MEMORIES OF LIVING IN HILDENBOROUGH IN THE 1940s & 1950s
Robin Oakley
Robin Oakley
My parents, Gerald and Pamela Oakley, bought Oldhouse Farm in Philpots Lane in 1939, and lived there for 20 years until my father’s death in 1959. I was born in the house in May 1940 (and was officially named Robert, but always known as Robin); my sisters Jennifer (Jenny) and Sally were born in 1942 and 1948 respectively, and my brother David in 1950. Throughout his time in Hildenborough, my father in particular was an active participant in village life, including being Chairman of the Parish Council from 1950 to 1955.
Oldhouse Farm is a listed sixteenth-century farmhouse on the west side of the village, that (with its barns and oasthouse, converted in the 1930s into adjacent properties) had originally been the home farm to Philpots Manor. It has hung-tiles on the exterior, and inside has large period stone fireplaces with a ‘priest’s hole’ concealed behind them, accessible only through the upstairs floor. The oak-beamed house and its spacious gardens, orchard and surrounding fields were a wonderful place for us to grow up when we were young.
Oldhouse Farm is a listed sixteenth-century farmhouse on the west side of the village, that (with its barns and oasthouse, converted in the 1930s into adjacent properties) had originally been the home farm to Philpots Manor. It has hung-tiles on the exterior, and inside has large period stone fireplaces with a ‘priest’s hole’ concealed behind them, accessible only through the upstairs floor. The oak-beamed house and its spacious gardens, orchard and surrounding fields were a wonderful place for us to grow up when we were young.
My parents, who were married in 1938 and had grown up in and around Lewisham, saw it as a dream opportunity to move out of London to raise a family, and no doubt also hoped to escape the threat of bombing in the impending war. My father continued to work as a chartered accountant in the family firm in the City, travelling up daily by train from Hildenborough Station in his dark suit, bowler hat and with briefcase and rolled umbrella. My mother exchanged art school and her independent life for full-time motherhood and home-making, and they were affluent enough to be able to engage domestic help and a gardener, and for her to keep animals and indulge in her love of horse-riding.
It is difficult now to disentangle my first real memories from images in early photographs. I have rather hazy recollections of being looked after by my father’s now-elderly childhood ‘nurse’ (i.e. nanny), Gertrude Rowland, who had been summoned out of retirement in Derbyshire, all properly kitted out in her traditional dark blue and white starched uniform.
It is difficult now to disentangle my first real memories from images in early photographs. I have rather hazy recollections of being looked after by my father’s now-elderly childhood ‘nurse’ (i.e. nanny), Gertrude Rowland, who had been summoned out of retirement in Derbyshire, all properly kitted out in her traditional dark blue and white starched uniform.
But I have better memories of outdoor activities like being taken on horse-back by my mother, of watching the cows being milked (by our gardener/farm-worker, Eddie Crane) and of helping with hay-making. As children we were very fortunate that by keeping chickens, a couple of cows and other animals, and having a large kitchen garden and orchard, we were able to have a healthy diet throughout the war while so many others were deprived of this. I particularly remember the fresh warm milk being brought into the kitchen each morning, and how some of it would later be skimmed so we could have cream and also make butter.
By the time I was born in 1940, the war had already begun, and many aspects of life were rather different from what my parents had been looking forward to. To start with, the house turned out to be directly under the path of German bombers as they headed for London, and also of the long-distance rockets that were developed later. A large swivel anti-aircraft gun was mounted in the field below the house, and a barrage balloon was moored there also. My parents initially built a sandbag enclosure by the side of the house, so I could sleep safely outside in my pram during the summer, but when large-scale air raids began they erected an Anderson Shelter in the back garden and later installed a Morrison Shelter in one of our downstairs rooms so that we could sleep under it in relative safety. I will always remember the steady drone of the waves of German bombers flying overhead, and the sound of an air-raid siren still gives me shivers when I hear it. We listened to the radio a lot for news and entertainment, especially to Children’s Hour at 5 and programmes like ITMA.
