Forties Doldrums
Forties Doldrums Beryl Grimani-Harrold Starting school in 1941 was very much different from the bustling place we now know. George Lane’s first-year entry seemed to me a vast area of the unknown. Two teachers I remember well were Mrs Barden and Miss Miers. They later introduced a beautiful white fluffy Bunny Rabbit to the range of toys with which we played. The white rabbit was a great favourite and much loved by all the small pupils. The Headmistress Mrs Butler is also remembered with affection as was the white rabbit. School dinners remain a distant memory but the interruptions of these meals by enemy air raids were, to small children, frightening, especially when together with our plates and cutlery we had to walk briskly from the dining hall to the shelters abutting the gardens of the houses in George Lane. Those shelters were from memory very large, very dark and with copious quantities of spiders and dust and had very low benches for seating. There were toilets, but primitive is the best description. Despite this, we survived but to us, the ‘war’ was a source of wonderment. Each mid-morning the pupils were served a small bottle of milk with a drinking straw. In my opinion, this was just awful. In the summer months, the milk smelled off and had a peculiar tang. Desperately I tried to dispose of mine and was admonished for putting the bottle back into the crate. These crates, made of galvanized metal, were used by the boys as toboggans in the snowy weather to slide down the slopes in Husseywell Park. To them, it was great fun, but no doubt dangerous in reality. Food and clothing rationing were great trials for our inventive parents. There was very little wasted and the products from allotments and cultivated gardens were fully utilised. I’ve mentioned before the Pig Club which was situated on the land now occupied by the flats opposite the New Inn and Hayes Station. This was organized and run on a business-like basis by a group of men from the locality. During the week my grandfather and his friend ‘Smithy’ looked after the animals, feeding, cleaning etc keeping the sties pristine. At weekends the other members did these chores. My father with much help from the members built the sties. The straw and food supplies were kept in one of the two barns adjacent, the second being the cookhouse in which the pig swill was prepared and cooked in an old-fashioned boiler which caused great agitation when the fire was difficult to light. Water was drawn pail by pail from the well which until recently made itself evident by the small stream dribbling across Station Hill. This was quite an exhausting chore for two elderly gents. However we, that is Sally, my friend and I, spent many happy hours helping! Clothing rationing was quite a thing. In those days the motto of the time was ‘make do and mend’ and, because of the many and serious shortages of supplies, everything that could be mended was. School uniforms were passed from sibling to sibling until they became ‘beyond a joke’. Dresses were shortened and lengthened as the need arose. Sheets when worn were repaired ‘sides to middles’! We did not seem to mind, because that’s the way things were. Shoes were repaired until it became impossible to continue and as for darning socks, well, we soon became skilled in the art. During the many raids in and around Biggin Hill, I well remember that together my mother and I watched from an upstairs window the air battles at night, with searchlights and shells overhead and around the airfield. These were sights to behold and will forever remain in my memory. Following all these trials and tribulations of those dreadful times the war finally ended and a neighbour suggested that he took two of his daughters and me up to town to see the fireworks displays for the VE celebrations. Somewhat reluctantly my father finally agreed that I should join this little band of revellers. We went as arranged to watch from the rooftop of Devonshire House. The displays were many and wonderful, and for three young girls very exciting. We left Devonshire House very late in the evening making towards Charing Cross. There were thousands and thousands of revellers, more folk than any of us had ever seen before, and yes, the inevitable happened. We three girls were separated from our adult carer, and there we were somewhere, supposedly in Oxford Street and not knowing where to go or what to do! What a conundrum! However, not many minutes after losing sight of said adult we were noticed by a family group on their way homeward. They fortunately took us through the milling crowds to safety. They said they would take us to a police station on their way home. We walked and walked, seemingly for miles. It certainly seemed forever, but as good as their word they deposited us at Tottenham Court Road Police Station. Dead tired we were placed in the care of a Lady Warder who supplied hot chocolate, biscuits, buns and blankets and we curled up for much-needed sleep. Meanwhile, a very concerned/distraught carer telephoned my parents to say ‘I’ve lost the girls’. My parents were able to direct him to the police station and reported that we were safe and suitably fed and watered. He was then sent hot foot to Tottenham Court Road where he too was fed and watered! A couple of hours later we were all bundled into a police vehicle and returned to Bourne Vale arriving around 6 am. In the turmoil of being lost all three of us were nonplussed and in the heat of the moment, Angela remembered only her name, Sally only her age, whilst all I could come up with was the all-important telephone number that in some small way saved the day. Since then telephone numbers have always been very important and a secure anchor. I remember with thanks the family who rescued us and their kindness and care of us three lost waifs. Without their help who knows what might have happened? One can only surmise. Beryl Grimani-Harrold, President HKVA
