FAMILY MEMORIES

Herbert Watson Atkinson was a journeyman coachbuilder and moved from York around the turn of the century, taking his wife and young family to Lowestoft, Nanpanton, Leicestershire, Shropshire and Manchester, finally settling in Preston about 1904/5. He worked at the vehicle and tram-car manufacturers, the United Electric Car Co., then known as Dick Kerr's, near Preston Docks (It was later known as the English Electric Co. and is now part of British Aerospace) and was engaged on the assembly of some of the first electric cars. Cars were then built for export to India and Africa but were dismantled for despatch.

The company was originally Dick, Kerr and Co Ltd. The factory was finally closed and demolished in 1993.

He was said by my father, his son Billie, to be of a carefree personality, although a conscientious workman/foreman, a good father and also popular with his fellows. He was remembered for his singing at work and for his recitation of poetry. At York, as a young man, he had been a member of St. Clements and St. Mary's Castlegate church choirs. Although I, his first grandchild, never knew him, I had the opportunity to meet, in my first job after leaving school (1935), two of his former apprentices (then working for Ribble Motors) who had liked him very much and confirmed the impressions passed on to me by my father. Grandad Bert, as he was posthumously referred to, was a keen walker, cyclist and outdoor enthusiast and judging from impressions given by his youngest daughter (my late Aunt Vi) was a keen socialist of the Fabian type.

It may have been a restless nature coupled with economic need which made him move his job and family so often in those few years. There are two or three tramcars in the Tramway Museum at Crich in Derbyshire - one saw service in Johannesburg - which may represent some of his work, particularly the double decker H2 Johannesburg.

Relatives of Caroline Atkinson nee Reynolds lived at Sherburn in Elmet, Yorks.

When settling at 2, Lark Avenue, Penwortham, Preston, in 1904/5, his family was complete and consisted of George William (1897) Doris Mabel (1898) Edith (1899) and Violet (1902). It was a good-class house with bathroom and hot water and they lived there for two or three years, the top three children going to Cop Lane School. In 1906/7 they moved to No. 6, Mornington Road, Farringdon Park, Preston: three up, two down, no bathroom or hot water and an outside W.C., - 4/- (four shillings) per week rent; a lesser abode than before.

How Bert met Caroline Reynolds is not certain; it may have been through his cycling activities. It is known that she was in service in York but her parents probably lived at Melbourne, some 8 - 10 miles S.E. of York, since it was in Melbourne they were married, about 1895. (I visited Melbourne around 1960 but the church there was a "Chapel of Ease" so I was not able to check any records). I spoke to an elderly villager who well remembered the Reynolds family but it is not certain which branch.

It is known that the Reynolds family lived in and perhaps originated at Acomb, York. There were six children: Minnie, Caroline, Florrie, William, Jim and George. I visited the William Reynolds family in 1940, when they were living in Green Lane and had relatives in Carr Lane, Acomb.

It was said by one of her friends, (Elizabeth Griffiths, Of Lancaster a family-adopted "aunt" whom we called "Auntie Miff"), that Caroline and Bert had a happy, although hard life together in their early days.

Married life for them probably started in Falconer Street, York, around 1895, Caroline being only 17 and Bert 24. Their first born came in 1897 and was christened George William, no doubt after his uncles on both sides of the family. (Bert's parents, Mr & Mrs William Hodgson Atkinson lived in Scarcroft Hill, York, in what has been described as a better class abode and there were six or seven in the family. Two brothers, George and William, emigrated to South Africa and two spinster sisters, settled finally in Bournemouth. (It is known that one of the aunts gave elocution lessons to children taking part in local festivals).

That Caroline was a countrywoman was shown in her gardening, which few townswomen had chance to do in those days and her skills in using the fruits and herbs of the hedgerows for preserves and wines. The family income at Mornington Road was supplemented by Carry taking in washing, especially of choir boys' surplices. These were picked up at the local cemetery lodge - where they were probably stored for the elaborate processional funerals that took place in those days.

At about this time all the children went to St. Matthew's School in New Hall Lane, Preston. The boys' school had been a "Higher Grade" school but had reverted to an ordinary grade elementary school around 1904.

Grandfather and Grandmother provided second-hand bikes for the children at an early age and many outings took place to Bezza Brook, Darwen Valley, Tunbrook and as far as the Trough of Bowland; these venues becoming traditional in the family's future generations.

The newspaper report of his death in the Lancashire Daily Post says Bert was working away from home at the outbreak of war (Halifax, for the United Electric Car Company). "His physical fitness enabled him to face many hardships. Severe winter in France, 1914/15, gassed at Hill 60. Invalided to Liverpool, from there sent to the Dardanelles and Egypt, to Sinai and finally to France where he met his death on September 16th. 1916. Shortly before he had met by chance his son Billie, a nineteen year old soldier with the Loyal North Lancs., whom he had not seen since the latter's enlistment."

He was killed on 14th September 1916

The newspaper article has a message from his former vicar in York, where he was in the choir of St. Clement's church and later St Mary's, Castlegate. Considering so many men were being killed, the length of his press obituary suggests he was well-known and popular. He need never have gone to the war!

Caroline received an officer's pension, since Bert's papers had gone through for his commission. She had first to lay claim to his pension and was obliged to cycle over to York or Leeds from Preston for a confrontation with the military authorities to get the right pension. (Duke of Wellington's Regiment). His name is entered in the Book of Remembrance in York Minster and on the Harris Institute Roll of Honour in Preston.

