History of Maypole, Dartford Heath - Recently Updated Pages

Maypole Estate - welcome

Maypoleman — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 15:03:07 CST

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year !!
and say a prayer for all our brave servicemen and women overseas - wherever they are.

Welcome to the Homepage for those interested in the history of the area known as Maypole Estate, Dartford Heath, Kent, England and the immediate surrounding area - Baldwyns Park, Joydens Wood, Coldblow, Wansunt, Leyton Cross etc.

Some pages now contain video footage.

Something we planned for the Spring of 2009 - click here updated 15/07//09 It was Sat 11th April 1400hrs Denton Road nr Rolex. It turned out really well - pictures are now on that page. Everyone had a good time. We were all well behaved and no one was naughty.

Something we planned for the Spring of 2009 - click here updated 15/07//09
It was
Sat 11th April 1400hrs Denton Road nr Rolex.
It turned out really well - pictures are now on that page.
Everyone had a good time. We were all well behaved and no one was naughty.

Another feature - if you wish to add your E Mail address so any interested parties can contact you just E Mail us at our E Mail address maypoleontheweb@aol.com

Another feature - if you wish to add your E Mail address so any interested parties can contact you just E Mail us at our E Mail address
maypoleontheweb@aol.com

Site last updated 24/12/2009 20:57hrs
Over 5700 visits since November 2007

and another feature - the Maypole Team can see members are talking to each other - fantastic ! That's what it's all about. . . . .

and another feature - the Maypole Team can see members are talking to each other - fantastic ! That's what it's all about. . . . .

Adverts. Something to sell / wanted ? Click here.

Adverts. Something to sell / wanted ? Click here.

'Nostalgia ain't what it used to be . . . . . .'

If you live here, once lived here or just want to know about the local history / inhabitants / the old Maypole School etc then this is for you.

The History of Maypole Team believe they have the most comprehensive records of this area held to date and stored in one place.

Looking towards Hospital Gates c1910. Denton Terrace visible but school not yet built.

Contact us at

maypoleontheweb@aol.com

Looking towards Bexley Hospital Gates 1946 in direction of Bexley.
See some very precious memories which may jog yours !

The most beautiful discovery two friends can make is that they can grow separately without growing apart.

Memories of Kim Button
Memories of Susan Kirby
Memories of Audrey Jackson
More memories of Audrey Jackson
Memories of Tony Helyar
Memories of Ann Martin
Memories of Pat Richardson
Memories of Sheila Houlton
More memories of Sheila Houlton
Memories of Perran Newman
Memories of Barbara Houlton
Wheels - Perran Newman
Memories of Frankie Gemmell
Information from Janet Lee
Memories of Bernard Lodge
Memories of Stuart Grieve
The Tea Stall on the heath - Sheila Houlton
Memories of Steven Parker
David Bainbridge
Peter Walker
Memories of Tony Helyar - Baldwyns Park Pavillion
Memories of Barbara Thomas (Now Joss)
Memories of Margaret Cadman
Memories of Michael Jennings
Memories of the late Alfred Peters
Memories of Barbara Ireland
Memories of Derek LOTT

Above - Ordnance Survey c1869

This site is constantly under review with additions being actioned / planned all the time. If you have any anecdotal memories you wish to share or you wish to contact old friends / neighbours etc from the area just contact us. Now you have found the website please tell your friends and spread the word. We look forward to hearing from you. Although we enter information which we believe is accurate - we could be wrong or misinformed. Let us know if you see any discrepencies or have additional information. The success of this site is dependent upon YOU. We hope you enjoy the visit.

More Updates - more images are being added - please check pages you have already visited and Maypole of the 1950s page, 'Random Photographs' section. More memories are coming in - visit memories section

Contact us:

If you wish to add to the site with any of your memories / requests then please E Mail us on maypoleontheweb@aol.com or enter the wetpaint domain.

Our sitemeter shows over 5700 'visits' since 5th November 2007. You are all welcome to join in and contribute - it's easy ! Take the plunge. You may be able to find old friends and acquaintances. Don't keep your memories to yourself. Contact us.

Aerial view of the Maypole Estate c1925 - note that Beaconsfield Road was yet to be completed

We reserve the right to remove any inappropriate comments which may cause upset or offence without notice. Nothing contained in this website will be tolerated which may cause any offence whatsoever to anyone alive or to the memory of anyone who is dead. Maypolehistory Team.

"Goodbye, children, wherever you are" as Uncle Mac used to once say on the 'Light Programme' all those years ago.

Useful links

Specifically growing up in the 60s . . . . . . . . . and
If you like the Beach Boys and Brian Wilson - just click here and enjoy a marvellous tribute

http://www.bexleyhospital.co.uk/memories.html

http://www.dartfordarchive.org.uk/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/kent/discover_kent/history/changing_places/dartford_west_hill.shtml

Bexley Local Studies & Archive Centre

Toffee Sunday Smash - music from the 'British Psychedilic era'

(You will need to download Quicktime if you haven't got it already - it will ask you when you click on the above hyperlink and, if you want it will download it for free and lead you all the way - it's simple and the site can be trusted)

Nostalgia of retail WOOLWORTHS through the ages Strangely enough this site no longer connects - goodbye Woollies !

Nostalgia of retail - KAYS catalogue through the ages

Coldblow / Wansunt

Bexley Archives

Baldwyns Freeholders

If you are interested in Classic Cars and wish to view / join our sister local Wetpaint site click below Ford Sidevalve Owners South East

If you are interested in Classic Cars and wish to view / join our sister local Wetpaint site click below
Ford Sidevalve Owners South East

Reasons for this site

Maypoleman — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 18:32:22 CST

I had intended writing a book - and still do. However with the advent if the internet this is a first step. Some friends and I hope to create a community on the web where neighbours and friends - past and present - can meet / reunite and share memories / stories etc. We look forward to as many people as possible visiting / contributing to the site. Please see the below which was to have prefaced my intended publication !

Firstly, I am not a trained historian. This document is not a basis of absolute proven fact. There are occasions when I have deduced, rather than proven, a state of affairs. This will be made clear by the text. I have attempted to acknowledge fact, where I can. As a result it can be said that most of the contents surround fact, but some may just be a well based assumption. This is a trap which most amateur researchers fall into !

My family moved to Beaconsfield Road in May 1955 from Dartford. I was 2 yrs old. 27 years later, in 1982, I moved out of my parents house, and away. Until recently, I had always believed that my formative years on the estate had been very happy. 45 years, or so, later on - and with a wealth of proof of how some other kids grew up - I now know how happy I was !! This must have been the same for most, if not all, of the other Maypole fledglings who are now flung world wide.

I have to thank the late, and very sweet, Miss Winnie BLACKMAN for the inspiration to go ahead with my labours. It was in 1990 that I went to her house at 17, Denton Terrace and spoke with her. She had lived there since c1912. She showed me some old sepia coloured photographs of other happy children from the estate back in the early 1900s. Luckily, I have now managed to date and validate them - naming virtually all the children and adults shown. She told me about 'Dick Turpin's Cave', the 'First’, ‘Second’ and ‘Third Valley', the 'Camp hole', the 'Daisy Meadow', the 'Green', the 'Penny Royal', the 'Moles Hole', The 'Glory Bumps' and so on. These were names that, in my opinion, were now confined to memory and about to pass without record.

Bexley Hospital, the reason for the estate's existence, was being run down to nothing and all of the old various substantial houses were either gone or about to go. Original family names had all but disappeared from the estate. The older rituals such as the 'Children's Procession', the annual 'Maypole' dance, the Sunday outing to 'watch the traffic on the Rochester Way' and the ‘Estate Bonfire’ on 'Bonfire Night' had already gone.

Before yet another new generation put it's stamp on the estate I felt that someone had to write about the previous ones. I have set out to put down a prehistory of the immediate local area before the estate was built. I am now embarking upon the more complex task of recording individual memories from those who made the estate what it was, what it is and how it developed. Over a hundred years have now passed since the plans were drawn up for the little Maypole housing estate. The world has advanced beyond the limits of even the most imaginative mind living at that time. Global events such as two World Wars, The Depression, The Moon Landing; national events such as the death of Queen Victoria, the General Strike, the abdication of Edward VIII and the 'Big Freeze' of 1947 have all gone to shape the lives of those living on the estate at the time. It is the stories of those who lived through these times that I am now researching.

I have no intention of embarrassing any individual or family and to this end I will devote my most earnest attention. I intend to compile a written record for posterity. As a document I would like to make it as enjoyable and as factual to read as I can - however, with regards the latter and relying upon the memories of others, it may not always be possible! So - in advance I make no apologies for the shortcomings or the inaccuracies that some of you may impart to me in your efforts to tell me 'how it all really once was'.

Memories of Kim Button

Maypoleman — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 15:58:38 CST

I was born in Dartford and came to live on the Maypole Estate when I was 2 and a half years old in 1955. I lived there in the same house with my parents until 1982.

See Reasons for this site as another part of Memories of the estate.

Memories of Kim Button

The first memories of my life on Maypole Estate I have start at about the age of 4 years old, in the latter half of the 1950s. I lived in Beaconsfield Road. The alley way behind the houses was our playground. Although we would be in earshot of our mothers (who, incidentally in those days seldom went to work, but stayed at home to look after us) we had our very own world away from the grown ups. We played Cowboys and Indians, pilots of rockets to the moon or we could be anything or anyone we wanted to be. It was such a safe environment. This is a far cry from the way I am having to bring up my children in today’s world.

My first friends were Keith Hawkes and Penny Smith from Baldwyns Road. We would occasionally go to the back alley of Baldwyns Road where I met Alan Booth who lived in one of the houses there. He became my next ‘best friend’. As we grew older we would be allowed to play ‘out of earshot’ of our mothers - but always within two or three minutes of our own alley. I rode my first bike down our alley and also ran hell for leather there in my first American Baseball ankle type canvass shoes pretending I was Batman.

As a treat we would occasionally be given some money to buy sweets from 'Vines' the Post Office or 'Barretts' shop. I can remember ‘Jamboree Bags’. These were bags containing a mixture of sweets and small plastic toys. On hot summer days we would buy ‘Jubbly’s’

These were triangular shaped cartons containing orange flavoured ice - if you rubbed them up and down you would end up with a very cold and refreshing orange drink. Sadly, the shape would occasionally mean losing the ice as it popped out of the carton and into the dirt. We also bought ‘Black Jacks’. These were small liquorice toffee sweets costing 4 for a 1d so they were great value. The next favourite purchase was ‘Wagon Wheels’. These were ginormous circular chocolate coated biscuits. They were 4d and we could only get these from the café and mum didn’t really like us going in there because there were Teddy Boys who smoked and played Rock and Roll on the jukebox ! One must remember that our pocket money was only 6d a week so Wagon Wheels were a real treat. We would occasionally buy ‘transfers’ which we would wet and stick on our arms. We enjoyed this because they looked like tattoos.

We played ‘*** cards’. (computer won't accept f a g cards) They were picture cards in cigarette packets and we would place one on the ground then drop one of ours on to it. If it landed on it we would pick them both up. If not the next child would drop one of theirs and if it landed on the two they would pick all of them up - and so it went on. A favourite cheap toy was a water whistle. Rather like a Sherlock Holmes pipe made out of plastic you would add water in the bowl and blow. The sound was a warbling whistle - rather like bird song. Talking of ‘*** cards’ we would find old cigarette packets, fold them up and attach them on the forks of a bike with a clothes peg. We would then place the other end into the spokes so as we rode down Baldwyns Road (The only 'made up' road in the interior of the estate) we thought we sounded like motorbikes. Not a computer or TV in sight. TV’s only really came in a bit later - and then for only a portion of the day.

We eventually ventured on to the heath. This is where my imagination was allowed to explode. What adventures we had over there. The ferns were taller than us and the trees were hundreds of feet high - well that’s how it seemed. You know when you smell the earth or damp leaves or grass it takes you way back. Most of these smells and sensations take me back to the heath. The smells of late autumn, the mist shrouded, dampness in the valley of the Dell. The sensation of running through piled up leaves down the Paddock near the A2. The sound of broom seed sacks popping open in the heat of summer. The magical feeling upon hearing your first real cuckoo in a copse a mile off. The aching thirst after running around in the sun for a whole morning. Hearing the first crack of thunder in the outside world away from the protection of your parents. The glorious feeling of snow up to your waste. The sight of the first daffodils in Spring growing wild in the valley of Heathwood and the pride of producing some picked ones to your mum. The feeling of being in a ‘Hansel and Grettle’ forest in the silver birches near the Sandpits towards Leyton Cross. I can remember the first time I saw mist, in layers, over where the swings used to be and where the camp hole is. It was magical. Like horizontal curtains of chiffon where your head would be above and your feet below and you could only just see them. All of my earliest perceptions started here and on the Maypole Estate. I have carried these through my entire life. This is why I am so very, very fond of the dear old Maypole Estate.

My brother and I (the little one) in the back garden in Beaconsfield Road - c 1963. Snow snow and more snow - loved it !

As we became older and more adventurous, so we started taking risks. Not so much risks of health and safety as in today’s society - more a risk of being caught ! The lure and sense of mystery over that fence or behind those locked gates kick started the magnetism of 'civil trespass' in me when I was about 8. It happens to all of us at some stage. My first incursion was into the Broomhills Field, with some mates to stroke the cows. So innocent and so trivial. It was my first positive and pre-emptied wrongdoing. I can remember the cowman shouting at us as we ran away - and my heart pounding as I went back to him. I thought I was going to be sent to Borstal (Homes for delinquent kids) and my family would be shamed for evermore. I was only slightly scolded and, in fact, praised for returning whilst my mates buggered off - leaving me to it. No Borstal.

Maypoleman with cat - Tim - rear garden in Beaconsfield Road c1960

Afterwards I always made preparations for escape - coupled with an excuse if I ever got caught. You see, in those days, Maypole Estate was surrounded by fenced and gated places. Boys have a fascination with climbing, digging, holes, caves, water, trees, birds nests, catapults, bows and arrows and so on. It is in our genes and I knew there would be times when it would be impossible to resist. The next incursion was into the rear of Broomhills by the old Institute Hut. There was an air raid shelter we had heard about from the bigger boys and this challenge incorporated most of the aforementioned activities. Instead of climbing the fence behind Baldwyns Road we decided a safer approach was from the stream by the allotments, that ran form the dip to the A2. We could then go through the bushes along the boundary with Maypole House, past the Cowshed (Nissen Hut) behind Broomhills and along.

