My Life by Lionel Graves. (Page 6)
We used to go swimming in some ice cold tarns and he took us yachting on Lake Windermere. We also had the usual camp fire songs and fun and games, smoked in the tents. At the end of the camp I was supposed to get the train for Scotland to the Cuthill, Prestonpans and stay with my grandparents, but a porter put me on the wrong train heading for Yorkshire. I had to retrace my steps and no one to meet me in Edinburgh so I crossed the city by tram to the other station and got
the train for Prestonpans. I must have looked like a waif from a storm, after a week's camp I was frequently called “ Puir wee laddie” (poor little lad – for you Sassenachs). I got a local bus from the station and was greeted with great warmth and surprise on arrival. The card I sent with details of my arrival times didn't arrive till three days later and they found a squashed pack of five Woodbines in my hip pocket.
The Head at Kings was L. A. Wilding but the staff and he didn't get on and he eventually had a breakdown and retired, being replaced by Canon Creighton who had previously been Head before his retirement for age.
During this period Dad gave up the Market Tavern and moved into Longfield.
Longfield, Tenbury Wells 1938
In 1939 on the declaration of war the school was taken over by the RAF and we were evacuated to Criccieth in North Wales, some of the day boys became boarders but most transferred to the Grammar School. We were billeted in hotels according to Houses, Castle House was in the Pines Hotel near the level crossing. When I went back on a visit it had become an old folks home. There was a milk bar at the bottom of the garden near the harbour, below the castle, and milkshakes were 3d (1 ½ p), pocket money at school was 6d (2 ½ p) a week.
I joined the Junior Training Corps which was formerly the OTC, all the Lee-Enfield 303 rifles were taken away to replace those lost at Dunkirk and there were only a few Martin-Henry Boer War rifles and some ancient musket types left, but it was not too long before we got replacements. Field Days and exercises were taken in the hilly and wooded Welsh countryside, on one occasion, a poor old Welsh biddy with very little English, thought we were the German Invasion.
Just about then I caught scarlet fever, quite serious in those days and got carted off by ambulance to Bangor isolation hospital where I was in a mixed children's ward which included Welsh speaking youngsters who would gabble about you without you knowing what they were saying. One day a large number of tattered looking troops appeared outside, they were the survivors from Dunkirk and in a sorry state, members of the Liverpool Regt, we talked to some of them through the windows, miserable Scouses, who told us that it was all over and the Germans would be here in a matter of weeks.
I got back to the important task of dropping bits of bread and biscuits to a mouse that came out of the wainscotting behind my bed and was almost tame, until a nurse caught me and put down a trap for it, no heart at all. Just before Dunkirk at home there had been an appeal for men to go and man the flotilla of small ships that sailed across the channel to evacuate the troops from the beaches. Dad had wanted to go but Mother put her foot down, pointing out his age and the family that depended on him and luckily for us, he listened to her. I'm not positive but I think the local watch repairer who had retired in 1914-18 did go, can't remember his name though.
Finally discharged from hospital and back to normal school life. There were not too many organised games, runs along the beach to Black Rock and along roads, passing Llanstomdwy (probably, no, certainly spelt wrongly) where Lloyd George the former Prime Minister was living at the time, but we didn't drop in for tea. That winter was so cold that large puddles of sea water froze on the shore. An unofficial game was sheltering behind a large boulder on the beach and throwing smaller stones at each other, simple tastes. I joined the school choir and the local Anglican vicar enjoyed us joining his choir for “Guide me O Thou great Jehovah”.
One day Alex MacDonald took a group of us to climb Moel Hebog, a relatively small mountain, unfortunately it started snowing and I never saw the summit.
Finally it was back to Worcester for the next September start of the school year, as the RAF had not used the school buildings at all, we needn't have been evacuated.
Email: Lionel Graves (lionel@graf-tek.com).
Copyright ©2000-2008 L. Graves. All Rights Reserved.
