FRAMILODE PASSAGE – 1940S TO 1950S
Congratulations to Michael Ayland for stirring happy memories of my childhood home and of former friends and neighbours. It was in 1940 that my father became licensee of the Darell Arms at Framilode Passage. We came from Minsterworth where he had been a builder and carpenter. My earliest memories are of going back to Minsterworth in the ferry boat with him to collect his long fruit-picking ladders which lay nicely along the flat-bottomed boat. It was summer and the river was low and calm as we glided over the shallow water covering Longney Sands.
The ferry was an important part of life at Framilode. It had been an important crossing point for centuries where earlier ferry boats had been capable of transporting men and animals. In our time, the usual fee-paying passengers were cyclists and if they arrived at low water, father would scull the boat with one oar from the stern and deposit people and bicycles on Rodley Sands. Sometimes patrons had to wait for high water and then would be taken from one bank to the opposite bank. On lovely summer days, local children were taken across to build sandcastles and play or swim in the shallow water. It was our very own seaside. People came to both banks on such days by foot, cycle, family car, and even by bus to Rodley sometimes.
When the ferry boat or our own little dinghy needed new planking, father would get them out of the water, take them to the farmyard, and make them good as new. He was a practical man and he knew the ways of the river. On busy days he would employ a neighbour to operate the ferry for him.
My school was the Church of England school opposite the Post Office and Stella Gower’s general store. Sarah Griffiths also taught me in the infants’ class, then my teacher in the middle class was Yvonne Wathen, and finally Mr R. H. Hancock was my teacher in the top class where we were warm in winter thanks no doubt to the same old stove that Michael recalls.
I remember being fascinated in Mrs Wathen’s class when we were given material to make things by hand. Phyllis Gardener and I put our initials on our bags – mine was P.A.L. and hers were P.E.G. I remember so many girls and boys from those days and sad to think of those no longer with us.
School dinners were served at the back of the top class and yes, Mrs Keable our dinner lady, is also fondly remembered. In Mrs Griffith’s class the windows were taped but no-one explained why and my memories of the war were my mother’s obsession with “black-out” curtain material. Better still the window sills were full of jars of flowers, we often took flowers to school. Flowering was an occupation girls loved to do. Oh! the primroses that bloomed in Overton Lane!
The Darell Arms had been built by the Darell family in 1878 on the site of the former Passage Inn. My parents took the premises after Mrs. Honey whose husband Eric had been the licensee. There was a large room called the Club Room and a big sideboard containing all kinds of catering items which Mrs Honey must have made good use of. She no doubt used the Tea Garden between the pub and Ayliffe’s mill. In our time only some of the chalet-type buildings had survived in the tea garden
My sister organised a Christmas party for the children of our customers one year, Mr Phelps from Upper Framilode acted as Father Christmas. Every child had a present and there was a lovely Christmas tree. My father used the club room to store boxes of fruit and it was also a depot for blackberries picked by everyone around for despatch to a jam factory.
Michael Ayland remembered Mr and Mrs Ayliffe and their son at The Mill. I was a regular visitor there and often invited to tea in the room overlooking the river. There was always junket on the table, a concoction something between todays yoghourt and jelly. The house had four-poster bedrooms and one night I was invited to go and see Mrs Ayliffe’s sister Miss Harper, who was in bed and poorly. There were curtains around her bed, the room was dim and old-fashioned. It was like something from Dickens. I was not too worried and I was used to going to bed via our back staircase and carrying a candle.
My father made cider at The Mill in those days, courtesy of Mr. Tom Ayliffe. It was quite an occasion but I guess the wives in the area could tell when their men had been drinking it. Local wives and children made good use of the low wall in front of the Darell on summer days, they sat there and enjoyed their drinks taken out to them by their men. When a tin of Smith’s crisps arrived, they were sold in a flash as only one tin came at a time. There were no sweets or chocolate but when the first chocolate wafers came -what a treat they were. It was war time of course.
When Lockdown happened, I turned my attention to my old home, gathered my memories and photographs, and wondered who had lived there and at the Passage Inn before us. Thereby hangs another tale. It is curious that the Darell Arms, ferry and lands were just over 12 acres in the periods of Mr and Mrs Honey and us, but the Passage House in the 1740s was 22 acres and 3 boats, in 1812 it was over 17 acres (6 of which were in Westbury parish – presumably in Rodley). By 1839 the inn had become freehold and John Fryer’s widow Caroline had died there. Here, my family make a connection because Caroline’s daughter Hannah had married a successful mariner named Edward Warren, and Edward is on my husband’s extended Warren family tree. His grandmother Maria Warren, born in Saul, married his grandfather William Daw son of a trow owner, also with the name Wiliam Daw, who had traded in the lower Severn and coastal trade.
Pam Daw 2023
Goto: Geoffrey Howard of Priding
