Freebodies Farm – rowleyregislosthamlets.co.uk

The Farms in the Lost Hamlets

As I have mentioned before, although the landscape around Rowley became industrialised and scarred by mining, clay extraction and quarrying, much of Turners Hill remained open countryside and in use for farming, supplying the local population with milk and eggs until well into the 20^th century and much of the area on the hill is now being returned to a green condition as quarries are filled in.

There were several farms on the Rowley side of Turners Hill itself, and this post is principally about Freebodies Farm, Hailstone Farm and Turners Hill Farm with a mention of Lamb Farm, nearer to Portway Hall. To local people these farms were often known by the names of the farmers living there at the time but on maps their traditional name are usually shown. Of the local farms, there were apparently at least four dairy farms in the area in the 1920s and 30s, run by the Monk, Richards, Merris and Skidmore families.

At an early stage there was a Mill or Windmill Farm at Tippity Green although this was not identified in the later censuses, it appears to have been on the site of the former parish windmill and this area was subsequently quarried away.

This photograph of the Ibberty (later Tippity) Manorial Mill appears in J Wilson Jone’s book, The History of the Black Country which was published in about 1950 although the date of the photograph is not known.

In 1841 Edward Alsop aged 60 was listed as a farmer at the Wind Mill Farm in Tippity Green, with his presumed wife and four children, plus a male servant. Next listed on the Census was Elizabeth Lewis, aged 40, an ironmonger, with her family and then Joseph Bowater who was a butcher and subsequent licensee of the Bulls Head so that is the correct area in Tippity Green. Neither the Alsop nor Lewis families are listed in the area by the time of the next census.

There was also a Knowle Farm but this is not quite within the area of the Lost Hamlets and I have not indexed the Census for this area.

Also, the late Anthony Page has a picture in his first book on Rowley of Warren’s Hall Farm which was over the top of the hill on the Oakham Road, a large white house. It later also had riding stables and later still became a residential Nursing Home before being demolished and replaced by housing. Again, it is not quite within my study area and I have not indexed the census for this area.

Portway Farm, also slightly outside my study area, still exists though no longer in farming use, perhaps the only one of all these farms to have survived as a building to the present day.

The Censuses

The Censuses are not consistent about how the farms were recorded. Sometimes they were not listed by name. Where I have been able to identify the farms I have shown the results under details about each farm. To date I have only transcribed censuses for the Study area up to 1881. Later ones will follow in due course and I hope to upload the transcripts to a website for the Study at some point.

Not all the censuses include the acreage farmed by each farm but where they do, they vary considerably from one census to the next which does not help with the identification process.

Where on Turners Hill were the farms?

I was very unclear until recently exactly where each of these farms was although I think I have them identified now. No doubt someone will help me out if I have this wrong!

Freebodies Farm and Hailstone Farm were next to each other down a lane on the left off the Turners Hill Road, above the Hailstone quarry with the Hailstone Farmyard being at the end of the track in the area shown on OS maps as Gadds Green. Hailstone Farm occupied the two buildings shown on the left on this photograph and Freebodies the three buildings on the right.

The date of this photograph is not known (copyright also unknown but will be gladly acknowledged if informed) but the two farms are very much on the brink of the quarries so probably 1960s.

Turners Hill Farm was further up the hill, on the right.

Turners Hill Farm, 1969. Copyright: Mike Fenton

Many of the fields were divided not by hedges but by stone walls which is a very common practice in areas where there is a ready supply of stone for use, as in the Cotswolds and in the Yorkshire Dales. There were some hedges, though, because Reg Parsons who grew up at 2 Turners Hill in the late 1930s told me that his mother loved the wild sweet peas which grew in the hedges near there. He remembered Vera Cartwright with the milk cart which delivered daily to Blackheath, Whiteheath, Langley and Rowley Regis, seven days a week. Before the advent of milk bottles, milk in most parts of the country was taken round in churns and cans and the cans were taken into the customer’s house to be dispensed into their own jugs. This was not just in Rowley, my husband can remember, as a boy, helping his uncle with his milk round in Gloucester where the same system was used. He also said that the horse or pony would know the route and stopping places where they would wait patiently for the milk to be dispensed before moving on to the next stop.

Reg Parsons also remembered that there was a field below his home on Turners Hill which was used as an fuel dump in the Second World War, he remembers piles of Jerry Cans on concrete bases and also an anti-aircraft gun (known apparently as Big Bertha) near the Wheatsheaf pub. My mother used to be on fire watch sometimes during the war, with the St John’s Ambulance brigade and she also remembered the gun there. Sarah notes that one of her grandfather’s fields was requisitioned by the army so this would have been for the fuel storage that Reg remembers and she also tells of family memories that during the war a German bomb landed on one of the fields killing a cow. And during air raids, the ponies pulling the milk carts had to be unharnessed in case they bolted, with all the potential loss of milk and vehicles. Later, in the 1950s, six caravans were put on the site which were lived in by local people.