He is also listed on the Thiepval Memorial, among the 75,000+ Allied soldiers lost on the Somme whose remains have never been identified.

Caroline and her three daughters continued to live at Mornington Road, Doris joining the Co-op as an apprentice tailoress, Edith and Violet completing their education at Park School and subsequently qualifying at teacher training colleges.

It is not clearly remembered what work Caroline did to supplement the family income but she may have been paid for completing shirts for soldiers; she served in a canteen for troops on Preston station but this was probably voluntary work.

Billie was demobbed in 1918/19 and continued as a brass finisher where he had served some of his apprenticeship (Adelphi) Preston.

Bert and Carrie had been members (probably founder members) of the Clarion Cycling Club in Preston, a parallel organisation to the later nationwide Cyclist Touring Club (CTC).

In the twenties and early thirties there was an establishment near Clayton-le-Moors and Ribchester, known as the Club House (possibly Clarion Club House), used for rallies and cycling weekends. Bed and Breakfast dormitory accommodation was available and apart from a resident steward, staffing was voluntary. Carrie was a regular helper and one of the mainstays of the large, old, whitewashed house, which had grounds bordering on woodlands by the Ribble. (Since the picture we have of Carrie and Bert is reported to have been taken at Ribchester Bridge, it may be that this club house was functioning in the pre-14/18 war years).

I have vivid recollections of large rallies (hundreds of bikes), exciting sports days, picnics by the river, family meetings with aunts and uncles and always - "Nanna" Carrie. As a young boy I walked with my father to the house for weekends (mother coming by bus). The route was via the Five Barred Gate pub at Salmesbury, Halfway House Inn on the Whalley Road, then by various footpaths over the fields to the house. The house and grounds have been modernised and are diffcult to recognise now.

Carrie eventually owned her house at No. 6, Mornington Road, and in the early thirties made extensive internal modifications, fitting a bathroom, rebuilding the staircase - mainly as a D-I-Y project; quite an unusual achievement, in those days, for a lady.

Although an attractive and vivacious lady, hardworking, enterprising and free of her family, she did not re-marry.

In the mid-twenties she took in a lodger, whom she knew from the Club House fraternity and with whom it was supposed she had an intimate relationship. This Oscar Fowler was by trade a cabinet maker and worked for a picture framing firm in Blackpool, where he travelled by motor bike daily. Carrie also became a keen rider and, rare for a lady in those times, a keen supporter of Preston North End. O.F. was not accepted or particularly liked by the rest of the family and for a time there was estrangement, but it was later appreciated that she was happy with him as a friend, all her family being pre-occupied with their own affairs. Life was more of a struggle then.

Naturally, being very young, the writer was not then aware of the situation, which of course, today, would have been more acceptable. Had she re-married she would have lost her pension and her treasured independence .

Caroline was what today would be called a conservationist, a proponent of the good life, abhorred waste, made the best use of her talents and resources. Her larder was always stocked with home made preserves, elderberry wine, eggs in waterglass and herbs from the field and garden. Being the eldest grandson by five years (there were ultimately 11) perhaps I was somewhat a favourite, probably because on my tender years she "minded" me while my mother worked in the cotton mill. Perhaps my presence had helped fill her life after the family left home. Tiger Tim Annuals, Teddy Bears, a mongrel called Laddy and a much remembered cosiness.

Her house was an end terrace, adjacent to some spare land which nobody seemed to own or care about and which was known locally as the "hen pens", reminiscent of an enterprise once carried out there.

Whether she actually rented, obtained permission to use, or simply annexed the land by stealth is not clear but ultimately she succeeded in creating a most beautiful garden, the envy and admiration of the neighbourhood. At first she kept hens and planted a few fruit trees, later developing flower beds, a sunken garden, lawns and a rockery and finally covering some 1/4 acre. There was, however, some local competition for the waste land. A man living a withdrawn existence (a war veteran) 1914-18 in a primitively converted old railway wagon and shanty-like complex, fenced in by chicken wire and boarding, eked out an existence, keeping a few chickens and rabbits. His patch was on the edge of an old sandpit-cum-tip and bordered Nanna's "property". They ignored each other watchfully, suspecting each others' "field enclosure" policy - but there was, I feel, a mutual respect.

Eventually she established a thick hedge of thorn, willow, hazel, etc., fully enclosing the garden. But she helped the old man in his latter days.

On our weekly visits, up to her decease, she rarely sent anyone away without a bunch of flowers or fruit of the season.

Her end was sudden and sad. The GPO had renewed a telegraph pole on the edge of her garden and she bought the old one for a shilling. With occasional help she sawed this up into logs and one day, working on her own in the drenching rain, she caught a chill, congestion of the lungs and died at the age of 56 (1935/6).

No. 6 was sold, the garden survived for a few years due to the work she had pout in but gradually returned to dereliction and wasteland. The neighbourhood and family was the poorer for her passing .

Grandad Bert's family has lived in Scarcroft Hill, York. His father was William Hodgson Atkinson and his mother ??Emma Watson from Rillington, near Pickering, Yorks., WA may have come from Scarboro or district. There was a mention once of family associations with Robin Hood's Bay - in the churchyard there are many Atkinson tombstones but this is a common name in the NE of England. Aitken, Adkin(s), Atkin, Hutchin, etc., Danelaw). WHA's father was Pearson Atkinson, whose wife or himself had origins in Rotherham.

