charlie he
was unsuccessful so all he could say was “Humbug laugh at I”. (PICTURE OF COUNCIL HOUSES) All these houses are gone and were
replaced in 1939 by council houses. Next to the bungalow
lived Richard Tubbs known as Dicky. As the chimney always
smoked with the door shut Dicky had several holes bored in
the front door to cause more draught and so overcome the
smoke problem. He
also used to shout at the top of his voice and ask us kids
if we could shout louder.
We used to tease him and say he had a lot of money
hoarded (some hopes considering his wage until 1915 was
about fifteen shillings a week and never more than thirty
shillings). He
used to shout at the top of his voice “liar, liar theest
burn in hell talking like that”. Dickey was very fond
of chewing tobacco and after a while taking it out of his
mouth and putting it in his hat. He went to chapel on
Sundays in his best corduroy trousers and hob nail boots and
one Sunday took off his hat and went to his pew and to the
delight of the lads behind him his quad of tobacco was stuck
to the top of his head.
Dicky was a member of the Rechabite
Friendly Society but always managed to get his
contribution back. One
time he was supposed to have bad feet so he walked to Cranborne to the doctor, 6
miles there and back, collected a certificate, then walked
to Chalbury, 4 miles
there and back in the afternoon, to hand the certificate
over to the society and get his benefit. Before this William Froud in about 1830
bought the life lease of a former Beer House known as
the “
About 200 yards down on the
south side of the road is probably the last cob building
built in Woodlands and it was built as two cottages. Later Fredrick Tubbs
who managed the nursery near the “Round
House” had a family of four daughters and eight
sons so the two cottages were made into one. They lost 2 sons,
Bert and Harry, in the first war. About 3/4 mile down
the lane in front of this house stood a keepers cottage in
the middle of Richard had a
new horse van built and went to collect it at Charles Sevior at Horton but
didn’t take his purse.
Charles would not let him take the van so he went
round to see Charles wife and borrowed the money from her. Up the lane
by the side of this holding stood the
second Methodist Chapel in Woodlands built after the one
behind the Round House was taken away. When the
third chapel was built the 2nd was turned into a dwelling in
which lived Albert Tubbs and family. Their
youngest son Walter known as Skinner was a bit of a problem. When we were kids at
school we were terrified of him jumping out from behind
bushes in weird clothes.
When the foxhounds were about, he would climb a tree
and shout at the top of his voice (and sign he had seen the
fox) but when they arrived he was in a shed watching them
and laughing to himself at having made fools of them. When he came out of
the army after the first war he bought a new bicycle in
Wimborne. On the
way home one of the chaps with him said when they got to a
duck pond “ bet you wouldn’t ride your bike into that
pond Skinner”. “Wouldn’t
I” he replied and rode right into the pond and fell off in
the mud. Opposite stood a pair of cob and thatched cottages in the first lived Mr. Turnell and family, he was a retired sailor who sailed under sail when he first went to sea. Next door lived William Reed and family. For several years he worked on the Estate but later worked in the brickyard by Verwood Station. A public footpath runs in front of these cottages called “Pieces”. In the 2nd cottage Eliza Ann Wilcox,
an elderly widow. Afterwards Herbie
Wilcox a retired butler who had a lovely tenor
voice. The next holding along was
occupied by Bartimeas Haskell who was very upset
if anyone touched anything belonging to him or even trod on
his land. This is the cottage where the Methodists
held a 24 hour prayer meeting and only drank
water when their chapel behind the
Round House was taken away. They prayed that the
steward who took away the chapel would have a change of
heart, or be removed. Within
a short time he died suddenly in Next door again stood a very small cob and thatched cottage occupied by Alfred Loader. Alfred was the father of Jackie near the school and he had a small holding and also worked on farms part time. He was in great demand for building cattle sheds, the walls being upright stakes intertwined with gorse, the roof being thatched. They were very popular with farmers because everything grew on their own farms and so the only outward cost was less than £1.00 a week labour costs and the animals were loath to damage the prickly walls. Again next
door lived Jackie and Jane Dowland. When I knew them they
lived a very secluded life, Jackie doing a few odd jobs such
as beating for game at the big game shoots or helping
thrashing corn or just scrounging any odd potatoes, corn etc
he could find. When
going out, his sister would always shout “John, John, here you got
your sack”. Older
people said as a young man Jackie was a proper dandy wth
silk hat and walking stick when he went courting Sarah
Haskell near the Round House.