Many people have mentioned their memories of the Cartwright family who farmed at Hailstone Farm on Turner’s Hill for many decades and who had a riding school, as well as the milk round. Sarah Thomas has written a fascinating book called Hailstone Farm about life on the farms there which she has published privately and, having come across my study online, she has very kindly sent me a copy but with the stipulation that she does not wish to have any of the contents to be put on social media. However, she tells me that she has deposited copies of the book in national and local archives so it would be well worth enquiring, if you are visiting local archives or perhaps Blackheath library, whether they hold a copy. Certainly Dudley Archives lists a copy and Sandwell Archives appear to but do not specify where it is held and it is not reservable through the library system. The book is full of photographs and pictures of documents and family memories and history. I will not be reproducing anything from it but it will inform me about the farms and where they were so that this study has a more accurate record of the farms and their ownership over recent years.

Freebodies Farm, Turner’s Hill

There has been, if not specifically a farm, then an area known as Freebodies on Turners Hill for centuries.

A Survey of English Place Names refers to it as an ‘early-attested site in the Parish of Dudley , a name of the manorial type, deriving from the family of Frebodi found in Dudley in 1275 and 1327’. Bear in mind that for centuries the main route from Rowley to Dudley ran over Turners Hill so directly through the site where Freebodies Farm later was. There was, may still be, an area of Dudley called Freebodies in the Kates Hill area of Dudley and the Freebodies Tavern was there until very recently.

The Morgan website has a large amount of well documented and referenced information on local families and the area and notes that a document in the Dudley Archives shows that there was a Deed Poll in about 1550 by a William Chambers Alias Ireland assigning ancient ecclesiastical land of the Priory of St John’s at Halesowen. A number of his descendants for the next 150 years appear in the local records of Rowley Regis and Dudley, using the names ‘Chambers alias Ireland’ These include intermarriages with the Darby family. The name Ireland is sometimes spelled ‘Ierland’ or ‘Yearland’. The same document demonstrates that they owned ex-monastic lands at Rowley called Freebodies, and this reference recurs in a number of later Darby wills. If you have Chambers/Irelands/Darbys or Cartwrights on your family tree it is well worth looking at this site https://www.morganfourman.com/ Sadly I have none of these names in my tree!

A survey by Lord Dudley’s Stewards in 1556 produced a rent roll in which William Ireland’s Freebodys, later called Freebury Farm is recorded, suggesting that it was established before the neighbouring Hailstone Farm.

A Will of John Chambers in 1870, implies that the farm on Turners Hill was originally part of the Freebodies estate. Certainly, John Chamber’s brother William was an executor of his will and was described as a farmer of Rowley Regis.

At other times it was known as Freebury Farm. Spelling was very variable in those days!

Censuses for Freebodies: At Freebodies Farm in 1841 were Josiah Parkes and his family (including Sophia Cole who was mentioned in my earlier article about the Cole families around Turners Hill, and one male and one female servant.

However, there is no mention of Freebodies in the 1861 Census nor any farmer listed in Gadds Green. However, listed as Farmhouse, Turners Hill and as a farmer of 30 acres is William Smith, aged 54 with his wife Sarah and his Levett granddaughter, plus two servants. Was this Freebodies?

In 1871 there is no mention of Freebodies Farm but two households are listed as ‘adjoining Hailstone Farm’ – John Bradshaw, an agricultural labourer aged 26 with his wife and his 11 month old son plus his brother aged 21 and also an ag lab. The brothers had both been born in Haselor, Warwickshire and his wife in Solihull. Also described as living ‘adjoining Hailstone Farm’ was a blacksmith Henry Russell aged 33 with his wife and daughter. So both of these households were from outside the area. It is possible that the land of the two farms was being worked together and the farmhouse used to house either farm workers or tenants.

The next building listed is Brickhouse Farm which was some distance away in Cock Green on the Dudley Road and which was being farmed by the Levett family with one ag lab and one female servant. There is sometimes no accounting for the routes taken by census enumerators!

Or was there a well established path across the fields between Hailstone and the Dudley Road at Springfield which everyone used? This seems likely as Reg Parsons mentioned to me that his father, on his way home from work, would sometimes get off the bus at Springfield to buy something from the shop there and would then cut up over the fields to home. This does seem more practical than the residents up on the hill always having to walk down to Perrys Lake, along Tippetty Green and to the Knowle that way. There is certainly a Footpath marked on the 1904 OS Map, here, running from Knowle Farm to Hailstone Farm and also further on up Turners Hill. .

Hailstone Farm

A lease in Dudley Archives dated 1796 is for a lease of 21 years to Samuel Round, farmer, of Hailstone Farm (a messuage called Freeberrys alias Fingerhold – that Finger ‘I the Hole popping up again!) so it seems likely that the farm was established by the late 1700s.

