I used to live on a street called Lamlash Street in South London at the Elephant and Castle area. It was a very close-knit community and I have very fond memories of my time there. So, when I was left some inheritance money by my favourite Uncle, I decided to use some of it to write about our family life on Lamlash Street.
It took me 3 years (yes ,I know a long time), but I did finish it and in the process learned a lot about my Mum and the family.
I learned that I had a Mum who was fired on by WWII enemy fighter pilots… yes that was a plural.. she was fired on twice and was sent back to school in the afternoon, looking at the bullet marks along the street as she went!
I also learned that, I had a distant cousin who was killed by the mob and left to die on the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral; something to do with them being upset with him for not repaying a loan, no credit cards in those days!
Additionally, I learned that my Nan was a very ‘colourful’ lady in her day…something to do with enjoying a few drinks at the local pub in the company of men friends… with her children waiting outside the pub, along with all of the other kids … no daycare in those days.
All these little gems came to light while I was talking with family, about life in the 1960’s. However, most of our life was predictable and routine and being a 10-year old I was repeatedly told ‘children should be seen and not heard’… no children’s rights in those days. As long as you were fed, clothed and went to school, your life was complete!
So, back to my neighbour. Last week I was sitting having a cup of tea, when up popped a message on my phone saying ‘Think we may have been neighbours in 1961’, … well I was so excited. He had tracked me down through a google search for Lamlash Street, which revealed my book cover. We chatted and he shared some photos of his. One of the photos was of his Mum standing outside our house having a cup of tea with a neighbour. I could not believe my eyes… the neighbour was Mum! So, we have a photo of the two Mum’s chatting together outside number 11b Lamlash Street. Sadly, Mum died from Covid in January of this year, but she would so have loved to see the photo. It looks as if it was taken on the same day as the photo on the front of the book, which is of my Aunt on the steps of our house; which means it was very likely to have been my Dad taking the photo. He was an amateur photographer and used to develop his black and white photographs in his makeshift darkroom. Paying for photographs was expensive in those days, and so no-one would have ‘wasted’ what little money they had on photographs taken outside the house.
My sincere message to you is this. If you are thinking of writing down your family stories, then just go ahead and do it. When I started, all I wanted to do was write about my family before the stories were lost, and now I am in contact with a neighbour. If you share your family stories, which to you feel unexciting, unexpected things could start to happen.
Life is short
Jill
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