Above - picture of a basic Nissen Hut

The journey was fraught with difficulties - the first and foremost for me was cowardice. The fear of being caught still pervaded. I had promised the cowman I would never do it again. Then, I thought, it is not actually his field I am going back to. Simple in a child’s mind and this, I am sure, is the experience of many of us. You see, I had excused myself already. I had stifled and delayed that all important alarm bell in our heads. We did not venture on to Maypole House property as we knew Mr Stockford would catch us and take us to Mr Winter who had a gun and we would be shot. Much safer being told off by the Nurses from Broomhills. The cow parsley was high and shielded us most of the way. The nettles stung us the rest. We eventually came to this magnificent manmade cave. It was like a holy shrine to our achievement. None of us actually went in the first time as we didn’t have a torch and there must be dead bodies in there from the war. Such is the imagination of kids. The smell of nettles, cow parsley and the sound of buzzing insects always takes me back to this one escapade.

Below - contemporary sketch by Maypoleman 1967 of the air raid shelter entrance. The figures are not using it as a urinal but Kim anda friend entering ! It was known by us lads as the 'Skull' as the two doors were dark and like a pair of eyes.

Below:- David Richardson (West Lodge Bexley Hospital, Alan MacLean (East Lodge Bexley Hospital) and Kim Button. Photo taken in 1967 in rear garden of Beaconsfield Road. We thought we looked so 'macho' !

Not to be 'outdone' by Perran Newman . . . . .

Me on the Excelsior Talisman Summer 1968

To be continued . . . . .

Original Recollections

My earliest recollections of the estate (c1957-1965) are

Playing in the back alley of Beaconsfield Road with my first friends Keith Hawkes and Penny Smith. The back alley was our little world when we were small.

Childrens games. Amongst the games we played were ‘Peep behind the curtain’ and ‘Cowboys and Indians’. I first learned to ride my bike when I was about 5 down the same alley. I thought dad was still holding me up as we trundled along. I turned round, he wasn’t - and I promptly fell off !

My first day at the Maypole School. It was miserable - cried most of the first morning.

The smell of coal burning from the fires in peoples houses in winter. Carrying a bow saw to collect wood over Dartford Heath with my dad. The smell of the damp leaves down the Dell and the fogs which always seemed to persist in those winters.

Seeing Tom Gosling who lived in Baldwyns Road. He walked up and down the alley several times a day, every day, for what seemed years . He spoke with an impediment and wore very thick glasses. Would always say to us boys, ‘You allright boys ?’. He was a happy soul most of the time - always cheerily going about his errands.

Piano lessons. Hated them. Went to a very large and ‘posh’ house in the Dell for this particularly brutal form of punishment.

Playing with mud made in the old galvanised tin bath in my rear garden with Keith Hawkes. I remember it hung at the back of the house near the coal bunker - we all had those !

Sundays. Hated them as well. Boring. Having to attend Sunday School at the Baptist Church along Dartford Road. Having to hang around all day whilst mum got the dinner ready. If I wasn’t in ear shot when it was ready there would be hell to pay.

Teddy Boys. Was frightened of them.

Playing in the long ferns over the heath and making camps in them.

A horse being owned by Mr Pope - or was it Piper ? Big thing which pulled a cart. Don't know where he kept it. Rag and bone men on horse and cart shouting in a loud voice, 'Lumber, Lumber'.

The Salvation Army coming round playing carols at Christmas.

The Esso Blue Man. (Or was he the Esso Blee Dooler ?)

Don the veg man who came round in a van

The man from the Pru - collecting weekly insurance subscriptions - in cash !

The annual Sports Day in the summer in Broomhills / St Barnabas

Collecting wood / garden waste from residents for the annual bonfire on trolleys - and getting up to half a crown for doing it. This went towards our fireworks. Can remember knocking on doors asking if they wanted any rubbish taken over. Can remember the delight of counting out the coppers at the end of a fruitful Saturday.

Neighbours collecting money for wreaths for any neighbour who had died.

Watching traffic on the old A2 as a passtime on Dartford Heath

Standing / sitting on the pavement outside the cafe waiting for cars so we could collect 'car numbers'.

My recollections of Maypole school (1958-1964)

The smell of pencils, crayons, wax and that ghastly floor varnish after the summer holidays.

George Stockford - the caretaker. Grumpy but kind. Always wore a trilby hat. I remember being chased out of Maypole House grounds by him a couple of times. He worked there as well. He seemed to be everywhere to catch us out!

The Institute Hut in Baldwyns Road which acted as an ennexe to the school. Miss Hunt who taught there. The smell of the gas fires which hung on the side walls. The creeky steps to the kitchen at the back.

Fractions and how Miss Alley was there when they finally clicked.

Teachers - Miss Janet Lee, Miss Tozer, Miss Alley, Mr Deer, Mr Hembury, Miss Tilyard ?, Mrs Cridge, the Headmistress Mrs Chambers.

Playing ‘British Bulldog 1-2-3’ and ‘It’ in the playground.

Racing matchbox cars down the straight behind Barratts shop.

My classmates, David Richardson, Philip Read, Penny Smith, Michael McKeogh, Jeremy Stevenson, Brian Hunt, Ann Martin, Stephen Cooper, Jacqueline Grossman and Terry Warner just to name a few.

The bad winter of 1963 - school closed for several weeks.

The clay bins in the cloakrooms and the glorious feel of fresh clay between the fingers.

Milk - being placed on radiators in winter to defreeze them. Aaaagh.

Nature Walks on Dartford Heath.

Country dancing to an old gramaphone - double Aaaagh.

Listening to teachers reading to us - bliss.

Later recollections from childhood / adolescence c1965-1970

Heath fires, fire engines and that peculiar damp, earthy, smokey smell as it was being extinguished.

Heathwood Lodge and Mr Whitehead who always wore a beret and always had a bike with him. Going down the deep well at the side of the old house when he had moved out in the summer of 1967.

The long creeper vines in the Dell. We tried smoking them - makes me shudder now.

The incredibly high rope swings attached to one or two trees down the Dell. Fantastic. The older boys - Ronny Potter and co. put them up there. I always thought they were so brave. Remnants of the ropes still exist high in the boughs, after nearly 50 yrs !

Broomhills and it’s frog ponds to the side, the field with the cows to the front, the Cow Shed and air raid shelter to the rear. Daring each other to see how far up the private drive we could go without being caught by the nurses. Collecting conkers after school which we dislodged by throwing sticks - this became an art after a while.

The first sodium street lights along Old Bexley Lane on the way to Coldblow Crescent c1961.

My Mums Coop Divi number (20592 ?) which I had to give to Mr Chipperfield at the Butchers in the Dip.

Building a dam in the stream at the bottom of Broomhills field, opposite the shops at the 'Dip' and being told off my the ladies hairdresser, Mr Sweet ?c1963

The annual Bonfire over the heath and the ceremonial lighting of it by ‘Buster’ from Denton Terrace.

The tragic news of Steven Parker from Beaconsfield Road being killed on his motorbike (c1965?) . This hit hard at us younger kids who thought the older ones were invincible.

The café and the ‘pinball’ machines. The jukebox and records of the time being played to death.

Catching lizards, grasshoppers and slow worms over the heath.

The sound of the single bell tolling on a Sunday at St Barnabas Church.

The sound of the hooter from Bexley Hospital which wailed once a week - a fire alarm but we kids thought it was a warning that a patient had escaped.

The 401 bus running every half hour and costing children 3d to go to Dartford. The red buses from London on Sunday which used to bring visitors to the Hospital. They would park 3 at a time on the heath waiting to return.

Heathkeepers in their uniforms and the glory bumps and sandpits over the heath where we used to ride our bikes. The old buildings at Leyton Cross on Dartford Heath where the gun implacements used to be.

Other mates from those times - Alan Booth, Tony Smith, Michael Morand, Karen Smith, Ronnie Gosling, Alan MacLean, Peter Walker, Peter Garman, Chris Giles, Robert Hogan, Johnny Barrett, Edward Ginn, Deborah Battleman, Steve Judd, Chris Richardson, Paul Richardson, Philip Hayward and many more.

Dartford Heath

Maypoleman — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 13:04:14 CST

UNDER CONSTRUCTION . . . . . .

There wasn't originally going to be a page on the heath - but it featured so much in the history of the Maypole Estate that we shall begin one . . . .

Below - a view of the heath looking towards the Bexley Asylum c 1910. Note the trees on the right. This is the site of where houses were built along an unmade road called 'The Dell'. The child sitting in the centre of the image is probably just to the left of where Denton Road ran and is now in the middle of the new A2 - well, built in 1970 ! - and probably in the centre of the footbridge now over the A2

"Bexley Asylum" from Dartford Heath Postcard - picture Tony Kinson courtesy of the Bexley Hospital website

Memories of Stuart Grieve

Maypoleman — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 15:24:53 CST

I attended Maypole CPS between 1945 & 1951. Like many children I recall the first day as being rather traumatic. Then, as others have recalled, Miss Gaspar was the head with her deputy Miss Burr. There was a Miss Bean, a late middle aged person who always wore what we took to be a tea cosy on her head. There was also a Miss Torrie whose marriage to another teacher, Mr Davis, I attended as a choir boy at Christ Church Dartford. There was also Mr Rees, a small amiable Welshman, who often seemed hard -pressed.What surprises me in retrospect is that, apart from occasional nature study, we were rarely taken on to the heath for sport.

Something which sticks out in my mind is the PE in the playground which was supervised by female students from Madame Osterberg's Physical Education College in Oakfield Lane,Dartford. Madame Osterberg was in the forefront of educational innovation in the late 19th century & had initially come to England at the invitation of the London School Board. The college she set up was where netball was first introduced into the country. The girls who taught us were turned out in airtex shirts & maroon, heavy duty skirts & put us through a routine with bean bags & hoops. We once attended a party at the college which architecturally must have been a model of its kind & had spacious well-kept grounds.

There was one particularly painful memory, which was the visits to the school dentist, I believe at West Hill Hospital.Three successive Fridays I had to undergo drilling without anaesthetic from this large bald man with steel spectacles & I was deterred from visiting the dentist for some years afterwards.

As I lived at the top of Station Road, Crayford approaching the school across the heath I could always clearly see the chimney of Bexley Hospital & the sad fact is that the topicality of Nazi atrocities caused we children to discuss whether they were burning patients' corpses if we saw the chimney smoking. As pupils we did once make a social visit to the hospital,when a Christmas party was held for us.All I recall was that the blue -iced cakes were the best I've tasted.

Every Christmas there was the Nativity play & as a choir boy I often had a singing role & for that & 'general progress' I once received a school prize, a book entitled 'African Adventure'. Miss Gaspar did on another occasion give me an award in the cloakroom with a cane. Generally corporal punishment consisted of a smack on the back of the leg, which was painful.

I've been back to the area a few times since leaving nearly forty years ago. The motorway has wrecked Dartford Heath & presumably no children travel to the new school from Crayford & indeed the links which used to exist between Crayford , the Maypole & Bexley must have ceased , not least the gang fights which ranged across the heath.

Further addition added by Stuart 26/10/2008

I just noticed a reference to the gun club in the intro to the web site & it reminded me that I & a friend trespassed there in the mid fifties occasionally. On one occasion we took possession of an elevated position for firing the clay pigeons & were quite happily firing them off when I lent forward at the wrong time & the return action of the sling mechanism caught me full in the face & knocked me flat. At this point an inquisitive & slightly aggressive alsation dog appeared & forced us to roll down the hill thro' tall ferns. I reached the bottom by a stony track on hands & knees & peered out to see my friend being seized by a large man.I'm ashamed to say that my first reaction was to lie doggo but my intentions were foiled by the dog confronting me face to face & thus we were both marched to the exit with severe warnings. I returned home with face streaming with blood & a broken nose & had to pretend to my parents that I'd fallen off my bike.

Further added 5/12/09 - re the Army Camp at Leyton Cross, Dartford Heath

After the war the army camp was used to house POWs, both Germans & Italians, who were distinguished by insignias on their sleeves. I seem to recall one such was a red diamond shape. Living at the top of Station Rd. Crayford I used to see them passing the house as they were eventually allowed out. I particularly remember playing cowboys & indians one day when a German POW pointed at my silver revolver & asked what it was. As though he didn't know! At a later stage still,I suppose, British troops who were still stationed at the camp on a couple of occasions gave me & friends a lift home in bren gun carriers in which they were roaming about tearing up the tarmac on Denton Road.

Sir Hiram MAXIM

Maypoleman — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 17:21:32 CST

SIR HIRAM MAXIM

Below - plaque at Maypole School

When Charles MINET died in 1874 Baldwyns Manor House and Estate had to be sold. The Manor eventually came into the hands of the London County Council. Between the years 1876 and 1898 it was leased to various tenants. One of these tenants was Sir Hiram MAXIM. He rented the Manor from about 1889 until probably c.1896. ( It is not clear as to the exact dates because the waters are muddied by the discovery that John GOTCH HEPBURN was shown in residence in the Census of 1881 and a local newspaper cutting shows liquidation of his firm and auction of his contents in the Manor in 1893 ) With regards HEPBURN a centenary document for Madam OSTERBERGS College shows him as purchasing a house called 'Oakfield' in Oakfield Lane in 1895. It may well be that he sub let Baldwyns to MAXIM ? It was at Baldwyns manor that MAXIM continued his experiments with flying machines. It was in 1891 that he began his work, in earnest, on the first flying machine. He built a large hangar near the manor house ( South west by several yards ) where the flying machine was developed and stored. The Planning Application to the London County Council of 1894 shows the site of the hangar and the path of the rail tracks that it was to run on. They ran from just south of the house, out of the hangar, South Eastwards, towards the direction of Birchwood Road just north of its' junction with Tile Kiln Lane. The rails measured 1800 feet in length and were eventually widened to an amazing 35 feet. When MAXIM wheeled the centre section out of the hangar, he attached the wings. He called these wings 'Aeroplanes'. The total wingspan of the craft was 104 feet. The Wellington Bomber used in the second World War had a wingspan of only 86 feet 2 inches.

The first propelled flight of man in a machine heavier than

air was witnessed at Baldwyns in 1894 - but it was not 'free

flight'.

Maxim's Flying Machine c1894

The machine was so unwieldy that it had to be tethered to rails. Height of take off, therefore, was restricted. The Aeronautical Society witnessed and acknowledged this achievement but as it was not 'free flight' it made few headlines. On the night of the Census of 1891 records show that there were two other engineers staying at the Manor House at the same time as Hiram. They were father and son Henry HOUSE (Senior and junior) Father was aged 50yrs and the son was aged 27yrs. Both had their wives with them. Mary was aged 49yrs - the mother of Henry Junior. Vera was aged 21yrs and married to Henry Junior. The family came from Connecticut, America. Hiram, was also American by birth and spent his early years in Massachusetts - the State bordering Connecticut. It is more than likely, not just coincidence, that these visitors were engineers - and thus they may have been able to assist him in the project of flight that was so important to him.

