A very early memory of life at The Haynings is of the "Night Nursery" and the Day Nursery". The Night Nursery had very bright curtains with repeated pictures of a parrot with a curved back - almost a semi-circle. I have only one memory of my cot and that is falling out of it on to a red "Dinky Toy" fire engine. The ladder on it gave me quite a cut - I still have the scar today - and I bled like a stuck pig.
The Day Nursery was over the kitchen and in the early days was presided over by our nanny - Celia. It was quite a large room with a window and window seat overlooking the garden. Celia believed that children should have their milk heated. I do not like hot milk and even less do I like skin on milk - Celia did not believe me when I said it would make me sick - I proved her to be very wrong and thereafter was allowed to have cold milk! The window seat was a favourite spot and was, if my memory is right, the theatre where Barbara and I operated on her pink teddy - after various amputations, it never recovered. The Day Nursery was also the place where I decided to give Barbara a haircut, I only snipped off a couple of her lovely curls but was ever thereafter blamed for her losing all her baby curls (she had a mass of them as a toddler).
The one other vivid memory of the Day Nursery was water. The Haynings was not on the main water supply until well after the war - 1947 ish - water was pumped from a 120 foot deep artesian well to the tank in the roof just above the nursery. The pump was powered by a large electric motor - later used in the workshop to power a wood turning lathe but more of that later - which had to be started manually in the pump house half way down the garden but was stopped by a very "Heath Robinson" affair consisting of a wooden float in the tank connected to a copper rod by a piece of cord. The cord passed over a number of pulleys before hanging down the wall by the back stairs. When the tank was full the rod shorted out two copper nails, completing the circuit which stopped the pump. This piece of equipment became increasingly unreliable - corrosion on the copper, dust, cobwebs, friction, etc - all led to failure. If the tank was full - the rod and copper nails were in full view if rather high up the wall - and water was still heard coming in to the tank, there was a switch at the bottom of the back stairs which theoretically would also stop the pump. However, it too was not wholly reliable and then it was a dash down the back yard to the pump-house 30 metres away to stop the pump. On many occasions the inevitable happened and the first thing anyone knew of the full tank was water pouring through the nursery ceiling and sometimes through to the kitchen as well. It says a lot for the ceiling that it was only after many repeated floods that the ceiling finally collapsed and had to be replaced.
In about 1947, parents decided to have the exterior lathe and plaster cladding on the front and side of the house replaced. The house was not a listed building at that time so this was merely a normal maintenance activity. Removing the old cladding was quite easy. It revealed the sound oak frame of the building and the dry brick filling between the frames. There was only one rotten timber and that was a fairly recent piece installed when the surgery window had at some time been modified. Instead of using lathes to hold the replacement plaster, the builders used expanded wire mesh. Their intention to nail it to the beams was much more difficult than imagined as the old oak was as hard as iron and virtually every nail had to have a hole drilled otherwise it just crumpled under the hammer. A pebble dash finish was used instead of the old smooth plaster to prevent children scribbling on the wall - now a listed grade two building what would English Heritage say to such a modification!!
The lawn at The Haynings was dominated by a very large and very ancient yew tree. Despite a rather bushy trunk, it was a splendid tree for climbing.
My earliest memory was resting in my garden cot watching the branches above - I should explain that with only 20 months between us Margaret and I both had a daily snooze outside. Margaret had a very large pram which was quite adequate for two when out for a walk but not for two sleeping toddlers so I had a green painted cot which usually stood under the tree except in particularly wet weather when it was place in the large lean to summer house.
In 1944 when Mummy and Margaret went to the Orkneys to join Daddy for a week Barbara Ian and I were left in the tender care of a highly trained professional nanny. Unfortunately she was very bossy and did not understand the rather easy and benevolent if well disciplined routine to which we were accustomed. I rebelled and took refuge up the tree. It took a great deal of cajolling to get me down and with the ever present threat of a repeat performance, a rather more acceptable routine was established. It was noteworthy that there was no come back when Mummy returned.
After the war we acquired an aircraft fuel tank - the type of overload tank carried on a weapon pylon on the wing . With two "cockpits" cut in it and nicknamed the "doodlebug" after the German ram jet bomb, this became a great garden toy. Eventually it was slung with ropes from the yew tree and became a super swing.
Eventually it was decided that the tree was taking too much light from the house and it had to go. The trunk was removed to Tommy Reed's sawmill but I have very clear memories of Daddy's efforts with help (or hindrance )from family and friends to get rid of the stump. Rather than being cut in to planks, the trunk was cut in to blocks about 30 inches long by 15 wide by 4 thick. They were used for many purposes but the wood was very tough and with a high silica content tools blunted quickly. At least one piece ended up as a bowl and another provided bearing blocks when the treadle lathe (mentioned above) was converted to take the electric motor from the pump-house. The lathe itself had come from long term residence in a field belonging to one of father's patients.
At the bottom of the garden, there was a large pond, not one of the tiddly little man made affairs shown in the gardening programmes on TV but big enough to have a punt. Reputed originally to have been part of the outer defences of the castle, it was not particularly deep but had a very muddy bottom. Naturally, while we were little it was out of bounds except for the rare occasions that an adult was present. This only made it more attractive, exciting and mysterious. However, once we could swim properly, fishing was permitted - it was well stocked with roach - quite inedible even to the cat - but easy to catch with flour and water "dough" as bait.
As we got older the punt too was put to use although lack of maintenance while Daddy was away during the war meant that it was rather leaky - or perhaps it had always been like that.
There was a path round the bottom of the pond which was frequently overgrown but passable for determined explorers. Access was always made to the two bullace trees and to the Granny Smith apple tree when the fruit was ripe. Alarge patch of bamboo provided a ready supply of sticks for fishing rods, javelins, bows arrows or whatever else the imagination dreamed up. There was also an area between the garage and the pond regularly used for bonfires. On one occasion, I must have been about thirteen, I put too much damp wood on a fire filling the whole area with dense smoke while I was away collecting more rubbish. I was convinced that I had set the whole area on fire and that the garage cars and all would go up in smoke. Fortunately a gust of wind cleared the smoke and all was well.