Jane I was told was a lady’s maid and travelled all
over the continent but literally her dress consisted of a
black blouse and a hessian sack for and aft as a skirt. They were both struck
down with pneumonia and died within a day or two of each
other. After
their death, neighbours burned all their belongings among it
was at least one book “1st Edition Hutchins History of
Dorset” which the local doctor knew they had and he told
someone he would have paid £25.00 for it and this was 50
years ago. They
were both buried in paupers graves in
Following the
path through the Pieces over a wooden bridge we come to a
gravelled lane now known as Turning left
onto the lane we come to a village bakery and general stores
started by James Cutler who also traded in underwood and no
doubt used the faggots to heat the bread oven. He was a strict
Methodist but it is said (not proven) a debtor met him one
Sunday and offered to square up . James said “I do
not take money Sundays”.
“Right” said the debtor, “I shall be gone in
the morning”. “All
right then” said James, turning his back to the debtor and
showing his back pocket “stuff it in here then”. Leading off
to Jubilee farm were
3 thatched houses on the left hand side, the first was
built by the Dowland family. In the early 18th century felons who were found guilty of several crimes including stealing livestock as well as murder were hanged and their bodies taken to a gibbet and hanged in chains. One of these gibbets was at West Parley and it was thought if anyone had certain ills, a part of the felons body would cure it. One of the Dowland family walked to the gibbet and picked up the felons toe nail and brought it back to Whitmore. Whether it was the thought of it, the family could not sleep or rest whilst it was in the house. So the person who collected the toe nail had to walk with it back to Parley and replace it where he found it and sleep and rest came back to the cottage. In the second cottage
lived George Haskell with a large family. During the summer
months he used to attend village fetes with his swing boats
and the frames of which he had built into horse drawn wagons
when he ceased this enterprise, but some of the boats were
still in the lofts in the 1940s. He also used to take
vegetables to
Poole
and sell in The next house was occupied by William Scott and he farmed the Jubilee holding whilst his wife had a small shop and bakery. At the Methodist chapel they used to have at least five tea meetings a year and Mrs. Scott and Mrs Cutler, four houses down the lane, used to take turns in supplying the bread, cakes etc for same and trying to see who made the tastiest cake. Coming back out Whitmore Lane on the right, was a holding built by Jacob Wilcox and his family, most of whom had either biblical or names of reformers such as Luther, John, Wesley, Dinah etc. At first he was a leading member of the Wesleyen Methodists opposite but something went wrong so he left them and joined the Primitive Methodists at Haythorne which meant about 6 miles walk to the two services each Sunday. He was said in his earlier days to be a champion scythe man often with a mate starting to mow a field of hay or corn at daybreak and continuing until the job was finished, no matter how long it took. On the left handside, coming out of Whitmore Lane, was a thatched cottage built by Samuel Froud, son of William at the top end of the village and his wife Betsy, later it was occupied by his grandson Harry who worked in the woods hurdle making. The next house up the hill lived John Haskell, brother of George, who lived in Jubilee Lane. These brothers were not a bit alike, George being devout Anglo Catholic and a true blue Conservative. George a teetotaller and John was the local cider maker. John was a follower of the local foxhounds and used to open the gates for the riders to pass through taking off his hat and saying “remember poor old Jack sir” hoping to receive a sixpence (2 1/2p). At other times one would think he and his family were the lords of the Manor. Next up the