The rails outside Baldwyns Manor on which the Aeroplane ran

Regarding MAXIM, the following was found in the Bexley Records Office written by Susan ILLOT:

" He was born in the USA in 1840 to a French Huguenot family. As a result of growing up in a frontier settlement he developed into a very different character to the typical nineteenth century philanthropic engineer. He was a non drinking, non smoking agnostic with a tremendous capacity for hard work. He despised slackness and insobriety; but who was also a picaresque individual, an accomplished card player with a fondness for boxing and wrestling.

The aeroplane approaching the hangar just outside Baldwyns Manor

He came to Europe for the Paris Exhibition in 1881 to represent the United States' first electric lighting company who were exhibiting his electric regulator. He then came on to Britain to investigate our electrical industry and it was while staying in London that he made drawings for an automatic machine gun. The innovation of Maxims' gun was that it was the recoil of the weapon which supplied the energy to insert a fresh cartridge in the barrel and to detonate this cartridge in turn. The first Maxim gun fired 666 times a minute and this model was later followed by a larger gun firing 400 times a minute, nicknamed the pom pom by African Natives.

Hiram Maxim with his machine gun

Maxim approached VICKERS, a steel company to manufacture his gun and so in 1884 The Maxim Gun Co. Ltd was formed with Albert VICKERS as chairman and production was started in their works in Crayford. Maxim then came to live in Stoneyhurst, Crayford and he gave lectures in the neighbourhood, substituting corks for bullets in his demonstrations.

Video of Hiram Maxim and his gun

These talks must have provided a lively alternative to the more usual lantern slide evenings or smoking concerts.

Sir Hiram was also well known for his aeronautical experiments for although he designed a helicopter as early as 1872 he did not construct his first aeroplane until 1892 when trials were held in Baldwyns Park.

This aircraft was105 feet wide with 17 foot long propellers, fitted with 2 X 362 hp. steam engines and weighed about 2 tons. The machine ran along railway tracks and Maxim proved that it could lift a weight of 2.5 lbs per square foot when moving through the air at 40 m.p.h. It crashed safely to the ground, eagerly watched by hundreds of spectators. Sir Hiram never developed the idea any further having proved his point he continued devising all manner of ingenious items which included an explosive similar to gelignite, various gas machines, engine governors and even a medical inhaler to relieve the chest condition from which he suffered in old age." Hiram MAXIM was knighted in 1901. He was also interested in and did work on aerial navigation. He died at Sydenham in 1916. He was, in every sense, an 'Avid Inventor'.

Picture of unknown origin and may be subject to copyright

Sir Hiram Maxim's flying machine on display 1894

Useful links

http://www.ctie.monash.edu/hargrave/maxim.html
http://www.bondle.co.uk/personal_pages/jon/maxim/

Flight at Baldwyns
A close encounter with Hiram Maxim

Random Photographs - persons

Maypoleman — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:30:41 CST

The below (donated by William Beck) was taken around 1953/54.

From left to right: don't know, Nancy Beck, Denise Flett, Edwin Flett.

Nancy dressed in mother's silk dressing gown with chrysanthemums in her hair, Denise wearing a pillow-case labeled 'Lavender bag'

and Edwin, with the best available sign of: Good old Maypole ~ nothing changes, we are still celebrating, Good old Maypole.

Hi Kim,

Have been looking through the updates and seen the picture sent in by Will Beck, the unknown girl is my neice Carole Smith.

Four little girls in carnival dress. I really enjoyed the reunion on the heath and look forward to the next one.

The history of the Maypole is so interesting and very special to all of the "old timers" Thank you.

Best wishes, Pat Page nee Davies

Below photo (courtesy of 'William') showing the Institute Hut, Baldwyns Road - 1922.

Below - William and Nancy Beck in Girls Life Boat and Boys Life Boat uniforms at the Baptist Church

Above - we are informed that, sadly, Gordon Lennox and George Stockford (Jnr) are now deceased.

The late Jack Roome c 1922 in Scout outfit
Image courtesy of the late Kitty Roome

Above the late Kitty Roome (sister of Jack) in Dartford Girls Grammar school uniform c 1920s - first day at school - doesn't she look proud ! Taken in rear garden of Denton Terrace - near location and same aspect as Frank Blackman photo and looking towards Rolex / what was Maypole House property ( the Daisy Meadow)

Below is her father - image courtesy Bexley Archives

Title John H E Roome, R.F.R Date c.1900 Description John Hector Edward Roome, father of Miss Kitty Roome, local Bexley historian. Her father first joined the Royal Navy in 1896; he was born at Sidcup in August 1880 and died in Bexley in December 1945.

The late Frank Blackman (Son of Edwin and brother of Winnie) c 1930 in his rear garden in Denton Terrace wearing a Seascout uniform ? - rear towards where the Rolex watch factory now stands.

Courtesy of the late Winnie Blackman

The late Gordon Lennox wearing the Cameron 'Tartan' Scout uniform c early 1940s ? This special scarf was authorised by the Scouting Movement at the request of Mr Cameron of Broomhills.
Courtesy of the late Gordon Lennox

The late George Stockford (Snr) Caretaker c1960-1965 Maypole School

The late Charlie Lawrence - a black boy - (born 28/4/1919) taken in rear garden of George Stockford's house in Baldwyns Road c1937. He was a pupil at Maypole School. Has been described by the late George Stockford (Jnr) as a great friend and convivial boy. He lived at 14 Ivy Villas (Next to the Post Office) with his widowed mother. Her husband was killed in WWI when HMS Hogue was sunk by the Germans (20/09/1914).

Archives from the HMS Hogue Roll of Honour - LAWRENCE, Leading Stoker, WILLIAM, 297574. (RFR/CH/B/9794). Royal Navy. . Age 31. Son of John Lawrence; husband of Elizabeth Lawrence, of 14, Ivy Villas, Maypole Estate, Bexley, Kent.

During WWII it was believed that Charlie joined the RAF. Records now show he was a soldier in the Queens Own Royal West Kent Regiment. He later became a German POW. George Stockford (Jnr) proudly remembered collecting food for red cross parcels for him. After all, his dear mate was safe. Not for long.
In November 1941 Charlie died. There were two stories floating around as to his death 1) he was shot - we are told whilst trying to escape - that was the usual reason, wasn't it - mmmmmm ? and 2) died of pneumonia after being worked down salt mines. Either way, we suppose this was nothing to do with his colour ?
He is buried in Poland. Two generations lost to enemy fire.

Below - grave of Charlie Lawrence in Poland

Above . . . . .
All dressed up and nowhere to go . . . . .

Happier times - Alice Blackman (Sister of Winne and Frank and daughter of Edwin) and friend outside front of 12 Denton Terrace c 1920s

Courtesy of the late Winnie Blackman

. . . . and duplicated from the transport page below is Callices greengrocers lorry

Above

From Sheila Lusher nee Houlton - she suspects the above culprits to be

"We concluded that the chap on the bike is David Cruikshank. (He appears in photo fourth down from top of this page some 40 years on !) Left to right, we think they are: Ernie Gosling, Mosie Challice, Rose Challice (wife), Jackie Challice and David C. I am happy to be corrected by another reader, as this input is from my brother, although he seems very certain. Not many of 'em left, I don't suppose?

Had a lovely afternoon, reminiscing with Den".

Regards,

Sheila (16th. December 2007)

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Above - and for the special memories of Sheila Lusher - Mr Pope and his horse, Heath End Road. We thought it was beaconsfield Road but Steve Parker put us right ! The other photo is of Mr Smith - Penny Smiths dad in Fancy Dress in Baldwyns Road, for one of the procession 1950s. Standing next to him is Mrs Potter - already featured in another photograph of the same procession.

Photo courtesy of Penny Smith

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Below (Courtesy of Steve Parker - Bill & Lou Proudfoot having just received trophies for indoor sports, Bexley Hosp. Sports & Social Club, mid 1970s

Below left to right - David Richardson (West Lodge, Bexley Hospital) Alan MacLean (East Lodge, Bexley Hospital) and Kim Button - see photo of him fourth down from top of page taken some 30 years on. Photo taken in rear garden of 2 Beaconsfield Road 1967. Army surplus was all the rage then. Fashion was nowhere to be seen !

Top of page . . . .

Looking for ?

Maypoleman — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:09:26 CST

E mail us at maypoleontheweb@aol.com or add in the Comments Box who you are, your contact details and who you are looking to get in touch with.

For your safety and pleasure we prefer not to add your home address or landline telephone number - E Mail or Mobile is preferable.

Details will then be added to this page.

Name / contact details of enquirer	Searching for . . . . .
Kim Button (details with website team)	Christopher GILES who once lived in Coldblow Crescent c1964.
Kim Button (details with website team)	Phillip HAYWARD who once lived in Coldblow Crescent c1968
Sheila Houlton sheila-a.lusher@sky.com	Elizabeth (Chapman) ? A girl from Singapore. c1947 attended Maypole School
Sheila Houlton sheila-a.lusher@sky.com	I just wonder what happened to Michael Bean? He lived in the first bungalow past the off-licence down the 'Dip' at Baldwyns Park. We used to play after school, sometimes, in Michael's back garden where there was a Dene Hole with a wooden structure guarding it (in case we got to venturesome). I think Michael's father must have been in the Diplomatic service as he was never around. I moved from the Maypole in October 1952 and although I never saw most of my classmates again, I did meet some at the final reunion in 2002. Michael wasn't there and no-one said anything about him. Just wonder where he might be
Steve Parker svparau@xtra.co.nz	Does anybody know what happened to Brian Seymour he used to live in one of the houses on the right hand side down the dip just past the entrance to the allotments. I am of course going back to the 1940s & early 1950s. Steve Parker
My name is Paul Underwood and I went to the Maypole School from about 1945 to 1952. Address and contact details can be supplied. undart@mac.com	I wondered what happened to Judith Batchelor?
From Jacqui nee Bedford Please E Mail the Maypole History Team for contact details We have reunited these two !! (12/11/09) The Maypole Team	Hi KIm, Thank you getting back to me I understand your caution. I was at school with Iris in Bexleyheath,and spent many weekends at her home in Beaconsfield Road, she was my bridesmaid in June 1964, my husband was in the army so I moved about a lot and we lost touch. The last I heard from Iris was that her and Sue had a double wedding. I have found a few old friends from the 50/60's and would love to find out how life has treated Iris. In those day I was known as Jacqui Beckford I would be grateful for any information that would help me trace her thankyou Jacqui
Keith Walmsley (1955-1961) would be pleased to hear from any of his contemporaries. keith.driby@hotmail.com

Memories of the late Mr Alfred Peters

Maypoleman — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:51:05 CST

Alfred Peters

If you have the time please read Alfreds story - it is both amusing and touching

Mr Alfred Peters was interviewed in 1998. He agreed to write down his memoirs and, at last, it can now be published on the website. He was a kind and generous man who was very enthusiastic about telling his story from his years on the estate - for the benefit of other younger residents. We are grateful for his contribution. Sadly, Alfred has died, but we hope his abbreviated story will bring smiles to those who never knew him or were not around in his day, whilst at the same time, enhancing his memory to those who did / were. Maypoleman's 11 year old daughter spent many hours transcribing this for the site and she now knows nearly as much as her father does about the estate ! However, she earned some extra pocket money for her efforts !

My name is Alfred John Peters. Born 3-12-1914 so I am in my eighty fourth year.

My birthplace – Southall Middx, my father was a regular army man fighting the Great War, to be demobbed in 1919-20. He joined the L.F.B. Stationed in Kensington and in 1926 took up an appointment as fire officer at Bexley LCC Mental Hospital where the family occuppied West Lodge.

West Lodge is the lodge to the right in the below picture.

The family consisting of Father Charles, Mother Ethel, Brother Ronald, aged 3, and sister Joan, aged 18 months, and me. The hospital was an important teaching hospital until its demise so shamefully, hundreds of doctors and nurses and thousands of patients. Almost self supporting with its hundreds of pigs, herd of cattle, a resident farm bailiff and cowman, many acres of fruit and vegetables grown, and poultry, by the hundred with outside supervision. The patients supplied the labour, and were very jealous of their occupation. I was eleven years as a boy, with my friend Len Sandford the head cowmans son, we used the farm, cricket pitch and all aspects of the hospital as a wonderful and private play area. In those days 1926 into the 30’s the hospital produced many operas and plays by their own Amateur Drama Soc run jointly by the doctors and nurses. The annual ball in the lovely hall was an event of the year and tickets were in great demand.

Patients of course had their weekly film shows and dances also their sports days. It would take a very large book to tell all of Bexley hospital in its Hey Day.

In spring of 1926 I was enrolled at the Maypole Council School and so started a period that I can look back on and say “It was smashing”.

A quick educational check placed me in standard six under Mr Wellington. There was five classes, starting with the infants, then two junior classes, taken by lady teachers, Miss Pinkney was one, I forget the other names.
Standard six was taken by Mister Wellington and Standard 7 and 7x by the headmaster Mr Snell, five really 1st class teachers. School hours were nine until 12.0 o’clock 2.0 PM until 4.0 PM with a break of 15 minutes playtime morning and afternoon.

The school day started at nine o’clock sharp when a teacher blew a whistle and everyone in the playground stood still, on the second blast we smartly moved into the hall (made by sliding a divider across two classrooms).
Mr Snell officiated, he was a deep breathing fanatic and with windows open we would on the count breathe in till about to burst, hold it and expel rapidly. Then with a pupil (Vera Saunders) on the piano he would sing the scales in two or three keys, we were now ready for the hymn and prayers by Mr Snell. Afterwards he would make any announcements affecting us. We were then marched quietly to our classrooms.
My class standard 6 under Mr Wellington comprised about 45 pupils, he was a very strict disciplinarian dealing out a vicious six of the best and impositions, “I must talk only when necessary”, to be written 100 or 200 times in your own time and to present it to him next day. I had more than my share and deserved it. He was a fine teacher of many subjects. The Bible, maths and English, drawing, drama, literature, singing, he was a good pianist, he also took gardening, geography etc.

On Monday afternoons with all the gardening tools held at the correct and safe angles we would march to the school allotments. All the boys from standard 6, 7 and 7x took part and the girls did needle work and cookery. The lots were divided into small individual lots under a pupil who would grow and experiment fruit and veg and to compare results and treatment plot by plot. A very useful and enjoyable lesson, to finish with a thorough cleaning of equipment. How those spades and forks shone!

Talking in class was forbidden and punished, Mr Snell would visit the class and say “Good morning class” the class would stand without of any noise of desks and seats say “Good morning Sir” and very quietly sit with straight backs and folded arms. At a certain age you moved to standard 7 with Mr Snell who took woodwork on Monday mornings and maths moved up to algebra etc. Mr Snell took great interest in all school activities which in those days included Empire Day (May 24th I believe), chairs would be borrowed from the hospital placed all around the play ground, the maypole was erected and ‘tilt the bucket’ frame put up. Children were dressed in National costume so there were Welsh, Scots, Irish, English (John Bull), Canadian, Zulu’s, African’s, Australians etc. We would march, sing the National songs, various tableau would be performed, the Maypole danced , Jack O the Green and a clown (me) performed, hymns suitable and the National anthems sung to end the proceedings.

