Memories

A collection of childhood memories from persons who lived on the Ferndale Park Estate between when it was built and the 1960s

The idea of this page is to provide a source that will hopefully help to bring back childhood memories of those children who lived on the Ferndale Park Estate between when it was built and the early 1960s, and to show their descendants, and others, what life was like for us at that time. The memories are in surname order of people who submitted them, and the text and pictures are interspersed with some of my own memories and research. Please look back here from time to time as, hopefully, more memories (and pictures) will be added – and perhaps yours?

Most of the children on the estate went to the infants and junior schools at St James and St Barnabas in Quarry Road in the 1940s and 1950s and it is intended to add a separate page for ‘Schooling’ and a page for ‘Shops and Tradesman’, accessed by the drop-down menu at the top of the page. Do you have any old school photographs that include children from the estate, or of the nearest shops to us in Albion Road and St James Road, or any memories of them?

I would love to hear from you if you lived on the estate, I also welcome any corrections or clarification of anything that has been written here so far – thanks, chris@g4bue.com

A Google Earth view of the present day Ferndale Park Estate showing Pigs Hill bottom centre, part of the new Springhead road top right and part of the Hilbert Recreation Ground left.

DANE, Alan, 70 Ravenswood Avenue

Alan said in 2016, “I remember from my early childhood ‘Pigs Hill’ being a rough track prior to its construction as a metalled road. During my childhood, few people on the estate owned cars. My father, Ken, owned motorcycles. Firstly a 1935 Sunbeam which he converted from hand-change gears to foot-change. Subsequently, he owned a Triumph Thunderbird and for both of these he built sidecars. I still have vivid recollections of lying within the body shell of a sidecar holding a solid metal ‘dolly’ whilst my father hammered in rivets. No ear plugs in those days – deafening!”

Games

“Much to the annoyance of some residents, a group of Ravenswood boys played vigorous ball games in the road. One of these called ‘It’ involved one person throwing a tennis ball at others who tried everything to avoid being hit. The thrower changed roles when making a successful hit. Girls on the other hand occupied themselves in the more genteel pastime of skipping.” I remember playing ‘It’ with my brother Tim and admit being two of the ‘Ravenswood boys’ described by Alan!

Guy Fawkes Night

“In the weeks leading up to Bonfire Night on 5 November, copious quantities of wood were collected and a bonfire built. Usually this was built on the waste unbuilt ground on the left or at the bottom of Pinewood Road. Old clothes were somehow obtained and a Guy built. I think one or two adults attended the burning but more to observe than supervise. Hand warmers were made by stuffing old rag into a cocoa tin and the rag was set to smoulder. The ends of the can were punctured and swung round by wire attached to the can. This had the effect of encouraging the smouldering rag but sometimes flames emanated from the can.”

I don’t remember the hand warmers that Alan mentioned but do remember building the bonfire he described in the weeks leading up to Bonfire Night. I only remember building it on the strip of unbuilt land at the bottom of Pinewood Road by the side of number 14 that led southwards alongside the wood to the edge of Geoff Heasman’s nursery, that we called ‘The Land’, and where the present day 18 and 24 Pinewood Road houses are located.

Gardens

“Virtually all gardens on the even side of Ravenswood were large. Those on the odd side were less so. As far as the evens were concerned, and from my certain knowledge, houses between the low 40s to upper 70s, apart from one or two, were all well kept. There seemed to be a general pattern of flowers and shrubs near the house, with a vegetable patch further from the house. In the growing season it was common for several of the men-folk to be tending their gardens at the same time during the growing season.

“Without exception it seemed, every garden had its own shed. However there were a multitude of sizes and shapes. Some small and squat, others extensive and tall. One house for example used a redundant wartime Anderson shelter as a shed (11 Lipscombe Road). In our case, Dad made what can only be described as a Swiss type chalet. This also doubled up as his workshop where many items of furniture took shape. At 58 Ravenswood Avenue, my uncle’s shed took the form of a recovered wartime Nissen Hut. Nor was there any consistency as to precisely where the garden sheds were located – some relatively close to the house, whilst others at the furthest extent of the garden and virtually in the adjoining wood.