Hayes remembered in the 40’s
Hayes remembered in the 40’s Peter Harrold At the beginning of the war, I was 4 years old and unaware of the gravity of the situation. One of the highlights of that period started with Father building an Anderson Air Raid Shelter in the garden of 17, Hambro Avenue. This was a corrugated structure dug into the ground for four feet and covered with earth. Being below the surface it always seemed damp, but we felt safe. As soon as the air raid siren sounded, whether day or night, o昀琀en being woken up, we would all dive into the shelter, which was father when not on police duty, mother and three boys. This went on throughout the war. In 1944 when the Doodlebugs (flying bombs – V1’s) started, the family cat somehow knew as soon as the Doodlebugs passed over Dover as he was in the shelter way before the rest of us. We demolished the shelter after the war burying most of it in the ground as we found it impossible to completely dismantle it. Before a rocket ‘V2’ destroyed Grandfield Nurseries in West Common Road (now the Rosary Catholic Church) on 9 February 1945 and Hayes Stores opposite, I remember that outside the shop, there was a tin full of broken biscuits. You took a handful, put it in a bag, and paid a nominal sum. The other lasting memory of that period was life at Hayes Primary School and the dash to the shelters when the air raid siren sounded. The siren was situated on the junction of Hayes Street and George Lane adjacent to the lovely garden of the ‘Walnut Tree’ so could be heard over the whole of Hayes. On the same site was a police box to enable the policeman to keep in contact with the Bromley Headquarters. We continued our lessons in the shelter and, if necessary, had our lunch there. A dark and spooky time. By the winter of 1945, the school in George Lane became overcrowded, so Miss Barnes and Miss Keilly took the top two classes to Gadsden (now the Administration Office at Hayes School) which had been purchased by Bromley Council. The removal of books, pupils and equipment to Gadsden was undertaken during a par琀椀cularly snowy winter, and to make the transportation of innumerable books easier, the pupils were requested to bring their toboggans to school. These, duly loaded, processed across the playing field and Baston Road to Gadsden. There was a great shortage of vehicles and manpower at this time and this procession was the most efficient way of removal. In 1946 my twin brother and I moved to Brewood Preparatory School, a private school in a private house on Courtlands Avenue run by Mrs Wood assisted by Miss Skinner. Later we had to move to Miss Skinner’s house at 7 Sackville Avenue as Mrs Wood’s son came back from the war and needed his home back. Mrs Wood was a tough disciplinarian and any misdemeanour was treated with a slipper on the backside. Miscreants were taken into the kitchen to lean over a chair and then whacked. We in the classroom could hear the chair scrape across the floor as the slipper found its mark! Soon after the war, we were invited by Mr Milne of Kechill Gardens to join him and make camp on farmland (now the estate of Bourne Vale and Mounthurst Road) to set up his ham radio on higher ground, where we made contacts throughout the world. Many of you will remember his son Geoffrey. These were interesting times. During this period, we boys played cricket at the top of Station Hill and regularly got told off by local people for using a hard ball. We had to stop as the common rangers were onto us. Another problem we had was Sgt. Egan who lived in Bourne Vale. He was determined to stop us riding our bikes on the pavement (which was certainly not allowed in those far-off days), in the end having a word with our dad to stop this naughty behaviour. During the war, a bomb landed on the two houses opposite us on Hambro Avenue. They were unsafe and had to be pulled down. The gardens soon got out of hand with much undergrowth. So, before they were rebuilt, even though it was wired off, we went in there to catch bullies and generally play about as boys will. After peace was declared Mum bought us a fox terrier which my twin and I regularly took on the common, and on Sunday mornings, we regularly walked up to Keston ponds, with no fear of our parents for our safety or being accosted, as would be a concern today. In 1947 we had a very heavy snowfall, the second highest in my lifetime, 1963 being the heaviest. During this period, we had our sledges out and one of our favourite runs was Holland Way, but the nearer option was Husseywell Park when as well as sledges we found some metal milk crates which took us faster down the hill and across the frozen lake at the bottom (so much for health and safety). Another popular pastime was that on the way home from school we went to Hayes Farm cowsheds to watch the herd of Guernsey cows being milked, still in the traditional old-fashioned way. During the late forties, we supported Bromley Football Club at their home games, with the highlight being in April 1949 travelling to Wembley with my father and twin brother for the FA Amateur Cup Final (the first time it was held at that venue). We were accompanied by my father’s colleague Mr Greener and his son Christopher (later to become the tallest man in Britain as well as being an international basketball player). Bromley won by a single goal, repea琀椀ng their success for this trophy in 1910/11 and 1937/38 seasons. That 48/49 season they won the Athenian League title and the Kent Amateur Cup, great excitement for all the supporters. These were incredibly happy days despite the war and rationing of sweets (not finishing until 1953). We were limited to
