The Friends of Honeywood Museum
Registered Charity No. 1067131
Honeywood Museum by Carshalton Ponds
Honeywood Walk, Carshalton, Surrey SM5 3NX Telephone: 020 8770 4297
e-mail: lbshoneywood@btconnect.com

Memories

Do you have memories of life in 20th century Beddington, Carshalton, Carshalton Beeches, Cheam, Hackbridge, North Cheam, St. Helier, Sutton or Wallington that you would be happy to remember with us?
Send us an email by clicking HERE to share your reminiscences of life in the borough in the 1900s, or write to Local Memories at the Honeywood address at the top of this page . Old photographs you would be happy for us to show would be very welcome.

John Parkin writes (16th July 2008):

CARSHALTON AND LOCAL MEMORIES

My early years

I was born on 2nd July 1950 at 5 Smallholdings, Little Woodcote Estate, in Carshalton, the roads now being known as the “Telegraph Track”. The house, which is still there today, is a short distance up from the Woodmansterne Road entrance to the Oaks Park. Some years ago, my late Mother told me that I was a “home birth”. As a family we lived with my grandparents, my granddad growing flowers. These houses, of quite distinctive character, were built for veterans of the First World War, of which my grandfather, Harry Robinson, was one. I think they were owned by Surrey County Council. Carshalton, of course was an Urban District within that County until the formation of the London Borough of Sutton. My father, an orphan, came from Yorkshire, whilst my mother’s family were from Croydon, my nanny’s maiden name being Potter. It was the Second World War, which brought my parents together. One of my mother’s sisters (she had two sisters and two brothers) had been evacuated to South Wales, where she later made her family home. My mother, Isabella (Bella) Robinson, met my father to be, Thomas (Billy) Parkin, who was wearing army uniform, on a train and the rest, as they say, is history. They were married immediately after the cessation of the war at the former George Street Congregational Church in Croydon. Living on the Smallholdings, as we always knew them, meant that we had a life of fresh air – as my mother recalled. I was always out in the garden. After all, what entertainment was there indoors – no television, no telephone or videos and only the occasional listening to my grandparents’ wireless. My father would make a “soap box cart” for us to ride on along the driveway. The Oaks Park was a short walk down the road so the love of the countryside started at a very tender age.

However we were not confined to home, far from it. My first school was in Woodmansterne and my brother Norman and I walked there in all weathers (I recall the heavy snowfalls we used to get), taking the path alongside the Oaks Park and then along Carshalton Road – the education authorities provided an escort for a group of us from the Smallholdings. There used to be a small shop up to the crossroads and turning right. It was owned by a Mrs. Lane and I recall my brother and I walking there one day to find that she had sadly died. “Bunny”, I think he was called, ran the cycle shop in Ross Parade and his family lived on the Smallholdings. He told me that he often used to carry my nanny’s bag from Boundary Corner, where she would have alighted from the trolleybus. If you look at the names on the Smallholdings today (2008) there are still a number of families who have been living there for generations. I lived in the family home from July 1950 until 1959, when my granddad retired and moved to Croydon Lane in Banstead. We could no longer live there as a family, so we were put on the council waiting list for a council house. We moved to temporary accommodation, provided by Surrey County Council, firstly near Witley, secondly in a prefab in Kingston and then to a house called “Oakdene” in Denmark Road, in Carshalton which, I believe, is now the site of the Council offices. Later that year we were fortunate to move into a house in Stanhope Road, Carshalton-On-The-Hill, an area known as “Little Jerusalem”. The large houses in nearby Stanley Road were built as hotels on the assumption that Carshalton Beeches Railway Station would in fact have been nearer than it is!!

What else do I recall about life on the Smallholdings? The milkman came with a horse and cart and as far as I recall he delivered on a Sunday as well and I remember wonderful tasting bottled orange juice. We had blackberries at the far end of the land behind the house and this must have led to my continuing to pick blackberries in the autumns nowadays. The land backed onto the old Queen Mary’s Hospital. We would use Carshalton Beeches Station for train trips to the seaside and life has turned full circle, as for the past eight years I have been working at the station selling tickets for rail travel. But my greatest public transport memories are of the 654 trolleybus route, which was to finish in March 1959 – as I write these notes it is almost fifty years since motorbuses took over, at the start of the London trolleybus conversion programme, which culminated at Fulwell depot in 1962. We travelled most weekends to Croydon, on Saturdays to the shops – Surrey Street market was a favourite; my father got his haircut in a row of shops which were demolished long ago and which were passed by the 630 trolleybus route – Croydon Tramlink now operates where the rows of shops used to be, on both sides of the road, leading to the old Pitlake Bridge; and finally my Dad bought our first television at the Reeves store in 1959. On Sundays, Mum, my brother Norman and I took the trolleybus to Reeves Corner and walked to the George Street Congregational Church, where I was christened – this church building is no longer there. We would go to London at Christmas time and visit Selfridges to see Father Christmas and “Uncle Holly” (remember him?); we would take the 234 (double deck RT bus) or 234A (single deck RF with a conductor) to Purley to see the latest Norman Wisdom film and we might take an RF on the 213 from Beeches Avenue to the Downs at Belmont, for walks across the chalk hills. Rather than carrying a pushchair on to a bus, my Mum had two friends on the walk to the bus stops, where she could leave the pushchair to be picked up later. In the fifties, after leaving the top of Boundary Road and entering the Telegraph Track, it was possible to see the radar devices from the relatively nearby Croydon Airport. One final thing I recall – a fowl pest outbreak on nearby farms, when I saw chickens being thrown onto the fires. At the time we had recently bought some young chicks, but they were kept well clear of any visitors!! Talking of animals, the Crusaders Hall at Boundary Corner has been the venue for Missionary Mart auction sales for very many years. It must have been towards the end of 1958 that we went to an auction and bought a rabbit for five shillings – we named him Timothy.

