大象传媒

My Father worked very hard during the war,as I have previously said he worked at the Times newspaper. Whenever he had a holiday due or even when he had a long weekend, which occurred when his weekly rest days coincided with a weekend, he would be off fishing.He belonged to the fairly exclusive Red Spinners club.They had a lake at Cheshunt in Hertfordshire, also a stretch of the river Stour in Dorset. This was at Sturminster Marshall. As travel to the coast was no longer possible we used to take our holidays there. We stayed at the Red Lion a lovely old country pub. Travel in wartime was difficult, trains were packed with servicemen and women and we often had to stand in the corridor for much of the journey.Mother and I would leave home in New Southgate at 6.30am and travel by bus and tube to Waterloo where we met Dad,who stayed at the Times after finishing about 2am.We then caught the train from platform 13 at about 8.15.Then the train would wend its way through the badly bombed area south of the Thames finally reaching the open country.Sometimes we were lucky and found a seat at Basingstoke. Then we reached Winchester, then past the aerodrome at Eastleigh and came to Southampton Central. The station here was a terrible sight! not a pane of glass remained intact,there were bullet holes in the walls and it was a scene of complete devastation. The train always stopped here for about 10 minutes,the station is right by the docks on the edge of the Solent. I was always terrified that we would be attacked by an enemy airccraft. All railway carriages had this notice"In event of air attack lay on the floor.In case of gas attack do not touch the outside of the train" I used to read this and imagine the worst! Even to this day 60 years on I always avoid Southampton if I can.Then about 3 hours after leaving Waterloo we arrived at Wimbourne.Usually we had to wait about an hour in the quaint old square for a bus to take us the last 5 miles to the village.The bus dropped us at "Miss Joys" a sweetshop come post office run by the aforementioned Miss Joy. A short walk to the Red Lion and we were there.The pub was run by Frank and Amy Frampton, Frank was a tubby man straight out of Thomas Hardy, Amy was a cockney small and lively like a sparrow. Amy's Mother lived in a cottage near the pub rented at a rent of 25p a week.It was one of a row of the oldest thatched cottages in England sadly damaged by fire in 1976 but happily restored.

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