Armistice day was observed by the whole school with all the sad hymns to be sung, Christmas time was so special, a play was put on or a series of sketches, chairs again borrowed and the hall filled with parents, evenings and afternoon performance.

Mr Snell was a good artist and would paint all the very large backcloths. The last I remember was a Dutch canal or sailing barge, windmills in the background, for a cantata “Jan of windmill land”.

It was a very friendly school. I never saw any bullying, play times were filled with the current seasonal games; Tops, Cigarette cards, marbles, conkers, five stones – all in their special time of year.

Football and cricket played with a tennis ball took up a lot of time and many players could join in “Seven + seven x against the rest” was the war cry. Girls of course did all the things that girls do, skipping etc and mostly seemed to be in little groups one of the most unusual customs was the use of nicknames all of which had a reason for their existence:

Bogey ELLIMAN ****** BLACKMAN Massa PETERS (me) Manny ELLIMAN Gump HENN Diddy HENN Taffy WELLSPRINGS Bessy WOOD Fatty MEACHAM Bunter MEACHAM Tiptoe FORD Glarni HOGAN Skinner BEDWELL Dinah DYSON Tongy THOMPSON (captain) Smut SMITH Eno SMITH Spadger BARRETT Sanny SANDFORD Many more which I have forgotten. Christian names were never used. In fact my best friends mother asked my mother how her “MASSA” was thinking it was my name as I had been poorly at that time.

AFTER THOUGHTS

Mr Wellington was Dooky (DUKE) Mr Snell .P.C. or Peecy He promised to track down wrongdoers like a policeman hence P.C.

I must not forget Charlie Lawrence. A Negro boy who lived with his white mother next to Vines. His father was killed in the Great War at Sea. (HMS Hogue) Charlie was the happiest lad I ever knew, a great friend of my brother and often in our house. He was conscripted in 1939.

Below - photograph of Charlie LAWRENCE taken in rear garden of Baldwyns Road (Backing on to Beaconsfield)

He died in a salt mine in Germany after capture I believe at Dunkirk.

He made the mistake of being black. We heard he died of pneumonia.

Footnote from Maypoleman . . . . . . . .
During WWII it was believed that Charlie joined the RAF. Records now show he was a soldier in the Queens Own Royal West Kent Regiment. He later became a German POW. George Stockford (Jnr) proudly remembered collecting food for red cross parcels for him. After all, his dear mate was safe. Not for long.
In November 1941 Charlie died. There were two stories floating around as to his death 1) he was shot - we are told whilst trying to escape - that was the usual reason, wasn't it - mmmmmm ? and 2) died of pneumonia after being worked down salt mines. Either way, we suppose this was nothing to do with his colour ?
He is buried in Poland. Two generations lost to enemy fire.

Below - grave of Charlie Lawrence in Poland

Other Names Remembered

F. James R. TuckerK. Lucas F T. Gordon D. Lucas F M. Gordon F E. Lucas F E. Smith F T. Gosling (Imbecile) E. Smith R. Gosling (cripple) R. Munday E. Gosling Q. Cole F A. Murray R. Wallis F F. Johnson R. Wallis M. Seal W. Meacham A. Elliman L. Bedwell S. Elliman L. Sandford M. Brooks F E. Thompson Captain D. King F M. Young F J. King F Ted Smith R. Cosselton F
Most of these names plus those on the previous page were from one class. Class have 45 pupils

Outside School Activities

Winter with a good snowfall meant sledging. If you walk by road towards Crayford, on your left is the valley, the Dell, where we sledged. Seventy five years ago the valley was just grass, heather and some bracken. You could sledge down the end slope along the bottom to the style that is on the footpath to Bexley. Perhaps 1/3 of a mile, and people came from all over to enjoy this till quite late in the evening, some times.

The valley is now thick woodland with just a trodden path that runs through to the stile. In the summer sledging on the dry grass gave lots of fun. We were never bored, school holidays meant scrumping, stealing fruit from gardens and orchards to bake on a fire whilst we smoked “monkey chaff” a dried herb found in the Heath, rolled in newspaper, it was awful. Bows and arrows were popular also tracking games where one or two people would run off into the blue, the remainder on a given time to try to catch them. Various trees, mostly Hawthorn had names, the “Home Tree”, where games started and finished, was a very large tree the branches and foliage touched the ground to make it a big green tent. The “Action Tree” another Hawthorn whose spreading branches allowed us to jump and swing about in all sorts of action. “Slippery Jack” also a very hard tree to climb, it had a long slippery trunk with no grips. A scout group 4th Dartford was founded, a hall supplied (by the church) by Mr Cameron, a great benefactor of the Maypole Estate, he also gave us all the instruments for a drum and fife band and thus supplied a good many lads with useful pursuits.

I seem to remember girl guides being started too. Christmas time meant carol singing.

I had a very special friend John Palmer (we remained close friends all our lives) and he and I would go carolling and at the end would adjourn to the Maypole Café for hot pineapple drinks and share our takings, several shillings a lot of money in those days, it bought our Christmas presents etc.

Mr Bert Vine owned the Paper, Sweet and Tobacco shop and employed three paper boys, this job was much wanted and always had a taker ready as one boy left, my turn came, I suppose I was about 12 years old. I had to be at the shop by seven am. to mark up and sort my papers, magazines etc. When the bag was loaded it was extremely heavy and chaffed your bare knees (boys wore shorts until school leaving at fourteen). Then you had “Longuns”.

AFTER THOUGHTS

John Palmer lived in Summerhouse Drive, his house was called “In a Wood” and was the only house on the left hand side of Summerhouse Drive. I remember three large houses (one – Eltham Lodge) on the right, all the rest was virgin woodland in 1926.

My Round – Baldwyns Park, Summerhouse Drive, Tile Kiln Lane and Cold Blow. To return to shop and then do Baldwyns Rd. Seven days a week. Nobody had bicycles. Dinner Time (two hours off school 1-2pm) report to shop to do errands (1 hour)

Evening Walk to Bexley Station to collect evening papers, mark them and deliver them around Maypole Estate.

Saturday After morning round to collect paper money from that round, and if on checking the cash Bert Vine found you short it would be stopped from your wages. In the afternoon you would sit in the shop to errands until time to go to Bexley to collect and deliver evening papers (also to measure our paraffin).

Sunday Easy day just the morning delivery. s p My wages 3/6 a week and a dozen toffees.

AFTER THOUGHT

Vines also sold paraffin and petrol, two hand pumps in Beaconsfield Road (petrol 11 ½ d per gal) the petrol was drawn from the main tank by hand operated pump into a marked glass container, then gravity fed to your tank.

I was well pleased when in the summer holidays I was able to give my notice and take a job in Bexley at Mr Scotts High Class Grocer Delivery boy with a trade bike 15/- a week just for the holidays. I perhaps should mention that of my paper boys salary I gave my mother 2/6. and 10/- of my holiday job each week. Cricket and football has not been mentioned but played a large part in our free time activities played on the Daisy Green (where the watch factory now stands) and the Asylum Green a long wide grassy area between hospital fence and Wilmington Rd, now all trees and shrub. Girls – of course there were childish sweetheart relationships that bloomed and died all the time, nothing more. They were a pest.

AFTER THOUGHTS

I must mention “Mum” I forget her name, a mature lady who kept the classrooms clean and looked after the large coal fired boiler that heated the school a much loved and friendly lady.

The Heath in those days was a safe place for kids to play and wander only once did a scare run through the neighbourhood, a murder was committed by the golf links 1928 I believe, the man was caught and I seem to remember he was found to have a mental history. There was a full time heath keeper who lived in a cottage with his family. The donkey pond in those days was never empty and in summer two feet deep, full of newts, frogs, tadpoles and it was there we sailed our boats. Most of the Heath was heath land. Open grass areas were plentiful, and Hills Dairy herd were taken to graze all day every day, in charge of a chap named Wickens who lived on the Maypole (Hills Dairy was in Wilmington on the Swanley Rd by Wallis’s Nursery).

The only other pond was the Penny Royal a small swampy area where the flower of that name grew.
At the end of Baldwyns Road stands the hut “The Maypole Hut” wedding receptions, whist drives, concerts and dancing all took place here. One of the major attractions was the Princesses Theatre where for 4 pence or 6 pence on a Saturday evening you could watch films which would provide a talking point for long afterwards.

At thirteen I had my first bike, in Bexley Village Bert Hall had a bicycle repair business and when he died all his bicycle bits and pieces (a lorry load) was dumped down a denehole in Joydens Wood, it was a treasure trove and I managed to get all I wanted to build a bike including a 3 speed Hub and a bundle of spokes. I assembled the lot and had a bike. I left the Maypole School in 1928 Dec, to start work, aged 14.

AFTER THOUGHTS

Ted Smith and I would go with Bill Hooks to cut the bracken for bedding for the donkeys that his father kept. The donkeys roamed the Heath, would be used for rides on fete days, so much ago.

The nature of the Heath has changed enormously, in 1926 one could stand opposite Maypole House and see nothing but bracken 4ft high right to Crayford corner. A solitary birch here and there and a clump or two of gorse, now it’s mostly covered with shrub and trees.

Joydens Wood also was still 80% virgin woodland full of wild flowers. Bluebells, primroses, violets, lily of the valley, thick forest areas with many deneholes, and a flint lined roman well (on Brinkhurst’s land). Chestnut hazel and cobs were plentiful. Also crab apple it was a wonderful place for boys to roam and play bracken 5’ high.

Bessie wood (I’ve mentioned him earlier) would pick bunches of these woodland flowers and sell at the hospital gate to visitors on Sunday. Also bunches of home-grown pinks, he never missed a chance and was a tough handful and works as a farm labourer. In Bexley.

AFTER THOUGHTS

The old shoemaker taught a young man (name forgotten) to repair boots and shoes and on the cobblers death made a good living doing repairs in a shed in his Badwyns Rd Garden.

RANDOM THOUGHTS

Mr Edgeworth was the village bobby and had a quiet, peaceful existence. Crime on the Maypole never came to light to my knowlegde. Mrs Whibley was a person who lived in Denton Terrace, worked hard in all sorts of good causes, Sunday school, scouts and guides, it was she who arranged with a clothier shop in Bexleyheath to supply scout uniforms at a few coppers a week per person over a period. Mr Blackman also lived in Denton Terrace and was the Mayor of Dartford.
The Maypole Café has always been there, the shop next door was a boot and shoe repairers and the owner and elderly man did a good job and was well patronized on Maypole and in the hospital (1927). He was knocked down and killed by a motorcycle outside Westlodge in the hospital. The driver W.Boyce of Bexley was not to blame and the shop was taken over by the Cooperative Stores, Mr Bedwell manager.

AFTER THOUGHTS

Mr CURDLING (General Store) He would allow nurses to run up monthly bills for stockings, etc and very often was the loser by his kindness as the nurses would leave unpaid bills many times. Their work was hard and they were poorly paid. Mr Curdlings Shop was a special feature of the Estate. It was the biggest building on the estate embodied shop and two flats above.

The shop was long, dark, supporting pillars along it’s length – and sold everything tobacco and cigs, clothes, lengths of cloth, cold meats and grocery etc, etc. He, Mr Curdling, also run a car hire service.

He was the reincarnation of Mr Pickwick, stout, red-faced, jovial, a very special Maypole character. He held his 50th wedding anniversary in the Maypole hut. I remember him singing “My Old Dutch”.

He lived in a big old house that lays back from the Denton Rd, right opposite Crayford Corner football area, his daughter Joan still lives there, she must be in her advanced eighties and still very active.

These jottings take me from 1926 to 1929 when I left school donned ‘longens’ and went to work.
My intimate connections with the Maypole started to decline as new horizons beckoned but the Maypole Estate and its environs will always be very special to me. I got married from West Lodge in 1938, to a wonderful girl from Yorkshire, Anne.

Fin. Not quite! He said carry on.

JAN 1929 – JULY 1938

In Jan 1929 aged 14 I started work in engineering and tool room dept. of the Siluminate Insulating Company. My uncle was works manager so I started at an enhanced salary of 17/6 per week of 47 hours(7/6 for me 10/-. Mum).
I had my first new bicycle an Armstrong paid for weekly by my parents(cost around £3.10) so I rode to the factory at Erith alongside the Thames five miles. I was of course the shop boy, sweeping, cleaning, and making tea, several tin tea cans on a long pole, each with its screw of tea sugar and condensed milk, to be filled with hot water at the canteen.
Invitation to the industry consisting of an assault by several and the application of black grease to the private parts this was common place in those days.

AFTER THOUGHTS

A favourite past time in the 1920’s to 30’s was on a Sunday afternoon in the summer to walk the crossroad made by Princes Rd and Denton Rd and to sit on the grass and watch an almost endless stream of activities on the road. A column of hikers 50 strong striding along packs upon their backs and often singing away. Cycling clubs 50-100 strong, 2 deep wheeling away to coast or where ever. Motorcyclists on so many different British made bikes – Norton, BSA, Ariel, Vellocette, Matchless, New Hudson, Francis Barnet, Scot, Ascot Pullin, to name just a few, Rudge Whitworth.
Coaches packed with outings and cars of many makes all British used to give us pleasure to just sit and watch. I eventually graduated to the operation of simple jobs on radial drill, milling machines, etc.

Finally bandsaw doctor, responsible for the sharpening setting and the brazing of broken saw bands. At 14 this was quite a responsibilty as saws were soon broken cutting 1” thick asbestos sheet, and a badly brazed join would play havoc.

In March 1930 this firm closed and moved to Manchester, I was unemployed. I applied to Hall’s and I obtain a job on inspection and burring benches, where I believe my talents were noted and I was transferred to the fitting shop, there to serve an indentured apprenticeship.

J and E Halls was a world famous engineering firm specialising in refridgeration, lifts, escalators, and much more.

AFTER THOUGHTS Bicyles were the transport in my young days and one chap S. Ogilvy, cycled everyday to J and E Halls (where he was apprenticed) from Catford. Others from Farningham, Sidcup, Woolwich, were common place.
I should mention that at this period I bought for £3.10s my friends fathers motor cycle 250cc BSA Circa 1926 rode it for six months and bought a racing bike from the proceeds of its sale.

My starting wage at 16 was 11 shillings a week, I got half a crown pocket money or 1/6 I forget. My best friend John Palmer also started in apprenticeship as a plumber with OM Keevil of Dartford.
So we were both tied with little cash for five long years. With night school, three nights 7-9pm and one full day at Dartford Tech College. Never the less we saved up and bought a small tent, cycled with all our gear for a fortnight at Leysdown Isle of Sheppy. We did this in 1930 or 31 our annual holidays.