Early Schooldays in Hayes, One hundred years ago
Early Schooldays in Hayes, One hundred years ago Jean Wilson In the 1980s I was fortunate to meet some of the pupils who had been at the Hayes Church School over a hundred years ago. Beatrice Russell and Grace Willis (née Knopp) started in 1908/9 and Bill Dance in 1918. In the classroom photograph of 1908, Beatrice is on the left in the second row and Grace’s older sister Ruth is on the left in the front row. The head was William Plant who had arrived as the teacher for the senior pupils – those over 7 years old – in 1874. He was a keen musician and the school had regular concerts. He was also the Church choirmaster and there were plenty of schoolboys (not girls) in the choir. All remembered the strict discipline at school but they also enjoyed their schooldays and still had the books they had received as prizes and the silver medal given for 100% attendance and good conduct. Beatrice Russell recalled the cookery lessons which started with a visit to buy the meat from Miss Sands, the butcher in Baston Road, who once it was weighed made them work out the cost. Grace Willis remembered the strange way in which Mr Plant did the spelling tests, standing back-to-back in a circle. Bill Dance remembered that for woodwork lessons the boys had to walk to Keston School once a week and were punished if they arrived late. Football and also netball was played on the old cricket ground on Hayes Common. The boys carried up the goalposts and the pitch was marked out with sawdust. Bill Dance also had some less pleasant experiences such as clambering over the old roof of the outside toilet to collect fallen walnuts and falling through into the bucket below. It resulted in a caning both from the head and from his mother! William Plant retired in 1920 and some parents felt that the new head Mrs Burman was ‘too modern’ but they were pleased that she continued to encourage a love of music. Winifred Timms, at school from 1917-1928 and her sister Dorothy from 1923-1929 recalled the many Nativity and other plays that were acted. Dorothy remembered being Molly Cottontail in a performance of Brer Rabbit. ‘I had a lovely rabbit costume with a super tail’. Her sister Winnie was one of the narrators. Winnie also recalled that as soon as they began school they had to start to knit vests. At first, she was slow and when she came home from school she had to sit and do so many rows before she was allowed her tea. However, at the age of eight, she knitted a jumper in pink with champagne colour around the neck and the edge of the sleeves. Another school started in Hayes in 1919, Hayes Court School, but it was not for the local children. It was an exclusive girls’ boarding school opened in the rambling old house by Miss Katherine Cox. In 1985 Roma Goyder collected and published the memories of pupils who had been at the school and I was delighted to speak with Elizabeth Belsey, who was a pupil from 1925 to 1930 and later returned as a teacher. Miss Katherine Cox was ahead of her time in her attitude towards education. She could be both autocratic and also allow the pupils considerable freedom. Described by one pupil as ‘tall, angular rather than graceful, she paddled along on low-heeled pumps dressed in loose, loudly checked clothes’. Nearly all the pupils disliked the school tunics – ‘a long-sleeved grey wool stockinett琀e in winter, grey ‘sponge cloth’ in summer both garnished with green bobbles and fringes . . . We wore green-grey matching knickers under our tunics’. The traditional subjects were taught but there was an emphasis on English literature and also on science and mathematics. Pupils remembered lessons from her father, Professor Cox, a former Professor of Physics at McGill University who had published books on mechanics and ‘Beyond the Atom’. His lectures on astronomy ‘were well above our head’. Fanny Hopkins remembered that she was so inspired that until she was 17 ‘she read nothing except poetry and astronomy’. There were lessons from Mr Hamilton, ‘whose enthusiasm for Maths was so infectious that I actually caught a glimpse of what the subject was all about’. On the fringe of the Bloomsbury set Miss Cox was keen to ensure that art, music and drama were also well represented in the syllabus. Mr and Mrs Wheatley came once a week from the Slade School of Fine Art and his advice was to ‘draw, look and see where the lines go . . . put down what you see without fear or prejudice . . . never use a rubber’. Marion Richardson, a pioneer in art education for children, later took over and there were also talks from many famous ar琀椀sts including from the well-known mosaicist Boris Anrep, whose daughter was at the school. In 1926 Virginia Woolf came with her sister Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant and her advice ‘Don’t read a book because you think you ought to; only because you want to’, remained firmly in one schoolgirl’s memory. It seems to have been an inspirational place and many pupils went on to achieve great success in many different walks of life. Please send any of your memories to: contact@hayeskenthistory.co.uk. Jean Wilson