Sarah’s Cartwright grandfather had been born on Hailstone Farm but the family then moved elsewhere, again this makes me think of the information on the Morganfourman site that the Cartwrights were closely linked to this area as far back as the 1500s. He took over first Lamb Farm in 1912 and then Hailstone Farm in 1924 and ran their businesses from there, including the riding school established by Sarah’s mother and the milk round (which had originally been started in the early 1900s when the family were living at Lamb Farm), later taking on the tenancy of Freebodies in addition in 1932, subletting the house to tenants. In addition to the Riding School, there were some Gymkhanas there – much more detail about this and photographs in this article in the Black Country Bugle in 2019. https://www.pressreader.com/uk/black-country-bugle/20191106/281505048027440

Later part of the family moved to another farm at Bewdley and Sarah’s mother and father continued to live at Hailstone until the 1960s when the lease was terminated and the land taken back for quarrying.

There is much more detail in the book about the farms, their construction, plans, photographs, invoices etc from the business in the book, a real very personal record of a Rowley Farm in the 20^th century.

Censuses for Hailstone Farm

In 1841, the farmer at Hailstone Farm was Samuel Round who was sixty, with three servants, possibly the Samuel Round mentioned above who was granted a lease in 1796 or possibly his son . I can find no trace of Hailstone Farm or the Round family in 1851.

In 1861, Keturah Round, a married lady of 54 was at Hailstone Farm with several children though no spouse and she is described as the Head of the household though not a widow. She had married Edwin Round in Dudley in the Sep qtr if 1854 and was previously Wheale.

In 1871 Hailstone Farm was occupied by Elizabeth Stickley, a widow with her occupation given as Farmer with her two sons John aged 37 and Thomas aged 27, both described as Farmer’s son, along with Ruth Lees, a servant but possibly also related to Elizabeth Stickley as her maiden name was Lees. In the previous census this family had farmed at Oatmeal Row, Cakemore, next door to some ancestors of mine!

In 1881, there is no mention of Hailstone Farm, and no farmer listed but there are three households listed as Hailstone Hill. Susan Jones, who was 50 and a widow was listed as an annuitant aged 33, born in Middlesex, as were the two young nieces living with her who were scholars. Her femail servant was born in Kingswinford. It is tempting to think that this was Hailstone Farm. One of the other houses was occupied by Joseph Hooper, a Farm labourer, aged 48 and born in Cleverley, Shropshire and his wife Ann aged 54, born Thame, Oxfordshire. The tenants in this area certainly almost all came from outside the area, it seems.

Turners Hill Farm

Maps show Turners Hill Farm higher up Turners Hill from the other two farms and there is also a reference on some maps to Cloudland though not on recent maps. There appears to be a large House there, too, Turners Hill House and sometimes the owners of this house were also described as farmers. It is possible, since there is evidence that the Downing family had other land in the area which they let out, that farming was not their principal occupation and that most of the land was farmed from Turners Hill Farm, rather than house.

Censuses for Turners Hill Farm/House

At Turners Hill in 1841 was Joseph Downing with his wife Nancy, son Isaac and two female servants.

By 1851 still on Turners Hill but with no name given for their residence was his widow Nancy Downing with their son Isaac, aged 35 who was a ‘proprietor of lands’ and three unmarried daughters, all described as annuitants, plus a Thomas Whitehouse who was probably Nancy Downing’s brother as her maiden name was Whitehouse. Thomas Whitehouse was a widower, and also a ‘proprietor of lands’ like his nephew.

By 1861 Isaac Downing was still living on Turners Hill, with his three sisters. This time he has given his occupation as “Principal occupation: general superintendence of the cultivation of land. “The Enumerator has added Farmer. But Stephen Parsons on Facebook commented that he remembers that in his time there was a large house on the right of Turners Hill Road which was Turners Hill House, and that Monks Lane ran below it which led to Monks Farm and the quarry. There was also an area in this location called Cloudland on some maps. So were the Downings perhaps living at Turners Hill House but contracting out the farming? It seems likely. I was interested to see on the Facebook page that Linda George has receipts signed by Isaac Downing in 1855 and 1856 for the letting of a farm at Darby’s Hill to Samuel Cook so the Downing family may have had substantial land holdings around the area.

The Downing siblings, still all unmarried, were still on Turners Hill, in 1871, Isaac, now 55, described as Landowner and Farmer and also on Turners Hill and described as a farmer of 88 acres in 1871 is William Whitehouse, a widower, with his two teenage sons a female servant and a farm labourer. I note that a William Whitehouse had been one of the witnesses of Joseph Downing and Nancy Whitehouse in 1810 so may well have been an uncle or cousin to the Downings. This census is the last one showing this Isaac Downing, as he died in November 1874 and was buried in St Giles.