With petrol being almost unobtainable, there was the problem of how to get around. My father bought a two-wheel pony-trap that we could all fit into, so we could get up to the village and to nearby places like Leigh and Penshurst. In the village I remember going regularly to a hut erected just below the church where we went to collect the blue-labelled bottles of concentrated orange juice that were issued for children, which I thought was delicious. For groceries generally, however, we used to go with our ration books and coupons to Adin Coates store in Leigh, which was opposite the blacksmith’s forge where we took the horses and ponies to be shod, and which also did deliveries in the local area.
With petrol being almost unobtainable, there was the problem of how to get around. My father bought a two-wheel pony-trap that we could all fit into, so we could get up to the village and to nearby places like Leigh and Penshurst. In the village I remember going regularly to a hut erected just below the church where we went to collect the blue-labelled bottles of concentrated orange juice that were issued for children, which I thought was delicious. For groceries generally, however, we used to go with our ration books and coupons to Adin Coates store in Leigh, which was opposite the blacksmith’s forge where we took the horses and ponies to be shod, and which also did deliveries in the local area.
My other favourite trip at this time was to take a picnic up to Penshurst Airfield so I could see the aeroplanes of the fighter squadrons that were stationed there. You needed to know your way round the lanes in those days, as all the signposts had been taken down. We sometimes saw groups of prisoners-of-war working in the fields who were from nearby PoW camps (I remember a very crowded one surrounded by barbed wire on the Pembury Road outside Tonbridge), and I recall individual Italian PoWs working without supervision in our own fields – which must have been after Mussolini fell and Italy joined the Allies in 1943.
Meanwhile my father, together with Frank Benbow and other neighbours, had joined the Home Guard – or to be precise, in his case the local Cadet Force - as one of its officers. The Cadets were formally part of the Regular Army, but did similar activities to the Home Guard and cooperated with them, and he had to attend training courses and was often out at night on watch duties.
Meanwhile my father, together with Frank Benbow and other neighbours, had joined the Home Guard – or to be precise, in his case the local Cadet Force - as one of its officers. The Cadets were formally part of the Regular Army, but did similar activities to the Home Guard and cooperated with them, and he had to attend training courses and was often out at night on watch duties.
All this time though, my father continued to travel up to London daily by train, as he had before the war started. He used to tell how one morning he got off the train and walked up Queen Victoria Street by St Paul’s, where his office was located – but there was no office there, just a pile of rubble. Amongst other things most of his personal papers and family records were lost, and (to my later childhood regret) also his father’s fine stamp collection.
In the summer of 1944, when the doodlebugs (V1 flying bombs) started coming over, my mother took me and my sister Jenny by train up to the Peak District in Derbyshire, to stay in the village (Thorpe Cloud, by Dovedale) where my father’s old nurse had returned to rejoin her family. She found us a small stone cottage to stay in, with no running water, which we had to get from the well. We stayed there for several months: for my mother it must have been hard, but for me it was a great adventure. My father remained in Hildenborough, looking after the house, and they kept in touch by writing letters, some of which we still have.
In the summer of 1944, when the doodlebugs (V1 flying bombs) started coming over, my mother took me and my sister Jenny by train up to the Peak District in Derbyshire, to stay in the village (Thorpe Cloud, by Dovedale) where my father’s old nurse had returned to rejoin her family. She found us a small stone cottage to stay in, with no running water, which we had to get from the well. We stayed there for several months: for my mother it must have been hard, but for me it was a great adventure. My father remained in Hildenborough, looking after the house, and they kept in touch by writing letters, some of which we still have.
May 1945 brought the end of the war, and celebrations on VE Day. According to The Courier, a number of events were held in the village and my father helped to organise them. We have a photograph of me and my sister waving Union Jacks at home in the garden. We all look quite smartly dressed, so we were probably on our way to the village celebrations.
Life now began to return more to normal. We took our first summer holiday, in Bognor, sharing the beach with scaffolding and other defensive barricades. And I started school, not in the village but at Hilden Oaks, on Dry Hill Park Road on the way into Tonbridge. Several of my friends went there as well, and at first we all used to walk up all the way up to the main road in the village and then get the bus into Tonbridge. Later there was a little green bus which came down Philpots Lane and took us the whole of the route.