My cousin Peter Howard knows more about this.

When Bert had served his time as a coach builder is not known. He joined the Boys' Brigade or some such group in York and there is a photograph of him with his friend William Stockill (of whom more later). W.S's granddaughter Audrey was later to become my wife.

William Stockill, a railway signalman, married Isabel Hurst, who was a friend of Caroline's (but several years older) and it is thought that the two girls were in service in York, but not at the same place.

The families were firm friends and kept in touch with each other through the years after the Atkinsons left York and in the post-war period - the connection continuing with the union of John Atkinson (myself) and Audrey Maddison in 1944. Will Stockill's daughter Nan, later Maddison, died 1992 remembered Bert Atkinson well and confirms his popularity, gaiety and attraction for young people and his restless nature.

1918 or somewhat later saw my father, George William Atkinson demobbed. Home to his family as a potential breadwinner. Later married my mother Florence Garth in 1919 and went to live with her parents James and Jane, at 13, Rigby Street South, Preston. (This street was in later years named Nimes Street as a result of some connection between Nimes in France and Preston).

After leaving his first post war job (probably due to the post war recession) my father worked as a salesman for the timber firm of Cartmel and Son, Park Road, Preston, until the outbreak of the Second World War.

His sisters Doris and Edith married respectively Walter Hutchinson and Bert Swindlehurst who were Preston men and Billie's friends through Scouting and through the war. Violet, the youngest sister married Ernest Howard of Bury, whom it is presumed she met through cycling activities and probably at the Clarion Club House aforementioned.

The Preston families were closely knit, often joining together for picnics along the River Ribble at Salmesbury and Bezza Brook, weekends at the Club House, some cycling, some walking and if afforded, via Ribchester on the bus. They also met frequently, particularly at Christmas for parties at Auntie Edith's (Manor House Road) or Auntie Doris's (Fishwick Parade) and my home; one of their favourite social pastimes being the card game Newmarket.

Naturally we saw less of the Howards living in Tottington near Bury; family owned transport in those days was usually confined to bicycles. But they occasionally came over to see Grandma. Auntie Violet was my Godmother and I spent a few holidays with her at her home in Tottington on the fringe of the bleak south Lancashire moors and when I was old enough - 1933/4 - made the journey by push bike. My Uncle Ernest had served in the 1914/18 war, latterly as a member of the newly formed Flying Corps. He spent his working life as a tramdriver, bus driver and Inspector with the Bury Municipal Transport. It was rare in those days for our class of people to launch out on house purchase and I recall being told that this was achieved at some cost and sacrifice.

(This paragraph has been omitted as containing private and personal data).

Auntie Violet became involved in local politics, ably supported by Uncle and became the first lady Councillor in the district of Tottington and subsequently the first Lady Chairman. Violet Howard was a member of the Bury Bench of Magistrates for many years.

Country scenes, walking in her beloved neighbouring moors and motoring holidays in scenic Britain were her delights.

As a child I remember her long narrow garden running up to the open fields from her Accrington brick terraced house in Hilda Avenue, Tottington. The immediate neighbourhood was the ad hoc linear development typical of the industrial valleys of South Lancashire. Gritstone terraced houses, unmade, unadopted roads and streets, poultry enclosures, struggling or derelict cotton mills.

To the end of their lives their garden remained a joy to them and an oasis in the rapidly encroaching urban development.

Violet died in 1980, a week or two after her brother William, my father. Her last letter to me, saying she was dying, was calm and matter of fact, with no regrets and with gratitude for a "good innings". This was typical of her philosophy of life.

Uncle survived for two years.

Their front doorstop was the brass control handle of the last electric tram to run in Bury. There were no funerals, since they had many years before donated their bodies to Medical Research at Manchester. Such was their concern for humanity.

My cousins began to arrive around 1925/26, Frank Hutchinson being the first and Geoffrey Swindlehurst closely following.

Doris and Walter Hutchinson later had two daughters. (Part of this paragraph has been omitted as containing private and personal data). Their final home was at Tunbrook, Grimsargh, NE Preston.

Auntie Dons and Uncle Walter had settled at No.27, Fishwick Parade after their marriage in c. 1924. It was an end terraced house - everyone was welcome. Dons was a loving mother, the house was always clean, cosy, but delightfully untidy. She was a deep thinker, convinced socialist and loved to put down her work and discuss the political situation of the day. In my early teens and particularly on my leave from the Airforce, I spent many happy hours with her, discussing the world in general.

She had been a great swimmer, at one time accomplishing the river swim from Bullnose at Preston dock to Lytham. But Uncle and I could never get her to come with us to the baths early Sunday morning. Auntie in those days had no opportunity for gardening and this was to be fulfilled in her later life when the family moved to Fulwood and then Tunbrook.

My Uncle Waiter and I had, especially in my early teens, a great affinity. He spent a lot of time with my family, especially on Saturday evenings when he spent the "last hour" with my father at the Local, then came home for supper, often a cowheel pie, hotpot, pigs' trotters or stewed tripe by a big coal fire. Auntie Doris stayed at home with the children but we often met on Sundays at their home.