hill was Charlie Thorne who through ill health did not do
very much work. The
next lived Job Cutler and his wife who had the nickname of
“Bridget” as she knew all the local gossip. The whole family, one
son and two daughters, used to work together making sheep
cribs which farmers filled with hay winter time for their
sheep. They also
went working on farms hoeing, hay making and harvesting,
going as far as Chichester living rough in farm buildings. One young man hoping
to earn extra wages went with them but only stayed a short
while. He said
Job was busy washing his feet when the groceries were
brought in. His
son picked up the cheese and said “nice piece of cheese
father”. The
old man took his feet and hands out of the water, grabbed
the cheese and said “put it down oaf you know you shouldn’t
handle food.” I
think this was the last straw for the young man as he came
home the next day. Job
and his family used to go to Wimborne on Saturday nights,
coming home very late in their donkey cart. One Saturday night
some lads of the village blacked out their windows with corn
sacks and Job and his family slept on until late afternoon. Job was brother to
James who had the shop and bakery. All these
cottages were demolished and bungalows built on the site in
the 1950s, also a thatched cottage father up the hill which
caused a blind corner, lived in by William Jacobs and his
wife Louise. It
was a small farm but all the land was taken to build the
council cottages and bungalows. Behind this holding
was another cottage occupied by William (Billy) Warne a
hurdle maker. Down
what is now known as
Farther down the
lane in Martins farm lived Wesley
Wilcox and his daughter
and son-in-law Harold Bacon.
Wesley was also a hurdle maker and Harold helped on
the farm as well as horse haulage and agricultural
contracting. They
were staunch Methodists, Wesley being Sunday School
Superintendent for a great number of years followed by
Harold Bacon. Their
Sunday started at 9.30 am Sunday School till 10.30, morning
service 10.30 till 12.00 or sometimes 12.30, Sunday School At the back
of this farm was Woodlands Park and the gamekeeper lived in
a cottage in the middle, but being such a big wood it was
almost impossible to keep the pheasants from straying to
there arable land outside, which meant a short stay for the
keeper. In the early part of this century Charles Cutler was the gamekeeper and he had several daughters who attracted the lads from the village and Charles was on the strict side. One night he chased some lads and they took refuge under a bridge and Charles stayed on top waiting but he got tired first after, the lads said, was (or seemed) 2 hours. On the other
side of the park was a hamlet known as Knobs Crook, the
first holding being occupied by Charles Froud. The next holding was
farmed by Fred Chalk, who left in the 1930s to take over
Woodlands Manor Farm. The
next tenant was Mrs Chalks brother Oliver Wilcox who was a
bit of a dream. Everywhere
Oliver went he took his bicycle including one day in
Ringwood Market when he was pushing it down amongst the
drivers loading up pigs and the remarks used to him are
unprintable. Behind this
farm, was another occupied by Harry Gallop and his wife
Nellie who made a very poor existence as Harry did his grass
cutting etc by the date always whether it was an early or
late season. Next
came Slough Lane
farm occupied by
Joseph Lockyer afterwards Charles Hopkins and latterly by
Frank Froud. When
Harry Gallop left, it was occupied by Mr. Hawkins. In 1944 a German
bomber shed it’s load of oil bombs (still buried) also a
load of incendiary bombs.