I recall going just once to Saturday morning pictures at the Odeon in Wallington (now the “Whispering Moon” Wetherspoons pub); however Norman and I were regulars at Sutton Granada, taking the trolleybus from Boundary Corner into Sutton. For 6d (that’s two and a half pence in today’s money) we had a full morning’s entertainment. There were a couple of cartoons; a short film (maybe from the Children’s Film Foundation, possibly a documentary); a full length feature film and of course the weekly serial – it would finish with such a cliff hanger that you would want to return “same time, same place, next week”. There was pre-film entertainment, with the organ, which rose from beneath the floor, with some singing, including “We’re one for all, and all for one, the Sutton Grenadiers”. That was part of growing up in the fifties and sixties – going out for entertainment and mixing with other people. If the film broke, everyone would stamp their feet and I recall children occasionally letting off stink bombs; however as the cinema, in Carshalton Road, was opposite the Police Station, this wasn’t too much of a problem!! At Christmas and on your birthday there was a voucher for free admission and some free refreshments – those were the days indeed!!

The Stanhope Road Years

When we first moved to Stanhope Road there were some corner shops just a short distance away, separated by a coal yard (which was subsequently turned over to flats) – one of these sold fish and chips. There were also corner shops in Stanley Road and on the corner of Stanhope Road and a larger number in nearby Stanley Park Road – my mother liked to buy ham from Abbots on the corner of Stanley Road. All the corner shops have gone – but in those days there were no supermarkets and few people had cars. The nearest telephone was in Stanley Road – it was to be over twenty years before we first had one at home. We had an open fire, which would also heat water, in a big “copper” and with little or no other heating in the house, the family grouped together in the living room and of course we sat down at the table to take meals together – a far cry from the takeaway meals of 2008!! My father always used to count the bags of coal when they were delivered!! Gas for cooking was paid for my meter – so the gasman would come periodically to empty it. We also had the Corona man, delivering a range of soft drinks, including “dandelion and burdock”. I would cycle a great deal, not just to school, but for leisure and once went to Guildford and on another occasion to Shepherds Bush – I didn’t tell my parents”. My father, who worked as a gardener at St. Helier Hospital (he cycled to and from work) grew fruit and vegetables in the back garden and had some very tall sunflowers!! Whilst he was still alive I used to walk alongside the Oaks Park to my granddad’s home in Croydon Lane in Banstead. My grandparents are buried in the Parish Church in Banstead and my parents at Bandon Hill.

The School Years

When I was living temporarily in Denmark Road, I went to Camden Road School. It is interesting that some 40 years later I should run Scout meetings in the school hall, when I was Scout Leader with 6th Carshalton. In 1961 I went to senior school – Carshalton West, at Wrythe Green, where the boys were downstairs and the girls upstairs (the girls now have the full school). In 1963 we combined with Tweedale and the new school was in Winchcombe Road. I took the 157 bus to school, in the days when there was a conductor. When I travelled to Carshalton West, I found I could save an old halfpenny, by alighting at Carshalton Station and walking the rest of the way. But then this was worthwhile for a penny lolly at Coopers at Wrythe Green. Rather than having school meals I would often go to Rose Hill to a café, or others in Ruskin Road or at Wallington Green, or I would have fish and chips at Rose Hill.

The Scouting Years

Scouting was part of my life from 1958 until about 2005. I joined the 10th Wallington (Holmwood) Boy Scout Group in the Wolf Cubs at the age of eight – meetings were held in Holmwood Hall. I continued as a Scout and Senior Scout and then became a leader and I held a warrant for some 36 years. During my Scout leadership, having left the 8th Wallington (the 10th had merged with the 8th in 1968) I moved to 1st Belmont and subsequently 6th Carshalton. My first Summer Camp was near Tenterden in Kent – in those days we would hire a removal lorry (often Humphreys from Cranfield Road in Carshalton) – the camping gear would be loaded and the Scouts would sit on top – health and safety wasn’t an issue in those days. In 1964 we went to the Lake District by steam train. Throughout my time in Scouting I travelled widely, not only camping but also youth hostelling trips, taking the boys to every corner of England, Wales and Scotland, including the Isle of Skye. Nearer to home we held some camps in the Oaks Park and at Coulsdon, sometimes taking trek carts across the Smallholdings.

For many years, following the amalgamation of the 8th and 10th I could (and indeed have) written a book on Scouting!! For many years I ran the Scout meetings in the Stafford Road hall at Christ Church in Wallington, now occupied by the Sainsbury’s supermarket. We had bi-monthly church parades there too, whilst jumble sales and Fayres were a regular feature.

The Church Years

Since attending Wolf Cub church parades, I have been involved at Wallington’s United Reformed Church, on the corner of Stanley Park Road and Holmwood Gardens, and have been a member for many years. I also attended parades at Christ Church in Wallington and recall the halls, with the cellars. It is interesting to note that when, many years ago, the local council wished to widen the road, by taking church land, it was agreed that if they built a wall then this could go ahead. The trams had recently been withdrawn, so the granite setts between the tram lines were taken up and used to make the wall – I have one as a souvenir!!

The Transport Interest

I have always maintained an interest in public transport, particularly the local trolleybuses and buses and their routes. I recall many bus routes which no longer operate in this part of London and the vehicles which have long since disappeared from public service. As the conductor operated buses gradually disappeared, I took photographs of the last journeys, sometimes with the crew posing in front of them. For example I have some lovely flash pictures taken at the Wallington Belmont Road terminus (this was the main bus terminal point from the north when it was a low bridge at Wallington Station) of the last crew buses on routes 115 and 115A (worked by buses from Thornton Heath Garage). During the long hot summer of 1976 I photographed the last RF single deck buses on routes 80 and 80A out of Sutton Garage. When the last 154 bus ran via Ruskin Road and Park Lane (the roads covered earlier by both trams and trolleybuses) I photographed the last one (DMS type) driven by Johnny Gardener, who had started as a trolleybus driver in 1959. The following morning, 23rd April 1977, I rode and photographed the first 154 bus on its new route via Carshalton Beeches and the full length of Stanley Park Road. There are many memories I have of the local buses, far too numerous to mention here.