“The majority of house from 42 to 76 (except 58 and 70) Ravenswood and 8 to 11 Libscombe Road, had a stream at their lower extremity just in the woodland strip to the rear of the houses in Sandhurst Road. Given that many, if not most of the residents, cultivated their own vegetables, the stream provided a ready source of water for their growing crops.”

OAKLEY, Marion, 46 Ravenswood Avenue

Marion said in November 2016, “I remember Pigs Hill being a single track and built by Italian prisoners of war. We moved into 46 Ravenswood Avenue in May 1941 and our semi with number 48, was the last pair of houses to be completed in the original phase. At the begining of the war, the Government passed an edict that if houses were in the process of being built and were waist high, then building had to stop, but if they were head high then building could continue. We previously lived in a flat in Dorking Road (with the Handy Shop on the corner).”

Trenches

In October 2017 Marion said at a recent reunion of the Tunbridge Wells Grammar School, she met Carole BLAKER (32 Hilbert Road) who now lives in the Ilford, Essex area Carole had been talking to a girl who lived in Dorking Road about some tunnels during WW2 opposite her house on the allotments, and wondered what they were.

The 8 September 1939 Courier published information about what to do if you are in the street when an air-raid warning is given. Under the heading ‘Air raid shelters in Tunbridge Wells. Where to go if you are caught in the street.’ (picture right), it reported, ‘If you are in the street when an air-raid warning is given, hurry towards one of the shelters which have been erected in various parts of the town. But don't panic. If there are a lot of people going into the shelter, wait your turn. There is plenty of room in the shelter, and everyone will get inside more quickly if you move in an orderly fashion. You will, of course, take your gas-mask with you.

In Tunbridge Wells there are already shelters at the following places...The Hilbert Recreation Ground which may be reached from many points in St. Barnabas parish and from Upper Grosvenor-road, 200 people.’

Patricia SKITTRALL nee TAYLER (20 Hilbert Road) said in May 2017, “For my last birthday my daughter gave me a book by the Tunbridge Wells Civic Society called Tunbridge Wells in the Second World War. I am amazed at all the pre-war activities going on in the town while I was still in nappies, but they genuinely thought Tunbridge Wells would be in the front line if the Germans had invaded. Anyway the book mentions the trenches (with details) which it says were built in the Hilbert Recreation Ground. I can only assume they were along the path at the bottom of the hill, behind Dorking Road. They would have been accessible to the residents either side of Albion Road. I never played down there when older so wouldn't have seen them.”

My dad was a very keen gardener, in fact he had worked in a nursery after leaving school and before he joined Tunbridge Wells Police in 1935, and when I was very young he took me in his wheelbarrow around the other side of the estate to Hilbert Road, somewhere opposite numbers 40 and 42 where there was a small nisson hut. This was the headquarters of the local allotment association where Dad bought fertiliser and other things for the garden, and would chat with other men who were also keen gardeners. I imagine the nisson hut was erected during the war and perhaps it was connected with the trenches?

In 2016, Christine HARRISON nee SKEWIS said, “I can remember some shelters under the trees in Hilbert Road. There was a gate opposite the pillar box. We had a shelter in our garden at 6 Fairfield Avenue, I don't know if it is still there.”

In November 2016, Alan Dane (70 Ravenswood Avenue) said, “I do not remember any such shelter in Hilbert Road, but there certainly was one at the bottom of ‘Pigs Hill’ on the Dorking Road side between the allotments and Willet’s wood yard. There was a fenced area, it may still be there, on the left handside at the top of Hilbert Road which I believe enclosed an emergency water reservior/tank. The fence consisted of high (over six feet) railings. The fact that these, unlike many in Ferndale, were not removed during WW2, would attest to its wartime role. I assume the reference to ‘trenches’ means in fact air raid shelters.”

Patricia TAYLOR, 20 Hilbert road, said, “At the bottom of the (then) sandy hill there was an ARP post in the war where my father did his bit before being called up in 1941. There was a huge tank just up the road towards Ferndale with EWS painted on the side. I know now it was Emergency Water Supply, but no-one told us and we didn’t ask.