I should perhaps explain at this point exactly where we lived in relation to the centre of Hildenborough village. Our house, Oldhouse Farm, was one of around 20 or so houses that clustered around the junction of Philpots Lane and Eggpie Lane, about a mile out of the village on the west side. To reach it, you forked off left at the War Memorial down Noble Tree Road and then crossed into Philpots Lane and over the railway bridge beside Philpots Manor. It was a little neighbourhood, largely created in the 1930s, of mainly middle-class/professional families in separate houses with gardens, many of whom were friendly with each other (especially if they had children). Most of the families were also active in the main village in some way or other, whether it be the church, sporting activities, or even the parish council. So we were both part of the village, though also rather separate from it.
My father Gerald was one of the more active ones. He was a Parish Councillor and Chairman of the Council from 1950 to 1955, and he used to play cricket regularly for the village team, and I remember being very impressed when we came to watch that he was the Captain. He was also a member of the Church Council and we used to go to church regularly on Sundays and sit at the front, and I remember him taking the collection and being on duty at the church door sometimes.
Life now began to return more to normal. We took our first summer holiday, in Bognor, sharing the beach with scaffolding and other defensive barricades. And I started school, not in the village but at Hilden Oaks, on Dry Hill Park Road on the way into Tonbridge. Several of my friends went there as well, and at first we all used to walk up all the way up to the main road in the village and then get the bus into Tonbridge. Later there was a little green bus which came down Philpots Lane and took us the whole of the route.
I should perhaps explain at this point exactly where we lived in relation to the centre of Hildenborough village. Our house, Oldhouse Farm, was one of around 20 or so houses that clustered around the junction of Philpots Lane and Eggpie Lane, about a mile out of the village on the west side. To reach it, you forked off left at the War Memorial down Noble Tree Road and then crossed into Philpots Lane and over the railway bridge beside Philpots Manor. It was a little neighbourhood, largely created in the 1930s, of mainly middle-class/professional families in separate houses with gardens, many of whom were friendly with each other (especially if they had children). Most of the families were also active in the main village in some way or other, whether it be the church, sporting activities, or even the parish council. So we were both part of the village, though also rather separate from it.
My father Gerald was one of the more active ones. He was a Parish Councillor and Chairman of the Council from 1950 to 1955, and he used to play cricket regularly for the village team, and I remember being very impressed when we came to watch that he was the Captain. He was also a member of the Church Council and we used to go to church regularly on Sundays and sit at the front, and I remember him taking the collection and being on duty at the church door sometimes.
My mother was active in the Women’s Institute, and I remember going with her to events such as village fetes and activities in the Drill Hall, including when she acted in plays the WI put on. But during these years she was mostly involved with running the household and managing us children, as well as maintaining the large garden and organising the social life of the family. The latter was important to her, and she had extensive social networks in the wider area, and enjoyed visiting and going to parties, and also to events like point-to-points and even hunt balls. My father cared little for all this, and preferred to spend his spare time on the farm, or to socialise by going out shooting pheasants (and also rabbits, until myxomatosis arrived in 1953) with neighbours and friends on our and other local farms.
My mother’s independent spirit did shine through strongly from time to time, most memorably when she notoriously stole the village Belisha beacons. These guarded the crossing on the main road outside the church, and there was a plan for them to be removed (and the crossing to be re-located) – which was opposed by many people. When the beacons had been taken down and left beside the road, she drove up and took them away and hid them in our garage. She must have been spotted because the local police came round later and retrieved them!
Among the other people in our little enclave who were active in the village when I was young was Mrs Margery Finzi who lived at The Haysel, a few houses up the road from us (she moved later to Riding Lane). She was always very kind to us, and helped my mother after my father died. Her daughter Jean was a photographer, and took some lovely photos of my brother and younger sister when they were young. Margery Finzi helped to run various voluntary organisations in the village, and a room in the Village Hall is named after her.