We decided at 17 to join the territorial army 5 Batt Queens own royal West Kents. C. Coy stationed at Dartford drill hall now council offices by park entrance in Lowfield St. The termination of this would coincide with our apprenticeship finishing.

This solved our cash shortage and catered for our annual holiday. In camp or Barracks we were paid 14/- a week (full army pay for a private 2/- per day) and our firm also gave us full pay for army camp. We were millionaires. You signed for four years.

We were both crack shots with the 303 short Lee Enfield, a marvellous rifle, a possible at a 1000 yrds quite often. We were battalion champions in turn and this fetched a few more bob in weekend shoots.
We were both keen fisherman and cycled to Yalding many times on a Saturday cycling home to have an evening st the Princesses. We also belonged to Dartford Harriers Cross Country and track, more to keep fit than break records. Cycling was second nature Hastings and back one Sunday.

The Terriers had a boxing club and so began an additional interest I was Battalion and Division Champion for my four yrs service boxing at 9.9 and 10.7 lightweight and welter. Halls also started a boxing club and became well known as one of the best around. As a leading light I was then boxing six rounds, not done now.

As you can see our time was full and we were happy with our lot. Dressed to kill in our Sunday best made to measure 37/6, 47/4 with waistcoat, we were content until. –

We had three months to go to the completion of apprenticeship and army service and John Palmer said when I was arranging our Saturday, “Oh, by the way I’m taking a girl to the pictures Sat evening” this was a bombshell as we were always too busy to bother with girls.

So started his courtship and eventual marriage to Lilian Brown, John died in 1991 after a career with the Local Council ending as chief building inspector and quality control. A smashing chap and took infinate pains in anything he did if it was perfect it was near enough.

A few weeks later I met the girl I was to marry, Anne Arundel a sweet Yorkshire girl, a nurse at the hospital. At this time my pocket money was 5/- per week and would be spent thus on many occasions between Anne and me. 6d bus fare to Bexley Heath from the Maypole, two seats at the Regal cinema 3/-, 1/- for ½d of milk tray chocolates and 6d bus home total 5/- all gone until next Friday. About this time 1935-6 I had left my employment on the outside staff of J+E Hall Installing refrigerator plants in ships, hotels, shops and fruit farms (I had a motorcycle).
I joined Fraser v Chalmers a well known heavy engineering concern steam engines for pit heads, turbines, coal crusher, conveyer and hoists for air craft carriers, really heavy stuff.
I loved it.

I now had a 500cc motor cycle so no more pedalling, and I was saving very hard to get married. I left Frasers and joined Vickers Crayford, engaged on highly skilled admiralty fire control gear, predicting gear for high angle guns, pompom predictors, torpedo calculators, where .0001” was a large lump. The Spanish was had ended Hitler helped by chamberlain and co was heading for war. Engineers were in demand and I took home £7-8 pounds per week av. Wage at that time £2-10s - £3, so I saved, got married 31st July 1938, and left West Lodge for 106 Chastilian Rd.
“That’s me lot”

Notes
Maypole Café Already there in 1926 and a kids meeting point to discuss the merits of all the many varieties of toffee bars etc etc. A cosy place for warmth and hot drinks in the winter. Ran by a Miss or Mrs Brooks if my memory serves me rightly.
Penny Royal A small swampy pond so named because it was home to a small blue flower ‘The Penny Royal’
Donkey Pond A pond always full in my young days. The donkeys drank there. (They were kept on the Heath by Mr Smith of the Maypole Estate).
Anti-aircraft guns at Leyton Cross A very large encampment with concrete roads, shelters and 3.7 inch guns were established on the Heath. Gravel pit cottages Two small cottages on the Denton Rd opposite Crayford Corner and were occupied by Gravel pit empolyees. One cottage now demolished and a much larger house instead built after the war.
Heath Keeper He had a cottage on the Heath. A family of wife and two daughters who attended the Maypole School.
The Maypole Itself (1926) Was errected in the school playground and Mr Snell (headmaster in my time). Would supervise all the dances.
Mr Blackman First Mayor of Dartford. Winnie daughter I believe, son still resides on the Maypole Estate.
Bowmans Lodge Now sadly demolished and should have been a listed building. Bowmen would meet there to hold their competitions on what is now Crayford Corner. It was Tudor origin and was lived in until the 1930-39 period. It served as a tea and refreshment place.
Broomhills Lodge At the entrance to Broomhills (the Cameron Estate) Mr Elliman and his family lived in the lodge. He was groundsman, keeper, he had two sons Arthur and Sydney also a daughter. The lodge is now demolished and replaced.

Memories of Derek LOTT

Maypoleman — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:46:47 CST

An excellent recollection of facts and names - The Maypole Team

My First Memories of the Maypole

Would be around 1942 about a year after moving there from Station Road Crayford. My sister Evelyn was born that year in the nursing home in Wansant Road. My dad along with Misters Pope, May, Perkins and a few others who for one reason or another were not called up to fight were part of the Home guard and did fire watch duties at night around the area. They used to meet in the public air raid shelter by the bus stop up by the school. This was also the place we all had to go to to collect our gas mask, young children were given Mickey mouse shaped ones in a cardboard box with a piece of string attached to hang it around our necks. Bexley Hospital was bombed several times by incendiary and other bombs, I remember standing watching as the planes tried to avoid the search lights and the shells from the mobile pom pom gun that the anti aircraft gunners from the army camp at Leyton Cross drove around chasing the enemy.

My dad was exempt from call up as he was to valuable to Vickers making guns, where he invented a couple of ways to speed up production of same. In July 1942 my mother gave birth to my sister Evelyn the same name as herself. As previously mentioned Evelyn was born at a nursing home in Wansant Road Bexley, while mum was there a German plane crashed just over the road in a field and the young pilot was brought into the nursing home. The nurses and young mothers felt sorry for the young pilot when the police came and took him away, as yet they did not know of his doings only a short time before the crash. He had been shooting at school children in and around Dartford West as they came out of school. One young lad had his bottom shot off by machine gun fire while cleaning his mother’s windows.

Later at the age of four I was to attend St. Michael College also in Wansant Road as a day pupil. Soon after this the school was renamed “The London Choir School”. While there I lost a friend who on the way home from school crossed the road and was knocked down by a laundry lorry and killed instantly. I was off sick that day or I would have most probably have been with him, as we often crossed there together to buy a penny bun from the off-license come grocer shop down the dip (Baldwyns Park) as it was known.

Soon after this Hitler started sending over the V1 rockets commonly known as the doodlebugs, these eerie sounding rockets had short wings and a tail with an engine fixed to the top of it from which exhaust flames could be seen . When the fuel ran out and the engine stopped. Every one would huddle in a corner and wait for the inevitable bang; if you heard it you knew it wasn’t your turn this time. I remember laying in bed one night with mum (dad was on air raid warden duty or nights at Vickers, when a doodle bug came over so low that we could see the flames from the engine as it passed over our roof. It was that low that it took the chimney pot off the roof of a neighbour across the road, before running out of fuel and landing in the allotments just 300 yards away, being so low it hit the earth softly and we were able to see the engine intact the next day. Shortly after that Hitler started sending the V2 rockets that were even more frightening, you would hear nothing until they hit their target.

I can remember watching a dog fight over toward the Joydons wood area and seeing the loser bail out and watching as his parachute opened. One also fell in the nursery of the Maypole House. The Winters who owned the Maypole house used to sell products to us from their nursery; where now stands the Rolex watch factory. Mr Winter was a director of the Co. Tony Winter would have been the youngest boy: A tragic family, three off whom committed suicide.

Mr Pope was later to to keep his horses in the Winters field. Mr Pope used to sell logs from his horse and cart, many a day I would have helped Alan, Ian and George Pope saw up logs for their father; sometimes by the light of an oil lantern.

During the war everyone had to carry an identity card with them where ever they went. I can remember that a police man would get on the bus and check them, he usually got on just where the bus came off the heath and entered Shepherds Lane. On one occasion Mum was questioned at length (much to her embarrassment) on the bus and this was later followed up by a home visit from the police. We later learned that a German P.O.W. Had escaped and had taken on the identity of a Dutch Pilot using the name Van Lott. A book was later written about him and called “The One Who Got Away” as he was the only German P.O.W. To escape from this country.

After leaving St Michaels Collage I went Yorkshire to live with my old great aunt for around nine months on my return I went to school at the Maypole Primary. Miss Gaspar was the head teacher who had taught my Mother at St Albans Road school Dartford, and did not like my mum for reasons that I will not go into here. She immediately took a dislike to me and bullied me all through school, I was caned often and can honestly say that I had never committed the offence for which I was punished. I was stood in front of all the teachers during my first week there and she told them to keep an eye on me as I was trouble; *****. She also would not allow me to sit the eleven plus.
In my class there were Allen Pope, Lindsey Fisher, Anthony Hancock, John Morgan, Peter Howard, Howard Rogers, George Govier? Janice Scott, David Bainbridge, ??? white, Maureen Green, Christine Harper, Brian Coleman, Anita Web, Judith ???, Barry Miskin, Averal Hunt and about ten more. I think I have done well seeing as I can not remember last w???.

Having not been allowed to take the eleven plus I ended up at Dartford West Secondary (no regrets), I did reasonably well there and held the record for bowling at cricket until the school closed some fifty or so years later.

Do you remember Curdling's Shop at the end of my Road (Beaconsfield), that nice smell of a small grocers shop where they cut, slice and weighed every thing by hand. Sugar weighed into a brown bag, sweets and lemon powder poured into a cone made of news paper, butter and cheese sliced and wrapped in grease proof paper; very little came pre-packed and the smell of the cheeses, fresh bacon, bread and other items all mingling to give that unique smell that I can smell even now. Mrs Turner worked there before Mrs Roberts Mrs Vera Barrett and Iris was it who married a G.I.?. Talking of smell I used to like the smell of leather and polish in Mr. Miles the cobblers shop.

Dad and Mum used to keep chickens and Rabbits to subsidise the meat and egg rations as many others did. Not like David Saunders and family who some time after the war ate all the pigeons I had sold to him. I think his Parents conned him into eating them as they did not like him keeping them in the garden.

Evelyn and I sang in the choir at St Barnabas, I until my voice broke. We received 3d a week if we attended choir practice and the Sunday service, this we would receive around Christmas time.

The post office was owned by Mr. Vine who used to sing and could often be heard on workers playtime; 247 medium wave, light program lunchtime radio. I can still see the face of the lady who worked behind the counter (ginger hair and glasses head always tilted to one side) selling sweets and cigarettes but can not recall her name. The other lady behind the post office was Mrs Vine. In those days every one was given the title of Mr. Master. Mrs. or Miss. Sir or Madam, no Ms. in those days.

Does anyone remember the winkle man coming round on a Sunday afternoon ringing a bell, Grooms baker and hills milk being delivered by horse and cart and the rag and bone man totting with his horse and cart? The only time a car came up the road was when the Doctor was making a visit or some wealthy visitor came by taxi even the local constabulary came on a bicycle. Mr Waterman the postman in Beaconsfield was the first to buy a car on the maypole I believe, and Mr. Pope and my Father were later to buy motorcycles and side-car.
As others have mentioned we had the maypole institute which was used for all manner of things, youth club, ladies institute, dances, plays and other forms of entertainment. Members would have an annual outing to the seaside usually Margate or Ramsgate and occasionally to Herne Bay in a Grundens charabanc (coach). Of course there was the annual fancy dress show followed by sports, where we that won races were disqualified from ever running in amateur races as we would receive financial reward 2s 6d for first prize if I remember correctly. Of course non of us new at that time of things like that, it was all so innocent.

I joined the merchant navy on my sixteenth birthday and sailed to Australia via the Canary Islands and South Africa, returning via Aden, Suez and Bruge. We were one of the last ships to pass through the Suez canal before President Nasser closed it. I was a terrible sailor and within a year of returning to these shores I joined the RAF as a regular, In 1963 I married an Irish girl named Mary and in 65 moved into No. 30 Baldwyns Road which had been the house of the Hogan's. One of the Hogans remained in the house as we were later to find out. When any of our four children that slept in the top rooms fell ill she would visit them and stroke them. We told the late Mrs. Perkins about this and when Mary described the old lady who visited, Mrs Perkins said that it was indeed Granny Hogan. She dressed all in black and wore long black lace gloves and this was exactly how the two children that had seen her described her. We never told the children what the other had seen, yet both described the same woman. My Mother was first to say on visiting the attic bedrooms that it felt haunted and my dogs would not go to the attic floor.

Children I remember from my childhood on the Maypole would be:
Denton Terrace; Barbara May, Busters daughter who died so young, Willie and Nancy Beck, Dorothy and Barbara Taylor, Pat Flett, Robin Hunt? Barry and John Collins, Carol Slade, Averal Hunt, Pam Wright and Derek and Basil Bedwell.
Beaconsfield; Kim and ?? Button, Fred, Jean Perkins, Angie, Sylvia, Alan, Ian George Pope, Raymond, Beryl, Brenda Wibley, Valerie Eynon, Iris and Pat Connelly,Tony Smith, Janice Scott, Pat, Gill? Richardson Carlton Ball, Colin and Robin Wickens, Stan, Margaret, Jim, Pearl, Elsie Snowdens, Dickie Balcomb, Tony, Yvonne Clark, Brain John and Jean Parker, Maureen Green.
Dartford Road; Jackie Smith, Veronica Taylor, Jack, Norman, Moses Chalice. Christine Miles.
Heath End; 2 , Sonia & Nigel Windmill, Eileen, Barbara Jean Rivers,Steven, Marion Parker.
Baldwyns; Sheila, Audrey, Barbara, Joan Haulton, Joyce Stockford, Peter, Margaret Cadman, ?? Tucker, Christine, Ann, Joan Potter, Billy Fowler, Lee Smith, Mick & June Hogan, Tom Gosling, Gordon Lennox, David & Eddie Wooldridge, Willie, Stan, Molly Barrett, Angela Wibley, David Ann Mosses Mavis Proudfoot, David, Wendy Saunders, Mavis & ? Warwick, Roberta & David Cruickshanks, Michael Masters, Ken & Thelma Perkis. Dorothy Piper.

The Whitehead Girls I believe lived over in the cottage at Capt. James. Earl Read, Bob & Marion Shaw. Lived At The Hospital Gate.
Apologies for those I can not remember and for those who's names I have misspelt.

Memories / comments / contacts

Maypoleman — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:17:41 CST

This page is being created and will be added to as and when . . . . .

The below are the first - there's more in the pipeline . . . . .