SMITH, Carol (now CAMPBELL), 3 Fairfield Avenue and 78 Ravenswood Avenue

Carol said in 2016, “There was no central heating in the houses, but there was a coal fire in the living room which gave some warmth to the house. Most households seemed to have a heavy curtain hanging inside the living room door to keep the heat in and draft excluders were everywhere too. All the windows and doors were draughty and it was difficult to keep warm in the winter. The winters in Kent can be very cold and snowy, but as children, we were always pleased when it snowed.

“Everyone seemed to have a substantial garden, that I recall. Big enough for a formal garden and a large vegetable patch beyond, and people would give excess produce to their friends and neighbours. We had a screen of climbing roses between the formal garden and the vegetable garden. My grandparents house at 3 Fairfield had a very tall hedge with an arch and a wrought iron gate dividing their back garden. Front gardens were mostly tidy and houses regularly painted, and those who were not quite so dedicated in there home maintenance, were the exception.

Anderson Shelter

The GESSEYs [85 Ravenswood Avcenue] still had an Anderson shelter in their garden, and 3 Fairfield Avenue had a brick built shed which was in the garden, attached to the side of the garage which they had used as an air-raid shelter during the war. It was very dark in there, damp and full of the most enormous spiders.”

Several people have made reference to an Anderson shelter and it dawned on me that some younger readers may not know what it is. In November 1938, Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain placed Sir John Anderson in charge of Air Raid Precautions. Sir John was a scientist turned politician who led the Ministry of Home Security. Anderson commissioned the engineer William Patterson to design a small and cheap shelter that could be erected in people’s gardens. The first ‘Anderson’ shelter was erected in a garden in Islington, London on 25 February 1939 and, between then and the outbreak of the war in September, around 1.5 million shelters were distributed to people living in areas expected to be bombed by the Luftwaffe, and during the war a further 2.1 million were erected. Of those 3.6 million shelters, just a handful remain in place today.

Anderson shelters were issued free to all householders who earned less than £250 a year, and those with higher incomes were charged £7. Made from six curved sheets bolted together at the top, with steel plates at either end, and measuring 6.5 x 4.5 feet, the shelter could accommodate four adults and two children. The shelters were half buried in the ground with earth heaped on top.

STACE, Clive, 104 Ravenswood Avenue

Clive said in 2015, “I lived at number 104 Ravenswood Avenue. It was built around 1938 but we moved in when I was about two, I have been told. My earliest memory was from the war, and the building stayed that way until well after, as you know. I think the bungalow next to our house, 102, was one of the first to be built. I think most of the estate was built within a very few years, then got interrupted by the war. The unbuilt parts, opposite your house, opposite Lipscomb Road, and the bottom of Pinewood Road, were quite good butterfly and moth sites, as you know.

“I went to St James’ school that was infants only. It and St Barnabas infants (which served different but contiguous catchments) both fed St Barnabas juniors, which is why we had to move. I remember having lessons at St James in an air-raid shelter when the siren sounded.

TAYLER, Patricia, 20 (now 42) Hilbert Road

Pat wrote to me in November 2016 after finding the website. She is now Patricia SKITTRALL, lives in Norfolk and sent me her wonderful childhood memories:

“On reflection I suppose we were rather an insular community separated by a steep sandy hill from the (then) edge of town and the large impressive houses and gardens along Ferndale.

“I was born in 20 Hilbert Road in April 1936 and I would think my parents probably moved in there early in 1935 when the house had just been built. I heard that my father had bought it in an auction, which seemed a bit odd as it was a new development. It was I think something in the £550-£600 price range, not as expensive as those shown in your newspaper advertisement. Apparently it was a cold house, having only single-brick outside walls. The kitchen (very small) eventually made room for an anthracite boiler which heated the water and a tiny radiator in the dining room. In winter one got used to frost on the inside of the windows upstairs. There was an incident one winter known as the ‘Burst Pipe’ but as I was small I was kept out of the way and never found out what really happened.”