Redgate Cottage (the old workhouse)
Redgate Cottage (former workhouse)106 West Common Road18th centuryLocally listed Redgate Cottage (also known as Redgates Cottage, 18th Century Cottage) dates from before 1754 when Joel Kempsell sold his cottage for £18 to the Churchwardens and Overseers of the Poor for ‘the sole use and benefit of the parishioners’. WorkhouseIt was used as the Parish Workhouse until 1836. Revd John Till, rector from 1777 – 1827 described it as a ‘small timber and brick dwelling, standing on the right hand side of the road leading from the upper village towards Baston House and Keston.’ It was probably originally a two storey oak framed building with a single storey rear wing, later faced in brick at the front in the Georgian style. It still retains timber box sash windows. In 1782 the house contained seven elderly or infirm parish poor, Thomas Kelly, a labourer, his wife (who took care of the house) and their four children. Thomas Kelly later took employment as a shepherd and the house was then in the charge of John and Sarah Ward, who had five children by 1798 when his mother and Widow Lucas were living there. Numbers in the house varied but never seemed to be more than 20. After the passing of the Poor Law Amendment Act in 1834 neighbouring parishes were grouped together and a central Bromley Workhouse set up at Farnborough. The use of this building as a workhouse ceased when its few inhabitants were transferred. What happened to the workhouse?At first there was some dispute about who would benefit from the sale of the workhouse – would it be for the poor parishioners of Hayes or for the wider area? Initially the Vestry decided to let the Poorhouse at an economical rent of not less than £8 per annum and Lady Gibbs of Hayes Court used it for her workers. It was lived in by Joseph and Sarah Nisbet and their family until Joseph’s death in 1842. In 1844 it was decided to sell the house and garden lately used as a Poor House. Four tenders were received. The highest of £220 was from Wilhelmina Traill of Hayes Place but in practice the money was paid by Lady Pilkington who had inherited Hayes Court and who was already renting the property.The sale was confirmed 7 April 1845. It continued to be used to house Hayes Court employees. A trust was set up to ensure the sale money was administered for the benefit of the Hayes poor. In 1879 Frederick Norman took over Hayes Court and Henry Harwood, a labourer, moved in to the cottage with his wife Eliza and 9 children and they lived there for the rest of their lives. In 1881 there were also 2 lodgers. Henry died in 1898 and his widow in 1902. John Dingwall, a gardener, was the next tenant and then Edward Pattenden. The cottage was described in 1910 as a 3 bedroom property with a gross value of £235. In the 1911 Census it was said to have 4 rooms. In 1918 the property was sold by Lady Pilkington’s descendant, Mrs Diane Rose, to Sir Thomas Duncombe Mann of Hayes Grove Cottage for £200. He then sold both his house and the adjacent land and cottages to Miss Katherine Cox who established a boarding school at Hayes Court. Percy Jones, tenant 1919 – 1950s Percy Jones Percy Jones became head gardener at Hayes Court and lived in Redgate Cottage until the mid 1950s. Pupils at the school later testified to his amazing gardening skill and one pupil Valerie Finnis attributed her love of plants to him. She later became a Fellow of the Royal Horticultural Society and received the Victorian Medal of Honour of the Society. He was also very active in the community. A Parish Councillor from 1925 – 1931, he was elected to the Bromley Town Council in 1937 where he served for 10 years. During this period he also became a committee member of the Hayes Village Association, secretary of the Hayes Village Hall Management Committee and President of the Hayes Horticultural Society, Allotment Association and after the Second World War the Victory Social Club. He was also a Hayes Common Conservator and a Trustee of the Poor’s Land Charity. Stanley LilleymanStanley Lilleyman and his family lived at Redgate Cottage by 1957 and the swimming pool at the bottom of the garden was used by the pupils of Baston School in the 1950s and became known as Lilleyman’s Pool. The house Deep End was later built on the site of the swimming pool ExtensionsLater owners made changes both to the building internally and added extensions. A flat roof single storey extension was added to the rear and a lean-too pitched roof built to the side which extended to the rear as a mono pitch. Rear of Redgate Cottage 1980 (A Stanley) Front of Redgate Cottage Today the house retains a simple appearance at the front but there is now a wooden front door. The rear is highly varied but retains some of the original oak framed building at first floor level. All the external walls of the building have been painted white, except for the black oak timbers.