My mother’s independent spirit did shine through strongly from time to time, most memorably when she notoriously stole the village Belisha beacons. These guarded the crossing on the main road outside the church, and there was a plan for them to be removed (and the crossing to be re-located) – which was opposed by many people. When the beacons had been taken down and left beside the road, she drove up and took them away and hid them in our garage. She must have been spotted because the local police came round later and retrieved them!
Among the other people in our little enclave who were active in the village when I was young was Mrs Margery Finzi who lived at The Haysel, a few houses up the road from us (she moved later to Riding Lane). She was always very kind to us, and helped my mother after my father died. Her daughter Jean was a photographer, and took some lovely photos of my brother and younger sister when they were young. Margery Finzi helped to run various voluntary organisations in the village, and a room in the Village Hall is named after her.
Further up the road, still on our side, was Philpots Manor, where Dr Davison the local village GP lived with his wife and family. Dr Davison’s predecessor as GP had been Dr Fraser who lived at Mountains (now Fosse Bank School), closer to the village on Noble Tree Road. I remember ‘Mrs (Mountains) Fraser’, as my parents referred to her (to distinguish her from the vicar’s wife), being a rather formidable woman, but she kindly allowed us children to use their outdoor swimming-pool during the summer, which saved us from having to go all the way to Hilden Manor each time we wanted a swim.
Other families we knew well in our immediate neighbourhood included the Benbows, who lived in ‘The Cottage’, between the Finzis’ house and Philpots Manor. As I already mentioned, Frank was in the Cadets/Home Guard with my father during the war, and Joyce was active in the WI with my mother (they used to act in plays together). Their son Gavin was one of my two best friends throughout my childhood, and his sisters Sandra and Lynda were similar ages to mine too. My other best friend was Christopher (Toff) Whall, who lived in Brook Cottage by the bridge on the corner of Philpots Lane and Eggpie Lane. He had a younger sister Veronica (Nicky), and his parents were Molly and ‘LG’ (he was always called that), who was expert at mending broken watches and clocks.
Both families were there throughout the twenty years in which we lived at Oldhouse Farm, and as children we spent a lot of time together, including playing games, collecting stamps and building dens across the fields (no television!). When we were older, in the summer holidays our parents organised cricket matches, we went hop-picking, and we also used to go for long cycle rides: we would cycle to Tunbridge Wells or Sevenoaks, and used to roam further along the North Downs to hunt for fossils in quarries. At Christmas, we would all go carol-singing together round the neighbouring houses on Christmas Eve, and when the weather was cold enough we skated on local ponds.
My sisters Jenny and Sally were both very active with horse-riding and in the Pony Club, and that brought them close to the family of Liz and Tony Brown, who lived a short distance up Eggpie Lane at Durhams Farm, with their similar-aged children Sue, Mike and Robert. The Browns like us kept ponies for riding, and on several occasions they and my mother organised a gymkhana for local children in the field opposite their farm. They had a long-term lodger called Frank Gabb who was passionate about old traction engines, and periodically could be seen driving one up Eggpie Lane.
Other families we knew well in our immediate neighbourhood included the Benbows, who lived in ‘The Cottage’, between the Finzis’ house and Philpots Manor. As I already mentioned, Frank was in the Cadets/Home Guard with my father during the war, and Joyce was active in the WI with my mother (they used to act in plays together). Their son Gavin was one of my two best friends throughout my childhood, and his sisters Sandra and Lynda were similar ages to mine too. My other best friend was Christopher (Toff) Whall, who lived in Brook Cottage by the bridge on the corner of Philpots Lane and Eggpie Lane. He had a younger sister Veronica (Nicky), and his parents were Molly and ‘LG’ (he was always called that), who was expert at mending broken watches and clocks.
Both families were there throughout the twenty years in which we lived at Oldhouse Farm, and as children we spent a lot of time together, including playing games, collecting stamps and building dens across the fields (no television!). When we were older, in the summer holidays our parents organised cricket matches, we went hop-picking, and we also used to go for long cycle rides: we would cycle to Tunbridge Wells or Sevenoaks, and used to roam further along the North Downs to hunt for fossils in quarries. At Christmas, we would all go carol-singing together round the neighbouring houses on Christmas Eve, and when the weather was cold enough we skated on local ponds.
