General Chat

How far back do your family memories go? On my father's side, they are obstinately stuck circa 1930, but my mother's stories go back almost a century earlier. The day I fitted folk story to fact for that earliest memory was spooky, to say the least. B

I remember my gran and her sister telling me wonderful stories about them growing up in Cornwall as the youngest of 6 sisters. The infuriating thing is that I can't remember them in great detail, feels like they are just at the edge of my memory and I can't quite reach them. Jane

My Gran was born in 1896 and used to recount stories of her as a child taking dinner (served at what we would call lunch time these days) to her father and grandfather as they worked in the fields. Dinners on plates with cloths tied over them. One particular story we used to ask for over and over again - only because it had what we deemed a rude word in it - and I can see her red with embarrassment at having to repeat such a word - would never raise an eyebrow now! One particular day, her friend was also taking her father dinner. She stumbled over the stile and gravy spilled down the front of her dress. When she reached her father he asked 'Wha's up gal - you pi**sed yerself?' The days of the Bedfordshire 'clanger' - suet pudding with meat in one end and jam in the other, separated with a wodge of suet crust. Of collecting beer from the pub in a jug and her more adventurous sister drinking a good few mouthfuls and topping the the jug up from the tap by the horse trough. Her father complaining to the pub that their beer was weak. Lots more memories all flooding in now - thanks for that. Magsxx