Newsmedianews | Hadley, Shropshire

Paradise Lost,
Derek ‘Gash’ Gambie, Hadley lad, vintage 230742.
Thursday, 17 January, 2008

I got onto the ‘Trip to Trench’ bit first and immediately wrote my recollections of it. However now that I have visited your CV site I need to do a bit of modifying.

First, I have some good news for you, I’ve seen your paradise muddle, it’s not a dream it is real. I went to Norman Pedley and told him I was 13 when I was only 12. He had a vacancy for a paper boy down the Trench. Towards the end of my first morning I delivered papers at the rather run down Prospect Terrace, then, went through the arch to the first house of Forge Row. I like Victorian architecture but on that wet morning in 1954 it was a dreadful place. The view from the front window was an acre and a half of tangled rusting wire and scrap metal lying on earth that was a mixture of black soil and brown crumbling patches that was nature taking iron back to its roots of ferrous oxide. I pedalled away from that poor area rather faster than I had arrived and a few minutes later I turned under the arch of The Stables and set eyes on the white house for the first time with my mouth wide open. I can see clearly why you thought the area was paradise, it was quite a long way removed from Forge Row. The house was like something out of a Poirot film but it was the colour that startled me as I had never seen a bright white house before and it looked totally out of place. Age plays tricks on your memory but I thought it had a flat roof. Am I right or am I wrong? I delivered a paper to one house to the left of the arch and to the white house which I knew belonged to a family called Schalsha. I believe I knew Michael, I think he was at my school, Hadley County Boys and he may even have been in my class as I have a photograph of the class with what I think is his smiling face right in the middle of the front row. I have a group photo of the 1st Hadley Scouts taken at a ‘bangers and mash’ party and think he is on that one too. Again, I have to say I am not sure as I heard this in a pub, he was drowned off the Welsh coast before reaching his teens. Is that true? There is also a boy called Ron Harris on the photo, I thought he came from the Stables, was he your older brother? If so then your parents are also on the photo. We played a game of cricket in the school yard one day and he bowled some unplayable balls at me. I am no cricketer but I was annoyed at this so stepped forward at the next ball and hit it clean over the railway line into the yard of Bircher’s garage. The teacher, Mr Phillips, declared this as six and out adding further to my irritation.

After I left The Stables I delivered to one of the red brick semis next to the main road where Barry Rickus lived. He was in the same class as me. Then I went through the gates to the posh house that you call The New Orchard, I had never seen anything like this either, you really were a lucky lad. I did not deliver to the main house but to an upstairs flat to the left of the house above what I assumed had been the stable block. Then I carried on through to the back where there was a single story chalet type building that I now assume had once been the summerhouse and this was my last delivery of the day. In years gone by this would have had a nice outlook but now it looked out to the drying up canal which, on the right bank, was lined by factory windows, half of which were smashed.

From your CV you are about 7 or 8 years younger than me so, as a child, this is a huge gap and you may not know the following names. Barry Poole was the four foot six middle son of the proprietor of the Esso garage near you and he had one leg 3” longer than the other. There was a sign on the workshop door that read, ‘the man who lends tools here has left’. There were identical female twins living next to the shop opposite Prospect Terrace the same age as me, also the Broome family lived next to the pub at the start of your lane. Over what I always regarded as the border line between Hadley and Trench, the lock, lived Peter Barclay, in my class, a tough guy, nearly as tough as me. John Leek, whose mother worked at the Regal Cinema in the ticket booth and a guy called Vincent whose surname I forget.

I loved my childhood in Hadley, born Manse Road and wrote about 30 short stories about it which the local newspapers have very kindly published over the last few years. I’ve also written a couple of novels based in and around the area but nobody wants to even read the synopsis never mind become my agent. I was very much a ‘Just William’ character. I have been down every street, road, lane and footpath in Hadley and up every apple tree. Watery Lane was my best bit of paradise and I have wonderful memories of roaming along its hedgerows with my best mate Ben (Cliff Bennett who is still my best mate). My favourite walk was to turn left when you reached the stream and follow it right up to the tunnel under the railway line. I saw a Kingfisher there once but doubt if he stayed as I never saw any fish. I was a total failure as a fisherman in the Trench pool, I swam and nearly drowned in the Valley pool with Ben and was warned off from going anywhere near the middle pool. Did you find the tunnel under the incline?

The top of Blackies Lane near the railway line was another favourite spot and I would sit in the shade of an oak tree and watch the tops of the corn stems swaying in the breeze. I have no idea why Hadley and the surrounding green fields were chosen to be constantly raped and pillaged by the soulless men in black suits so best hold on to your dreams and seek out your new paradise and wide open spaces elsewhere.

I have found mine, I have my spacious house which I have called ‘Nutwood’ (because in my dreams I am living next door to Rupert Bear) and I am surrounded by acres and acres of open unfenced countryside and forests. I even have my three lakes which are my Trench, Middle and Valley pools. I have my Watery Lane and Blackies Lane and there is even a town nearby that could double as Bridgnorth. It’s 800 miles due south of Hadley and they talk funny but one thing is for sure. They will never build a 17 storey tower block in my village or raze to the ground the small medieval chateau.

I have retired now so, yes, I am not putting much back into society, apart from the money I am putting into the local economy buying loads of building materials to modernise and expand my house. But I think I did my bit in days gone by. Nowhere near as many different jobs as you but I did manage 10.

Like you I went to the Walker Tech, first as a full time student at Oakengates and then on day release for 6 years getting City & Guilds, and an ONC both in mechanical engineering at Bennetts Bank. Served my apprenticeship at Audley Eng Newport and became a fitter / machinist. (mainly lathe and miller like yourself)

I’m also a founder member of the Shrewsbury & Newport Canals Trust which has the intention of reopening the line from Norbury junction to Shrewsbury. There are also hopes that some of the route back up towards Trench can be reopened but alas we will never see the Trench lock again.

I’m not going to put you down and I hope you will not begrudge me my current relaxed lifestyle. I wish you good luck and happiness. Keep looking for that soul mate, my aunt did not marry till she was 58!

Cheers
‘ Gash’ Gambie, Dordogne, SW France.

Footnote.
I was waiting at Bergerac airport to pick up my sister a couple of years ago when a man came up to me and asked if he had just heard a Wellington accent? His name was John Smith and he was born on the Trench side of the lock and went to the John Hunt school. He was about 10 years younger than me so quite close to your age and left home to join the marines when he was just 16 and moved to France about 20 years ago. So now you know there are at least two men from Hadley / Trench who have found a new paradise.

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