I remember a large round rosewood table with several pull-out leaves making it oval, seating 8 or 10 people and almost filling the small living room. The fare was plentiful, ham or tongue, cheese, fruit salad, cakes, the great fillers being parkin or as Auntie Doris would call it "Dicky Bunnock". These were special occasions. We were not poor compared with many of our local contemporaries in the cotton town, for our fathers were never unemployed.

Uncle Walter was manager of a wholesale cheese factor (Bamber's) in Preston and also had a part time interest, collecting as an agent for a clothing club, which was a way in which industrial class families could clothe themselves reasonably well on an instalment plan. Uncle and I often went swimming together to Saul Street heated baths, that is, when I could persuade him to get up on Sunday mornings at 7am. The first occasion revealed to me what a ''war wound" was, for my Uncle had suffered many.

Swimming in the open air was my favourite pastime. In the baths at Waverly Park the cost was a penny, and a rough Irish linen towel was provided. More often it was the river at the Halfpenny Bridge, where it cost nothing.

Edith Atkinson and Bert Swindlehurst were married about 1923/4, their eldest son Geoffrey coming along on 1st, February, 1926. Auntie taught school on and off in the mid twenties; in those days there were no permanent posts in teaching for married women. Their second son Stanley Noel was born Christmas 1927, followed by Jean Margaret in 1929, later by David and Jennifer. At that time Bert Swindlehurst had a gents' tailoring business in Lancaster Road, which his mother had helped him to set up. Following that they lived in Lovatt Road, Preston and later in Manor House Road, Holme Slack.

Bert's business was destroyed by fire around 1930 and he then became agent and later manager for a clothing club. This position he held until his retirement. Like most of the family of that generation, he was a keen cyclist, later motor/combination cyclist and was fond of the outdoor country life. He liked telling a good joke, at which he laughed heartily himself, was good company and liked his pub life. One of his many country haunts was Brock Bottoms (the Brock being a tributary of the River Wyre near Garstang, north of Preston), where he often took the family.

Uncle Bert's ashes are scattered in that green valley of the Western Pennines which he loved.

Geoffrey was too young for the active 1939/45 war but towards the end was called up and served on the Loyai North Lancs (as his father had in 1914/18). During his sojourn in South Africa as a commissioned officer he contacted some members of the Atkinson family (brothers of our Grandfather had settled there).

The only other contact as far as is known, was when William Atkinson, who was a Gold Mine official in or near Johannesburg, came to Britain in 1931. I remember meeting him at No. 6 Mornington Road, when the whole family was assembled. As young as I was I remember how upset my Grandmother Caroline was. It was perhaps the resemblance of my Great Uncle Will to his brother Bert, her late husband. Great Uncle Will produced from his jacket pocket a large gold nugget and caused a minor sensation. (Part of this paragraph has been omitted as containing private and personal data)..

There is a separate detailed chronology/narrative of the Swindlehurst family, recorded by Edith.

Continuing my family story: My sister Kathleen was born Feb 29 1930. She was a lovely child, gentle and affectionate. Unfortunately she developed congestion of the lung at an early age, this turning to bronchiectis, infection of the lung lobes. Throughout her childhood she was delicate, often in hospital; her schooling was interrupted. She worked as a shop assistant in the post war years. (Part of this paragraph has been omitted as containing private and personal data).

Kathleen died 1963, aged 33. What strength she had, had been given to the lives of her children and husband. With her passing a gentle ray of light went from our lives and the main link between my parents and me was all but severed.

We had been as close as brother and sister could be, considering our ten years' difference in age. I had cared for her as a child, looking after her in her pre-school years, filling the gap between the time my Aunt Polly's spell of "baby minding" and mother coming home from the factory. She had a brief but happy married life but due to the long periods of illness, weakness told out in the end. She did her best. Brian was sadly widowered at 35. (Part of this paragraph has been omitted as containing private and personal data).

Family life in my childhood in the early Twenties was closely knit with both my father's and my mother's relatives. I recall my maternal Grandmother Jane, who died of cancer in 1924, aged about 44. She and my Grandfather James Garth lived in the same street as we did and after she died James moved in with my family. A few years later he married again but this was not a happy relationship. There were periods when he came to live with us away from the turbulence of his second wife and family. He was a good natured, generous man. A painter and decorator by trade, he worked as a maintenance foreman for Messrs. Horrocks, the weaving company in Preston. He suffered from acute Rheumatism, contracted during the 1914/18 war when he was an Army groomsman in the Cavalry. I believe he was invalided out of the Army late in the War (19.14.1918). He always had to wear special boots. As with most families, the Garths had suffered the loss of a son in the War. John Garth, my mother's brother, had been posted "missing, believed killed". One wall of our house was always dominated by an enlarged picture of him in uniform. It was said that my Grandmother Jane never accepted his death and to her end believed he would turn up some day. There had been another child, Edith, who had died very young. So my Grandfather, at the early age of 50, had been deprived of all his family apart from my mother, Florence.

In those days Grandfathers and indeed fathers were not expected to do any household chores, the custom being for them to walk out on Sundays, visit their relatives and return for the traditional dinner at about 1 pm, after having called for "one" on the way home.