FINDLAY, Alexander George
FINDLAY, Alexander George FINDLAY, Alexander George 6 Jan 1812 – May 1875Engraver, geographer and hydrographerFellow Royal Geographical Society Alexander George Findlay was born in 1812 to Alexander and Sarah Findlay. He followed his father’s profession as an engraver and cartographer, producing many maps for R H Laurie. In 1842 he published a revised version of Brooke’s Gazetteer & the Coasts & Islands of the Pacific Ocean. His output was prolific and well described in his obituary by the Royal Geographical Society of which he became a member in 1844. He produced a unique series of Six Nautical Directories of the Great Oceans which were widely used. He sat on the Arctic Committee of the Royal Geographical Society. and he was a friend of Dr Livingstone, mapping the Nile and the routes taken by Burton and Speke in central Africa in 1858-9. On R H Laurie’s death in 1858 he took over the publishing firm. He was awarded the medal of the Society of Arts for his dissertation on ‘The English Lighthouse System. In Hayes he designed a new altar screen for the Church and painted the wording of the Ten Commandments as a thanksgiving for his recovery from an illness in 1847. Today, these hang in the belfry of Hayes Parish Church. In the same year he also drew a detailed plan of the Church interior. In 1850 he married Sarah Rutley and moved to Rockwells, Dulwich Wood Park where he died 3 May 1875 aged 63. He was buried in Hayes. He had no children so left the business to his nephews, Daniel and William Kettle, who lived with their mother Sarah at the White House. They were already involved and continued both to produce original works and also to revise and update some of their uncle’s maps. William was described as a hydrographer in the 1881 Census but by 1891 both he and his brother Daniel were listed as Nautical Publishers. In 1897, the year they left Hayes, William Richardson Kettle FRGS, for example, produced a supplement to the 4th edition of Findlay’s Sailing Directory for the Indian Ocean, Red Sea, Persian Gulf and Bay of Bengal. Daniel with his interest in antiquity and local history seems to have been the brother who was more involved with events in Hayes although both brothers subscribed a guinea (£1.05) annually to the Hayes Church School. References: P Griffiths, The Findlays of Leith & London and their Kettle Descendants, with special thanks for the image of Alexander George Findlay.C Kadwell History of Hayes Bromley Historic Collections p180/28/12
KETTLE, Daniel Walter
KETTLE, Daniel Walter Daniel Kettle was the son of Daniel and Sarah Kettle. He was 13 when his father died and his mother moved back into her family home, The White House, on Hayes Common. Encouraged from an early age by his grandfather, Alexander Findlay, and uncle, Alexander George Findlay, he soon was involved in the production of many different types of maps and in the 1871 census his profession was given as a Geographical Draughtsman.Ten years later he had taken over his uncle’s business and was now a nautical publisher with a special interest in producing or updating coastal and ocean maps. It is fortunate for people interested in the history of his local village that he was very keen to preserve information on and drawings of Hayes that would otherwise have disappeared. He reproduced a map of Hayes & its Environs in 1882 which had originally been made by his grandfather Alexander Findlay in 1829. He ensured that the statement of the receipts and expenditure for the 1856 building of the north aisle of the Parish Church was preserved and also provided details of the building of the south aisle in 1879 and the contribution of Lord Sackville Cecil of the Oast House. After the death of the Revd George Varenne Reed a full list of the contributors to the rector’s memorial fountain was made. He made black and white drawings from some of the original paintings of Wilhelmina Traill of Hayes Place, including a view of the Village showing the old George Inn and the stocks in 1815. Another illustration he saved was a drawing by his uncle, Alexander George Findlay, of the village in about 1835. He was also interested in archaeology and drew a palaeolithic flint & neolithic flint axe found in 1896 on the Common.The following year he discovered and made a detailed coloured copy of a Hayes palaeolithic flint. Shortly before he left Hayes in 1897 he collaborated with Lord Sackville Cecil of the Oast House to insert these drawings in a copy of Kadwell’s History of Hayes 1833 which was created with space for later insertions. He still retained an interest in the village after he moved and on his death he was buried in the churchyard. References:P Griffiths The Findlays of Leith & London and their Kettle descendants www.genealogycrank.co.uk with special thanks for the photograph of Daniel Walter Kettle C Kadwell The History of Hayes in the County of Kent, 1898 edition Bromley Historic Collections P180/28/12
FINDLAY, Alexander