My sisters Jenny and Sally were both very active with horse-riding and in the Pony Club, and that brought them close to the family of Liz and Tony Brown, who lived a short distance up Eggpie Lane at Durhams Farm, with their similar-aged children Sue, Mike and Robert. The Browns like us kept ponies for riding, and on several occasions they and my mother organised a gymkhana for local children in the field opposite their farm. They had a long-term lodger called Frank Gabb who was passionate about old traction engines, and periodically could be seen driving one up Eggpie Lane.
My own life changed substantially when I was sent away to boarding school a few days after my 8th birthday (so young!). So it was my siblings who continued to have the main involvement in local life in Hildenborough and with friends in our immediate neighbourhood: my own involvement became limited to school holidays. Obviously I was away at school for the majority of the time, but Hildenborough and my family and friends there still remained the most important part of my life until I finally left school.
However, I do have strong memories of coming back home specially for Coronation Day in June 1953. I remember we had to get up in the early hours of the morning and take the train to Charing Cross, so we could secure a place in Northumberland Avenue to watch the Coronation Procession pass by on its way to Westminster Abbey. Then we returned home, and joined the celebrations in the village, which were held in the school playground. My sisters and brother were all specially dressed up for this, and my brother featured in a photo in the Courier, dressed as a sailor in a boat that was constructed round his tricycle.
During the 1950s my father expanded the scale of his farming activities, purchasing more land to the north, and constructing a bridge across the stream to access this together with a modern farmyard with barns in place of the old wooden cow-sheds and stables that he had inherited with the house. The main vehicle access to the farmyard was across a field bordering on Eggpie Lane, opposite Durhams Farm. The new fields provided grazing for cows and sheep, as well as opportunities for horse-riding. I learned to drive a tractor on the fields to help with maintenance soon after I was 15, well before I could drive a car on the roads.
When we became teenagers, our network of friends became wider, extending to Tonbridge and Sevenoaks and the surrounding villages. There were parties and dances to go to, and we went to dancing lessons in a church hall in Sevenoaks in the Christmas holidays. Here we learned the waltz and the fox-trot, and Scottish country-dancing was also popular. But soon we began buying the early rock’n’roll 45rpm records (like Rock Around The Clock) to play on our Dansette record-players so we could listen to them and have fun together at home.
In 1958 my father was diagnosed with cancer, though after treatment he became stable for a while and was able to continue with his normal life. But early in 1959, his condition deteriorated and he died in St Thomas’s Hospital in London, and was buried in Hildenborough churchyard. By this time I had left school and was working as a trainee for British Petroleum in Mansfield in Nottinghamshire, prior to going to university. It was a terrible blow for my mother, as she was left with my younger sister and brother to bring up alone, and after all the financial accounts had been sorted it turned out there was very little money left.
So she had to sell the lovely house we had all grown up in, and move into the farm-worker’s cottage, Culvermead, which fronted onto Eggpie Lane and which she renamed Oak Tree Cottage. But she had great support from her long-standing friends and neighbours in the area, so it was a wise move to have made and testimony perhaps to a ‘Hildenborough spirit’. She also returned to her artistic roots, and to help make ends meet she began designing Christmas and other cards for the Ward Gallery, and later worked as an art teacher at Hilden Grange School in Tonbridge.
During the 1950s my father expanded the scale of his farming activities, purchasing more land to the north, and constructing a bridge across the stream to access this together with a modern farmyard with barns in place of the old wooden cow-sheds and stables that he had inherited with the house. The main vehicle access to the farmyard was across a field bordering on Eggpie Lane, opposite Durhams Farm. The new fields provided grazing for cows and sheep, as well as opportunities for horse-riding. I learned to drive a tractor on the fields to help with maintenance soon after I was 15, well before I could drive a car on the roads.