Often I cleaned his boots and polished his walking stick for the reward of sixpence, quite a sum for a little boy to get in the Twenties. Being his only grandchild till my sister arrived in 1930, he rather spoiled me. He was a lovable man. My Mother was naturally fond of him, as only two of them remained from a family of five and he was also a substantial asset to the family when he lodged with us in the Twenties. He did all our decorating and painting and was a recognised expert at graining indoor woodwork, which was then the fashion. He took very little drink, but was a keen member of the Fishwick Working Men's Club, good at bowls, dominoes and crib. He died of cancer in 1938, shortly after being hit by a car. He had taught me many things. I loved him and missed him. Grandad had eight brothers and sisters. Most of them were, or had been, employed in cotton mills as spinners, weavers or tacklers.

I recall nine members of the Garth family in the Twenties and Thirties. Great Grandfather must have died (c.1920) before or just after I was born. He was said to have been a very dignified and patriarchal figure and known locally (and I trust affectionately) as "The Lord of Fishwick". He lived in Fishwick Parade. I do not remember what his job was. Either he or his father came from Milnthorpe near Camforth (or so I recall being told).

The eldest offspring was Sarah Garth, married Robert Pearson and lived in a better class Accrington brick terraced house off the West side of London Road. They had two daughters, one of whom (Nora) married Bob Sharrock and kept a newsagent's shop in Ellesmere Port and had a son called Leslie. The other married ? Machin and I think also lived in that area, probably Birkenhead. They had a daughter, Vera, she was friendly with my sister Kathleen. The last time I met her was at my sister's Wedding, at which she was a bridesmaid (c1955).

Mary Garth married Fred Corner (who may have been her second husband). There was a daughter, Elsie, who married late in life and lived in a large semi-detached house in the country at Grimsargh. (No issue).

Mary kept a herbalist/general corner shop near us at the corner of Rigby Street and New Hall Lane and was well patronised as a knowledgeable herbalist. When she died in the early Thirties the shop was taken over by her sister Martha.

Martha was rather a surly character and rather self-pitying - a contrast to all the other Garths, who all seemed to be happy people. She married Bill Nixon; there were no children.

Bill Garth and his wife Annie lived a few streets away from us towards town. We had little contact with them. They had a son, Harold, and a daughter, whose name I forget.

The true chronology escapes me but either Lydia or Gordon was the youngest. Lydia never married. She was a somewhat eccentric lady, very much the fussy spinster. I believe she lived in lodgings. somewhere towards Waverly Park but do not recall seeing her anywhere but in our house (and then rarely) and meeting her in the street, where she would fumble in her purse and give me a penny. I remember this being a bit embarrassing when I reached my mid-teens - she was a kind soul. Her end was sad, since she had lost some of her faculties. My mother cared for her a little as the need arose.

There was also a brother, John (Jack), who went to America around 1920, perhaps earlier. James, my Grandfather, also had a short spell in the States, Boston, Mass., I think. but came home disillusioned after having to defend himself against robbery. This may have been before the first War.

James and Gordon had a close affinity as brothers and friends and the looked very much alike. Both married ladies called Jane (Janey). I scarcely remember my Grandmother - she died when I was only four, but remember Aunt Janey quite well in her home in St. Mary's Street where there was always an affectionate welcome and something from the cupboard for a little boy.

Their daughter Beatrice was quite a few years younger than my Mother (her cousin) and I remember her as a bright and happy person.

I am now informed her married name was Morris, that she had a son, Harry, and a daughter. Pauline, the latter being a friend of my Aunt Edith Swindlehurst's daughter Jennifer.

There was one other Aunt who I almost forgot, Beatrice, (married name Woan) who lived in Ducie Place, near the cemetery at Farrington Park, Preston. She had two daughters, Lilian and Doris.

The house at no. 9, Rigby Street was terraced, two rooms downstairs, one being the kitchen. and three bedrooms. It was a cut above the others in adjacent streets since the front door of the living room did not open directly into the pavement but had a small entrance (vestibule). The floors were Pennine flagstones covered with linoleum and carpet squares and a pegged rug in front of the fireplace.

The range in the living room was cast iron, consisting of a "fireplace", oven and kettle hob. All these had to be blackleaded each week (usually Friday unless it was Christmas Day; then it would have been done on Thursday). Knobs, rivetheads and handles would be burnished. In my early years there was a large bricked-in coal fired copper boiler in the kitchen which provided bath water and weekly wash water, and a large galvanised tin bath which hung on the back-yard wall when not in use. The closet (now called toilet) was a brick built cubicle at the far corner of the yard. It had a roof of pennine flags, a broad well scrubbed wooden bench seat and a primitive overhead flush system, which didn't seem to cause as much trouble or freeze up as many installations met in later years. Next to this was the dog kennel where my mongrel ''''Paddy'''' lived, then the coal house. The yard was about 14 feet square, paved with two foot square hard pennine flag stones, which served us as a diminutive football and cricket pitch and when not in use, for hanging and washing. In one corner was a lean-to shed, built by my father for keeping budgies, but deteriorated into a den where a few of my school and street friends met and formed a "penny club" where we told ghost stories, swapped comics, larked about by candle light and later on tried out the odd fag and pipeful of Dad's baccy. The back way out of the house was via a narrow and dark lobby from a latched door on the street. This was shared with the neighbours and used for hanging washing on wet days, storing clothes-horses, props, bikes, etc.,

We had three bedrooms, approached by a narrow, steep, high-welled staircase. There were some dark corners in the house, since until 1931 we had gas lighting, the staircase (where it was difficult to replace the gas mantle) was often dark, and under the stairs was a mystery hole where it was said there were "Bogeys" amongst the dirty linen and odd stored items. The door into the kitchen was fitted with about a dozen coat hooks which, when fully occupied, weighted and twisted the door until it would not latch.