Old Mr. Hawkins went out and started picking them up
in a wheelbarrow. Frank
Froud told him to stop as a lot were unexploded and wanted
gentle treatment so the old man tipped them all in a heap
so Frank ran. The next cottage was abandoned in 1920 when the end fell out but the Stride family renewed it with weather boarding and is still in use 60 years later. The next house was occupied by the
women
(Amy Farrant) who told James II soldiers she had seen the Duke of
Monmouth and he was caught a short distance away under an ash tree in a ditch forming the boundary between Woodlands
and Horton Parishes. It is said the old woman that betrayed
Monmouth became lousy and the older people always called A farm
surrounding Monmouth Ash and bearing that name was farmed
for many years by Jethro Wilcox. At that time when a farmer
thrashed his corn, the workers on the machine had a cooked
dinner provided. When they went to this farm the joint was
half a pigs head 90% bone so Jethro said to his wife “who’s
going to carve mother you or I”. After his
wife’s death he lived alone several years and some young
chaps working nearby were invited in to eat their packed
lunches as the weather was bad and they always remembered
Jethro’s dinners consisting of a frying pan full up with
cabbage and bread. Anyway he lived to a good old age so it
must have suited him. Coming back
towards Woodlands via Davis Cross we come to Wedge Hill Farm
where “Tommy” Young lived, a rather poor sandy holding,
he mainly kept sheep which he folded on other peoples land
and on one field at Knowle Hill about 3 miles from home. As
boys we used to tease his ram and he told a friend “I can’t
understand why that friendly ram has got so bad tempered. I
have got to put a hurdle in front of me when I go into the
fold” he later went to Pentridge to live. On the other
side of Wedge Hill was another holding that had been
reclaimed from the common in the early 19th century by an
old lady named Jenny Clench who was reputed to be a witch
and was supposed to turn herself into a hare and find out
what was happening in the outside world. When the St.Giles
Estate Agent tried to get her to start paying one shilling a
year for a dinner at Horton Inn whereby she would be paid
rent on her holding she told him to keep his dinner and she
would keep her one shilling. By doing this she not only kept
the freehold but also the right to turbary rights and also
to shoot over the common. During the 1914-18 war this
holding was bought by a Mr.Searles who had been disposesed by
the War Department on Salisbury Plain who needed his land
for chemical warfare purposes. Adjoining this holding was Mount Pleasant Farm which was tenanted by Mr. Joe Collins who had also been disposesed by the War Department so two people became neighbours again. Both Mr & Mrs Collins had been married before and also had four children of their own and the combined family amounted to about 20. Soon after they came they were made homeless again this time by the farmhouse burning to the ground. At one time there were four cottages at Mount Pleasant but three fell down and were not replaced. Adjoining Mount Pleasant was another holding now known as Gravel Pit cottage but years ago it consisted of three cottages and was known as “Wild West”. Local people at the time swore it was haunted. We are now
back to the top of Jubilee Hill so called because a monument
was erected there in memory of Queen Victorias golden
jubilee and to make the occasion memorable, two babies
called Ewant Tubbs son of Lewis and Emily Tubbs and Lilian
Victoria Bacon daughter of Mrs.George Bacon, later Mrs.Henry
Tubbs were christened on the monument. When the huge stones
arrived at Verwood Station they were loaded on to farmers
wagons causing most of the wheels to collapse. It is said
the stone masons were never fully paid as the cost was more
than the money collected, but to remove them would cost more
than their worth. In the 1950s vandals pushed the obelisk on
top over, and has never been replaced although the huge
stones are still there. (The Stones were replaced in 1999
for the millenium) We now turn
towards Verwood and at the T junction turn left, on the
right lived Joseph Bailey,a strong Methodist as was all the
inhabitants of Sutton. A lad who was bird scaring nearby
often ate all his food by midmorning so he used to go to the
door and ask Mr, Bailey what the time was (he probably smelt
the dinner cooking) Joseph replied “sinner time my son,
come in and join us.” After his death his daughter married
Charles Sims who with his sons after him farmed it until the
1950s.
Farther on where the road
forks, lived Andrew Wilcox and his wife Ellen whose brother
was Job Haskell
the pig killer. Andrew used to collect tolls for cattle
turned on Woodlands and Horton common. Some of the commoners
used to say they had less cattle than they really had but he
used to enquire of other people how many cattle so and so
had and then go back and collect what was due. Until 1904
Sutton Farm was occupied by Mr. Saunders after which Robert
Froud took over followed by his son and grandsons. On the south side of
the farm is the old road that was replaced by the present
road as the old one was too steep for horses. The next holding now
known as Walnut Farm was occupied by William Cutlers brother
who started the shop and bakery at Woodlands. His son Edward
followed him also his grandson until the 1960s. Next door lived
Joseph Cutler who was clerk to the Parish council and also
collected the rates. He
was self educated but he was given to argue on politics,
religion, and he was quite convinced that he knew all the
answers. Over
the road lived Dan Rickets, quite short and a bald head, he
used to sell the vegetables etc at the Methodist Harvest
Festival and used to pour with sweat jumping and throwing
his arms about. When
he had a fuchsia to sell he’d say “how much for this
future”. His
son John lost an arm in the first war and he used to cycle
to Verwood daily and collect newspapers for the
neighbourhood. Until
then very few people had a daily paper unless it came by
post every morning. Until the
first war there was a brick and tile yard toward St. Giles
on the left hand side. It
had two open Scott kilns and employed several men but it
never reopened after the war.
