ĂŰŃż´«Ă˝

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Jan Bedford of the Kent County Council Maidstone Library Team on behalf of Jim and Irene Maxted and has been added to the site with their permission. The authors fully understand the site's terms and conditions.

ĂŰŃż´«Ă˝ People’s War — Staplehurst Library Monday 7th June 2004

Mr Frederick (Jim) Maxted

I was lucky for a year or two and came home about every six weeks and one of the visits I made here was when the Doodle Bug fell. Now, when that happened luckily I was in bed with the wife. Out of bed we get, have a look, no, nothing to worry about, popped back in bed. Then we heard a hell of row outside, so we put the light on, when we put the light on there was the windows and all that just hanging on the sash and the bedroom was plastered in broken glass. But we’d both got out of bed, both been to the window, got back in bed and never got a cut. The first time I came home was when the land mine dropped over the back there at Bathurst.

When the land mine dropped I lived in Chestnut Cottage, next to the chemists then, and it blew the back door and everything in and broke the glass where Doves is and that is the other side of the road. And when the Doodlebug dropped later on when I happened to be home, the blast came the other way. So we had all the windows in the front of the house all blasted. But there were 2 major things that happened here in Staplehurst and one was the first time I came home on leave, that would be 1940. But anyway I was about when they both happened.

All the cottages down there that look nice, they were all brought up to scratch with bomb damage funds. Now the other side of the road where Vine House is, where Mr Silken, a labour MP, lived, all those ceilings were patched up and that’s why the bloke who’s just been in there and altered them all had such a big job. Once he got in and uncovered a bit or two he saw all the damage. Of course then further down there was Harmers shop that got a bit of damage and then of course you had Worsley’s, you had the post office, you had private houses, you had the greengrocers, they also done milk, they done coal, they done everything Worsleys. They were the first ones that cleared refuse from the village, they’d go around and get a few tins, but mostly it was ashes. And they’d go and take that up Bell Lane where the carts went and filled in the ruts before they had a road.

So I was up at chief headquarters when the doodlebugs started. I was on transport then, 317 STC supply column. And I went into the billet up there with just one other fellow in there. Then the doodlebug come, I come back off wherever I’d been, Manchester or wherever it was, when I got to the billet, I couldn’t find a bed, everybody was in the billet. And what happened was the people that lived in London got all these compassionate postings or whatever you call it, they was home every night with the wife or the family, but soon as the doodlebug dropped they all had to report back.

We had a section of about 600 drivers for supplying and we used to work from the stores up to Antwerp. Of course the run up was into Germany, into Denmark down almost into the Mediterranean, all down the Rhone Valley. I suppose I must have done about 10 or 12 trips across the Channel. I’d go and pick the stuff up, we’d go to Tilbury go on the boat, Tilbury to Southend, stay there until it got dark, and then go across, and it took about 14 hours loading included.

I was in Germany somewhere, I was going along and I caught the edge of the kerb on the road. Down there a lot of the roads had been bombed, I was always about 10 days behind the most advanced troops, but when they’d gone they’d only bulldoze the road, they would run on. And I got a puncture, I know I was on my jack then, I think, and the size of the wheel, I got to my knees to have a second go. And then of course they had doodlebugs over there as well as here. I’d been at Ostend and I saw the workers blown in the water. You could be waiting to be loaded up and see them chugging along, and you knew they were meant for there.

What about the camp? The Jubilee Field, have you got a record of who built that and everything? Blays was the contractor who built it. I was down there working when war was declared. They had a couple of foremen down there from London and one of them said “cor blimey, I’m going home to my missus” and that’s the last we saw of him, so we lost one guv’nor. But Blays built it and Hookers, you’ll know Hookers from the quarry up at Langley, they had a quarry up there, they brought all the stone down for the square, made the square. Thorns they were the people that made all the army huts, I think they came from Erith, somewhere there. That was more or less completed very early in the war.

Mrs Irene B Maxted

I was working in Staplehurst and I began work at 8 o’clock in the morning and I had come from Marden. It was a bit eerie I heard a strange noise. It was the first Doodlebug I saw; well it frightened me out of my life. I didn’t know whether to keep biking or to go back home. It was at Bunches Lake, which is between here and Marden. There was this terrible noise and then all of a sudden it stops and when it stops that’s when they blow everything up. So anyway I came to work, I had to be at work at 8 o’clock, I worked in the shop at the top of the hill, I think it’s a Chinese or an Indian now, the top of the hill next to the church. So I come on my bike and I looked and there was a lot of people milling about, and they were all in uniform, they were Terriers and in the yard up at the Bell there was all these vehicles, Chiesman’s, they were a big store in Maidstone, and they had all these red vehicles that they used to go around delivering. These Terriers they’d commandeered these vehicles to come down from London. There they were all in the Bell yard. I went around the back of the shop with my bike and my guv’nor was there and said I don’t suppose they’ve had any breakfast do you? I said I don’t know. So he said well I think we’d better cook them some breakfast. So we had a cellar up there, and down the bottom of the steps we had a gas ring, so we filled a bucket up with eggs and took down and put it on the gas ring and cooked all these eggs for these boys. And of course we had bread and stuff because it was a grocer’s shop, so we sorted them out then. And then they went in the Limes which they call Vine House now, so they bedded them in there, they went in there for the rest of the day and the night. They also went into Surrenden down here, they sort of took over these houses. The next day after that we had another lot arrive they were down into the manor, they had lorries. They used to come up through the village every day with these lorries and go down to Lampards which is near the station, there’s a garage there, to fill up with petrol. Me and my mate in the shop, we were out there waving to them.