By today's standards, all this would be primitive but the house was always cosy and warm and clean. We lived comfortably.

Monday was washday; cold meat from the Sunday joint, the latter serving for many concoctions until Thursday. Thereafter, sausage, fish and chips or corned beef. There was ham, brawn, potted meat for teas. Porridge or boiled eggs for breakfast and on Sundays the full "traditional English breakfast" as it is erroneously called today. Mother baked lots of cakes, pastry and there was often trifle for Sunday tea.

St. Matthew's Church School (Elementary) was nearby and my father from aged 9 and my mother had both been pupils there and some of the teachers who had taught them later received me into their care. We had Scripture every morning for half an hour, sometimes a religious input by the local Vicar - a Reverend Redfearn. He later took me for confirmation classes - a kindly, gentle man. He would not allow any boy or girl to be confirmed unless he or she had attended the classes and understood the Articles of Faith, the Catechism and had knowledge of the Prayer Book.

In the day school, classes were mixed until seven years old, after that there was a strict segregation. Boys and girls were not allowed to mix - even at playtime or in the immediate vicinity of the school after hours.

Sports days were on Waverley Park about half a mile away and there was always an opportunity to play football or cricket, or run off when teacher wasn't looking.

For a time my Aunt Edith taught in the school - I recall being somewhat conscious of being regarded by the other kids as an oddity, being connected with teachers, since the latter in those days were regarded with awe. Nevertheless, I look back with happiness on my schooldays at St. Matthew's, the morning prayers and assembly, the squeaking and groaning of the large screens as they were pushed along their "trarnllnes" to partition off the classes after prayers. The Headmaster was Mr. Wilson - "Cock" Wilson, looking always so dignified and authoritarian. (All male staff were called "Cock" and all female staff "Peggy"; it was a tradition in that school and I wonder if it is still the same today, where various ethnic groups have inherited that part of our industrial working class England).

My Mother, Florence, must have been a good hard worker, for in spite of the unemployment rate she was often in a good job. She was regularly called to train young weavers ion the techniques of Jacquard loom weaving.

She was generous in support of several of our "out of work" and "out of luck" neighbours, but on the other hand was not very economical in the use of her own funds. Money was a constant worry to her, not because she did not get enough, but rather that she could not manage it or save any.

Nevertheless she managed some annual holidays for us as Blackpool and Morecombe in the mid-Thirties. This was in boarding house accommodation, the arrangement being that Mother provided the food and the landlady cooked for us - a popular system among working class boarding house keepers and their guests in those days.

My sister Kathleen was two years old when I started (1933) at the Technical School (Harris Institute of Junior Technology) and my mother began working again. Kathleen was "minded" by our Great Aunt Polly (my maternal Grandmother's sister) who was childless and somewhat housebound with rheumatism and other complaints. It was my job to take her to Aunt Polly's in the morning before school and bring her back home in the evening before Mother got home, and usually I prepared our tea.

Polly Worden, my Grandmother's sister, was a character, a working class lady, "straight laced", a slave to routine and a very strong sense of value and decorum. She kept my Uncle Frank at the end of a domestic leash, not tightly, but enough to keep him in check. Those were the days when wages (not always in a packet) were handed over to the lady of the house and pocket money for beer and "baccy" and football was doled out on Friday night. Frank smoked a clay pipe and "twist" tobacco, which he lit from the fire. using long wax tapers or lengths of twisted newspaper. Woe betide him if he dropped ash on the carpet. "Frank!" she would say, "Ash!" and he understood! There was a wind-up gramophone with a horned speaker, records of Tauber, Peter Dawson and Stanley Holloway with his recitations of "Albert", the "Bloody Tower" and "Three a' pence a foot". As a young boy I spent every Monday evening playing games with Aunt Polly, usually dominoes, or Ludo, or looking at the volumes of the Children's Encyclopaedia, which were bought for me by my father (using Daily Herald coupons) and which fascinated my dear old Great Aunt.

Her favourite pastime was crocheting and reading the paper - also in the early Thirties the radio played a good part in filling her life during the day, but she could never get used to "crooning" and other rendering of the then popular songs or music. It was always compared unfavourably with Tauber and Dawson.

Uncle went "out" every Saturday and Sunday morning, ostensibly to call on relatives, but his brief visits to our house and his other acquaintances were cover-ups for his calls at the "local".

Monday evening's highlight was a basin of Lentil and meat soup which had been simmering on the hob since Sunday morning in a cast iron pan - delicious - I have never forgotten the taste - or indeed the atmosphere of those cosy evenings. Chintz and plush furniture, coal fires, pans on the hob, smells of baccy smoke, kitchen scrubbed with carbolic soap, and the old-fashionedness of it all.

Polly was only just over 50 years old in the early Thirties and when one compares her way of life, her dress and her outlook and philosophy with women of the same age today there is a tremendous contrast.... She suffered (among other things) from Hay Fever and her expression "Ah gets it when they're agate wi' th' 'ay" was long remembered in the family ("agate" is an old Lancashire work meaning: doing; working; going about it, probably originating from the Latin word 'agere' - to do.

