The Angry Driver

CHRISTMAS REMEMBERED by Jimmer Taylor
I remember we always had a Children’s Christmas Party which was given by the Church and School in the old Village Hall which was where the War Memorial is now, a wooden hut which became, until last year, the Henly’s turkey shed in the orchard at the Sands Farm. Captain Benson always used to come to the party. Each Christmas those whose parents worked for the Fielding Johnson’s at the Manor Farm were given a hamper with a turkey and bacon and nuts and other goodies and if there were children in the family, a toy. Children didn’t get toys in those days like they do now. But I do remember a toy Reg made for me, he was like my brother, it was a battleship. I wish I had it now. He made it from a piece of wood with a hole cut in the side of it and inside the hole was a mouse trap with a piece of dowling fixed over the hole. You then fired marbles at it and if you hit the dowling plug hard it would explode and then you’d reset the mouse trap to explode it again. It was a wonderful toy and I played with it a lot. Round about Christmas we used to have fun up Sharp’s sledging’ that was the best, mind you, you had to look out for the wire at the bottom you were going so fast. I remember an apple tree by Barnetts Corner that was covered with Mistletoe and another which was an ash tree by the Boathouse pond. When we were older we always played football on Boxing Days amongst ourselves. Married against singles. We also had a proper football team who used to play matches against other clubs. At Christmas we used to all go to the pub, the publican and his wife were very good to us, all us boys Tom King, Pete Fielding, Pete Lydiard, he played the bones, Reg Russell piano accordion, Keith Kempton, Les Mathews, Ted Weston and others, it was generally round about dinner time. We’d sing “Beer, beer glorious beer”, Sammy Miller always said “We’ve been married for 40 years and it ain’t been a day too long. Henry Goodenough always sang songs. Constable Harvey from Hilmarton and Jack Gleeson from Cherhill used to be there. They were good times but the coming of the juke box killed it. Christmas was different in those days, you knew everyone and if us kids did something silly you’d get a clipped ear. We had a lovely life us kids in those days playing in the Home Wood and playing in the Quarry. We used to spend hours playing together.

Jimmers Ancestors go back a very long way in St. Swithins Church Records, many hundreds of years.