Tag Archives: Thorley

Peter Smith: Thorley 1950s, North View

Jean Storie, sitting on the North View gate of her Hillier grandparents’ house.Barn behind .

Snail racing was popular, the snails could always be found behind the grass at the base of the barn wall opposite our house. To avoid argument about whose snail was whose we got round to marking them with a dab of paint, red, blue and white. Some weeks later when we were looking in the usual place for some snails for another race we found that the ones with paint on had somehow made it back to their home completely unaided. After this I made a point of letting my snail go after the racing was finished in our garden and then over a period of days going out and looking for it to see where it was. Sure enough after a couple of weeks or so it reappeared in the usual place by the barn. Having done this a number of times it became clear to me that the snails saw the barn wall as their home, and did not want to live anywhere else, which was interesting, at the time!

Mike Smith, Mary Henderson: Thorley, Squibb family 1950s

Elsie Squibb wasn’t always popular. When we used to sit on the bank writing down the number plates of the cars coming through – and there weren’t many, – she’d come out and complain, and say we were making too much noise; she needed some peace and quiet.
On one afternoon she had brought home a nice box of cakes from Wrays Bakery in Newport. Mike Henderson kicked a football and it knocked into the box, and the cakes weren’t improved…. Mike Smith b 1951

North View, Thorley

We all used to be so envious of Phyllis Squibb. She seemed to have all the things our parents couldn’t buy us. Years later, she said how she’d envied our freedom. Her Dad used to insist on meeting her and walking her home, even from Wellow Institute.
Poor Els., her bark was worse than her bite. If you were in real trouble, she’d be there to help. Mary Henderson b 1954

Mary Henderson, Margery Henderson: Thorley 1940s

Yarmouth Common

Margery Henderson, my Aunt Marge, Dad’s sister, has lived in Canada since she married a Canadian soldier in WWII and went out as a War Bride. She’s in her nineties now and has children and grandchildren there.

Recently she told me she wished she’d never gone out. She can remember going across the Common in an Army wagon with her husband and couple more of the Canadian soldiers who were over here, and thinking, ‘What have I done?’ But she said in those days, you didn’t admit it. Her mum would have been horrified.
Her father, Vic Henderson, my grandfather, came off his bike through Wilmingham one frosty morning, coming back from coastguard duties. They thought he’d cracked his ribs, had this terrible pain, and Marge was sent for in Canada. Her husband worked for Canadian Pacific, up in the logging camps right up north. It took her two days to get to a train to take her to get a boat and they were becalmed coming across. It took her two or three weeks to get home. When her mum met her at Liverpool she thought, ‘Why’s Mum meeting me?’ By that time he’d died, but her mum, my Gran Henderson, didn’t tell her till they’d travelled back to the Island.
Mary Henderson b 1954

Eileen and Peter Smith: Thorley, Blacksmith’s cottages

When Ralph came back from the war, he didn’t want an indoor job so he went to work at Wellow Farm, and we lived in one half of Blacksmith’s Cottages. That didn’t last long. Ralph had arranged to play cricket one Saturday when they’d been told they would have the afternoon off. The foreman changed his mind and told him he’d have to stay on, haymaking. Ralph told him the hay wasn’t fit, and he’d committed to play in the team. The foreman told him to collect his cards, and we had to move out of the tied cottage. We moved back to stay with my parents in Yarmouth, and applied for a Council House. Eileen Smith nee Lansdowne b 1921

Ralph Smith as a boy, with Mr. Kingswell of Wellow Farm in the rickyard with lurchers ready for hare coursing, 1920s

My earliest memory of Thorley is from when we lived at Blacksmiths Cottages, the one nearest the church. We didn’t have an inside toilet there, only an Elsan chemical toilet in the shed. As I write this I can smell it even though 63 years have gone by since I last used it!

