June issue - Magazine - Page 21
Glenside
News
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AS WE WERE
Snippets from local newspapers
about our villages 100 years ago
Grantham Journal
October 27th 1927
Castle Bytham Parish Council Meeting
Some discussion took place about a bier [a
wooden frame on wheels to carry a cofn] for
the parish. The chairman, Dr H N Turner, said
they were undoubtedly behind the times with
regard to a bier, but where was the money to
come from. The Rev Lawson said they could
not afford to take all of the money out of the
rates, but he suggested a public subscription
be opened to see what amount they would
get. He would further suggest that the biers at
Bourne and Thurlby be seen before they ask
for estimates. Mr Jackson moved and Mr
Plaskett seconded that estimates be obtained
from carpenters in the surrounding villages,
and this was agreed to.
Some very strong comments were made
in reference to the drainage of the new
Council houses, the chairman saying it was
most unsatisfactory. It appeared the tenants
had taken the houses without any information
as to cleaning out the cesspit. Councillor
Andrew, who is a tenant of one of the houses,
said it was absolutely disgraceful. All eight of
the houses drained their refuse water into one
cesspit, and after a heavy rain, the lth forced
the lid off the pit. None of the tenants would
agree to cleaning it out, and it was a nuisance
to everyone who went to the gate. It was
decided that the Bourne Rural District
Council be asked to do something about the
matter at once.
Grantham Journal
January 5th 1929
John Johnson of Little Bytham pleaded guilty to
stealing a quantity of growing mistletoe to the
value of £1, the property of the Earl of Ancaster
at Grimsthorpe, on December 15th. Arthur
Green, a gamekeeper, stated that he saw the
defendant pulling bunches of mistletoe off the
trees. The defendant said he did not see any
notice prohibiting the taking of mistletoe and
he had only done what others had done, and
he did not think there was any harm in it.
Superintendent Dufn said that the Earl of
Ancaster had only taken this action in order to
bring to the notice of the public that trees on
the Estate were not to be interfered with. The
Chairman, ning the defendant 10 shillings
[50p], said future similar offences would be
more severely dealt with.
RB
LOCAL INTEREST
War Memories
Following on from his article about V E Day last month,
Arthur Chambers recalls the wartime days
in and around our villages
This area was very important during the war and the community certainly
played its part. There were three shops in Castle Bytham, and four pubs, at
that time and it was a hub for everyone in the area. A lot of people worked
making munitions in Grantham. Lime produced at the quarries supported the
war effort and the farms kept going throughout to produce food for everyone.
The bomb dump at Morkery Woods supplied bombs for all the North
Lincolnshire Bomber Command stations. Here in Castle Bytham we had our
own Home Guard and Royal Observer Corps post, where my father kept
watch in shifts.
The army camp at Angel Wells was also very important. The American
soldiers stationed there were in the first wave of troops into Normandy on DDay. They were dropped by air from North Witham aerodrome at one minute
past midnight on that day.
So many things happened in wartime. I was leaving school at 12 o'clock
for dinner one day and as I was just coming out of the school porch, a plane
came very low, right over the school. It was a Dornier DO17 German bomber.
It was a very cloudy day and I think he had dropped down to find a reference
point to establish his location. A few minutes after that there were explosions
heard and we knew he was bombing Grantham.
Another day we were up at Lawn Wood, over at the far end, when we
suddenly heard machine gun fire close to the railway. A Junkers JU88 was
machine gunning a train going south. A few minutes later the plane turned and
came back and machine gunned a train going north. There were several
injured in that incident and the engine stoker and a soldier were killed. Until
they altered the bridge at Careby you could still the bullet holes that were
made in the stonework.
One of the events I remember vividly was the Coventry bombing. The
planes were coming over Castle Bytham on their way to Coventry. It was
moonlight and they switched off all the searchlights and they grounded all the
fighters from Wittering. My father came off duty from the Royal Observer
Corps at midnight. Mother had put us under the kitchen table and Father took
me out to the yard to watch the planes. You could see them in the moonlight,
German planes coming back and forwards for hours. I remember my Dad
saying, “They are bombing Coventry, you can go to bed, you'll be safe here.”
Of course, a lot of local people were in the armed forces. Some that went
to war didn't come back and I remember a few of them. Victor Crawford was
a Lancaster pilot who was shot down over Belgium. He had been in Canada
for nine months' training and came home on leave before joining his squadron.
I think he'd only completed three or four operations when he was shot down
by a night fighter returning from a raid.
I remember a couple of days before he was killed, a Lancaster came over
very low in the daytime. I'd never seen a Lancaster fly so low over the village.
Victor's father was out in the fields up by Lawn Wood and something came
out of that airplane and dropped in the field. His father went and picked it up
and I think it was a message from Victor. Within a couple of days of that he
was killed. The field where it happened is between the fishponds at St Martins
and Lawn Wood and it's now owned by the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust.
We lost other villagers, too. Alistair Tuner, the doctor's son, was killed on
a hospital ship at Dunkirk while he was on deck treating the wounded. Mr
Burton, who lived in the cottages along the High Street, had a son who never
came back from being imprisoned by the Japanese and one of the Keeley boys
also didn't come back.
The baker's son Fred Smith, who was a 2nd lieutenant, was killed while
on patrol in the push through France. He was out on no-man's land when the
fog lifted and he and his companions were exposed and couldn't get back to
their trenches.
We owe a debt of gratitude to those young men who gave their lives for
our freedom.
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