Playing

“When we were old enough to be ‘let out’ we played outside in the road or in each other’s houses. There seemed to be changes in what was the ‘in’ thing to play with outside – whips and tops, hoops, skipping etc. When we got bikes we would race round the estate, some in one direction and some in the other as there was a hill both ways. There was a nice flat bit at the back in Ravenswood Avenue and one side hadn’t been built up. I suppose building stopped because of the war.

“Indoors we girls played with dolls, board games, card games, jigsaw puzzles and a rather splendid dolls’ house made by my friend’s father. A game of Monopoly (which took ages) was left out on the front room floor ready for the next session after school. I did a lot of reading, especially Enid Blyton, who was producing books with some speed at the time.

“We had the occasional birthday party for local friends and played postman’s knock, musical bumps etc. We had to eat all the sandwiches up before we were allowed an iced bun. The presiding mother would hold a plate with the last (often fish paste) sandwich on it and say ‘come on somebody – win a handsome husband and a thousand a year’. I must have eaten one as I eventually got both!”

WW2

“I remember a Miss Westwood who would round up children from the estate and march us off to Sunday School. I remember the rag and bone man, gypsies selling clothes pegs and onion sellers on bikes.

“We had lodgers when I was small – a man from my father’s firm (Shell Mex) who I don’t remember and, during the war two women, one an actress from the local rep who I helped learn her lines, and the other, not sure what she did, from a very posh house near Sevenoaks. She bought me a book when she left.

“In the war we had an Anderson ‘dugout’ in the back garden, double length shared across the boundary with next door with bunks made of wire netting on a frame. I thought it was quite fun, though. We didn’t always go down once the early Blitz was over – would lie in bed and hear the German planes going over towards London. The sound of the air raid siren still gives me the creeps after all this time.

“Sometimes I sat under the dining table (heavy oak) during an air raid. Later we had a Morrison shelter indoors which took up most of the front room. We could hear the doodlebugs and wait for the explosion once the engine had cut out. We carried gas masks to school. Were told, if there was an air raid while we were on the way to or from school, to knock on someone’s door and ask them to look after us until it was over. There was a painted board outside our house which was supposed to change colour if there was a gas attack (or so they told me).

“My mother and other women on the estate formed a knitting party which met in Mrs Barriball’s house at 2 Fairfield Avenue (she had a big front room) to make garments for the troops – gloves, balaclavas etc. I used to help the knitters wind the wool into balls from skeins, all dull colours like khaki and grey. Mrs Barriball (known as Auntie Barry) had a lovely toy farm which kept me occupied while they got on with the knitting.

“Mr Millson, (just inside Ravenswood Avenue at number 3) had a grocer’s shop in Chapel Place so we registered with him for supplies during the war. My parents would sort out the hundreds of ‘points’ cut from ration books for him and I would take them round to Mrs Millson who always gave me a sweet for my trouble. She had a bowl of pot-pourri in the front room which I always thought was the ultimate in gracious living.

“Apart from missing sweets and one’s father being away, I think we accepted war as a way of life, not having known any different at my age, and to their credit, adults made sure we had a happy childhood and didn’t pass their worry and anxiety on to us.”

Post war

“After the war we had a Victory Party for the children held in the British Restaurant in the recreation ground. Iced buns were still in short supply even then.

“Of course when we got older we could go off for bike rides, go to the pictures (not the Kosmos which was known as the Fleapit), go swimming at the Monson Baths, play in Dunorlan Park (the mansion was still there then), climb on the Wellington Rocks on the Common and explore further afield. For girls it was surprising, when I look back, how much freedom we had, compared with children today.”

Above: The main headline of the 8 September 1939 Courier and below further down the page saying what you should do if you are in the street when an air-raid warning is given. Click on either image to enalrge it – photos thanks Courier.

Pages 78-81 from Tunbridge Wells in the Second World War describing the ‘trenches’, click on either image to enalrge it – photos thanks Patricia Skittrall nee Taylor.

A typical Anderson shelter – photo thanks Brian Chanter.

Slower pace: The junction of Ferndale and Sandrock Road in the 19th century, with children playing in the street and someone riding a horse, and without the traffic for which the area has now become notorious – photo thanks Zena Hassell, Facebook OTWPS.

And looking the other way further down Ferndale – photo thanks Mick White, Facebook OTWPS.