In my later teens and early twenties I visited her regularly and especially on my leave from the "Service". She was bedridden in '39 but when I returned home from overseas in '44 I was staggered to see her up and about and very active, albeit housebound. In those days there was not the medication or knowledge of therapy to treat her complaint so she must have had tremendous will power to overcome her infirmity.

On reflection, life at home was dull unless we had my uncles and aunts or friends for company. We had no wireless until I was about 11 (1931). Dad sat by the fire, or rather in front of it, and read the Lancashire Daily Post or a library book and Mother knitted or brooded over the day's events.

Dad livened up when we had company, made us all laugh heartily by dressing up and acting the fool or mimicking people. They had a lot of friends but unfortunately they were not self-sufficient or compatible with each other. Each had need of a medium or a catalyst.

The cinema was in its hey-day and there were at least five picture houses, as it were, "around the corner". Admission was fourpence or sixpence and there was a "Tuppenny rush" on Saturday afternoons.

Dad and I were good companions in those days and would often go walks together at weekends, to the Clarion Clubhouse via Salmesbury, the Five Barred Gate, or to Cuerdale and the Bezza Brook area, the former is now cut through by the M6 and the latter developed residentially. He was a great lover of the countryside and we were fortunate to live within two miles of really good walking country. Dad knew little about nature in any detail but he taught me what he knew and was a good observer and a keen spotter of birds' nests.

In the Summer holiday Dad and I took a LMS railway run-about ticket and travelled daily to the Lake District, Windermere, or Lakeside at Coniston, walk the fellsides for the day and catch the very last train home. In one or two years we did this from Morecambe, leaving Mother and my sister Kathleen to spend the day on the beach.

My first introduction to the Lake District was at Langdale where I went for the day with a friend of my Grandmother Carrie. That day, when I first saw Dungeon Ghyll in full spate and those fell walks with Dad, filled me with a love of the Lake District that has never diminished. That first view of the Langdale Pikes in 1930 has never left my memory: yet, even though I have climbed many peaks meantime, it was not until 1984 that I climbed the Langdales - as a member of a Geology Group from Nottingham University.

Most of my fellows joined Cubs, Guides or Scouts, attended Sunday School, etc., although it must be said that the woods and the riverside had equal if not more attraction in the Summer months. albeit that we lived in an industrial conurbation surrounded by streets, cotton mills and with hardly a green leaf in sight, we were very close to the country.

A few hundred yards away the industrial sprawl had been halted by the steep south facing river cliff of the River Ribble (my river). Here were woods sweeping down to the meadows on the river bank, long walks to Walton, Bezza, Cuerdale and Brockholes, and many small tributaries of the Ribble, with fishing, bird nesting and the occasional presence of fox and otter.

Memories of collecting primroses and violets on Cuerdale bank; the bluebells, mayflowers and orchids in the sleepy hollows; ragwort, buttercups and Ragged Robin on the flat marshy pasture leading down to the deep-cut sandy bank of the river where the martins nested and the voles and water rats played. Today, sadly, the country flora is under more pressure now than we ever would have dreamed.

Here we lazed our summer holiday days, in our sack-cloth makeshift tents, made our small camp fires and swam in the leisurely flowing waters of the river, between the beds of crowsfoot and the shifting shingle beaches which lay along the meandering course of the river from Halfpenny Bridge and Mellor Deeps. A macabre experience in the latter place was the discovery of a body afloat near the river bank. The poor man had been "a gentleman of the road".

The tenor of Elementary School life was first interrupted by the Scholarship selection to Grammar School, when one or two of my friends were picked out to follow this coveted line of learning. There was a strict numbers limit to such opportunities in Preston in those days. Later, at thirteen, I was among a further few to be selected for a two year course at the Harris Institute Technical College (Junior) which extended my education one year beyond the norm.

The Harris Junior Technical curriculum was Maths, Physics/Mechanics, woodwork, metalwork, English, History and Art. The establishment was a fairly new building (1920) in Corporation Street, Preston, and owed its existence to the Harris Foundation, which had also set up the town museum and library. Intake was about thirty per year in each of the Technical and Commercial schools, the catchment embracing Blackpool and the Fylde and Southport, Leyland, Chorley, etc., There were no females in the Technical side and only one or two boys in the commercial classes. Strict segregation was required, but not, of course, observed. (The establishment developed into a modern College of Technology and finally the University of Central Lancashire).

After two years and following examination, a leaving certificate was awarded, but several of my fellow students, including myself, were asked by local firms (via the school) to apply for apprenticeships in engineering. Since it was traditional that most boys who were applied were taken on, there was family pressure to accept jobs where offered; employment for schoolleavers was just as uncertain then as it is today nationwide.

So, many of us left without any certificate of education. I elected to follow the family tradition of coach builder and became apprenticed at Ribble Motors repair depot. I had enjoyed my spell at the college and continued with my technical education at night school during my first two apprenticed years. There were the inevitable distractions and interests outside work and nightschool: football, cricket, walking, cycling, girls, local church events. cinemas.

The most memorable things were the Saturdays cycling round the Trough of Bowland, the camping out at Squiregate, Blackpool, the rambles in Cuerdale, Bezza and Ribblesdale, the introduction to "dancing" at various halls in Preston and the Tower, Blackpool. But above all the spring flowers in the Ribblesdale woods (especially the Primroses and anemones); this was before the urban population were mobile enough to rediscover their natural heritage and subsequently began to destroy that which they were seeking.

