Memories of a Village Christmas 1939
As the festive season came nearer, the nursery workers went about their duties lifting fruit and rose trees, together with Christmas trees, on the eleven acres opposite the old vicarage. Little did they know that soon growing would end and an industrial giant would come to stay, and change in many ways the life of the village of Duston.
Arthur Wilcox hurried from Rose Cottage farm with his milk cans and ladle to begin his milk round after letting the cows return to pasture. Bert Westley, the postman, began his deliveries after sorting the distant Upton mail - where bills that bore a halfpenny stamp would have to wait until after Christmas. Alan Favell, the butcher, was trying to satisfy his late customers with a festive dinner of cockerel or a fat hen. Ernie Franklin plucked all Alan's Christmas poultry and his old army overcoat was always covered with down and feathers for a long time afterwards. Sergeant Wright's bike was propped outside Arthur Attwood's blacksmith shop in Elms farmyard while he and the road lengthman were discussing the goings on. May James kept the Post Office shop in the front room of her house, where there was sufficient space to accommodate the needs of a small village. Mr. Faulkner was loaded with several days supply of bread and found it hard going late in the evening delivering with his pony and cart among the many groups of carol singers.
Each afternoon, Mr. Law would leave his paper shop and go down to the crossroads at Millway to collect the racing paper Midday Star. These papers were thrown out of a car speeding through Northampton from Birmingham and would be sold on St. James' Square to the many boot and shoe operatives who worked in the factories there.
Bert Faulkner and his staff at Percy Major's mushroom farm in Ashtrees Park would prepare the last shed before the holiday with the stacked trays of compost for spawning. Reverend Thompson hurried around to give communion to the elderly and offer season's greetings to some of the families who had taken London evacuees into their homes that autumn. He would have to get back to St. Luke's that evening for a meeting with his churchwardens, Mr. Timpson and A.R. Jones, together with his sexton, Mr. Munday, who were all responsible for the blackout of the church. The services must not be interrupted by the Air Raid Warden. There had been a lengthy discussion at the October meeting of the parochial church council as to how the church was to be blacked out. It was decided to cover nine windows with curtains and six with brown paper, hoping more money would be found to meet the cost of finishing the job properly. After this Christmas the bells of St. Luke would be silent for five years.
This article was kindly donated by Fred Golby, local historian. To learn more about the history of Duston, see Fred's book A History of Old Duston & Old St James.