FINDLAY, Alexander7 December 1788 – 7 January 1870Geographer and Engraver of maps and chartsFounder Member Royal Geographical SocietyBuilt The White House, Hayes about 1830 Alexander was born in Bermondsey, the eldest child of Archibald and Mary Findlay. From an early age he was involved in the production of maps and charts and did much of his work for the map publisher Richard Holmes Laurie, whose business he helped to expand He married Sarah in 1810 and had four children, Alexander, Archibald, Sarah and William. His office was in London but he moved with his family to the countryside, initially to Keston. His son Archibald died in 1828 and was buried in Keston Parish Churchyard. Shortly afterwards the family moved from Keston to a house, later known as the White House, on Hayes Common. He also leased some land at the back of the house from George Norman. Map workIn 1829 he engraved R H Laurie’s survey of the Environs of London and a year later he became one of the founding members of the Royal Geographical Society. He remained a fellow of the society until his death in 1870.His works included a Chart of the Estuary of the Thames, maps of North America and Europe and a chart of the Mediterranean Sea. He continued to be involved in producing maps until 1865. His map of Hayes and its environs was included in Charles Kadwell’s History of Hayes, 1833. Churchwarden and Overseer of the PoorHe played an active role in the Hayes Vestry between 1835 and 1855. In 1840, as one of the two Overseers of the Poor with Joseph Langridge, he presented the accounts which the Vestry approved. In 1841 the other overseer was John Rose Brandon and from 1842 to 1844 Timothy Tilden. This included the challenging period when the local workhouse was replaced by the Union Workhouse set up in Farnborough after the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 and there were difficult decisions to be made about the sale of the Parish Workhouse. He attended the Vestry as a Churchwarden from 1845 to 1855 and chaired some of the meetings in 1848,49 and 52. He was also present in 1859 and 1860 when the Vestry considered encroachments on the Common, the possible disposal of Parish properties which included his home and the rights of Commoners. DeathHis wife Sarah died in 1865 from congestion of the lungs at the age of 76. She was buried in Hayes Churchyard. Alexander seems to have been deeply affected by his loss. In 1870 he died from ‘Decay of Nature’ in the presence of his clergyman son William who assisted at his burial in the Churchyard on 13 January 1870. References:P Griffiths The Findlays of Leith & London and their Kettle descendants www.genealogycrank.co.uk with special thanks for the photograph of Alexander FindlayC Kadwell The History of Hayes in the County of Kent Bromley Historic Collections P180/28/12
Glebe View
Glebe View Glebe View8/8a Baston RoadEarly 19th century with extension 1894Post Office 1894 – 1940Locally listed No 8 Baston Road was originally a two storey detached house which was owned by Thomas Staple, a tailor and shopkeeper, and seems to exist by 1814. The house was let until 1830 when Ann Staples was recorded living there. On her death in 1840 ownership passed to her son Thomas who leased the property to William Alp, a retired victualler, until the 1860s. Arrival of Robert Pearce (tenant 1880 – 1940)By 1880 Robert Pearce had moved into the house with his wife Phoebe and two young children. Robert was born in one of the three cottages facing the Cricket Ground (later Ivy Cottage), where he helped his father Thomas who was a florist Death of Thomas StapleThe owner, Thomas Staple, died in 1885 and his properties were bought by Sir Everard Hambro of Hayes Place. A major rebuilding and refurbishment took place which is shown by comparing the detached house shown on the Tithe Map, No. 204, and the position in 1898 where it is called the Post Office. The house had now become semi-detached with the addition of Elleray, 6 Baston Road to the north. Robert Pearce continued to live at No 8, known as Glebe View, and had five children by 1891. 204 is Glebe View Overseers Map 1898 (Bromley Historic Collections) South ExtensionThree years later a single storey extension in brick with a slate roof was added to the south of the property. It became used as the Hayes Post Office and was completed by 11 March 1894 when Robert Pearce took over the postal services. The sorting office was in the rear of the extension. In 1910 it was recorded that he was paying 4/3d (21p) a week in rent and that his house was worth £300. It was described as brick built and slated, bricks built on edge, in good decorative and structural condition. It had a sitting room, kitchen scullery, larder, 2 bedrooms, a box room and an earth closet. Glebe View and the Post Office extension Post OfficeIn the 1911 Census Robert Pearce was described as a sub postmaster and he was helped by his two daughters Amy & Bessie. They sorted the incoming mail into the various rounds and post marked the outgoing mail. There was an old fashioned telephone on the wall, the mouthpiece being fixed, and the ear trumpet detachable which clipped to the wall when not in use. This was not only used for sending and receiving telegrams but gentlemen who were being kept late at business would ring to ask them to send a message home to their wives, to let them know. All part of the service in those days. Christiana Timms recalled that the telegraph boy was the only one who had a bicycle in those days and she remembered her father Charles Harrod, a postman, saying that he had to walk as far as Leaves