Then came the realisation that it might be better for me to leave Preston; when exactly or why, is not certain. There was an advert in the National Press for RAF apprentices and following discussions with my parents (but above all as a result of consultation with my very close and respected Uncle Walter Hutchinson) my application was sent off.

Not the least influencing factor was the knowledge that employers customarily sacked their apprentices at 21 (having had the cheap labour) and only re-employed them if work load permitted. So there was no surety of continuing employment beyond 21.

Mr. Naylor, the principal of the H.I.J.T. encouraged me to join the RAF. I passed the entrance exam and before I realised what was happening I was on my way to Halton.

Little did I know then, that within two or three years I would in any case have had to join one or other of the military forces.

Mr. Naylor told me he had a friend who had joined the RAF and become Wing Commander. "If he could do it, Atkinson", he said, "So might you!" Of course, I did not make that elevated grade!

Life as a boy apprentice in the RAF was radically different from anything I had known at home. I left Preston and my family amid sad farewells in January 1937 with a few loose shillings in my pocket and a ten-shilling note sewn into my inside coat pocket (my parents were cautious in regard to train travelling con men) to arrive at Halton (Wendover) Station by way of London. Someone my Uncle knew travelled on the same train down and was asked to keep an eye on me for the journey (after the first few minutes he never spoke to me).

The age of the boys forming my 'Entry' ranged from 15 1/2 - 171/2 and many of them, then as now in retrospect to their photos, looked very much younger. The majority had no experience outside school. We were met at Marylebone Station and marshalled into a special train, where there were farewells (some emotional) to the boys whose parents had accompanied them so far.

Most of the boys were from Southern counties and it was not long before we few Northerners were looked upon as somewhat odd because of our accents. The majority of these chaps had either matriculated or had a School Certificate and I was a further oddity because I had actually been working!

One or two lads jibbed at the first hurdle of parades and disciplines and gave up within the first three months in which we were all allowed to change our minds - before "swearing in" our allegiance to King and Country. The terms were that we should serve three years apprentice-ship in aircraft engineering, then serve for 12 years from the age of eighteen.

The pay was one shilling per day. all found and an allowance for clothing (RAF uniform wear and tear) and barrack room damages. No civilian clothes were allowed, not even"on leave" until we had done two years of our term, so on arrival our civvies were parcelled up and sent home.

Halton Camp was run virtually on Public School lines (after all, we were still boys) with vacations at Easter, Whitsuntide, August and Christmas. The school masters were civilians (some ex-officers of the first World War), teaching Physics, Maths, theory of flight, mechanics and General Studies and most of the workshop instructors were time serving NCOs.

Discipline was strict and activities intense, physical training after "Gunfire" i.e., tea and biscuits at 6.30am, then "square bashing" after breakfast, followed by a march to workshops and schools accompanied by fife and drum bands. Sports were compulsory, two halfdays per week allocated for football, rugby, cricket, athletics etc., with voluntary games at weekends. Time off from Saturday at noon until Monday with compulsory church parade on Sunday morning. C of E service was conducted after the command "Fall out Roman Catholics, Jews and other denominations". They, of course, had their own services.

Payday was always Friday which, in alphabetical order, we were paid 3 of our seven shillings after identifying ourselves by calling out the last three figures of our Service number. The other four shillings were saved as deferred pay for leave money. Rail warrants were provided three times per year.

There was food a-plenty, reasonably good, perhaps not as good as at home, but simple and wholesome. We were not pampered by variety of fare as we are today.

The pay was slightly better. I had been receiving eight shillings and sixpence per week in my apprenticeship at Ribble Motors, of which my Mother gave me one shilling and sixpence pocket money. Of course, my parents would have had to provide me with food and clothing for the next few years.

I never recall being homesick but was always glad to go home on leave and mix with my boyhood friends in Preston (some of them were to be lost in the War a few years later). I myself would have been called up in 1939/40 with perhaps no choice of which branch in the Forces.

None of us thought seriously of war in 1937 even though events in Europe were working up to a climax - and I do not recall this affecting our outlook for the future - in those days there was very little media hype to condition us into thinking the worst.

Exams were frequent and searching - a few who were academically tops and showed prowess and/or leadership and were good at games were selected for the Officer Cadet School at Cranwell, this selection often conditioned by the family background element particularly if one's father had been or was still a serving officer in the forces. On the whole, however, selection seemed to be fair. The war broke out 6 months before our apprenticeship was complete.

In the two and a half years of close living with the same crowd of lads I made many friends and it was with some regret and a sense of isolation and not a little apprehension that I was sent on my way into adult Service life. We were individually posted so I knew no-one. But Service life was and no doubt is a fertile ground for friendship.

The last speech of farewell came from our C.O. (affectionately known as "Dihedral" because of his angular stoop). He said: "In the next few years, men, you will often feel a lump in your throat. It will either be your heart or your guts. Swallow hard - you'lI need them both. Good luck!"

My first posting was to Dishforth, Yorks. , Bomber Command, Whitley bombers and the "Phoney War". Later to the Middle East, but these years' experiences are not recorded in these memories - so much has been written by war chroniclers.