When we became teenagers, our network of friends became wider, extending to Tonbridge and Sevenoaks and the surrounding villages. There were parties and dances to go to, and we went to dancing lessons in a church hall in Sevenoaks in the Christmas holidays. Here we learned the waltz and the fox-trot, and Scottish country-dancing was also popular. But soon we began buying the early rock’n’roll 45rpm records (like Rock Around The Clock) to play on our Dansette record-players so we could listen to them and have fun together at home.
In 1958 my father was diagnosed with cancer, though after treatment he became stable for a while and was able to continue with his normal life. But early in 1959, his condition deteriorated and he died in St Thomas’s Hospital in London, and was buried in Hildenborough churchyard. By this time I had left school and was working as a trainee for British Petroleum in Mansfield in Nottinghamshire, prior to going to university. It was a terrible blow for my mother, as she was left with my younger sister and brother to bring up alone, and after all the financial accounts had been sorted it turned out there was very little money left.
So she had to sell the lovely house we had all grown up in, and move into the farm-worker’s cottage, Culvermead, which fronted onto Eggpie Lane and which she renamed Oak Tree Cottage. But she had great support from her long-standing friends and neighbours in the area, so it was a wise move to have made and testimony perhaps to a ‘Hildenborough spirit’. She also returned to her artistic roots, and to help make ends meet she began designing Christmas and other cards for the Ward Gallery, and later worked as an art teacher at Hilden Grange School in Tonbridge.
The farm that my father had developed was broken up into parts, and much of the land sold separately. The farm buildings and the field fronting onto Eggpie Lane were bought by the Browns of Durhams Farm opposite. Many years later Mike Brown, their elder son, built a modern house on the field and named it Oakley Farm after our family.
Oldhouse Farm itself was sold to an interesting couple, David and Pytt Geddes, who remained at the house for another 20 years and brought up their children Jane and Harriet there. David worked for Jardine Matheson, and he and Pytt (who was Norwegian by birth) had lived in China before returning to England with their young children. Pytt had learned Tai-chi in China, and when the children were older she became a pioneer modern dance teacher specialising in Tai-chi: she was one of the founding teachers at The Place, the now internationally-recognised modern dance centre by Euston Station in London.
Then, when my younger siblings had finally left home for university, my mother Pamela made the break with her Hildenborough past and moved far away to a cottage near the sea in St Davids, Pembrokeshire. The Hildenborough connection, however, still followed her, because she had remained close to one of my father’s friends who had also lived in the village, Hugh Craig. Hugh had been a senior manager at British Petroleum’s London office, but had now retired and was recently widowed leaving him with two young children. They were married in 1972 and settled in Gloucestershire, and she became once more a wife/mother with a new ‘step-family’ – but that is another story. She eventually died in 1997 aged 81, after being widowed again for a second time and later having suffered from Alzheimers. We brought her ashes back to Hildenborough where she had originally been so happy, and buried them in the grave in the churchyard alongside my father Gerald.
Oldhouse Farm itself was sold to an interesting couple, David and Pytt Geddes, who remained at the house for another 20 years and brought up their children Jane and Harriet there. David worked for Jardine Matheson, and he and Pytt (who was Norwegian by birth) had lived in China before returning to England with their young children. Pytt had learned Tai-chi in China, and when the children were older she became a pioneer modern dance teacher specialising in Tai-chi: she was one of the founding teachers at The Place, the now internationally-recognised modern dance centre by Euston Station in London.
Then, when my younger siblings had finally left home for university, my mother Pamela made the break with her Hildenborough past and moved far away to a cottage near the sea in St Davids, Pembrokeshire. The Hildenborough connection, however, still followed her, because she had remained close to one of my father’s friends who had also lived in the village, Hugh Craig. Hugh had been a senior manager at British Petroleum’s London office, but had now retired and was recently widowed leaving him with two young children. They were married in 1972 and settled in Gloucestershire, and she became once more a wife/mother with a new ‘step-family’ – but that is another story. She eventually died in 1997 aged 81, after being widowed again for a second time and later having suffered from Alzheimers. We brought her ashes back to Hildenborough where she had originally been so happy, and buried them in the grave in the churchyard alongside my father Gerald.