And then there are the local trains. I recall the semaphore signal gantry at Sutton; the signal box at Wallington just before it was being demolished; the sidings at Wallington, where some trains started in the very early mornings. Then there were the fast trains from Victoria to the coast, which called at Sutton and overtook stopping trains at Cheam (which explains why the two platforms are so far apart); there were through tracks. I have many railway tickets, both day and seasons which I was issued with over the years. At Carshalton Beeches, where I now sell tickets (in 2008), there were regular platform staff and I remember one, known as Taffy, who said he used to walk from Wallington, where he lived, along the track to get to work. The barrier was manned until the last train.

John's memories of local transport in Carshalton may be found BELOW - he may be contacted by email by clicking HERE

Paul Williams writes (12th July 2008):

ECHOES OF MY PAST

I was born in Carshalton on the Hill in September 1946 in the front bedroom of 74 Stanley Road. This was where my maternal Grandmother and Grandfather lived and where I was to live for more than twenty years. It was a 1930s built council house and well constructed. It had a ground-floor bathroom accessed via the kitchen but had no form of heating and was pretty-well unusable in cold winters, which were typical in the late 40s and 50s. The WC was also on the ground floor but access was via the back door, across an open archway that led into the garden. This open doorway eventually was fitted with a door but the council left a 1 foot gap at the bottom and the curved arch above was also left open. Its insulation value was non-existent! In the winter a tiny paraffin lamp about 6 inches tall was left burning in the toilet all night to try to ward off frozen pipes.

The house had gas lights installed in the kitchen, living room and the three bedrooms. These were most welcome. They provided a small measure of warmth in the bedrooms in winter when mine would be lit for an hour before bedtime and were invaluable during the many power cuts experienced in the post war years. There were no power points and apart from one 2amp socket used for the wartime ‘Utility’ radio there was no provision for any electrical appliances or standard lamps.

The only source of real warmth was the living room coal fire, which also provided hot water by means of a small back boiler behind the grate. That fire was much loved as the hearth and a toasting fork provided, toast, crumpets and chestnuts; all beyond the capabilities of the four legged Stoves cooker and the ridiculously poor gas pressure that supplied it. There were two other small fireplaces in the main bedrooms but there was never enough coal to use them. We got used to thick ice inside the windows.

Irons were heated on the cooker burners, although I recall seeing an unused gas iron that ran off a poker point. When appliances like a vacuum cleaner (an old Canadian Fillery I think it was called), electric iron and hairdryer came along, they were all fitted with a bayonet plug to connect to a light fitting. No earthing at all!

After I was born, my Grandfather, Charles Moore, who had fought with the ‘Buffs’ regiment in the First World War and was Air Raid Warden at The Mount in the second, fell victim to lung cancer and died after a long struggle in the War Memorial Hospital by Carshalton Park when I was two. Sadly, I have no memories of him although I am told he played with me a lot. Nor do I have any recollection of holding up two fingers to Winston Churchill from my push-chair when he visited Croydon (so I am told).

When gas pressure allowed we could use a gas copper to heat water for washing clothes. Rinsing was done in the Butlers sink and laundry was finished off on the great cast iron mangle that sat outside the back door – next to the two zinc baths that were used for bathing in front of the living room fire in winter.

Our coal store was a redundant Anderson Shelter and deliveries by black faced coalmen wearing their distinctive head-ware were all watched closely during deliveries as there were many tales of short deliveries! There was a small coal depot in Stanhope Road with high walls, behind our house.

Gas was the fuel for street lighting too. The warm mellow light these provided was quite adequate and there was no glare to hide the stars on a clear night. Some were lit manually such as at railway stations and private roads but ours had permanent small wind-proof pilots and were operated by long running clockwork motors that turned them on and off. They were well maintained and adjusted. They weren’t bad either on the long foggy nights that always seemed to follow Guy Fawkes night and the celebrations that everyone seemed to participate in.

Much more enjoyment was had from simple events such as the London to Brighton veteran car run or the University Boat Race, when small favours such as plastic oars were abundant in every newsagent, each sporting a ribbon in your choice of the dark and light blue of Oxford & Cambridge. Sporting events, local and national were enthusiastically followed and there was a strong sense of national pride that emerged after the weariness of the long years of war and hardship. Records achieved, for example, in aviation and athletics were lauded and cynicism was quite uncommon. Newspapers were generally regarded as trustworthy and responsible, placing emphasis on real news. I particularly recall headlines in the Daily Sketch and Sunday Express reporting on the death of Queen Mary and Joseph Stalin, the ascent of Everest and the Coronation; also, the national concern for the fate of the captain of The Flying Enterprise, a small freighter that had listed badly after a storm in the Atlantic. After days of struggling towards safety the list got worse but the captain refused to leave. He was joined by a brave reporter from the Express. They were rescued just before the Flying Enterprise sank.

The Coronation was a unique event, especially for a six year old going on seven. Apart from the excitement of the fancy dress costumes and the abundance of cakes and other treats, I don’t think I have ever seen such real enjoyment in the community since.

We were very well served by abundant local shops. Within a few paces across the road in front of our house we had a shoe repair shop with belt driven machinery. The noise of the equipment emanated from the doorway, as did the heavy odour of adhesive. I can’t remember the purpose of shop to the right. I vaguely recall the windows being obscured by brown paper.

