My time at Borocourt

I was born in 1926 at Dellwood Hospital, Prospect Park.  I was put in an incubator, because I was premature.  I was born before my time.

I lived at Borocourt Mansion.  I got up every morning at 7.00, and then I had breakfast.  I had rock cakes for supper.  I had lessons there.  I learnt reading, writing, I did exams from a red exam book.  I did History and Geography and sums. 

Mr Kerry, Mr Talyor, Sister Gray, Mr and Mrs Carvill, Mr Bradley – I think they have all died now.  Mr and Mrs MacDonald, John Williams, Sister McGarry, Mr Wright, Mr Freddie.

I had nice bedroom – all the bedrooms were on a level.

When I was young we had to eat off tin plates and tin basins, and tin mugs to drink out of.   We had china plates eventually.  If the crockery was broken we had to take it to Mr Wise, and he put it in the ‘condemned’ box.  He threw it away. 

Mr Salt (the parson) used to give a Sunday service on Sunday morning, and we used to sing hymns and Mr Salt used to read from the bible.

For lunch we had a roast and then a pudding, and then we all went out for walk, we used to walk to Kidmore End and Gallowstree Common.  Afterwards we listened to the radio and television, I liked Dad’s Army.

We used to have a disco in the mansion – in the Hall of the mansion.  We had Halloween as well – we used to dress up as witches and dance and the house was all dark.  People said Lady Wyfold used to haunt the house at night – but she didn’t really.  When we had discos, we had all the lights flashing, we had all the pop songs like beatles songs.

We also had fairs and carnivals – with stalls.  I bought a radio there for a pound and it worked.  I haven’t got it now.  They had raffles and tombolas, plate smashing and coconuts and hoop things you threw over things.

My Mum used to come to see me once a month.

They had woods there – I was allowed to go out on my own, in the summer, I liked the bluebells.  They had an incinerator – I remember it being there.   There were often people riding on horses – hunters.   They had apple trees in the gardens, and they had shed to keep the apples in.  There used to run buses to Borocourt and I was allowed to go into town – when I got in to town I bought a bun and coffee.  They used to give me money in an envelope.  We didn’t have television or radio very much, so in the evenings we played games.  Mr Pick used to fiddle around with the radio to get it to work with a stick.  In the end they did get television -

For supper we had cocoa and a rock cake.  In the afternoons we had big dinner that was served through the hatch.  They had nice kitchen there, and the meals were cooked by the staff, including Michael the chef.  We used to have coffee in cans.  We had milk churns.

 There were pigs but they smelt nasty – they had the food that was left over.  They had some goldfish on one of the wards.

There was a hair dresser at Borocourt called Wendy and Mr Paine the barber used to come round and cut hair on the ward. 

I used to work in the factory – put screws and washers together.  And put aerosols tops on to aerosols.  We worked all day until 4.00 – Monday to Friday.

Places near were The Unicorn Inn and Sonning Common.

My Mum looked like me her hair was grey, her eyes were hazel, she was about the same size as me.  I used to help her to turn the mangle, and all the water come out. 

We used to have gas mantles – had to put the mantles on and pull the string and then we used to light them but I can’t remember how we used to light them.

My Mum had a radio with a photo of Big Ben on the top.

At Borocourt we used to buy cigarettes – senior service players, woodbine, capstan, strand, No 6, sobranie, Rothmans, Sovereign, black cats, Craven A, Camel, Dunhill, Christmas presents.  You could pay with a ticket. 

Sweets – penny chews, fruit salad, flying saucer, licorice, sherbert fountains, wrigleys chewing gum, sweet tobacco, cigarettes like sweets.

Camp coffee, broken biscuits, buy a bottle sherry in old plastic bottle.

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