Emsmore The house my parents found in the tiny Worcestershire village of Alfrick (population 250), was the property of a local farmer, from whom we were able to obtain a 21-year lease. Emsmore was not a particularly attractive house externally, with its stuccoed finish and leaded panes which were quite inappopriate to it’s architecture. It stood at the top of a hill on the road between Alfrick and the neighbouring village of Suckley. A narrow lane wound away from the front of the house and down into the village, and up one side of the house ran an unmade up drive to a neighbouring farm. So it was effectively on a corner.
There were lawns and flowerbeds at the side and back of the house, and a large kitchen garden further back still. Across the road on the opposite corner was a small paddock containing a large barn, and an old stable in which my mother kept chickens during the war. Next to the paddock was the fruit orchard containing plums and apples, and beyond that were two fields which we rented out. All of this represented such a change from the flat in London, and before that the restricted atmosphere of my grandfather’s house.
Inside, the house was pretty plain too, but all and more than we needed. There was a large entrance hall from which you could turn right into the sitting room, left for the stairs and the diningroom, or walk to the back and through a third door to the kitchen, the doors to the garden, and a huge room at the back. There was also a loo off the hall. Upstairs you turned left for my brother’s room and the bathroom, right for my room and my parents’ room, and straight along the landing to a small spareroom, and a huge one over the big downstairs room.
There were various outbuildings up the garden, and also on the same plot was a pretty little two up two down cottage of considerable age and charm, which we eventually rented to my mother’s sister, as a bolt hole for her from Birmingham and the bombing raids. Next to the cottage stood a wooden garage where we kept our car, and which was also my father’s workshop.
Our new house had no electricity. In 1939 power was expected to come to the village at any time, but of course the whole thing was put on hold with the outbreak of war. This meant that my mother cooked on a paraffin stove, and we used paraffin lamps and candles to light the house. We had no mains sewage or water either, and our cesspit in the paddock had to be emptied every so often by a visiting collector. It was my father’s daily chore to pump up water by hand from our well into our water tanks. My parents were always so scared that our well would run dry (which it never did) that we had to get used to using the loos without flushing every time.
Despite these shortcomings in today’s terms, we became very comfortable in this property where we had so much room, and where we learned to live the country life, although I don’t think we ever became real country folk. I remember, for instance, that as a family we had already established a habit of lying in on Sunday mornings and having a brunch when we got up. But my mother was embarrassed to realise that farming people have to get up early every day, and that our closed curtains in the downstairs rooms were conspicuous and telltale by noon on a Sunday. So she used to open them before going to bed on Saturday night. Over the 21 years of our lease I think we became pretty much accepted by the local community, and our parents certainly made every effort to fit in and contribute to the life of the village.
Yew Tree Cottage
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