On the opposite side of the road is a lane and at one
time two cottages stood lived in by brick workers. Over a stream is
another cottage lived in by George Hayter and above this a
thatched cottage lived in by Joseph Hayter both brick
workers. Actually
the Hayter family was brought to Sutton by the seventh
(good) Lord Shaftsbury from the Fordingbridge area to start
the brick works. George Hayters cottage was afterwards lived
in by Ernest Froud, son of Charles Froud of Knobs Crook
later still by Cecil Cutler son of Edward Cutler of Walnut
Farm. Joseph
Hayter crossed over the road to a holding occupied by
Charles Reeks and Miss Scamell who moved to East Romford Farm. Back on the
St. Giles road again to Remedy
Gate, so called because in
1551 the boy King Edward VI sat beneath an oak tree which is
still standing (although only the outer shell, but is still
alive) and touched people for the Kings evil (some kind of
sore rash). He
was staying at the time at Woodlands Manor where a field is
still known as Court Mead.
The pair of cottages at Remedy Gate were first
occupied by George Froud on the St. Giles side and John
Tubbs on the Woodlands road.
At that time (and until the 1940s) they were supposed
to open the gates when the Shaftsbury family passed through
but other people had to open the gates themselves unless
they were prepared to give the people a copper or two to
open the gate for them.
Once the driver of a traction engine was so annoyed
at having to open the gate that he drove straight through
and had to pay for a replacement. After the death of
John Tubbs his cottage was occupied by his daughter Mrs. Sam
Stevens and then her son Mr. Frank Stevens. Next door Jesse’s
son Frank took over after his death until 1919 when he took
other employment. It
was lived in by the Froud family until about 1950. When the Tubbs and
Froud boys were small the old tree opposite was filled with
Goose faggots used to heat the bread oven. They found some
matches and soon they had a terrific blaze but their parents
managed to put it out but one of the boys remembered the
hiding he received to his death. Coming towards Woodlands on the left hand side is a field of about 60 acres. This was all allotments in half acre plots. Originally it was rough common land covered in thorns and gorse but Lord Shaftsbury VII had it drained and measured in half acre plots. At one time it all had to be tilled by hand (no horses allowed) and it was a picture seeing all the families working, seeing who could grow better crops than his neighbour. Most of them grew half their allotment to potatoes etc and the other half to corn which they had threshed and ground wheat for flour and other corn for feeding the family pig. This began to end, like so many other things after the First War and it gradually petered out and is now used for grazing.
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All the farm wagons and carts were
on wooden wheels surrounded by an iron bond. These bonds
were made slightly smaller than the wooden
Cross over the road again and on the common
was the village pound where any straying cattle were shut up
until the owner paid for their release and cost of food and
fine imposed. The last person to hold this office was Job Haskell. This is one of
the oldest names in the village and members of his family
leased several properties between the Pound and the present
Church. Job worked on the St. Giles
Estate but also he was the
local pig killer. Almost every cottage kept one
or two pigs. They used to bring the pigs and the local shop
often allowed them to have meal on tick and then their own
garden vegetable supplies fatted the pigs to 150 to 200 lbs
dead weight. Then Job Haskell
was called in to kill and cut up one pig for the family`s
use. The other pig went to pay for the meal from the shop.
The pig for the family was salted for three weeks and then
hung in the inglenook chimney to dry for the coming year.
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