I
was born in London (Clapham, actually; South London Hospital for Women &
Children, precisely) and lived in Wandsworth until I was five years old. Then –
as result of a rather too-longish story for here and now – my family moved to a
row of quaint cottages ('Heath Cottages' they were called) in
Chislehurst.
Twelve-point-something-miles
from London and at that time (1953) still a rural village with a stables, a
market garden, all those sweetly antique facilities (butchers, bakers,
fishmongers, ironmongers, grocers and greengrocers, a rather good library, a
flea-pit cinema with a corrugated roof in which – if it rained – it was too
noisy to hear the film) and – my chief delight – a blacksmith who, whenever I
looked in to watch him shoeing horses at his forge, would give me old
horse-shoes.
After
the dull streets of Wandsworth, Chislehurst was green and idyllic: a cricket
ground, woods and ponds (caves, if you dared to go down there) and a local
celebrity-tramp, 'Smokey Joe', who lived in the woods in an improvised 'house'
made of old blankets and tattered lace curtains!
The
village had a Victorian, 'Tudor-style', arched Water Tower (requiring use of a
driver-controlled one-way traffic flow accessed by nothing bigger than a single-decker
bus), a village sign depicting Queen Elizabeth I, in 159, knighting Sir Thomas
Walsingham IV (patron to Christopher Marlowe) and a cockpit, once used for
cock-fights but, mercifully no longer in service!
I
was educated at the village Church of England Primary School (dedicated to the
original Father Christmas, St Nicholas, whose associated Parish Church
contained the earthly remains of the aforementioned Tho. Walsingham); and,
having triumphantly failed my 11+ examination, Chislehurst Secondary School for
Boys.
I
attended, at various times in my variegated spiritual life, no fewer than four
out of the five local churches (two 'high', one 'low' and one Methodist,
although not in that order) and I worked in the village at the Local Council
Education offices and much later – after many other non-village jobs – sitting
at my typewriter as a freelance writer banging out scripts for the BBC. By
then, of course, Chislehurst was no longer so much a rural beauty-spot as a
dormitory for London commuters, the local blacksmith was now a Barclays Bank
and the Post Office an Indian restaurant.
I
loved my child life in Chislehurst (certainly more than I did the often
emotionally stressful relationships in Heath Cottages), but it was only
recently that I found myself nostalgically riffing on the theme of Those Were
the Days which prompted me to look up whether there were any such things as
transport or tourist posters for Chislehurst. And, yes, there were...
The
one at the top of this post is contemporary and produced by The Chislehurst
Society featuring the village pond, the cricket ground, the Church of the
Annunciation (one of the 'high' ones), the caves, and what looks to be a
blissfully happy couple of Chislehurstians.
The
earliest Chislehurst poster I came across dates from 1914 and seems to depict
what I assume was not an agressive local resident, but an early 'cave-person', suggesting
just how well known was the once-believed prehistory of the subterranean
labyrinth of Chislehurst Caves. Created for London Transport, this work by Tony
Sarg (1880-1942) is obviously inspired by what was at the time a theory
(frankly a legend) that the caves likely dated back at least 4,000 to 6,000
years. Unless this unattractive fellow was an ancestor of Smokey Joe.
From
1922 comes a black-and-white print – of what, presumably, must have originally
been a colour poster – presenting the drabbest conception of the rural paradise
of my childhood. Nevertheless, it is the work of the highly influential
graphic designer and poster artist, Edward McKnight Kauffer (1890-1954).
So, there's glory for you.The
next poster first appeared seven years later in 1929 and is the work of 'CWB',
Cecil Walter Bacon (1905-1992) and takes us back to the time of romantic myth
with a couple of Druids busily doing whatever Druids would have done in the
Caves if they had ever been there to do it!
I
should confess at this juncture that, despite living in Chislehurst into my
late 'forties I never visited the Caves: my memories mainly being of the
floor-shaking vibrations we experienced from the weekend pop-concerts that
thudded deep beneath our living room floor every weekend – oh, yes, and one
October when the village became the focus of national attention as a result of
Eamon Andrews hosting a not-very-creepy Halloween TV show live from the Caves.
Finally,
here's a contemporary poster created in 'retro style' (by an uncredited artist)
for purchase as a framed wall decoration. Shown is, to the left, the timbered
building that, when I was a child, was the local branch of Martin's Bank
(impressively embellished, in those days, with the sign of a gilded
grasshopper); and, to the right, the popular hostelry, 'The Rambler's Rest'
(rumored, back in the day, to have once had a secret way into and out of those
enigmatic Caves!) and, on its right-hand side, the end house of Heath Cottages
–– just a few doors down from where I lived for so many years.