Memories of Kim Button
Memories of Susan Kirby
Memories of Audrey Jackson
More memories of Audrey Jackson
Memories of Tony Helyar
Memories of Ann Martin
Memories of Pat Richardson
Memories of Sheila Houlton
More memories of Sheila Houlton
Memories of Perran Newman
Memories of Barbara Houlton
Wheels - by Perran Newman Updated 21/4/08
Memories of Frankie Gemmell
Information from Janet Lee (Teacher at Maypole School)
Memories of Stuart Grieve
Sheila Houlton - the Tea Stall on the heath
Memories of David Bainbridge
Memories of Peter Walker
Memories of Steven Parker
Memories of Tony Helyar - Baldwyns Pavillion updated 21/6/08
Memories of Barbara Thomas (Now Joss)
Memories of Margaret Cadman
Memories of Michael Jennings
Memories of the late Alfred Peters - long but interesting
Memories of Barbara Ireland
Memories of Derek LOTT

E Mail we have sent to a recent contributor . . . . .

Fantastic to have your E Mail. Thank you for your kind comments about our efforts on the internet. It will grow. You are opening up exactly what we want to know about. These are the most precious facts and anecdotes which go to make up our ever evolving history of the Maypole.

A few years ago one of our team was lucky enough to meet a man called Alfred Peters who was the firemans son who lived in West Lodge, Bexley Hospital. He has sadly now passed away. He was very kind and wrote a 'book' for him about his childhood years and he mentioned the places he played and the friends he once had. He mentioned the 'Aeroplane' - which he described as a row of trees in the Dell. He mentioned 'Slippery Jack' - a tree they once found great difficulty in climbing opposite Denton Terrace. He also mentioned the 'Action Tree' - not sure where that was. He went on to describe his days at Maypole School and the jobs he had as errand boy for Mr Vine and working for DENNIS the Butchers in Bexley. He described the petrol pumps in the rear garden of the Post Office which he used to operate to serve petrol to passing cars. Although too brief (aren't they always) his memoirs give life to the names of families who once lived on the estate. He went on to mention names of those in his gang including Eno SMITH and enlightened him to some of the nick names they had bestowed on them. Eno was known as Spadge Barrett, Glarni HOGAN, Diddy HENN, Gump HENN, Fatty MEACHAM - Bunty MEACHAM, Bogey ELLIMAN, Bessie WOOD, Massa PETERS, Nanny ELLIMAN, Skinner BEDWELL, Smut SMITH, Tongy THOMPSON, Tiptoe FORD, Monkey CHAFF, Taffy WELLSPRING and many more. None of these names were meant or intended to cause offence - and we hope they don't !

He went on to describe the tradesmen and the shops including the Boot Repairers and the Coop - just like you have mentioned.

His story is just one of the records we have about how life once was on the estate. Told through the eyes of a child his stories gave a highly perceptive feel about everyday life back in the 30s and 40s. We hope one day they will be shared by others when we finally produce a readable book / document. As we have stated we will always go to the enth degree to never make public anything which would cause offence. Luckily all our contributors have been helpful, kind and dignified. We may possibly mention little games they once played and some goings on designed to annoy the grown ups ! One of these described by Alfred was his little gang playing a rather dreadful game of 'knock down ginger' with a twist ! All that happened 60 years ago and can only now be seen as true school boy antics. No crimes - just wholly inappropriate pre adolescent fun !

We also have memories of persons from that era including those of David CRUICKSHANK, Phillip RUMBELOW, George STOCKFORD Jnr, Wendy SAUNDERS, Miss SKEVINGTON, Gordon LENNOX, Ruth ENTWHISTLE and many others. God bless them all.

We are keenly interested in the obscure - including any information in particular on the black boy who lived next to the Post Office called Charlie LAWRENCE. I have a photo of him taken in the back garden of George STOCKFORD. He went on to serve in the last war and met an untimely death in a POW camp in Poland.

We have so much information that it is difficult to express most of it in writing. Only so many pieces of information mean so much to so few at a time. A few years either side of a particular childhood and they mean little / nothing to the next generation or the one before. For instance one of our team grew up in the 50s and 60s and his memories are confined to that era. He remembers Sports Days in Broomhills, the Bonfire being llit by Buster, being chased by George STOCKFORD from the gardens of Maypole House, going down an old air raid shelter at the back of the institute hut in the grounds of Broomhills and making it their HQ for the summer of 1967. Being caught in the old farm at Bexley Hospital and exploring the old derelict house called Heathwood and being chased off by Mr WHITEHEAD who lived in the cottage next door. Some of us, too, have been chased from the old gun club as well ! Catching lizards on hot, lazy summer days on the heath and making camps in the bracken and fern which were so abundant in those days.

Once again - thank you for taking the time to write and impart with what you have written already.

Look forward to hearing from you again.

Kindest regards to you and your family.

Some Pupils 1950-1957

Maypoleman — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 05:53:24 CST

1913-1919 1920-1929 1930-1939 1940-1949 1958-1968

* Where there is a 'Mrs' 'Miss' in first name - this person is a teacher / staff

1950/01/10TH CLARKE ANTHONY

1950/02/28TH	COWARD	PETER
1950/04/25TH	FOWLE	WILLIAM
1950/04/25TH	MILES	CHRISTINE
1950/06/05th	BALCOMBE	PHILLIP
1950/06/05TH	SMITH	LEE
1950/09/05TH	APPLEGATE	ROGER
1950/09/05TH	DYSON	DOREEN
1950/09/05TH	CRUICKSHANK	LOUISE
1950/09/05TH	MOSSES	ANTHONY
1950/09/05TH	GRANT	JANET
1950/09/05TH	HENDERSON	LESLEY
1950/09/05TH	DYSON	ROGER
1950/10/01ST	POTTER	ANTOINETTE
1950/10/01ST	POTTER	CHRISTINE
1951	GRANGER	PHILLIP
1951/01/09TH	MOSSES	CHRISTINE
1951/01/09TH	TAYLOR	PETER
1951/01/09TH	TAYLOR	DAVID
1951/01/09TH	LIBBERT ( SIBBERT ? )	RICHARD
1951/01/15TH	PARKER	JEAN
1951/01/15TH	PARKER	JOHN
1951/01/23RD	POTTER	ELAINE
1951/03/12TH	CRADDOCK	PETER
1951/04/11TH	CONNELLY	SUSAN
1951/05/22ND	ZAMBRA	MICHAEL
1951/06/04TH	SMITHSON	JEAN
1951/09/06TH	PAYNE	EDWARD
1951/09/06TH	PORTER	GRAHAM
1951/09/06TH	BALCOMBE	FREDERICK
1951/09/06TH	PAYNE	JOHN
1951/09/06TH	HENDERSON	JILL
1951/09/06TH	RADZAR RADZAN ?	HELEN
1951/09/06TH	WINTER	JANET
1952/04/09TH	REYNOLDS	ANGELA
1952/04/29TH	ASHMAN	JACQUELINE
1952/04/29TH	DUNN	JACQUELINE
1952/05/05TH	ELLIMAN	PAUL
1952/05/05th	KNIGHTSBRIDGE	GAIL
1952/06/09TH	READ	EARLE
1952/06/09TH	READ	ROGER ?? BROTHER TO EARLE NAME UNKNOWN
1952/06/09TH	SHAW	DOROTHY
1952/06/09TH	BABIAK	CLIVE
1952/09/04th	DAVIES	DIANA
1952/09/04TH	NEALE	BEVERLEY
1952/09/04TH	HUNT	DONALD
1952/09/09TH	COOPER	JOHN
1952/11/26TH	BUTCHER	CHRISTOPHER
1952/11/26TH	BUTCHER	DAVID
1953/01/06TH	SCOTT	JANET
1953/01/06TH	COOPER	WILLIAM
1953/01/06TH	PETERKEN	MARGARET
1953/01/06TH	RADZAR	LINDA
1953/01/06TH	REEVES	JOHN
1953/02/03RD	ELLIOTT	JANET
1953/04/21ST	CADMAN	MARGARET
1953/04/21ST	WINTER	MICHAEL
1953/04/21ST	DENNIS	TIMOTHY
1953/04/21ST	DENNIS	MICHAEL
1953/04/24TH	BALL	SYLVIA
1953/06/04TH	WILLIAMS	LYNN
1953/06/04TH	WHIBLEY	BERYL
1953/09/09TH	ARMILL - ARNULL ?	ANNA
1953/09/09TH	KNIGHTBRIDGE	VICKI
1953/09/09TH	PULLEN	CHRISTINE
1953/10/06TH	COWAN	BEVERLEY
1953/10/06TH	WARNER	SANDRA
1953/10/12TH	HARRISON	SUSAN
1954/01/07TH	MOSSES	SUSAN
1954/01/07TH	MCKEOUGH	DAVID
1954/02/08TH	HUTCHISON	DIANE
1954/03/29TH	BARRETT	RONALD
1954/04/28TH	MOSSES	GILLIAN
1954/06/29th	BABIAK	CLIVE
1954/09/03RD	TURNER	LYNNE
1954/09/13TH	WITNEY	THOMAS
1955/01/06TH	POTTER	RONALD
1955/01/06TH	WILLIAMS	LESLEY
1955/02/14th	READ	LAURENCE
1955/04/26TH	PIPER	DOROTHY
1955/04/26TH	BUTTON	RAYMOND
1955/04/26TH	GEMMELL	ROBERT
1955/09/07TH	MACDONALD	MELVYN
1955/09/07TH	HUNT	DAVID
1955/09/07TH	FERRARI	SIMON
1955/09/07TH	WIGHT	RICHARD
1955/09/12TH	LEFEUVRE	JANE
1955/09/12TH	LEFEUVRE	ELIZABETH
1955/10/03RD	MCLEAN	IANN
1955/10/03RD	MCLEAN	STUART
1955/11/02ND	WHITTLE	LAWRENCE
1956/01/10TH	ELLIMAN	JOHN
1956/05/28TH	CONBOY	KEVIN
1956/05/28TH	CONBOY	RICHARD
1956/05/29TH	REEVES	MICHAEL
1956/09/06TH	HUTCHISON	CHARLES
1956/10/16TH	GRAY	MARGARET
1957//06/17th	PENDERGAST	HELEN
1957/01/10TH	GARMAN	PETER
1957/01/14TH	WINTER	MARIE
1957/01/14TH	VIAGAPPAN	ANNAMANI
1957/03/04TH	HAWKES	KEITH
1957/04/08TH	HUNT	DAVID
1957/07/16TH	PARNELL	BARRY
1957/07/16TH	PARNELL	ALAN
1957/09/10TH	PATTERSON	JEREMY
1957/9/10TH	STERN	ANDREW
1957/9/10TH	AUSTEN	ALAN
1957/9/10TH	REEVES	RAYMOND
1957/9/10TH	READ	PHILLIP
1957/9/10TH	SMITH	KAREN
1957/9/11TH	PENDEGAST	MICHAEL
1957/9/11TH	PATTERSON	MELISSA
1957	THOMAS	BARBARA

1913 - 1919 1920 - 1929 1930 - 1939 1940 - 1949 1958 - 1968

Top of page . . . . . .

Random photographs - transport

Maypoleman — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:06:09 CDT

This page contains Video Footage

The AFS fire engine. It was housed on land belonging to the Institute Hut and heath End Road between the wars.

and below video from 1950 Colonial Film Unit showing (somewhat patronisingly) people new to the country how the system works
What a green and pleasant land this was through the eyes of LT !! We sort of remember the dignity and politeness of public transport from that by-gone age !

Steam Train Bexley Station c 1910 taken from Bexley Archives website - they have copyright

Anyone remember the 'Double Decker' trains on the Loop Line ?

Below - inside.

The above are
Courtesy of
Bulleid Double decker Society

Below the 401 Bus - plying the route c1940s-1970s

Image taken Farningham courtesy of Ians Bus Stop

http://freespace.virgin.net/ian.smith/buses/index.htm#stop

Below (possibly mother of Wendy Saunders on motorcycle combination) - in rear alley of Baldwyns Road c1920s
Courtesy of Wendy Saunders

Above 'Wally of the week' Maypoleman on his Excelsior 250cc Talisman Summer 1968

Below what an Excelsior Talisman should have looked like prior to being butchered

Below 'Poser' Perran Newman on his 'lookalike' Goldstar mid 1960s

Above
From Sheila Lusher nee Houlton - she suspects the above culprits to be
"We concluded that the chap on the bike is David Cruikshank. Left to right, we think they are: Ernie Gosling, Mosie Challice, Rose Challice (wife), Jackie Challice and David C. I am happy to be corrected by another reader, as this input is from my brother, although he seems very certain. Not many of 'em left, I don't suppose?

Had a lovely afternoon, reminiscing with Den".

Regards,

Sheila (16th. December 2007)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Below type of fire engines from the Kent Fire Brigade attending heath fires c 50s/60s

