Memories of ‘Forties and Fifties’ Around Ongar

Whilst I cannot claim to be an old resident of Ongar, I have had, in the past, some connections, in fact quite a few, my late cousin, Daphney Luck and her husband Ray lived at 'Trees' Shelley with their son Peter and daughter, Diana ("Diddy"). Ray was the Council Surveyor and Fire Chief during the war and went on to Harlow and finally as the first Director of Technical Services at Uttlesford District Council.

I came to Stanford Rivers to live for a year, - next door literally to the famous Airman Neville Browning and his son John, with Albert and Grace Woodrow, whilst I spent the year working for W.F. Hinman at Murrel Farm as a pre Writtle College student, my workmates at Murrels farm included Charlie Champion of Toothill, Victor and Charlie Pragnell and former German P.O.W. Kirt, who was the Cowman - a man whose capacity for hardwork I have never seen the likes of before or since. I well remember the sound of John Brownings Crop Dryer, driven by a single cylinder John Deer Vintage tractor, "Pom, Pom, Pom" day and night, and his fleet of Ex WWII American Army 6x4 heavy trucks going by, loaded to the sky with Sugar Beat for Felstead factory - I don't know what modern day vehicle inspectors would have made of them or the huge loads carried, they would have had a fit on the spot I think. Years later I used to often meet John Browning in Cambridge Market by chance.

I remember one severe snow storm too, it was mid-March 1952, a blizzard raged all the Saturday night and by the Sunday morning, like the Ongar correspondent's experience in the last January issue, all was totally quiet as I looked out of my lodgings bedroom window to see the road in front and as far as one could see up and down, blocked by deep drifts.

My great Aunt, Maud Kibble, mother to Daphney Luck, was a great favourite of mine as a child, me the only survivor of my immediate family in the London Blitz of December 1940, "Kibby" as she was known, was kindness itself, her last independent home was a flat in the Rectory at Ongar, on the East side of the road out of Ongar towards Shelley, she took me to London on V.E.Day where we stood in the Mall for the big Parade, and then, after this amazing experience, to some lodgings for the night and then, as guests, to Westminster Abbey to next day for the thanksgiving service, I was in the pews on the mid left, next to the Aisle, where King and Queen, Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret passed right by me, within three or four feet, as an eleven year old by this time, I remember the sheer beauty of the two Princesses to this day.

Whilst working at Stanford Rivers in 1951-52 I played football for Toothill most Saturdays in the season, scored one or two goals, but found that hard farm work during the week was not the way to keep fit for football, for unlike when I was playing at Chigwell School the seasons before my legs seemed to feel as they had lumps of lead attached, and I never achieved the speed and fitness on the fields at Chigwell, not so long before, or ever again.

My own war experiences were far more than most kids, but did not involve Ongar, I was pulled out alive from under the wreckage of my home, survived a near miss in Suffolk where I was evacuated, from a crashing Pathfinder Lancaster which failed to take off on the first heavy night raid on the German Baltic Coast, then from two German VI Doodlebugs, and one V2 at Theydon Bois, and must be one of the few people alive today to have seen tons of earth, mud and trees falling back to earth after the huge explosion of the V2 rocket just behind Woodland Way, Theydon Bois, on the edge of land (now the Golf Course extension), in July - August 1944.

Now aged 76, I am quietly retired up here in the Northern Isles, where I have lived for the past twenty years.