Green, sometimes delivering letters to a farmer which could mean a trip across ploughed fields. The mail which arrived at Hayes Station from Beckenham was picked up by her grandfather in the early morning in the handcart which he used as a gardener on Hayes Place Estate. In the evening he took back the outward mail. Robert Pearce would deliver two or three rounds a day around the village, on foot. When he retired after 40 years service at the age of 81 in 1934 it was estimated that he had walked over 115,000 miles in the course of his duties. At that time he was said to be the oldest postman in England and it was remarked that he always had a smile on his face and a chuckle in his eyes. He had a rosy complexion, rounded face with a full white beard and moustache, and the local children thought he looked liked their image of Father Christmas. Robert Pearce Sale of 8 Baston RoadSir Everard Hambro’s properties were put up for sale after his death and in 1931 Glebe View was purchased by Mr Agg-Large. Amy Pearce had taken over the management of the Post Office from her father and her rent was 5/5d (22p) a week. A bay window was added to the main house and became a shop selling cakes, bread, sweets, chocolates, cigarettes and later ice cream. Robert Pearce died in April 1940 and in November the sub Post Office was transferred to 20 Hayes Street. Miss Pearce continued with the confectionery and general business until her death in 1944. Hayes Post Office and Cake Shop By the mid 1950s the Post Office extension had become a separate dwelling, No.8a, occupied by John Gregor and No.8 was lived in by Mrs Carter. The properties have remained separate dwellings since that time. No.8 remains basically unchanged, the brick walls are painted white with two dark stained solid windows at the front at first floor level. The windows have substantial timbered sections. No.8a had side extensions approved in 1983 and in 2003 but an attempt to replace it with a two storey new building in 2017 was refused planning permission. Together with the building at No. 6 these houses reflect their interesting Victorian heritage.
Ivy Cottage
Ivy Cottage Ivy CottageWarren Road, HayesLocally listedBuilt about 1891 Ivy Cottage is an attractive building situated on the north side of Warren Road. It is within the Hayes and Keston Commons Conservation Area and faces an open area of Hayes Common, used in the 19th century for cricket. Early CottagesIt stands on the site of three cottages built about 1851 for Miss Wilhelmina Traill of Hayes Place and known as Cricket Ground Cottages. The cottages were occupied by the families of Thomas Pearce, a florist, Alfred Smith, a policeman and William Carton an agricultural labourer. A total of 27 people lived there in 1871 including 14 children under ten years old. Miss Traill had leased the land from the Howard family and when the banker Everard Hambro moved to Hayes Place in the 1880s he bought the cottages, the surrounding land and the Star Brewery site for £8,500 with the existing tenancies. By 1890 all the existing families had left. Thomas Pearce in front of 1 Cricket Ground Cottage Conversion to one house Everard Hambro decided to redesign the cottages into one superior house as a home for his sisters-in-law Clara and Octavia Stuart. The changes included raising and remodelling the roof, adding a central staircase and the construction of a lobby that became the main entrance. The architect is unclear. It may be Ernest Newton whom he used to make alterations to the George Inn in 1904 but there is no evidence in his records. It was probably the firm of Williams, West and Slade whom he often used after his architect George Devey’s death in 1886. In 1910 the house consisted of a sitting room, dining room, kitchen, scullery and lobby and was described as: detached, substantially built of red brick stock and tile. Of good design. First floor; four bedrooms, one dressing room, bath and WC. Fitted with gas, hot water. Two greenhouses are in the garden with a smaller boiler. A very saleable property. Ivy Cottage 1955 (H King) Ivy Cottage was one of the properties that Everard Hambro later gave to his son Harold. The Stuart SistersClara Stuart was remembered by Elinor Harrold as ‘a tall angular lady with a very loud voice, she rode a large bicycle with an outsize basket on the handlebars, the basket was always overflowing with various articles. She was a pillar of the church and ran the Sunday School and most of the other organisations of the church.