There was also listed in 1871, however, a farmer of 60 acres on Turners Hill, James Bridge aged 28 with his wife Anne, one female servant and one agricultural labourer so this may have been Turners Hill Farm. By 1861 Ann Bridge, now a widow aged 39 was the farmer at Turners Hill Farm, by now farming 40 acres and employing 2 labourers, a cowman and a waggoner.

By 1881, there is the family of Samuel Woodall, an Engineer and Iron Founder listed first under Turners HIll, probably at Turners Hill House. He was 35 and born in Dudley. His wife Mary was born in Birmingham. In addition his two brothers and a sister were also living with them, with three female domestic servants, again all born outside Rowley. I presume this was the house previously occupied by the Downings.

Listed at 5 Turners Hill was William Giles, aged 30 – a farmer of 70 acres employing one additional man. This presumably was Turners Hill Farm. He and his wife were born outside Rowley, though not a great distance, being from Kingswinford and Cakemore respectively. Their elder two children aged 8 and 6 had been born in Enville, Staffordshire, the two younger aged 4 and 2 in Rowley Regis.

The Parish Registers

The Chambers family

On 31 October 1544, Margrett, wife of William Chambers was buried, so there were already Chambers in Rowley at this date. In 1558 William Chambers was buried. Between the two dates three Chambers girls – Mary, Margaret and Agnes were all married at St Giles. The records from 1558 to 1566 are noted by the Vicar, Adam Jevenn, as being missing. (I wonder whether he was an early ancestor of the Jeavons families in Rowley and Blackheath?)

In 1575, Jone, as daughter of John Chambers was baptised and in 1602, John, son of Thomas.

On 12 Feb 1603, a child William was baptised, described as the son of Edward Shakespurre and Joane, d. of Christopher Chambers. Freebodies is not mentioned but certainly Christopher Chambers was associated with Freebodies then . In January 1641, Edward, son of William Chambers of Freebodies was baptised at St Giles, in 1744 another William Chambers of Freebodies was buried . Christopher Chambers was one of two people appointed in 1650, along with three others to be ‘Collectors for the poore’ which implies a certain social standing in the parish. At times, the Chambers used the name Irelands, too. Sometimes their abode is given as Churchend though it is not clear where this was. Certainly there were 152 Chambers entries in the Parish Register between 1539 and 1684 for baptisms and burials, 1539-1754 for marriages. On occasions Chambers were also churchwardens.

By 1723, with the burial of Elinor Chambers, widow, her abode was shown as Ffreebodies. Another branch of the Chamber, however was at Brickhouse in 1724. In 1727, Christopher Chambers of ‘ye ffinger i’ the hole’ was buried. Another branch of the Chambers was described in a marriage in 1732 as ‘of Tividale’. So the Chambers seemed to be scattered right around Turners Hill over several centuries.

The Downing family also had a long term presence on Turners Hill. The first Downing entry in the Registers is in 1644 when Robert, son of John Downing of Warrley was baptised, with numerous entries after that, the first Isaac Downing (that we know of) being baptised at St Giles in 1672. In 1814 Isaac Downing, of Turners Hill was buried aged 75, having died of Asthma.

Back in 1722, Mary, wife of Isaac Downing ‘de ffox oak’ was buried but he appears to have remarried the following year and had a child Samuell baptised at St Giles, with an Isaac Downing of Foxoak being buried in 1727, probably not the same man but possibly related.

On 23^rd July 1815, Isaac , son of Joseph and Nancy Downing, was baptised and Joseph’s occupation was given as a ‘Beast Leech’ – someone who treated sick animals. Joseph and Nancy were still on Turners Hill in the 1841 Census. A daughter Mary Ann was baptised to them in 1818, followed by Lavinia in 1821 and Amelia in 1823. Another Isaac Downing was married to Elizabeth Nutt in 1815 so there were several Isaacs around then. Joseph Downing, originally a ‘beast leech’ and later a farmer died and was buried in St Giles on 2 Jan 1849.

Not all the Downings in the area were so well-to do – Mary Downing, aged 69 of Perry’s Lake was buried in April 1821, having died of cold. In 1823 William Downing, son of Joseph Downing a miner, died in the Poorhouse. In 1828 an Isaac Downing of Perrys Lake died aged 88 of natural decay so presumably there was some connection shown by the use of the name Isaac. There were also Downings in Mincing Lane, in Windmill End and in Portway, all apparently in labouring jobs of various sorts. By the 1840s another branch of Downings were living in Gorsty Hill and another in Waterfall Lane.

Only the Downings on Turners Hill appear to have been wealthy and one wonders whether perhaps one child might have benefitted from a scholarship to the Old Swinford Hospital and been able subsequently to have gone into a profession which improved his circumstances. I would dearly love to find out a list of Rowley boys who attended that school!