Anyway I come to the Battle of Britain. We used to have to deliver the groceries, we had a van, and we used to go out delivering groceries. I had to go up to Maplehurst, so I was up Maplehurst and the Battle of Britain is going on. And I’ll never forget the lady in the house, came out she said you’d better not stop out here you’d better come indoors. So she made me a cup of tea, and I’ll never forget this, she gave me some home-made cake, and it had caraway seeds in it, and I’d never tried that, and oh dear, I never forgot it, I saw her, she’s still alive and she spoke to me and I spoke about this caraway seed cake, it sort of stuck in my mind. But it was pretty horrendous when they had the Battle of Britain over here, because you never knew where they were going to land. The Germans were shooting and our blokes were shooting, but you never knew where the plane was going to come down. So when you’re on your own on a bike going from here to Marden it’s quite frightening.

Jim was telling you about him working on the camp. Well we was jolly glad of it, because they put all the soldiers down there, when they went it came on the wireless that all over the country, people were squatting in these army camps. So we thought that’s a good idea. Anyway we were living with his mother then. With all the chaps coming out of the forces, so we asked if we could have a little bit of a meeting. We had a meeting in the house and asked them if any of them would like to go in about what this was on with this squatting. So we all sort of banded together and there was a captain, Mr Rowe, he lived round Clapper Lane. We contacted him and he said well if you want to squat in there I’ll come with you and open the gate, because they’re locked up. So my guv’nor, I was still working at the shop, he let us have his van, but we didn’t have any furniture, we hadn’t got anything, but mother-in-law gave us some blankets, or something and we went down in the van, but we went round that way round the island, so nobody saw us. The other chaps came on bikes, Mrs Buttriss who lived in the village, she was born in the village, she came with a pram and her small child, because her husband had come with the Terriers and he’d been posted off. Anyway we went in and had a look around, and there was electricity on and they’d got these pot-bellied stoves and a coal shed, a whole lot coal there. We had a look round, being the first in, and we went for the sergeant’s mess. And oh it was lovely. We slept on the floor, we had nothing else to do and our mates, because they were all mates, we all went to school together, and our mates came down and they all chose where they wanted. The next minute the Council decided to take it over. So they charged us rent then. And they used to cut the electric off in the day, because it was all combined. And they had put a warden in, and he used to cut it off about dinnertime and he wouldn’t put it on until about 4 in the afternoon. So we had to put up with that. We paid £1.50 a week rent. But still it was good in the end, we were glad of it.

It was less than that at the start, they had another meeting, it was 15 bob for a start. And between us and our neighbours on the passage we put a blanket up. Things were different then. We didn’t take no notice. It was Jimmy Woods, he lived in the village eventually. We took one end of the sergeant’s mess and he took the other end. So we put this blanket up and we had the end where the bath was. So we used to say if you want a bath you can come through. And we were all just matey like that. You wouldn’t get it today, people would be frightened that something was going to be stolen. It wasn’t like that. And then the Council took it over and of course they were scared of it and they jolly soon put people who were living in tied cottages on farms and that and they were evicted and so they put all them in there. Anybody who wanted housing they put them in there, they were jolly glad of it. And then they built the council houses, so we were in line for a new council house.

Up Mill Lane up where Mr Hodges had his bakery and that that was all more or less demolished by the doodlebug. Offens had the butcher’s shop. They owned all these fields here Offens, all the haymaking and that. There was an old boy, Jess Craddock, he lived in with his horse. So of course everybody was concerned what had happened to Jessie when the doodlebug came down up there. But he was all right. He was in direct line for the blast, because the blast came right down Mill Lane and then across the road and demolished that house.

They were frightening those doodlebugs. Jim and I were coming home at Charing Cross Station. And I said I’ll go to the toilet, so I went off to the toilet and one of those doodlebugs came over, and I heard it cut out and of course it blew off the windows in the train. And of course he’s in a panic because he doesn’t know where I am.

And of course we had the Americans here. They were up at the aerodrome, they were up on Roger Munn’s ground (Chickenden Farm), they had planes up there.

He (Mr Maxted) was transferred to the RAF. If he was going over, if he had to take supplies over, they’d come this way, it was like a convoy. You’ve never seen lorries like it. I mean he’s only a little man, but when he came down with these big lorries you couldn’t believe it.

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