The next shop in the line was the all important newsagents, sweetshop and tobacconists. Here my father used to purchase single ‘7 o’clock’ brand razor blades and his packets of ‘Players Weights’. Next door at the end of the terrace was a general grocery store, at one time run by a family named Benjamin. From both shops you could buy snacks such as Lyons individual fruit pies. They were square and consisted of a rather shallow pastry case with a fruit filling (the terms pastry and fruit being rather loose) in a cardboard box. They cost 3^d and the most disgusting one was apricot! When sweets came ‘off-ration’ you could have unrestricted access to joys such as Cadbury’s fudge bars, Fry’s ‘Five Boys’ chocolate sandwich bars ,Wagon Wheels (not like the miserable imitations today) with varieties that included vanilla, strawberry and butterscotch. Seemingly countless rows of large screw top jars lined the shelves. These were filled with a bewildering choice of sweets; many of which have long since vanished; liquorice, of course, All-sorts, Pipes, Comfits, Pontefract cakes, Wheels, Twists and rock-hard Bassatti . Then there were flying saucers, mallow fried eggs, honeycomb, aniseed balls, gob stoppers, penny chews imps, mushrooms, cigarettes, sherbet dabs and jaw-breaking toffees to name but a few.

Two other shops followed in the row just beyond access between the two terraces. The first was the butchers shop. Sawdust on the floor and a selection of large knives and saws behind the counter with its butchers slabs. Rows of rabbits hung in the window. Tripe, kidneys, liver and other offal all formed part of a display of meat quite uncommon in earlier austerity years. Next door was Ede’s the green grocer. They supplied all the seasonal fruit and vegetables we needed, as well as my supply of orange boxes at 3^d to 6^d a time that provided wood for all sorts of boyhood constructions that my imagination could conjure up.

Behind our house, next to the coal yard, two other shops plied their wares, a small general store adjacent to a fish and chip shop. The latter was strictly seasonal and opened only during the months that old potatoes were available. Next to the chip shop a small alleyway between houses led to Windborough Road. This was not a public right of way and was chained closed once a year to confirm this. The alleyway was well used but has now disappeared, along with the shops and the coal yard. From my bedroom window I could look between the buildings and with my little brass telescope I could read the clock on the control tower at Croydon Airport.

Returning to the front of the house, there were more shops further up Stanley road near Cranfield Road West, one of which was a small drapers on the opposite side of the road, set well back with its neighbour. Another ‘corner shop’ was lower down the hill at the junction of Stanhope road. Opposite the upper junction of Stanhope road stood Cooper’s a large brown general store that sold grain etc. from hoppers in front of the counter. I recall the wooden floor, rows of different sized brown paper bags ready to dispense from the large scales, with their large set of weights. The building was on a corner, curved at the doorway.

The area was a strange mixture of houses; non-local authority terraces and semis, as well as the younger council houses that made up the eastern middle of Stanley road and Stanhope road. These contrasted with buildings such as Cooper’s that were clearly much older. Our home, for example, was opposite a large old house with very wide frontage under a canopy of trees. It had a shallow U shaped drive with stone pillars at each entrance. I think its name was Stanley House, although locally it was simply known as ‘Oscars’. It had a large abandoned apple orchard at the back which invited ‘scrumping’ at the appropriate time of year. ‘Oscars’ was between the main row of shops and a very tall but tired, imposing Victorian terraced houses. They were two or three storeys high, with cellars I think. Front doors were approached up a large flight of stone door steps. At the other end of this terrace stood a large Victorian building, fairly dilapidated, that had once, the old locals said, been a substantial hotel built for those following sporting pursuits. The rooms were now used as flats. The front doors to the Phoenix, as it was known were firmly shut and access was at the rear, where there were large metal fire escapes. The main hallway and staircase to each floor was dingy and heavy with the smell of cooking. At the rear of the Phoenix was a large children’s playground with a good selection of the standard equipment local authorities provided at the time on a hard tarmac surface. A tall slide, roundabout, a long multi seat swing that you could stand up on each end and work up until nearly horizontal (exiting certainly, dangerous – very probably) and a long way from what would be acceptable today. All this and two other sets of swings, all unsupervised!

Between the Phoenix and the playground lay the wide, shallow sloping entrance to an air raid shelter which turned 90 degrees to the west and ran behind the playground. An emergency exit was provided by way of a steel ladder covered by a manhole in the grounds of the Pannett & Neaden’s ( I can’t vouch for the spelling) dried herb factory that fronted the foot path that ran between Coopers and the top of Fir Tree Grove, abutting the allotments that now grow lavender. The aroma that came from this little factory was amazing. The smell of drying mint and sage was heady and pleasant and spread all over the neighbourhood.

There was a large courtyard between Coopers and the Phoenix that gave access to the playground and the footpath to Fir Tree grove. At the rear was a wall with a small building behind. This was used in the post war period as a dispensing clinic, where mothers could collect jars of the most horrid concentrated orange liquid supplement, cod liver oil and malt extract for their children’s well being! I didn’t mind the cod liver oil that much; the malt was something of a treat but that orange!

The shops I have mentioned met most of our daily shopping needs. Milk was delivered by an immaculately turned out horse and milk float of United Dairies. Bread from the Co-op bakery was in a less shining example of a van with fading livery. It may even have been electric.

One luxury, which I think was too expensive for us to enjoy, was a regular delivery by the Corona lorry. This carried vast quantities of large glass, metal secured china-stoppered fizzy pop; Lemonade, Limeade, Orangeade, Cream Soda, Dandelion and Burdock, Cherryade, Sarsaparilla etc. Walls ice-cream was also delivered regularly for a weekend treat, Wafers, Cornets and Neapolitan bricks.