Lamb Farm

Lamb Farm was, according to Roy Slim, in an article in the Black Country Bugle in 2021, a small farm adjacent to the Lion Farm which later gave its name to the Lion Farm Estate, near Whiteheath so slightly out of my main study area but included here as there were connections to Freebodies and Hailstone Farm . Roy says that the Throne Farm, farmed by the Skidmores, was much larger than either of them and I presume that the local roads with royal names were so named because they were on land formerly part of this farm. Throne Road, Throne Crescent, Queens Drive, Hanover Road, Tudor Road, Windsor Road, Stuart Road. And I am interested to see that some of the modern roads there, built where the quack was, also have names with Royal connections, Sandringham Drive, Palace Close, Majestic Way, with the Vikings, Celts, Druids, Goths, Romans and Saxons getting a mention, too!

After the Cartwrights moved to Hailstone Farm in 1924, Lamb Farm was let to various tenants, including Hawleys, Hewitts, Slims, Matthews and Skidmores. Roy Slim has also written about his family’s time there.

Lamb Farm was sold for development in 1945.

Local memories of the farms

On the ‘I remember Blackheath and Rowley Regis’ Facebook page, Raymond Kirkham remembered that he had known the farm halfway up Turners Hill as Cartwright Farm. This would have been Hailstone Farm, as at the time Raymond was growing up, the Cartwrights were working the area of both farms from Hailstone Farm and, although they leased Freebodies too and farmed the land, the house was let to tenants. He noted that the farm further up at the top of the hill was Monk Farm and this must have been Turners Hill Farm. He said that this whole area was his playground when he was growing up and his family got their eggs from the farm.

Ian Davies remembered Hailstone farm well, as he was related to the Cartwright family. Ian’s Geordie grandfather lived with the Cartwrights at Lamb farm, near Portway Hall, when he first moved south in the early 1900s. He remembers that by the 1950s George Cartwright had moved away to a farm near Bewdley and Hailstone Farm had been taken over by their daughter Vera and her husband George Thomas. George taught Ian to ride. The quarries were already threatening to swallow the farm back then. The narrow track from Turners Hill had quarries close on both sides. The farmhouse and top of the land were swallowed up by the Tarmac mega-quarry, The lower area stretching down to Springfield was used for housing.

Ian also remembered Lamb Farm which was on the left going down Throne Road, immediately after Portway Hall. He used to walk past the drive on the way to his grandparents’ house in Newbury Lane. He thinks that St Michael’s School was built on the land and that in the 1800s Portway Hall colliery was on the farm’s land and he thinks this was responsible for the subsidence that ultimately forced Portway Hall to be demolished.

Ian also kindly added a link on the Facebook page about memories of Blackheath and Rowley Regis to an article written by Sarah Thomas in the Black Country Bugle which appeared in Nov 2019, including various photographs.

https://www.pressreader.com/uk/black-country-bugle/20191106/281505048027440

There are obviously several family connections to the Cartwrights still in the area as Margaret Higgs said that George Cartwright was her father’s uncle, her grandmother was George Cartwright’s sister.

Mark Northall said that his father Frank Northall had worked at Cartwright’s farm as a lad.

Jill Watkins-Beavon had lived in Gadds Green which was the land opposite Hailstone farm, later her fmily lived in one of the four houses in the quarry.

William Perry remembered in 2018 that his father had told him that when he was young he would walk up Turners Hill to Cartwright’s (Hailstone) farm where they had a lovely horse that he used to stroke.

So this is all the information that I have found to date about the farms in the Lost Hamlets, all disappeared now into the quarry but helping to sustain the local populace in their time, and about the families who farmed them over the centuries. More information would be very welcome and this can be added, corrected or a further post done if sufficient additional information is found.

Life on the Edge

As I mention in the introduction to this One Place Study, it was the loss to quarrying of whole hamlets in which my ancestors had lived which prompted me to start this study in the hope of recording information about the hamlets and the people who lived there. Quite a few people have mentioned on the Facebook Page ‘I remember Blackheath and Rowley Regis’ their own memories of living on the edge of the quarries on Turner’s Hill.

Peter Hackett was amongst those saddened by the loss of these hamlets. He said in 2014 “You forget that Perrys Lake was almost a little community of its own. Obliterated. Fair enough you have the new houses now. You would have thought that the planners would have kept its original name….”

Marilyn Holder at the same time said “I took a drive over to see the lost community of Perry’s Lake today and found it rather sad that it has disappeared into history like so many parts of the Black Country.” Marilyn’s 4 x Great-grandad Isaac Bishop lived in one of these cottages and worked as a nail maker in his late 70s – no pension then, work or poor house! Her father-in-law was born in one of the cottages in Perry’s Lake in 1919. She thought that there were 6 terraced cottages, which according to the 1841 census housed around 75 occupants. No bathrooms and one toilet up the back yard served all the houses.

Growing up and family memories on the edge

Cottages at Perry’s Lake, just prior to demolition, early 1960s. Copyright Linda George.