‘She died in 1918 but her younger sister Octavia continued to live at Ivy Cottage with a resident cook and parlourmaid. Her sight failed and she became deaf but the obituary on her death, at the age of 80, in March 1940 referred to her courage and cheerfulness. She maintained a close interest in the affairs of the village, especially the Parish Church. Towards the end of her life she was helped by her niece Marjory Gray Buchanan. World War IIThe empty house was made available for use as a canteen for servicemen and women stationed in the area during the Second World War. Plans for the United Services canteen, as it became known, and for which Hayes Kent Village Association was largely responsible, were well under way by November 1940. Requests had been made for volunteers and essential equipment. It opened in December 1940 with dining, reading and writing rooms available for soldiers. Money for ‘little extras’ was raised through dances at the Village Hall. Fortunately, although it was affected by incendiary bombs in the raids on 25 March 1943 it incurred no major damage during the war. It closed in January 1945 and the Mayor and Mayoress of Bromley, Councillor and Mrs Arthur Collins, attended the farewell party held for the Ivy Cottage Canteen at the Village Hall. During the four years it had reportedly served 91,467 hot meals, 173,407 hot drinks, 75,400 cake and 81,925 cigarettes. After the warIvy Cottage reverted to a private house after the war. In 1953 planning permission was eventually given for the building of four architect designed bungalows and two houses on some of its land. The house was put on the market in 1955: For sale with vacant possession, 5 principal bedrooms, 3 reception rooms, room for double garage, entrance hall & cloakroom, bathroom & separate WC to be auctioned at the Royal Bell Hotel Bromley. Ivy Cottage in the snow in 1954 There have been a number of alterations to the property in the last fifty years including a side and rear extension. In 2010 planning was approved for a replacement double garage. It remains an interesting historic property. Ivy Cottage
Dreadnought Cottage (Stacey’s Cottage)
Dreadnought Cottage (Stacey’s Cottage) Dreadnought Cottage, (Stacey’s Cottage)Baston RoadEarly 19th centuryLocally listed Stacey’sDreadnought Cottage was originally part of Winch’s Cottage which in the mid 19th century became known as Stacey’s after George and Ann Stacey and their eight children, aged from 5 months to 13 years in the 1841 Census, moved into the southern end of the property to look after Anne’s mother, Elizabeth Winch. A lightweight partition was fixed between the two halves of the cottage. When Elizabeth died in 1850 she left George and Anne all the property in her will. Anne’s brother James disagreed, claimed he had a right to it and he occupied part of the cottage. The matter went to court and eventually through the arbitration of the rector, Revd Thomas Hussey, the boundaries were fixed between the two cottages in 1853. George, a vermin destroyer, and his wife Anne were allowed to remain in that part of the property in which they had lived with their family. James was allowed the part that had been occupied by his mother. When Elizabeth died Sir Charles Farnaby agreed that George and Anne Stacey could purchase their cottage for £11. Two of their sons, Richard & William, also became rat catchers.In 1867, after their mother Anne’s death, the other siblings who had an interest in the property agreed to convey the premises to the eldest son Richard, providing that their father George was allowed to live in the cottage and be fully supported by Richard until his father’s death, which occurred in 1870. The property was lived in by successive generations of the Stacey family until the Second World War. Stacey’s Cottage In 1910 it was described as a very old timber and tile bungalow, containing two bedrooms, kitchen, washroom and WC. Outside was a range of very old brick and tile buildings, sheds and WC washroom. On the opposite side of the road was a cowshed and two dilapidated sheds. Its value was put at £200. A Smuggler’s Hiding PlaceGeorge Smith, a builder, remembered Richard Stacey junior, with his ferret bags and pack of terriers at his heel – a fine specimen of a Kentish-man. He also recalled in 1924 that some years ago when they were making additions to the cottage they came upon a smuggler’s hiding place under the floor with iron hooks upon which to hang the booty of spirit or silk. Richard Stacey said that it was in the neighbouring cottage.Tea GardenAt the end of the First World War Richard Stacey decided to run a tea garden known as the Dreadnought Tea Gardens. It was very popular with local cycling and hiking groups. He continued to run this until his death in 1938. His widow Mercy died in 1942. Dreadnought Tea Gardens Second World WarWorld War II saw considerable activity over the Common and frequent incendiaries and bombs which left their mark on nearby areas. In a heavy bombardment on 16 April 1941 a number of high explosive bombs fell near Dreadnought Cottage. Eric Strouts, a stretcher bearer and fire watcher, who lived in Redgate Drive, was killed fighting the fires. After the WarAfter the war the family decided to rent out the cottage as a furnished property and they secured planning agreement for a garage, providing a large shed was taken down and all the ‘temporary’ buildings opposite were demolished.For many years it was rented by Leslie McCrow Redevelopment In 1985 it was bought by a builder Mr Brace and considerable ingenuity was used to make it a modern dwelling for his son, incorporating the footprint of the numerous outbuildings. Dreadnought Cottage before it was developed in the 1990s The original wooden cottage was maintained but reroofed When completed the property consisted of a lounge, dining room, kitchen/breakfast room, a conservatory, 3 bedrooms and an outside garage. The development was praised and reported fully in the magazine Finesse in 1999. There have been two more owners since that time. The redeveloped Dreadnought Cottage