Some Pupils 1920-1929

Maypoleman — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:35:31 CDT

1913 - 1919 1930 - 1939 1940 - 1949 1950 - 1957 1958 - 1968

Where there is a 'Mrs' 'Miss' in first name - this person is a teacher / staff

Date of Admission

1920/01/05TH	LUCAS	BETTY
1920/01/121TH	BROOKS	BEATRICE
1920/01/26TH	GREEN	WILLIAM
1920/01/26TH	GREEN	ERNEST
1920/02/02ND	CASSELTON	GWENDOLINE
1920/03/08TH	MUNDY	ROBERT
1920/03/08TH	BEARCROFT	SIDNEY
1920/03/15TH	BARRETT	ALBERT
1920/04/?	KING	FLORENCE
1920/04/20TH	BURKE	SIDNEY
1920/07/13TH	HENN	CYRIL
1920/09/06TH	WINTER	SYBIL
1920/09/06TH	PENFOLD	WALTER
1920/09/06TH	COLGATE	EDITH M
1920/09/06TH	ROSE	BERYL
1920/09/06TH	KING	JESSIE
1920/10/12TH	READ	ALICE
1920/10/12TH	READ	LENA
1920/10/18TH	BARRETT	ALBERT
1920/11/30TH	BROOKS	ROSE
1921/01/10TH	EVEREST	ALICE
1921/01/10TH	EVEREST	HERBERT
1921/01/17TH	HAMPSHIRE	IVY
1921/01/24TH	GOSLING	THOMAS
1921/01/24TH	GOSLING	HERBERT
1921/01/24TH	WICKENS	FREDERICK
1921/01/24TH	FORD	EDITH
1921/01/31ST	DYSON	CYRIL
1921/05/02ND	WALLER	IVYLENE
1921/05/02ND	SMITH	EDWARD
1921/05/10TH	FIELDER	WILLIAM
1921/05/18TH	KENNERSON	IRIS
1921/06/14TH	CLIFFE
1921/07/11TH	PENFOLD	WALTER
1921/08/30TH	TREADWELL	RONALD
1921/09/05TH	FACKRELL	CHRISTIAN
1921/09/06TH	TUCKER	KATE
1921/10/10TH	FINCH	KATHLEEN
1921/11/07TH	GRIMSHAW	KATHLEEN M
1921/11/07TH	LAWFORD	DORIS IVY
1922/01/09TH	SCHILLING	ALFRED
1922/01/11TH	SUTTON	EDITH
1922/04/05TH	WELLINGTON	WILLIAM
1922/04/25TH	PEARSON	FREDERICK
1922/04/25TH	WINTER	BASIL
1922/05/15TH	BEARCROFT	SIDNEY
1922/09/05TH	KING	ROBERT
1922/10/09TH	BROOKS	ROSE
1922/10/16TH	WOOLDRIDGE	HAROLD K
1922/11/13TH	JUPP	BLANCHE
1923/01/09TH	LUCAS	IAN
1923/01/10TH	LONGDEN	JESSIE
1923/01/15TH	MCCONNELL	MARY
1923/01/22ND	HUGGETT	LILIAN MAY
1923/03/01ST	CAPPS	MRS MILDRED
1923/03/05TH	HIBBERT	GEORGE
1923/03/05TH	HIBBERT	WALTER
1923/03/05TH	HIBBERT	CATHERINE
1923/05/23RD	JONES	MARY
1923/05/28TH	THROPP	FRANK
1923/09/04TH	WALLIS	JOAN
1923/10/08th	ALLMAN	FREDERICK
1923/10/22ND	MENDAY	MARY
1924/01/08TH	FOX	COLIN
1924/01/08TH	FOX	IAN
1924/01/10TH	HAMPSHIRE	GLADYS
1924/01/14TH	BEARCROFT	SIDNEY
1924/01/17TH	SMITH	JOAN
1924/01/21ST	WALLIS	GRAHAM
1924/01/21ST	COLGATE	THOMAS
1924/01/BETWEEN 14TH AND 17TH ?	LENNOX	RUTH
1924/02/19TH	JUPP	BLANCHE
1924/03/24TH	MEACHAM	SYBIL
1924/03/24TH	LAWRENCE	CHARLES
1924/03/25TH	RIPPER	JENNIE
1924/04/01ST	SPRINGATE	ROYCE
1924/04/10TH	JUPP	BLANCHE
1924/04/29TH	RUSSELL	BENJAMIN
1924/05/01ST	ALLMAN	WILLIAM
1924/05/01ST	ROOME	KITTY
1924/05/05TH	MORGAN	VIOLET
1924/05/12TH	WINCHCOMBE	MABEL
1924/05/20TH	JUPP	BLANCHE
1924/06/11TH	BEARCROFT	WILLIAM
1924/06/16TH	WALLIS	ROSIE
1924/07/07TH	WALLIS	STANLEY
1924/07/07TH	HEATH	GLADYS
1924/09/02ND	WEBBER	DOROTHY
1924/09/02ND	HEATH	WINIFRED
1924/09/02ND	WAIN	WILLIAM
1924/09/02ND	FROST	DENNIS
1924/09/02ND	WICKENS	LEONARD
1924/09/02ND	WICK	WILLIAM G B
1924/09/03RD	JAMES	WILLIAM
1924/09/08TH	HUNTINGTON	EILEEN
1924/09/15TH	BRYANT	WINIFRED
1924/09/16TH	JONES	LAURA
1924/09/22ND	WILLIAMS	DOROTHY
1924/09/23RD	BEARCROFT	RICHARD W
1925/01/06TH	EASTWOOD	HARVEY
1925/01/06TH	GEORGE	RAYMOND
1925/04/21ST	WALLIS	KENNETH
1925/04/21ST	FORD	THOMAS
1925/04/21ST	TUCKER	RONALD
1925/04/21ST	SHIPP	ARTHUR
1925/04/21ST	BROOKS	MARGARET
1925/04/27TH	WALLER	BERNARD
1925/05/04TH	HUGHES	JOSEPH
1925/06/22ND	OAKES	EMILY ANNIE
1925/09/01ST	MENGE	JOAN MAUD
1925/09/01ST	BALL	IRENE
1925/09/01ST	SMITH	PHYLLIS
1925/09/01ST	HAMPSHIRE	RAYMOND
1925/09/01ST	LUCAS	COLIN
1925/09/07TH	RUSSELL	MARGARET
1925/11/11TH	MAY	MARJORIE
1926/01/06TH	KING	VIOLET
1926/01/26TH	PARKER	ROSALINE
1926/02/02ND	FIELDER	BARNARD
1926/03/02ND	PEARCE	KENNETH
1926/03/02ND	PEARCE	RONALD
1926/04/13TH	BORASH	DORIS
1926/04/13TH	HOBBS	NELLIE
1926/04/13TH	LEMMING	BERYL
1926/04/19TH	WALLIS	VERA
1926/04/26TH	COOPER	VINCENT
1926/04/26TH	HAMPSHIRE	RAYMOND
1926/04/27TH	FRENCH	MARION
1926/05/10TH	PETERS	ALFRED
1926/06/17TH	SONNEX	AUDREY
1926/06/28TH	DALE	LESLIE
1926/09/07TH	HOLLAND	FRANCES
1926/09/07TH	COLES	QUEENIE
1926/09/07TH	BEARCROFT	DENNIS
1926/09/07TH	BLOOMFIELD	SIDNEY
1926/09/07TH	COLGATE	NELLIE
1926/09/07TH	TUCKER	IRENE
1926/09/07TH	BEARCROFT	RICHARD
1926/09/13TH	BROTHERHOOD	LESLIE
1926/09/20TH	TURNER	RONALD
1926/09/27TH	ALLMAN	MAY
1926/10/04TH	BROOMFIELD	EUGENIA E
1926/10/18TH	PALMER	PERCY
1926/11/01ST	ROBINSON	JOHN
1926/11/23RD	WOODINGTON	LOTTIE
1926/12/13TH	BROTHERHOOD	WILLIAM
1927/01/11TH	BOWEN	PAUL
1927/01/11TH	EDWARDS	EILEEN
1927/01/12TH	TURNER	FRANK
1927/01/24TH	MALONEY	JOSEPHINE
1927/02/04TH	GROUT	MRS RUTH
1927/04/26TH	BORASH	DENNIS
1927/04/26TH	WICKENS	MYRTLE
1927/04/26TH	SHIPP	DORIS
1927/05/23RD	WYATT	ETHEL
1927/05/24TH	HOLLIER	HETTIE
1927/06/13TH	MAY	BARBARA
1927/06/20TH	WHITE	DOUGLAS
1927/06/20TH	WHITE	FRANCES
1927/09/06TG	WRIGHT	JEAN
1927/09/06TH	SMITH	COLIN
1927/09/06TH	PETERS	RONALD
1927/09/06TH	CURD	ERIC
1927/09/07TH	HENN	RUBY
1927/10/17TH	NORBURY	EDNA
1927/10/31ST	BEDWELL	WILLIAM
1927/10/31ST	BEDWELL	LESLIE
1927/10/31ST	OAKES	EMILY
1928/01/10TH	BESSANT	JOAN
1928/01/10TH	HUMPHRIES	EDMUND
1928/01/10TH	TURNER	HAZEL
1928/01/30TH	PETERKEN	HAROLD
1928/0110TH	BEARCROFT	JOYCE
1928/03/05TH	HANNAH	BEATRICE
1928/04/17TH	WAIN	MURIEL
1928/04/17TH	MEACHAM	NORMAN
1928/04/17TH	COLGATE	WINIFRED
1928/04/23RD	WRIGHT	JEAN
1928/06/27TH	WEBB	KENNETH
1928/06/27TH	WEBB	MAUREEN
1928/06/27TH	BEVAN	KATHLEEN
1928/06/27TH	BEVAN	GWENDOLIN
1928/07/09TH	HEYWOOD	FLORENCE
1928/09/04TH	WALLIS	JOYCE
1928/09/04TH	TULETT	JOAN
1928/09/04TH	EDWORTHY	MARGARET
1928/09/04TH	PEARCE	STANLEY
1928/11/15TH	NORMAN	IDA
1929/01/07TH	GOSLING	RONALD
1929/02/04TH	HARRIS	RAYMOND
1929/02/20TH	CLOUGH	MRS M G
1929/02/20TH	SUMPNER	MISS E J
1929/04/15TH	EDEN	HILDA
1929/04/22ND	CANDLER	JOAN
1929/04/22ND	PEEL	EDNA
1929/04/29TH	ALBERTINI	ANTHONY V
1929/05/27TH	BRIGGS	GILIAN
1929/06/11TH	VAIL	ERNEST
1929/07/15TH	MILLER	VIRGINIA
1929/07/15TH	MILLER	CHARLES
1929/09/02ND	HOBBS	MARY
1929/09/02ND	PETERS	JOAN
1929/09/02ND	TURNER	ERIC
1929/09/11TH	MAY	AUDREY
1929/10/28TH	BARRATT	LANCE
1929/11/11TH	NANKIVELL	PAMELA
1929/11/11TH	NANKIVELL	ROY
1929/11/11TH ?	WEBB	KENNETH
1929/11/11TH ?	WEBB	MAUREEN

Top of page

Napoleonic Army Camp

Maypoleman — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 09:13:19 CDT

DARTFORD CAMP

Above - plate showing Regiments of Camp c 1778-1780 on Dartford Heath

Below showing proximety of where Maypole Estate was to be built

With regards to the Heath it is interesting to note that in 1780, whilst Great Britain was under fear of attack from France and Spain, there was a large temporary encampment of soldiersbased upon it. This camp lasted for a few years and the local neighbourhood benefited, hugely, in trade with the soldiers. This camp eventually swelled in numbers to approximately 8,000 soldiers. Remember, these weren't soldiers in camouflage - they would have presented any observer with a blaze of colour. The soldiers would have been under canvas and these tents would have been in neat rows. A contemporary plate, published by T BISH, showed that the Camp was situated between what is now Heath Lane and the vicinity of the gates of Baldwyns Manor (Bexley Hospital). At the height of the camp and situated towards the centre of the heath there was a shop for supplying the troops with stationery and small stores - T. BISH. (The contemporary map of the heath showing the camp also showed their 'shop') The 'Suttling' House - a merchant who follows army camps - stood near Bowmans Lodge and was kept by Mr POWELL of the Granby, Dartford.

The Magazine was situated near the end of Oakfield Lane. There were similar camps at Coxheath, Kent and at Warley Common in Essex. All three camps were uprooted at daybreak on 27th July 1780 and there was then performed a grand review of these troops held by their commanders. These included Lieutenant - General PIERSON, Lord AMHERST, Colonel St. LEGER, other commanders and their respective military attendants. After detailing their :-

'manual exercise, platoon, grand and subdivision street and bush firing'

the entire army comprising 4 divisions and their artillery then marched off the heath and made their way to Gravesend.

Typical uniform of British Soldier at the time of the camp on Dartford Heath

The other two aforementioned camps also made their way, respectively, to Gravesend and Tilbury. As a show of force the entire strength was conveyed across the Thames and back within 8 hours. Reports at the time indicate this huge spectacle was witnessed by many people. The 4 divisions then marched back to Dartford Heath and were dismissed at 8.15 p.m. to great applause. "The nobility and gentry who attended (this return) were afterwards entertained by a play called 'The Recruiting Serjeant', performed by the officers and their ladies, in a large marquee; after which, the general entertained them with a supper , and some of the noble visitors did not leave the camp until Sunday".

It was on Sunday evening, 6th August 1780 that there developed a violent quarrel at the camp between a soldier of the 52nd regiment and one of the Northamptonshire militia which 'occasioned a battle in front lines'. Colonel STRAUBENZIE of the 52nd endeavoured to quell the disturbance and was 'exceedingly ill treated'. It was with difficulty that the two regiments were prevented from 'making common cause with the combatants'. One man had his ear cut off; another lost two fingers and some had several 'very dangerous wounds from swords, bayonets etc.' This was the end for the camp. The location must have made it difficult to impose strict military discipline and in September 1780, the camp broke up - to the 'infinite regret of the belles of the neighbourhood'. It is reported that their trade was greatly missed and that 'Desolation reigned around' when they had gone.

Below - British Army tent from Napoleonic era.

On the evening preceding the break up of the camp a select party of Officers were invited to take a farewell supper with the Ladies of the neighbourhood. One of the attending ladies - a Miss THORPE - reported that "they broke not the bread of cheerfulness, it was but the ghost of gaiety;- for what availed the attendance beaux, to whom our 'Good night' might be forever! and their morning salute accompanied with the groan of (moving) forges - and - still more dismal sound that of departing regiments!" It has been said that traces of this once colourful encampment could still be made out by persons walking on the heath right up until 1840 or so - some 60 years after it's demise. Holes and craters on the heath where tents, marquees and earthworks etc. once were, could still be seen.

I can certainly remember, as a boy, playing in the once abundant heather on the heath in the late 1950s / early 60s and of rolling around in the small circular indentations in evidence at the time. Presumably some of these were the remains of the above described encampments. At the time we imaginative boys thought that they were bomb craters - a relic of more recent military action. Several of the older residents from the estate, however, confirm that they were there before the last war. For generations, a favourite playing place for local children living on Maypole Estate was a hollow on the heath. This is situated on the opposite side of Denton Road to where the Rolex Watch Company is and where Maypole House once stood. As children, we always knew it as 'THE CAMP HOLE'. The late Winnie BLACKMAN stated that children in the 1920s also used this name for the hollow. Does it have some connection with the Napoleonic military encampment of 1780 ?

Bonfire Night

Maypoleman — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:42:06 CDT

E Mail from Steve Parker has started this new page . . . . . .

Talking to my Grandchildren about Guy Fawkes night, got thinking about the great nights we used to have just after the war 1946,47,48,49,50.

The kids on the Maypole (of which I was one), used to start collecting rubbish for the bonfire weeks before the fifth, the fire was situated on the edge of the heath at the top of Heathend Rd. All the Maypole residents would be involved & save their rubbish,by the time of the big night everyone would turn out for the lighting & fireworks, of which there were plenty & bangers were bangers in those days & I'm not talking sausages!! One person who needs a mention was Herbie Richardson who always had some big rockets & Roman candles, ( or were they redundant flares?). Whatever they were he always put on a good show. When the adults started to wander home we kids would start our midnight feast of baked spuds, they always tasted better than any other time.

I must also mention Mr. Pope who would give rides to the kids on his pony. Great times & I can't recall anyone getting hurt, just a few minor burns. Anyone else remember these nights. Steve Parker

From Kim Button - Well, Steve - these are my memories of the time around Guy Fawkes night . . . . .

My ‘window of time’ as a kid was between c1963 and 1968. We would start collecting for the bonfire a couple of weeks prior to the 5th. After school and at weekends we would knock on doors of the houses on the estate and ask if they had anything to burn. It wasn’t seen so much of a danger then - especially when we knew most of the residents, anyway. We would use all sorts of trolleys, contraptions and old prams to ferry the stuff over to the heath. We would always go around in little groups as some of the stuff could turn out to be quite bulky or heavy. My little gang at that time were David Richardson, Philip Read, Peter Walker, Mike Moran, Tony Smith, John Barrett, Robert Hogan, Alan and Barry Booth, Terry Warner, Michael Mckeough, Edward Ginn, Penny Smith, Alan MacLean and Philip Hayward. Most of us lived on the estate but some came from Baldwyns Park and Coldblow.