Perry’s Lake was the biggest of the hamlets and in close proximity to the entrance to Rowley Quarry in an area known as “Heaven”. The Portway Tavern was once the haunt of quarry workers after a long shift. For many years the Portway Tavern was owned by the Levett family, up to 1900, who were also butchers in Rowley and Blackheath for many years. It remained open until The Portway Tavern was demolished in 1984.

Many people have commented that Perry’s Lake was known as ‘Heaven’ though this does not appear on any maps that I have seen.

Sue Cole was born in a quarry cottage up on Turners Hill. It was next to a farm. Her mum told her that she had to fetch water from the farm as they didn’t have running water, or electricity, they had Tilley lamps for lighting. And she had to sleep in the wicker washing basket, because her brother was still sleeping in the cot. She also remembers that she used to play on the top of the quarry, and had to go inside when the siren blew when they were going to blast. When she was about six weeks old they moved to one of the houses round the back of the Tavern. Her Dad worked at the Hailstone quarry.

Carol Adney was born in Number 16 in the row of cottages along the top of Turners hill in 1950 and lived there until she was 4yrs old.

Shirley Jordan recalled that her aunt Mary had lived in the first house round the corner from the Portway Tavern and then there was the road that was called round heaven. She used to play round heaven at the bottom and there were some horses down there. A lady and family called Onions lived round there as well.

David John Reynolds also remembered that Joe Onions had looked after the quarry horses. When David was a child in the 50’s Joe only had one horse to look after, a white one called Dolly. Geoff Skelton noted that the field is still there where they kept the horses, the golf course fence is where the fence was to stop people going to the edge of the quarry. Stephen Hall remembered Geoff Onions whom he had worked with at Albright and Wilson and who later kept the Portway Tavern with his wife Joan.

Eileen Hadley remembered that her great-aunt Kate Faulkner lived across Perry’s Lake, and that it used to be known as Heaven. Other residents included families called Bird and Harcourt . Jus Joan had a Great aunt whose name was Redfern, she lived in the first cottage set back from the road about half way down with a small front garden. George Webb said that his in-laws lived at the back of the Portway Tavern, aka Heaven in old cottages ,they were Harcourts and Reynolds , both worked in the quarry. He also recalled that Syd and Joe Dowell lived opposite the Tavern . Alma Webb also remembered that she visited the cottages by Portway Tavern. George’s wife Mary used to take her to see her sister who lived there. Her husband worked at the quarry and the cottage was on the edge of the quarry.

Jus Joan had a great-uncle Jesse Plant who was killed in the 1st World war who lived at no. 12 Perry’s Lake.

Tony Holland said that he lived in the Portway Tavern from 1959 to about 1962. (It’s surprising how many people lived at the Portway Tavern at various times! I shall write a separate article on the Portway Tavern and the other pubs in the hamlets at some point!) He also knew the area as ‘Heaven’. At the end of Heaven on the left hand side was a field owned by a chap called Joe, presumably Joe Onions. The children played football there and called it Joe’s stadium. Tony said he hung about with kids from Irish families that lived there. He knew that the houses did not have electricity and relied on gas lighting. The cottages were still there in 1962 and there were about half a dozen then.

Stephanie Pullinger says that her great-grandad was a quarryman. As they lived in Tipperty Green she assumes that he worked at the Hailstone quarry but has very little information and would love to find out more. He and his brother, according to family legend, were characters. Apparently one night he brought a donkey home that he found on the way home from the pub. On another occasion he brought an old gypsy woman back much to her great grandmother’s disgust! Stephanie says that every time she thinks about that donkey she imagines its hooves clattering on the cobbles in the entry between the terraced houses.

Hailstone Quarry workers c.1910. Copyright unknown but will be gladly acknowledged on receipt of more information.

Mention of the entries between houses brought back a memory of his teenage years for David Steventon when he was helping the local milkman with deliveries each weekend. Obviously on such days one would collect payment for the week’s milk from the lady of the house. So at the front end of each entryway I would start singing, “Milk ho, milk ho, milk ho, ho, ho!” And sure enough, when he reached the back door the customer would be waiting with purse open to settle the debt.

Reg Parsons was born at Number2 Turner’s Hill in the bungalow his father had built after demolishing some old cottages which had stood on the site. He recalled Slim’s sweet shop which was the nearest shop and his parents’ shop in Doulton Road. He remembered Vera Cartwright with her milk cart. Amongst the local boys he had played with were those from the Simpson, Parkes, Robinson and Hopkins families who lived nearby. During WWII the field below the bungalow was used as a fuel dump, which consisted of concrete bases with piles of Jerry cans of fuel, securely fenced! There was an anti-aircraft gun nearby, near the Wheatsheaf Inn, something my late mother had also told me about. Reg’s brother Harry was in the Grenadier Guards and his sister Edna was in the Land Army, based in Evesham.

