Story Search Results

Suits you sir! #24

...ck in the day and I believe he did his training in the Tower of London - there are still modern armourers today who work for the military or the Police and look after all the weapons. My dad asked him to make reproduction pieces of armour and helmets so he could swap them with the real thing.  The plan was that he would swap things over when my mum had gone out but as there were always banquet staff wandering around the house, that wasn’t possible.  However, we came up with a cunning plan!  As we were always coming home in the early hours from parties, it seemed a good idea for us to swap the armour over in the dead of night whilst everyone else was in bed....

The War Years and Beyond #38

...in those days never left the cities and towns where they lived and often didn’t know what a cow looked like in real life!  To see all the lawns and woods at the Hall must have been incredible for them although I’m not sure if they were allowed to wander around the grounds. Two of these youngsters returned to the Hall in the mid-1980s and spoke to my mum about the kindness they received from the family.  They also told her about the ‘secret airfield’ hidden away in a copse behind the ha-ha wall (the wall separating the bottom of the grounds and the deer park).   Apparently aircraft were kept here in readiness for action, it being a Satellite Landing...

Suits you sir! #23

...ck in the day and I believe he did his training in the Tower of London - there are still modern armourers today who work for the military or the Police and look after all the weapons. My dad asked him to make reproduction pieces of armour and helmets so he could swap them with the real thing.  The plan was that he would swap things over when my mum had gone out but as there were always banquet staff wandering around the house, that wasn’t possible.  However, we came up with a cunning plan!  As we were always coming home in the early hours from parties, it seemed a good idea for us to swap the armour over in the dead of night whilst everyone else was in bed....

The War Years and Beyond #40

...in those days never left the cities and towns where they lived and often didn’t know what a cow looked like in real life! To see all the lawns and woods at the Hall must have been incredible for them although I’m not sure if they were allowed to wander around the grounds. Two of these youngsters returned to the Hall in the mid-1980s and spoke to my mum about the kindness they received from the family. They also told her about the ‘secret airfield’ hidden away in a copse behind the ha-ha wall (the wall separating the boundary of the grounds and the deer park). Apparently aircraft were kept here in readiness for action, it being a Satellite Landing Groun...

Ventures New! #10

...VENTURES NEW We were now in our third year at Hoar Cross Hall and our lives were always busy keeping on top of the weeds and general upkeep of the house. My dad expected us children to help as much as possible, which we hated, and much of our time was spent trying to hide from him to get out of doing the chores. But sometimes we didn’t mind and we happily pulled an old trolley into the woods every now and then to collect wood for the fires and sometimes as a family we would spend a day clearing parts of the woods and grounds. My mum had hired a lady from the village to help with the housework and we had also taken on a retired chap called Mr Hickman to do som...

More Tea Vicar? #12

...Life at Hoar Cross Hall was always busy but during the long summer holidays it was easy to get bored. As there was no public transport from Hoar Cross and no other families living nearby, we three children had to make our own entertainment and we were always having adventures and getting up to mischief – a bit like the Famous Five but without a dog! We would roam around the village or explore the basement. My dad was a hoarder and had kept all sorts of stuff over the years including gas masks and field phones from World War 2. The old Servants Hall was now my dad’s workshop and he spent a lot of time down there restoring antiques to sell. He had one of the f...