Recycling in many forms was quite the norm too. Old newspapers were used to wrap ashes from hearths and collected for potash. Food scraps went to the bin of ‘The Pig Man’ who called weekly to collect organic waste to feed the pigs at the Woodcote small-holdings. Bottles too; empty milk bottles were meticulously collected by the milkman and most beer and pop bottles had deposits levied to ensure their return.

Further down the road in Stanley Park Road, only a few minutes’ walk away, we had another array of shops. A large general store on the corner of Stanley Road, two telephone boxes with their buttons A & B and un-vandalised telephone directories, an Off-Licence run by Fuller, Smith & Turner, the Post Office, Chemist, Johnson’s the Iron Mongers, a drapers, another butchers, bakers and Sabin’s newsagents where you could buy penny lollies from the freezer with a watery chocolate or spearmint flavour. The Gem, another sweetshop and newsagent where, in the summer you could buy frozen pyramid shaped cartons of ‘Jubbly’ orange juice. A fine wet fish mongers, Payne’s, with toys in one window and bicycles in the other, rounded it all off nicely. Just as well because public transport to and from this sub village of Carshalton on the Hill was non-existent.

Where we lived was a good mile or more from Carshalton Beeches railway station and about half a mile from Boundary Corner where the 654 Trolleybus service ran (slightly longer to get a less frequent service towards Kingston on the 213 at the junction of Stanley Park Road and Staplehurst Road).Other services meant a longer walk to Carshalton High Street or Wallington. Having said this it never was an issue, walking was the order of the day then for all of us.

The nearest cinema was the Odeon in Wallington, where I was taken to see films like The Dambusters, Titfield Thunderbolt and the Man from Laramie. The Odeon, at the corner of Ross Parade is now a pub, a long throw from when my paternal grandfather helped build the original cinema. Other delights awaited a small boy in Croydon, where you could visit a rather good zoo, complete with chimps at Kennard’s Arcade. Croydon Airport was just a bike ride away and many hours were spent looking over the gate at Mollison Drive watching the bi-plane Tiger Moths on training flights. Some learner pilots did very passable impressions of kangaroos on landing, bouncing high into the air several times before coming to an embarrassed stop. Some civil commercial services still operated such as Morton’s flights with four engine De Havilland Herons to Jersey and Rollason’s manufacturing business making their small single seat Turbulent with Volkswagen car engine. The biggest aircraft that regularly used Croydon were ex WW2 Douglas Dakotas. One would roar over our house in the early hours most nights, taking newspapers to Paris. All this disappeared, along with the Trolleybuses, steam goods trains, gas street lights and very importantly to me, The Oaks mansion in Oaks Park.

I seem to have left out so much; a myriad of days exploring the local country side. Wet days pouring over copies of Eagle, RAF Flying Review and Practical Wireless. School days, Cubs and Scouts meetings at Holmwood Hall (10^th Wallington) and happy memories of 350 Squadron ATC at Beddington. Local fetes and at Queen Marys, the Carshalton Parade which started at the hospital and passed our front garden gate, the sounds of home during those years. The one o’clock hooter at Queen Mary’s hospital and the school bell ringing from the tower at Stanley Park Juniors, summoning us back for the afternoon. Old radio shows, early television and happy holidays. Real carol singers at Christmas. Bob a Job weeks, London’s bomb damage that lasted for years, fishing in Carshalton ponds, collecting conkers in the park and best of all, as a small boy, a Christmas trip to the Gamages store in Holborn to see the model railway layout and Father Christmas.

Wendy Henningsson writes:

Recollections of Oaks Park and the Mansion

The first view I had of the tall oak trees was from a pram. Legend has it in my family that I started crying when my mother took me for a walk to the Oaks Park. Coming into the shade after the first part of our sunny outing, the sight of mighty tree-trunks and branches meeting thickly above our heads startled me. However, as I grew older, I happily went for walks to the Park with family, friends or visiting aunts and cousins.

Our way led downhill as far as the farm belonging to the Oaks Mansion. Opposite the farmhouse with its imitation Tudor timbered gable, there was a brick wall surrounding the vegetable garden. The wooden door in this tall brick wall was always locked. I wondered every time I passed it, what it might look like inside that garden and imagined it well-kept, well-laid out and full of exciting things. There had to be something special in there, I thought, as it was so secret.

Only many years later, after the end of WWII when the farmhouse stood empty, did it become possible to view inside the garden. Now dilapidation and decay had set in, the door had been wrenched open, it was hanging on its hinges and spreading away in front of me was – nothing. Grass-covered mounds where seed-beds had lain, weeds, nettles and brambles had taken over. On the outside of one part of the garden wall was a track leading towards Belmont; its surface was covered with black charred rubble, looking a little like coal dust; this came from the iron furnaces when Surrey’s trees were used for fuel long ago. After passing the dip in the road on a level with the farmhouse, the road then led uphill and eventually we came to a gate leading into the Park. The gate-house, or lodge was lived in for many years by a family called Gilbert. After 1945 they started selling ice-creams from the front window of the bungalow; this was my first acquaintance with “Walls ices”.

After entering by the open gate, we walked along a curved drive; on the left were smooth lawns and a handsome cedar tree also a series of flower beds on raised stone platforms with a wall at the back and in one part was an artificial stone “grotto”, with imitation stalagmites and a small cave that I could step down into. In front of the grotto there was a round goldfish pond, but this was boarded over during the war period and I used to look at it and long for the time when there would be fish in it again. We sometimes had a picnic in this area.

Following the drive towards the Mansion itself you could see high laurel hedges on the one side, these hid the outhouses from view. The outhouses contained servants’ quarters and bakery. They were used as dwellings for refugee children who came to England during the civil war in Spain in 1936. Three teachers, the “Senoritas” lived with them and a committee of local people assisted with organization and planning fund-raising efforts to support them. They held displays of Basque folk-dancing amongst other events.

