NOSTALGIA turns to Sandridge, with ex-shopkeeper Eric Darby's memories of the village in the late 1940's.

In these days when so many villages don't even have one shop, it seems incredible there can have been so many but then they obviously didn't mind diversifying to stay in business.

L and F.W. Dawson was a butcher, petrol station, grocer and post office all rolled into one.

"Next door was the slaughterhouse, which became an abattoir when Nora Dawson learnt a bit of French," said Mr Darby.

Sullivans haberdashery doubled up as a sweet shop, and there was another grocer, Readings.

Mr Darby's own shop sold papers, groceries, sweets, and radio and cycle parts and his own ice cream made on the premises.

"Arthur Hopkins delivered coal and vegetables by horse and cart, and later by lorry driven by Jim Cooper. Hopkins also had a couple of cows so you could get milk from his yard, which was guarded by geese."

Among local farmers, Mr Darby mentions Jim Sherriff is this the same Sherriff family who still farm land between Wheathampstead and Welwyn Garden City?

Dr Corner's farm had a herd of pedigree Jersey cows hence the Jersey Farm housing estate.

Other farms in the area were Jacksons, Pound Farm and Burrows Farm.

"The Queen's Head was run by Emily Atkins and family, and The Rose and Crown by Jimmy Shuff's dad," remembers Mr Darby.

"Simpkins wood yard was at the back of the pub. You could also get your shoes mended by Les Reynolds."

Villagers also used to call at the wood yard to re-charge their accumulators nine-inch tall glass batteries filled with acid which radios were run from.

"The Green Man was run by Tilley Hunt and Tommy Jenkins. This is the local pub where the threshers used to meet at harvest time.

"He kept pigs at the bottom of the garden.

"The Woodman was run by Bert Gudgeon who was a foreman at Trans-Planters during the day.

"Mrs King used to collect hospital insurance and lived opposite the village hall."

Two brothers, George and Percy Winch, used to drive round the village with a van emptying the buckets from the outside toilets.

"In some houses, they had to take the bucket right through the house.

"They used to park their lorry outside my house, while they went into The Green Man for a pint. They were covered with the stuff.

"The contents of the lorry were emptied into a pit in House Lane, then spread on the fields to make the vegetables grow."

Leslie Field and his brother John delivered oil from their hardware van for heating and lighting to those houses that still didn't have electricity.

"Leslie was called Nink everybody had nicknames in those days," remembers Mr Darby.

There was a blacksmith's in Church End, run first by Jimmy Hill and then by his son Charlie.

"The local policeman was Bill Whyman a very big man weighing more than 20 stone who rode a bike.

"We went to the chapel opposite Highfield Road run by the Stevens family, because it had a magic lantern, and better parties than the church.

"Dr Dykes travelled round the village on his bike. District Nurse Laidlaw walked."

October 23, 2001 9:36

Alex Lewis