Community Articles
Memories of Wotton
My name is Glenys Godson (née Adams) and my parents, Ben and Joyce Adams kept The Kings Arms public house in Ellerncroft Road.
I have just visited the Wotton website and I must say I congratulate everyone involved in producing this gem. It has brought back so many memories of when I lived in Wotton as a child. My name is Glenys Godson (née Adams) and my parents, Ben and Joyce Adams kept The Kings Arms public house in Ellerncroft Road. I lived there from 1950 until 1960, attending The Chipping Primary School. The pub is now a private house. I still visit Wotton, although only occasionally and recently met up with my first-ever friend, Anne Wytchard, who I used to live next door to.
Miss Burnett was the Headmistress at The Chipping when my sister Jackie and I attended and after Miss Burnett retired Mrs Tranter took over. About 1959 I made friends with a girl called Binny Foster, whose father had just become the Headmaster at Katherine Lady Berkeley’s school and we had some great times together. I was always at her house; the Headmaster’s house, which was in The Chipping, was enormous, with loads of bedrooms and little passageways and a set of back stairs which we used to sneak out of the house when we were supposed to be in. The garden was massive too and stretched right back up to Haw Street. It was so large that they were able to have a tennis court, unheard of in those days!
I liked school most of the time but as was usual in the 1950s it was strictly run and also being a church school religion took up a large part of the syllabus.
Before Anne moved we played together every day after school and at the weekends we used to go to the playing fields which I think were on the corner of New Road. There were swings, an Ocean Wave (Witches Hat) and a roundabout. Sometimes we used to go up Wotton Hill via a little path we called the Nip Nap and sit on the seat at the top; what ever we did the sun always seemed to be shining. Behind our houses there was a Children’s Home called Dryleaze. I don’t know what the house is used for now but the grounds have been swallowed up by houses. Anne and I used to sneak into the grounds to play. There were huge trees lining the driveway and a massive ‘island’ in the middle – probably just a very large, raised shrubbery but to us it was a magical place to act out our adventures, always in fear of being caught.
I remember a shop in the High Street, owned by a Mr Morley which was packed to the ceiling with all sorts of stuff; he could never have done a stocktake as it would have taken him all week!
Sunday afternoons Jackie and I were sent off to Sunday School at Tabernacle Pitch; the schoolroom was opposite. I don’t think I particularly enjoyed it but it gave our mother a couple of hours peace when she could listen to Concert Hour on the radio.
Our cousins, Robert & Christine Dingley lived at the bottom of Ludgate Hill at a house called Bryn Aber and our parents were very close. When I was ten my Dad, who worked at Berkeley Power Station, transferred to the one at Dungeness in Kent and so my contact with Wotton was more or less lost.
I’d be interested to know if anyone has heard what became of Fiona ‘Binny’ Foster? I’d also love to hear from anyone who was in my class at that time: Cynthia Jones (who I think was a distant relative), Jane Grimes, who still lives in Nibley I think, Vivienne Fraser, Gillian Cathles, Beryl and Jean Jenkinson, twins from one of the farms, Robin Hale or Geraldine Adamson, anyone really.
By accident, I made contact with Angela Stowers some years ago and we still correspond each Christmas. Her cousin Sybil Crossman was from the Durn family although Sybil lived in Dursley and she lives just around the corner from me! Angela moved to Stroud.
The place where a person first lives is always special and I have so many memories of Wotton which one day I will get into some semblance of order. From Kent, where I attended the County Grammar School we moved up to Cheshire and I went to the Cheshire School of Art & Design. Now, married with two children and two grandchildren I work as a Graphic Designer for a printing company.
Anyone like to contact, my address is: glengodson@plumley1971.fsnet.co.uk