The Mansion was not occupied at that time; the windows were boarded up and a brick wall built outside each window, behind which it was just possible to squeeze – an ideal hiding place when we played hide-and-seek. Shortly before the whole building was demolished, I had the opportunity to look inside and remember only the round ballroom, it was beautiful with an inlaid tiled floor which looked like marble. The ceiling was painted in soft colours, but of course it was all dusty and neglected having been out of use for so many years.

The exterior of the building was red brick and with its turrets and towers looked to be an ideal setting for drama and romance in the lives of “lords and ladies”.

The wide lawns on the north and east side of the building were always well looked after, even in wartime. In one corner was a dead oak tree which just asked to be climbed – an easy stretch up to the first level where you could stand, and then several thick branches pointing north east, south and west. It looked so easy. I surveyed it many a time, but courage failed. Beyond the tree there was more woodland and then an unmade-up track leading northwards to yet another gate.

On the other side of this tree-lined drive were large meadows where cowslips grew. One day when I went to look for these yellow flowers with my sister I was surprised to see bomb craters, huge mounds of white chalk had been thrown up in circles round the craters in the middle of these grassy green meadows.

Oaks Park inspired mixed feelings; on the one hand the whole layout of the park and its aspect were beautiful; there was a wonderful feeling of freedom to be able to run across the wide green lawns with the trees surrounding them. The clear fresh air of the North Downs and the quietness of the Park made it a delightful place to visit. However, because the Mansion stood empty and the out-buildings became neglected after the Basque refugees had moved away, there was also a sad and haunted atmosphere about the place. It seemed to me even more sad when I heard that the building was to be demolished – the whole character of the place was about to be changed for ever.

Wallington County Grammar School for Girls

The aerial view of the Wallington County Grammar School for girls shows the building and surroundings as my sister Marian must have seen it when she started there in 1937. At that time there were not many trees or bushes round the school grounds. When the Second World War approached, shelters were dug in the area between the small plots meant for growing vegetables and the upper playing field. The hockey field on the right of the photograph sloped even in those days – which meant hard work for the team whose goal was at the top end of the field. When Marion reached sixth form level and specialized in science subjects she had to go to the Boys’ County Grammar school elsewhere in Wallington for laboratory work. In this way her circle of friends increased and from time to time a handsome young man would appear on our doorstep ready to take her out. Mickey, Julian, David – as little sister I was very curious about these admirers.

The final examination at school was called Matriculation in those days and getting good results Marian started work straight away in a research laboratory in Croydon when she left school in 1943. Four years later and it was my turn to enter the same school. But not through the stately entrance shown in the middle of the long side of the building, pupils had to enter through the basement door which faced the hockey field. I was very proud going to school on my first day, wearing the school uniform, which was a cream coloured blouse and navy blue skirt, the tie in green and gold and blazer with a woven badge on the pocket. I had coveted the black felt hat with a brim which had belonged to my sister and at last I was allowed to wear it. Only to find that most of the other new girls were wearing navy blue berets.

I also ‘inherited’ many teachers who had taught my sister too. She had learned history with Miss Timothy, biology with Miss Moorhouse, German with Miss Theakestone and of course done gymnastics with Miss Eager. I attended the school for seven years, leaving there in 1954; it was a good school with a well-functioning building. But when it was first opened, nobody foresaw that the staff would one day all be arriving in their own cars – a car park for them would have taken a large corner off the hockey field. However I was sorry when I heard that the school had moved to new premises.

I took the photo on the right in 1952 (I think) of my three friends sitting on one of the shelters in the school grounds. They are Pam, Pat and Moreen.

Kay Grimwood writes:

I lived at number 68 Windborough Road from 1956-1961 then moved to Stevenage. We lived next door to Dr. and Mrs. Eichwald who had grand-children who were actors Kika, Petra and Paul Markham. I fondly remember the Gem shop and Jubilees, also the "wreck" park. We lived with my parents and grandparents. As a treat on a Saturday we would go to the small-holdings to see the animals. My grandparents were Winnie and Wally Blakey and they had a son Tony as well as my dad John. I would love to hear from anyone who remembered my dear grandparents. Oh, and my dad told us he took Cliff Richard to school on the back of his bike!

Click HERE if you are able to expand on Kay's memories for her.

The following memories of local transport in the area were offered at an exhibition held at Honeywood in the summer of 2006. We thank those who wrote for the time they took to do so, and for the fascinating reminiscences they have provided. Photos Sutton Local Studies Collection: click on them to see the larger images.

Audrey writes:`

A trip on the tram towards Croydon from Carshalton in about 1929

I was very excited that my baby sister and I were about to go for a ride on a tram! My parents both enjoyed travelling about as much as they could in those days, but when my father was at work mother really enjoyed taking us to places at every opportunity.

We must have walked from our house in Camden Road to Ruskin Road to catch the tram to Croydon. I was too excited about the journey to recall any detail such as tickets, the driver or the conductor but I think we went to sit upstairs so that I could have a good view as we rode along towards Croydon. I seem to recall that the seats upstairs were wooden and that one could tip the back-rest to face whichever way the tram was travelling (as they do in Blackpool still).

The motion of the tram was very unpleasant to me, and as we progressed I felt more and more ill as we had to stop and start fairly frequently for passengers to get on and off. (In later years using other modes of transport, I now know this feeling to be akin to sea-sickness, but being so young and inexperienced of boat travel I was unaware of the reason then.)

The excitement quickly wore off, so that my mother must have realised that something was wrong as I got quieter and quieter till she noticed that I was looking decidedly ill. We hastily left the tram near Croydon Airport. The journey home is a complete mystery to me. I have no recollection of it.