Blacksmith’s cottages 2013

Peter Smith b 1946

Eileen Smith, Mike Smith: Thorley, Blacksmith’s Lane

Blacksmith’s Lane, that was the original bridle path, went right through the copse down by the side of the two cottages, across the stream. Hec Stone’s – it must have been his grandfather – said he used to drive a coach and horses up through the copse. The bridlepath was still up through the copse… you’ve still got the dip. Eileen Smith nee Lansdowne b 1921
The bridleway went up through the copse and over across the railway line and right through to the other road. Even when we were kids where they used to go across the stream, it was all hard gravel there. You could always get across there because it was shallower. Mike Smith b 1951

Mary Henderson: Thorley, Blacksmith’s Lane 1940s

Blacksmiths Lane

Cottage in Blacksmith’s Lane, Thorley

My Great Gran Henderson lived in the cottage by the stream, on the corner of Blacksmith’s Lane, the one up the village side. So you had Hec Stone, whose father had been Blacksmith in the forge opposite, his family lived one side, then Great Gran Henderson came to rent hers, when James Enoch died. He’d been Chief Coastguard in Yarmouth. She moved down to Cowes eventually to a daughter, then Gran and Grandad took it on.

Gran Henderson was very strict. The children used to be over the fields playing and she used to blow a whistle to get them back, and everyone said: there’s Henderson’s whistle. She was quite horrible really because she used to put them under the stairs in a dark cupboard. Marge was asthmatic and she said: I’ll never forgive my mum for doing that. Mary Hendersonb 1954

Pam Bone: Thorley, St. Swithin’s Church, 1950s, 1960s

Thorley Church, St. Swithin’s 2010s

As a family we would go to the local church regularly and when I was older I was in the Choir. I went to the local Sunday School run by Miss Pearce and I collected the required number of religious stamps until I had enough to get a free bible.

The church was quite a significant focal point of the village. It was also very significant for me when I started school because it was where I knew the conductor rang the bell for us to get off the bus opposite our house when we came home from school. I used to worry that he would forget to do this and I would be carried off to the wrong stop. Pam Bone nee Cotton b 1948

Kitty Pearce: Thorley, St Swithin’s Church, 1920s -1990s

Kitty Pearce with her choir used to and put on nativity plays every year which packed the church out. She played the organ in Thorley for 50 years, right from when my mum was at school. I think she was one of the oldest organists ever; over 90.
Mary Henderson b 1954

Miss Kitty Pearce BEM was organist at St Swithin’s for 50 years. She retired in 1994 at 91, and died in 1998

Eileen Smith: Thorley, St Swithin’s churchyard 1960s

St Swithin’s Church, Thorley

Thorley churchyard spring

When Bert Welstead got too old to be able to look after the churchyard, Ralph took over from him and carried on the good job of looking after the wildflowers that make Thorley special. He was asked by visitors on one occasion why he didn’t keep the grass mown shorter; it looked untidy. He didn’t think much of them; they wanted St Swithin’s churchyard to look like a garden lawn. Eileen Smith nee Lansdowne b 1921 ( Thorley’s churchyard is recognised for its wealth of wildflowers, and the care that has been taken to conserve these through the years.)

Pam Bone, Peter Smith: Thorley, trains 1950s

I can remember being able to see the train go by in the distance from my bedroom window and sometimes we would walk down Hill Place Lane to see it go past.
Pam Bone nee Cotton b 1948

In September 1953 Mum, Dad, Mike and I walked over the fields at about tea time to wave to the last train from Yarmouth to Newport as it came past, being pulled as usual by a steam engine. A few years later the track was ripped up by contractors and it was interesting to go and watch them removing the various parts: long lengths of metal railway line, heavy metal chairs, fishplates, bolts and sleepers, all of which were taken away, until all that was left was a shingle track where the railway line had once been. Peter Smith b 1946

Yarmouth and Thorley Voices

Learn about the history of Yarmouth and Thorley from the people who have lived it