I have recounted elsewhere that Reg went to Britannia Road school and milked the cows at a farm on the way through Rowley, walking to and from school. From what Reg told me about where the bungalow was, I believe this was later replaced by a much bigger house by a local motor dealer Sid Riley who owned the Garage in Dudley Port, Caldene Motors. His niece Maggie Smith tells that he had a swimming pool in the basement of his house, which flooded the rest of the house, when quarry blasting damaged the footings.

If I am correct, this would have been the view from Reg and later Sid’s home.

View from top of Turner’s Hill. Copyright Catherine Ann.

Joyce Connop remembered that when she used to walk across Tippity Green (73 years ago!) to Doulton school there was nothing on the right hand side, only Ada’s cafe then she would cross over the bottom of Turners Hill. There was a row of houses, one had a shop in the front room, on the other side there were the grey looking council houses then and Stiffs concrete works, Portway Tavern and a row of terraced houses lay back where the golf range is now. There were a about half a dozen houses just round the corner from Ada’s cafe at the bottom of Turners Hill which were really old, Joyce remembers her mother saying they had earth floors. There were also about half a dozen terraced houses on the corner opposite the Bulls Head.

Joyce loved Ada’s café, Ada used to serve them with penny cakes on our way to school . She was seven, and remembers that it was lonely across there and no pavement then, noting that 7 year olds don’t walk all that way on their own to school now .

Playing on the edge

There were lots of places for children to play and have fun as with so much of the derelict land in the area, known as the ‘quack’, the ‘bonk’, the marlholes which abounded in the area.

Many children played around the quarries and some could remember falling over the edge. Pam Veal said that she fell off the top on to the ledge once.

Peter Greatbatch remembered in about 1965 when he was about 13, that he fell down the Hailstone quarry from top to bottom after climbing down it after a paper jet. He walked away, through the lorry entrance, with a sprained ankle and a cut at the back of his head, neither of these injuries serious! His brother David Greatbatch was there and also his friend Raymond Knowles who said to him after the incident “I thought you had had your chips there”. Peter says he will never forget it, the luckiest day of his life. Some years later, he added, he had another incident at the other quarry at Turner’s hill in the 70’s when he hit the big rocks put by the side of the quarry at the bottom of the hill. He was trying to broadside his Ford 1600E there in the snow. If those rocks weren’t there he and his three passengers would have ended up in that quarry. He says he would not have walked away from that one.

There was a pool at the Blue Rock quarry where David Wood and JJSmith used to fish, JJSmith commenting that he fell in more than once – the sides were very steep where the perch were and David Wood agreed that the sides were so steep you were lucky if you got out. Joyce Connop recounted that her brother had fallen in there when he was 10 and another lad got a lifesaving award for getting him out. Roger Harris remembered that he and his mates used to swim there, they used to make rafts out of old wood. One of his mates had a deep gash on his leg after hitting a sharp rock when he fell off an old bit of wood, noting that these were mad days in the 60s before such places were fenced off. There was little mention of Health and Safety in those days.

Sadly, not everyone who fell in got out. There were tragic memories of two brothers who drowned there, within living memory. It was believed that the younger fell in and his older brother jumped in to help him but neither could swim and both were lost, devastating their family and no doubt worrying legion mothers who urged their children not to go near such pools.

Riding on the Edge

Many people remembered riding lessons at Hailstone Farm. Ian Davies recalled that the Cartwrights ran Hailstone Farm which was off to the left on the way up Turners Hill. They were his relatives; his Geordie grandfather lived with them at Lamb Farm, near Portway Hall, when he first moved south in the early 1900s. By the 1950s George Cartwright had moved away to a farm near Bewdley and Hailstone Farm had been taken over by their daughter Vera and her husband George Thomas. George taught him to ride. The quarries were already threatening to swallow the farm back then. The narrow track from Turners Hill had quarries close on both sides. The farmhouse and top of the land were later swallowed up by the Tarmac mega-quarry.

Hailstone and Freebodies Farms, on the edge! copyright D Morris

Driving on the edge

The road between Perry’s Lake and Oakham, going up Turner’s Hill also had memories for many people. This was later closed and quarried away. There was a sheer drop on either side within a few feet of the road. Many people could remember walking up that road on their way to visit family. Roy Martin could remember when it was still open to two way traffic when he first drove up there. But being narrow with passing places, it was still dodgy so they made it one-way it uphill. But as John Packer remembered, a few people still used it as a short cut, as late as autumn 1968. Michael Bowater recounted that he just managed to escape serious injury walking up there one night on his way back from Brickhouse. A car coming up the hill was going too fast and he just about scrambled up the bank on the left, it was a close call, he noted, it was a good job he was young ,fit and agile. John Packer hoped the car wasn’t his red Hillman Imp!

This photograph shows the three main quarries with the Turner’s Hill Road, climbing between the top two roads. Note also the steep edge of the bottom quarry immediately behind Tippity Green.

Eileen Herbert could remember driving up Turners Hill with her dad to visit her aunt Rose Kite, Eileen lived in Highmoor Road and the siren before blasting was very loud from there. They always knew what time was as they could hear Lenches ” Bull” as well. “Long time ago but I can still hear them in my head!”