Later, when trolleybuses replaced the trams on this route, I went for a ride on one. Sadly I felt ill on that too. Trolleybuses would glide along and be too smooth. I hated the feeling. Many years later, when travelling in Italy, I discovered that going for a ride on a single decker bus, which was really a ‘boneshaker’, was my most enjoyable bus journey, because it didn’t glide, it wasn’t smooth and it shook me about as it bounced along!

Michael Barbour writes:

Because they were electric powered the trolleybuses were very quiet. They could get up to quite a good speed and I remember one really fast ride along the side of Figgs Marsh. In traffic, however, where they had to stop and start a lot they could be very jerky, a bit like Croydon Tramlink!

Peter Beddoe writes:

In 1956 my mother and I came over from Epsom to Sutton on the train. We then walked down Sutton High Street past the Gaumont cinema until we reached Benhill Avenue. We then walked along this road until we came to the trolleybus garage. I remember that we asked one of the mechanics in the garage whether we could go round the garage and he took us for a free conducted tour so I could take all the numbers of the trolleys in the depot. I seem to remember that there were long pits which the trolleys were parked over for inspection. We then went for a short trip on a trolleybus.

Although this is not directly related to Sutton I did go for a ride on one of the last trolleybuses on May 8^th 1962. I broke my journey up to London to college at Raynes Park and caught the 604/605 to Wimbledon. Unlike the Sutton trolleys the ride was very smooth. All you felt/heard was the pneumatic air working the brakes.

Dawn Donkin writes:

From 1955 until 1959 my sister and I travelled on the trolleybus from Putney to Hammersmith (626) to attend school. I was seven years old and she was 5 years old in 1955. Mum usually did the journey to school with us for the first few years but we came back on our own.

We took great delight in standing on the corner of Hammersmith Broadway to wait for the trolleybus to slow down so that we could leap on board! – unthinkable now. They were always delayed because the trolleys came off the wires or needed to be moved so that the trolleybuses could pass one another.

(Interestingly, it would then have been possible to travel from Sutton to Hammersmith by trolleybus with just one change of trolleybus – from the 654 to the 630 at West Croydon – ed.)

John Parkin writes:

I was born in July 1950 on the ‘Smallholdings’ otherwise known as ‘Telegraph track’ in Carshalton, and our family never had a car, so journeys were always made by public transport, notably trolleybus 654, boarding at the ‘Boundary Corner’ stop. Occasional journeys to Purley (maybe to see the newly released Norman Wisdom films) would be by bus route 234 (RT operated) or 234A (RF) from the Woodcote green stop, opposite what is now Wallington High School for Girls.

I was not quite nine years old when the trolleybuses finished, but I have many memories of journeys on them because, on a regular basis, we travelled on Saturday afternoons into Croydon for shopping, perhaps including Surrey Street Market and on Sunday mornings to the former George Street Congregational Church, which was subsequently demolished. We would alight at Reeves Corner and on return we would board at the stop shared with the 630 trolleybus route, which ran to ‘Near Willesden Junction’. I also recall occasional Saturday morning journeys with my older brother into Sutton for the Saturday morning pictures at the Granada. Oh happy days!!

There was one conductor who always called out “any more fairies” and I was told in later years by Johnny Gardner (then a bus driver at Sutton Garage and who had been the last person to be trained as a trolleybus driver at Carshalton) that he also used to call out “Sutton Gripes”. When someone corrected him – “The Grapes” – he retorted, “Well, have you tasted the beer?!!”.

On the day of the London closure, 8^th May 1962, I was still at Carshalton County Secondary School (as I think it was then known) and I made my last journey on a London Trolleybus in service in the capital on either a 604 or 605 from Wimbledon to Raynes Park. With my brother I had taken part in a tour of much of the remaining London system a year or two previously.

My interest in trolleybuses has continued throughout my life and I visited as many provincial systems as I could before the final demise of trolleybuses in Britain in Bradford in 1972, I toured both the Reading and Bournemouth systems when preserved London trolleybus 260 operated under the wires in those towns. My first closure was the joint Manchester/Ashton systems on New Year’s Eve 1966/67 and I left school a couple of days before the end of term in 1968 to witness the end of trolleybus operation in Huddersfield. I also visited Maidstone, Derby, Walsall, Tees side and Cardiff.

In more recent years I have ventured abroad to see modern trolleybuses operating in many countries, including the Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, Poland and Portugal.

I am a regular visitor at places in this country where preserved trolleybuses continue to operate – Sandtoft, near Doncaster; the Black Country Museum. near Dudley and the East Anglia Transport Museum at Carlton Colville, near Lowestoft. Indeed over the weekend of 10/11 September 2006 I was at Carlton Colville to witness the operation of preserved London trolleybus 1253 from the London Transport Museum collection, which was on short-term loan not having operated under power for some 40 or more years and unlikely to do so again.

My email address is appropriately Trolleybus654@aol.com.

Shirley L. Thornhill (nee Headech) writes:

MY EARLY YEARS IN CARSHALTON

My brother Alan and I lived at 5, Park Close, The Park Carshalton from our births to our early twenties. I was born in 1936 at the War Memorial Hospital, just around the corner from Park Close. My mother had been taken in to the hospital suffering with Scarlet Fever, and it was there that I was duly delivered. Our family had cause to use this hospital on several occasions, what with growing up accidents and to having my tonsils removed etc. My father Arthur Headech was a Handicraft Master and at this time he was teaching Woodwork and Metalwork at Carshalton West County Secondary School. My mother Rose did not go out to work although she was a trained hairdresser she stayed at home as was the case in those days to run the home and look after the family. Our home being a newly built house when my parents moved in just after they married and the first few years must have been hard for them to earn enough to pay for things for their new home in 1935 and starting a family.