The main reason we youngsters laboured so hard was for the money we could earn ! Some residents took every opportunity to rid themselves of anything burnable (and not so burnable) and there were times when we would take complete demolished sheds, entire privet hedges, bushes, shrubs, furniture, doors, fences etc. If they were generous, the resident would give us three or four bob or thereabouts (15-20 pence in today’s money). Doesn’t seem a lot but this was more than our individual weekly pocket money - well worth it. This money would be shared out equally at the end of the day among the kids doing the job. A good Saturdays work could earn each of us about 5 shillings each (25 pence). Therefore, this was about two weeks pocket money in one day. At that time a packet of 20 cigarettes was about 3/9d - three shillings and nine pence (about 17 pence) so we felt very lucky. Sadly, some of us started smoking at 14. We felt it made us look so much older and was a really ‘trendy’ thing to do in those days. I wish I had never started.

As the bonfire grew and grew in height and girth so we would actually ‘sculpture’ it. Our ambitions normally exceeded the reality and most of the bonfires I remember had large circumference bases - in anticipation for a really high monster. So, as the 5th neared we would then gather up the looser stuff and create a thinner and higher fire. One of the greatest pleasures for us was to build little ‘camps’ in the fire. We would use all sorts of imagination and items to build our little ‘dens’. We would use wood, lino, carpet, rugs, plywood, old doors, hardboard, motor cycle sidecars - anything. Some of these habitats were quite ‘roomy’ and when lit, added to the burning process by creating open pockets allowing flames to accelerate. Some people would take advantage of the opportunity and throw old mattresses on to it - these were filled with wire springs so were not really suitable - however . . . . . put two or three on top of each other and - hey presto - you have a fantastic trampoline !

As the 5th came nearer and nearer so our collections of small fireworks grew as well. Us boys weren’t interested in the pretty stuff - we wanted bangs. Bangers were usually 1d each.

Better ones were the 2d or 3d ‘Cannons’. These were just larger bangers. The best bangs came from ‘Aerial Bombshells’. They were about 1/6d each. (7 and1/2 pence in today’s money). They were fat, dumpy bangers. Some of us crazier kids would put them into sawn off scaffold poles and ‘fire’ them. Elf and safety would have had a field day.

Below 1930s poster

The actual night of the bonfire we just couldn’t wait for it to get dark. It always seemed the ritual that ‘Buster’ from Denton Terrace had the privilege of lighting the bonfire. It would burn and burn furiously for hours, surrounded by many families all going ‘ooh and aah’ as people would light their fireworks. As Steve has said the best part was putting spuds or chestnuts in the embers.

The following day it would still be smoking and we would pile up the leftovers to make yet another fire. Great days. This practice of the bonfire on the heath ceased c1970 when Maypole School started to use the heath as their sports field. Several attempts were made to build more bonfires but they were quickly dismantled and taken away by the Council. End of an era.
　

If anyone else has any memories of this annual event please E Mail us at the site.

Memories of Steven Parker

Maypoleman — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:23:58 CDT

Bexley Hospital outing to Margate 1964 - courtesy of Steven Parker

This has shrunk as it has come from New Zealand ! Actually it is only 42kbites so enlargement won't help.

Most of the people in this photo have lived on the Maypole at some time or other.Back row L to R---- Mrs. Barrett Snr. with one of her grandchildren, Jessie Barrett (now in U.S.A.) Ray Wheeler, Louis Cruickshank, ( owned a pub in Eynsford but not now ) Steve Parker,Bill Barrett in shadow, Morris Bridges, lived where Houltons used to live, moved to Leyton Cross. John Borrell, ran the butcher shop down the dip for a while, now in Erith. Bill Proudfoot, Vic Mcdonald, lady on the end ?

Front row L to R--- Lou Proudfoot, two girls with children not sure, Ailene Parker, Joan Mcdonald (nee Barrett ) her daughter Mary standing behind her, Netta Wheeler (nee Cruickshank). behind her my son Neville, girl next to him not sure,Mavis Barrett (nee Proudfoot ) the boy not sure, my wife Valerie, & then ? ?. not bad after 44 yrs. Regards Steve

Above top of this pair - Maypole School and below that Steve's daughter Aileen at the gates of Bexley Hospital

and below - 2008

I was born in 1935 in Bexley, my parents moved with my sister & I in tow to Heathend Rd. 6 months after I was born, my grandparents having lived in Beaconsfield Rd. since before WW1. My great Aunt (my G/Ms sister) lived in Baldwyns Rd. in the house I bought after my marriage & lived until we emigrated to N.Z. in 1967. So had quite a long history of the Maypole & its people. We still live in N.Z. where we celebrated our 50th anniversary in April 2008.

I also was a member of the St. Barnabas choir as was my sister Marian(nee Parker) the thing we liked most about it was the threepence (3d.old money) that we got each time we attended but was saved for us & given out at Chritmas, if you attended all services & practices you could get the grand total of 13/6d. Do you remember? or was I the only mercenary. A few names I remember, you may know more! David, Betty & Roberta ( Cruickshank) Joan, Audrey & Barbara (Houlton) Marian & Stephen (Parker) Wendy & David (Saunders) Gordon Lennox, Micky Masters, Kenny Purkiss, Jean Peacock, Pat Flett, Pat & Hazel (Richardson) Angela Pope, Joyce Stockford, memory fails me for the rest. The girls in red & white the boys in black & white, how angelic we looked.

The church was @ the rear of Broomhills, churchgoers would enter the Cameron estate through a gate in the alley @ the back of Baldwyns Rd. & walk straight ahead for about 50 yds. The church hall was to the right running @ right angles from the church where we used to attend Sunday school. I don't remember much about Mr. Cameron except he was a little round man who wore wire framed specs, he had a short walk from the back of the house to the church where he played the organ. He must have been Dorothys grandfather? That can be confirmed by Dorothy, who by the way was in the choir & her mother was always @ church. My wife Valerie remembers a ladies church group being held in the hall once a month & Mrs. Cameron being a prime facilitator. After the church & hall were moved my daughter Ailene used to attend ballet classes at the hall, can't remember the teachers name but she lived in Baldwyns Park. Apart from organising a wedding reception for some friends of ours thats about all I remember.

Before we left for N.Z. 40yrs. ago Mrs. Cameron invited my wife & I & 3 children for afternoon tea, quite a delight, One room was a treasure trove of chiming clocks -- table , grandfather, cuckoo, the whole range. The kids were thrilled to bits when she set off the chimes of many, this was followed by the playing of a pianola?

The two photos of Mr. Pope (above) with his horse & cart, the one on the left is Beaconsfield Rd. But the photo bottom right was taken outside my family home 14 Heathend Rd. the name of the house was Homefield & can just be seen above the porch far right.

I used to deliver the paper to Maypole house, the houses in the Dell Rd. also the big house & cottage on the heath to the right of the Dell. During the war there was a unexploded bomb sticking out of the ground ( about where the people are standing in photo 1) I think it was an incendiery, can anyone else remember this??

See Steve's recollection of Bonfire Night

E Mail addresses of interested parties

Maypoleman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 18:14:43 CDT

If any of you wish to add your E Mail addresses to this site so you may be contacted by anyone out there just E Mail the Maypole History Team at maypoleontheweb@aol.com - they will be added and / or deleted at your request . This means people can contact you without having to actually sign up to Wetpaint and will widen the ability for readers to get in touch with each other. The Maypole Team already have a list of about 25 E Mail addresses but will only add them with consent.

List of new contacts being added in due course below

1. Kim Button - Maypoleman - maypoleontheweb@aol.com

2. Sheila Houlton - sheila-a.lusher@sky.com

3. Steve Parker - svparau@xtra.co.nz

4. Paul Underwood - undart@mac.com

5. Peter Walker - peterwalker4@hotmail.com

6. William Beck - williamedward42@googlemail.com

7. ANGIE ASHDOWN - angie.ashdown@ntlworld.com

8. Frankie Gemmell - franreg05@btinternet.com I would be very pleased to have my e-mail address added to the as I would like very much to hear from anyone that remembers me!!!

9. Perran Newman - Pvlnewman@aol.com

10. Yvonne Kerrisk - bpsmiles43@hotmail.com

11. Tony and Marie Helyar - ahelyar@tiscali.co.uk

12. John Burton (Maypole School c1943-1948) anjburton@hotmail.co.uk

Places - the journey from Bexley

Maypoleman — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 15:01:08 CDT

Most of the below images are from the Bexley Archive and the copyright belongs to them.

Notes from Audrey HUGHES nee JACKSON

Bexley Local Studies & Archive Centre

Above - the path from Wansunt / St Marys Roads towards Bexley Village

below as it looked c 1994

and how it looks today . . . . . .

Above - the path from St Marys Road where it joined the path from Wansunt Road - looking towards Bexley. This has been known as 'The Snicket' (Perran Newman) and the 'Chicken Run' (Local name c 1950s)

and how it looks today . . . . . . .

Above - Date c.1936 Description Hill Crescent is at the top of Vicarage Road, Bexley where it meets the Dartford Road

Below - Dartford Road c1900 junction with St Marys and Wansunt. We are informed that the odd looking construction to the left was to do with gas regulation and was a type of 'sub station / valve'.
Also, enlarging the new Wansunt / St Marys development sign doesn't really make the content any clearer - sadly.

and below c1994

Below c1906

Above - Date 1906 Description Dartford Road, Bexley. 'Mount Eagle' behind the gates ? The area is known as Cold Blow. The view is taken from Wansunt Road (immediately on the left) looking along Dartford Road towards Baldwyns and Dartford Mental Hospital. Children and pony and trap in the road. Correspondence and stamp on reverse of coloured copy postcard. The wall facing the road in the above is the same wall as seen in the below two pictures.

Below how it looked c 1994

Above - Date 1906 Description Dartford Road, Bexley. The area is known as Cold Blow. The view is looking towards Baldwyns and Bexley Mental Hospital. Correspondence and stamp on reverse of both copies.

Above - same view as below.

Below -

Date 1908 Description Dartford Road, Bexley. The area is known as Cold Blow. The view is taken looking towards Bexley Village. Two small children, policeman and pony and trap in the road. Correspondence and stamp on reverse of postcard.

Below c 1994 . . . . .

Below - the 'Dip' c early 1950s

Below - the 'Dip' towards Bexley Hospital
Date 1913 Description The Dip, Near Bexley.

and as it looks now . . . . .

Below - Title Dartford Road, Bexley Date c.1950 Description Dartford Road looking towards Cold Blow and Bexley village. Baldwyns Park is the road to the left.

Coal Tax Posts - as seen in the above three images . . . .
Courtesy of Wikipedia . . . . . .

Coal sold in the City of London had been taxed since mediaeval times and, as it was all brought in by sea to one or two riverside wharfs, the collection of the duty had been relatively easy. A similar duty was collected on all wine landed in London. By the nineteenth century, however, there was increasing trade by canal and rail, and various acts of parliament extended the catchment area to a radius of about twenty miles from London. The City is a small (one square mile) but influential part of London and in 1851 an Act was passed specifying the points, far beyond its boundaries, where the collections could be made. Marker posts, inscribed with this legal authority, were erected. About two hundred have survived. Following enlargement of the Metropolitan Police District (which, paradoxically, did not include the City of London) in 1861 a further Act was passed and new marker posts were set to show the boundary inside which the duty was payable. Most of these later posts survive.
Not all of the points were staffed by tax collectors but on well-used routes with a heavy coal traffic, such as on the Grand Union Canal at Grove Park, Hertfordshire, permanent toll houses were built. [1][2] In other cases local coal merchants or, after the bulk of the traffic had passed to the railway, the railway companies calculated the sums due and passed the money to the Corporation. The railway companies were allowed to offset the coal they used for their engines, but only when employed on coal trains.
The erection of these posts was very much a last ditch attempt to retain the tax in the face of growing opposition. The tax had been running for at least two hundred years but within twenty years of the posts going up it was abolished. The Industrial Revolution was in full swing, London was expanding rapidly. The outer suburbs were becoming towns and their residents beginning to resent paying a tax which had very little direct benefit for them. One extreme case is Caterham which lay (and still lies) outside the Metropolitan Police District (MPD) but if coals were to be brought there by rail they had to pass through the MPD and presumably were subject to the tax.
The powers to extract these taxes were abolished in 1889, notwithstanding the City had fought against the abolition moves with some underhand tactics: a parliamentary select committee sitting in 1887 found that signatures on a petition in support of keeping the tax had been forged.[3]

Maypole of the 1950s

Maypoleman — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 03:24:00 CDT

This page has been constructed from donations by Maypolechippy - real name to follow in the near future we hope !

The below images can be seen a little more clearly in their original pdf format if you go to the bottom of the page and click on the relevant underlined title

In an E Mail from Maypolechippy "Having left the Maypole in my early twenties (when I got married) and having lived in Canada for the past 42 years, I had naturally lost touch with most things Maypole. My recently widowed sister (who still lives in the Bexley area) visited my wife and me this summer and we had a good time reminiscing about life on the Maypole in the 40’s and 50’s. We had great fun trying to name the other children living on the Maypole at that time, which led to us to develop a list of names and best guesses of their addresses. The result is a sketch of the Maypole as we remember it from that time and an accompanying list of names. We were also interested to see Stephen Parker’s Sunday School Outing photo of which I also have a copy. We tried to fill in the missing names in Stephen’s photo and made a record of them. I would like to share these memories with you in the hope that in their small way they add another snippet the ever evolving recorded history of the Maypole".

In an E Mail from Maypolechippy

"Having left the Maypole in my early twenties (when I got married) and having lived in Canada for the past 42 years, I had naturally lost touch with most things Maypole.

My recently widowed sister (who still lives in the Bexley area) visited my wife and me this summer and we had a good time reminiscing about life on the Maypole in the 40’s and 50’s. We had great fun trying to name the other children living on the Maypole at that time, which led to us to develop a list of names and best guesses of their addresses. The result is a sketch of the Maypole as we remember it from that time and an accompanying list of names.

We were also interested to see Stephen Parker’s Sunday School Outing photo of which I also have a copy. We tried to fill in the missing names in Stephen’s photo and made a record of them. I would like to share these memories with you in the hope that in their small way they add another snippet the ever evolving recorded history of the Maypole".

Kindly donated by 'Maypolechippy' are three attachments - and very well produced they are too, we might add !

Click on any of them below and you will be able to see their content in the original PDF image format. As you will see they have been created in great detail and are invaluable to those who wish to recall or discover.

We look forward with great relish to further contributions from Maypolechippy.

Plan of the Maypole Housing Estate c1950

Names of residents living on the housing estate

Sunday School Outing with coach in the background - photo with names