Angela Kirkham also recalled going to visit her gran, auntie and cousins (Tonks and Madley were the names), they used to visit on Sundays and always went over the quarry. She recalls that she spent most of her early childhood playing round the top of the quarry and the banks, sometimes with her brothers throwing bricks at other kids and sometimes at one another ! Angela’s Kirkham grandfather, father and uncles all worked in the quarries, they lived in Dane Terrace and Angela remembered that the blasts used to shake the house. These were presumably the Kirkham brothers Brian and Clifford who commented on the Facebook page that they all worked in the quarry, bringing the rock to the crusher or as a mechanic. Roger Harris also worked with them and said that, although the work was hard and the money wasn’t good, they had some laughs. Which sounds like a lot of life in the area!

Dropping off the edge

Not only people fell into the quarries. Gardens did too and other things! The map shows clearly that the quarries came right up to the edge of gardens in the hamlets.

1st Edition OS Map extract, Copyright David and Charles.

Graham Evan Beese recounted that his grandparents lived at number 50 Tippity Green until the bottom half of the garden fell down the quarry, pigs chickens and shed too. There is no word on the fate of the poor livestock! Graham’s grandparents were quickly moved to Eagle Close on the Brickhouse Farm estate.

Andrea James had a similar experience and recounts “We used to live along Tippity Green and our garden backed right onto the quarry , with only a tiny wire fence that , as children we could easily climb over. Every time they blasted we would lose a little of our garden.

In those days we didn’t have an inside toilet, ours was at the top of the garden and one morning I went to go to the loo …only to find out it had disappeared.

To add insult to injury I had a further telling off from mom when I woke her up to tell her the toilet had fallen down the quarry.”

Andrea added that, unlike Graham’s grandparents, her family were not rehoused after losing their loo, they used Mrs Faulkner’s loo next door for years! They stayed there until the row of terraced cottages were destroyed by a fire that started in the sweet shop . Their roof caught fire and Andrea’s father woke them all up to get out … her mom said “Oh my God ..where’s the dog ? “

Andrea’s dad said “He’s in the car with my fishing rods”. Andrea’s dad clearly had a good grasp of his priorities. They lost everything in the fire (except the dog and the fishing rods, of course) but her mom refused to move into the horrible maisonette she was offered so they lived in the burnt out shell, with help from local people, until they were offered a better house. Tough Black Country folk, these!

And if your garden didn’t fall into the quarry, it was still a risky place to live! Paul Pearson remembered when the air brake failed (or forgot to be put on) on one of the quarry wagons, and it rolled back down the driveway, across Portway road, down the gardens and into two houses. He said that there are still steel girders out in the front of the houses now that the quarry put up after this incident.

Working on the edge

As can be seen from all these memories the quarry loomed large over the village and especially the hamlets. Many local men and boys worked there, quite a few died there or were injured or maimed. Sarah Preston recounted that her great grandfather died in an accident there before her grandmother was born, he had done an extra shift to get extra money but didn’t live to see his daughter born.

There was regular daily blasting to loosen rock. Apparently when the blasting happened the workers sheltered under metal containers to save coming up away from the area. Anyone who lived or went to school within hearing distance of the quarries can remember how the day was punctuated by the regular sound of the siren at 10am and 1pm. Certainly I can remember it from my days at Rowley Hall Primary, although I do not remember it from my days at RRGs in Hawes Lane, perhaps the school there was that much lower down and on the other side of the hill. Recollections may vary, others may remember it from there, too.

Maggie Smith also notes that her son in law’s father owned a cafe in Low Town, Oldbury, called the Polar Bear. The cafe had to be pulled down to make way she thought for the magistrates court. It was taken in one piece and used as the cafe at the Hailstone quarry.

Many members of the ‘I remember Blackheath and Rowley Regis’ Facebook page have told of their memories of the sirens and the blasts. The blasting was not always without incident. Alan Homer recalled a rock coming through the roof of Toyes chippy on Dudley Road. Someone else (sorry, I can’t find this entry now!) remembered a rock coming through the roof of a toilet, just after she had finished cleaning it. Fortunately it was unoccupied at the time!

Kelvin Taylor noted that his family lived in Limes Avenue, a mile away below Britannia Park and could hear the siren and the blast if the wind was blowing in the right direction.

Graham Lamb remembered that his mother used to go mad because they had metal window frames and the blasts used to crack the glass, nearly every week his dad had to put a new pane in somewhere.

I have tried to gather these memories into a more or less coherent form and hope that people will enjoy reading about the life of the ordinary working people who lived in the Lost Hamlets. They had full, active, hard working and hard playing lives and formed strong communities. Though their physical homes have gone, something of their lives is recorded through these memories. Please feel free to contact me if there are more memories of family here that you would like to add.