Our stay at the house was short lived due to Hitler and the Second World War. In September 1940 when I had just had my fourth birthday an enemy aircraft on its way back from a raid over London and who had not dropped his last bomb decided that our front garden was a good place to jettison it. It made a twenty foot crater and blew our house and the one attached away with only part of the kitchen and back wall standing. I remember it as clearly now as I did then. We had settled down on the floor for the night in a small room downstairs with sand bags against the windows. The ‘all clear’ siren had gone and my Grandmother and baby brother went back to bed in another room. I remember a piercing whistling sound and then a blue zig-zag flash and we were all blasted into momentary unconsciousness. I heard my father calling in the darkness as I was dug out of the rubble with a few cuts and bruises. My baby brother was found lying under a ceiling that had come down with only a cut tongue. My father appeared to be unscathed, but my mother spent some time in hospital, she suffered from epileptic fits for the rest of her life due to the shock of the bombing. My grandmother did not survive. They found her the next morning among the rubble. Ironically she had come to stay with us from Ramsgate because my father thought it would be safer in Carshalton than her own home.

Just before the beginning of the war I was attending St Hilda’s School on the corner of Salisbury Road and Carshalton Park Road. My father would take me there on his way to work. After the bomb and our home destroyed I was taken by my uncle to live in the Lake District. I stayed there nearly four years. Meanwhile my father rented a house at 17 The Park for the rest of the war until our original house could be rebuilt. During a lull in the war I returned home for six months and went to Stanley Park Road School, but had to be taken back to the north because the flying bombs (doddle bugs) had started coming over. We were able to watch them flying over Croydon towards London from our front porch. The engines would cut out and Dad would say ‘some poor soul is getting it today’. After the war my brother and I went back to Stanley Park Road School. Later it was decided that I should attend St Philomena’s Convent School in Carshalton, where I liked wearing the brown blazer and the Panama hat, it was a lovely school with wonderful grounds and the lake to walk around at lunch time. The sisters were very kind and it was one of the sisters that taught me to sew, which stood me in good stead as I became a dressmaker later on. I also learned to play hockey there, but did not get as far as taking up lacrosse, because my father decided when I reached my teens that I should attend Collingwood Girls School in Wallington. My brother was already at the Collingwood Boys School in Springfield Road by this time. He left the school after the 11 plus to go to Purley Grammer School.

During my time at Collingwood I had a good friend Carol Brunker who lived in a house at Boundary Corner, we sat together in class. Her mother was a nurse and it was Carol’s ambition to follow in her mothers footsteps. I often wonder if she did and where she is now. After I left Collingwood when I was fifteen I went to the Epsom College of Arts and Crafts as I was showing some potential in my sewing and painting. I spent two years there and left with a City and Guilds certificate in Dressmaking. I then went up to London and worked for a court dressmaker in Bond Street travelling up to the West End every day from Carshalton Beeches Station.

After the war finished, a Neighbours Association was started in Carshalton. One of their activities was to produce a show in which all local children would perform at Christmas time. It was held in the Ruskin Church Hall, on the corner of Ruskin road and The Park road. I remember appearing as a toy gollywog in one show and a fairy in another. My mother took me to Wallington for a time to Hillcrest House Dance School to learn tap dancing and ballet. Later in my teens I learnt to Ballroom dance and it was there that I met my first husband. He was a keen motor cyclist as were my father and brother. Consequently I eventually obtained a motorbike of my own. A 250cc Phelon & More Panther, I spent many happy hours on it. Mother used to say she always knew who was coming up the road by the sound of the different motorbikes. During our school holidays or weekends Dad would suggest a walk to the Oaks Park while my mother had a rest in the afternoon. I remember the old mansion house with the windows all boarded up with corrugated iron. It did not keep the youngsters out as I heard from someone later that a few of them had removed an old bath and had gone sailing down the main staircase in it. I remember the smallholding houses that over looked the Oaks Park. When Dad eventually acquired a small car we used to have rides out to Box Hill, Leith Hill, Friday Street, and Abinger Hammer where you could enjoy a water cress afternoon tea.

In my early teens I learned to swim in Ramsgate when on holiday, and at home I would catch the bus and go the baths in Sutton. Also I took up ice skating and enjoyed many an evening at Streatham Ice Rink riding over from Carshalton on my motorbike. Looking back my brother and I had quite a packed childhood and teenage time with the various activities we were involved in. My brother on leaving school took up an apprenticeship with British Rail, and served his time near Southampton at the Eastleigh Locomotive works. He has worked for British Rail all his life and is now of course retired. My father went on to teach at the Wimbledon Technical College, and then in his final years at Pelham High School as Head of the Craft Department.

My brother and I are now living in Cumbria and we came down to Carshalton four years ago to walk down memory lane, we stayed in Sutton and took the train to Carshalton Beeches station and walked to our old house, then down through the Park to the High Street. Walked around the ponds and ended up at the Honeywood Museum. We were very impressed with the museum. Also the Library which had been altered inside from what I remember. A few weeks ago we paid a return visit and looked at Wallington, Collingwood Girls School had gone, but the Collingwood Boys School that Alan went to was just as it was all those years ago. We were invited inside to look around, the caretaker found some old school photographs which had my brother on. He was absolutely delighted. We walked from there back to Carshalton through the Park and we thought the ‘hogs pit’ was very untidy, could it not be made into a small lake, I suppose it will be ‘health and safety’ reasons again. Also the parade of shops opposite the park entrance I thought looked very shabby. It all wanted a coat of paint and tiding up. We noticed that the Honeywood Museum was closed and were pleased to hear that it reopens next spring after restoration.

We are hoping to come down again next year. How we both came to live in Cumbria is another story.

Click HERE if you wish to contact Shirley.

Click HERE if you are able to expand on Shirley's memories for her.