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RECORD OF A CONVERSATION WITH SIDNEY MALE , RY COFFMAN AND NICKY WOTTON ON 11 DECEMBER 2009 AT SID’S HOUSE IN ROWDELLS ORCHARD, SEAVINGTON ST MARY RECORDED AND TRANSCRIBED BY RY COFFMAN
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Sid was born in September 1916 at Townsend Cottage, Townsend, Seavington St Mary.    He went to School in ‘Higher Seavington’ but didn’t like school very much.    There were two teachers; Miss Kiddle (who taught the older children) and Miss Skentfield.  Miss Skentfield used to come over every day from Barrington on her bike.   Miss Kiddle used to have big purple hands like a man, she was very strong, and a firm disciplinarian -   it was common for children to get strokes from the cane.   Sid says he had many a clip round the ear up there!    Sid enjoyed playing football at school.   There were four teams: Red, Blue, Yellow and Green.   He remembered ‘egg shackling’ at the school on Shrove Tuesday.  (All the children brought an egg to school, the eggs were put in a large garden sieve and the eggs rolled around in it – last egg uncracked was the winner).  Some children used to boil their eggs, which was cheating!  They used to get a school photo taken each year and Mayday was always an important event.    His favourite lesson was the nature lesson at school.
There were seven children in his family, one girl and six boys, Sid was the fourth child.  One of his brothers, Charles, died in infancy.  Sid’s father was the carter, looking after and working with the horses on Manor Farm for years.  He died of cancer when he was 52.  His mother, who died in her 80’s, was very hard working.  She used to work in the shirt collar factory in the village which had 12 sewing machines.  The factory was in ‘Higher Seavington’ – Seavington St Michael next to Jack Rowsell, the blacksmith.  The factory was near where Bob Ash lives now at ‘Farriers’ – on the main road.  
Townsend Cottage where Sid grew up backed onto farm land and the children used to climb out through a back window and over a stone wall to play there.   The cottage just had two bedrooms; they all had to use the same ‘Jeremiah’ as the toilet was across the road on the bank opposite the house.  
Sid’s earliest memory was getting a hiding!  They used to get up to mischief but not the sort of mischief that people get into now; sometimes they would go into the field and round up the horses and then ride them around without halters or saddles.  They used to go catching moths at night.  They used to play hares and hounds across the fields after school. Sometimes when they were out they saw the real fox or a hare and ‘we didn’t used to turn up’ (to school)!  
Village children used to go paper chasing, they don’t play that now. Someone used to put the trail down and they would all go out chasing. They also used to play a game in the dark called ‘Nicky Nicky Night’.  They would all be outside and shout ‘Nicky Nicky Night - show your light’.  And the person with the light would have to show it and they would all try to find him.
Sid said that there was a big stone by the village pond, that the village children used to play on; it said Seavington St Michael and Seavington St Mary on it.  They used to call it the devil stone!  He wonders what happened to that stone.   He said that sometimes his family, his father and mother, would walk over to Dinnington at the weekend to the pub for a drink – there was a very big stone across the ditch which was a stepping stone.  Sid wonders what happened to these big stones.
Sid had an aunt who lived in School Lane her name was Annie Swain; she lived in one of the two terrace cottages on the right.  Sid said he used to drop in there to get a drink of water.  Mr Wilfred Webb the vicar used to live at the Parsonage. Sid was very active and enjoyed sport; he used to play cricket in the summer and football in the winter for the village.   There were many cups won by both teams, Sid said they must be somewhere!
He used to go to Sunday school in Upper Seavington in Upton Lane with Parson Nash who was the vicar. The children all had to read a verse from the Bible and one time, when it came to Sid’s turn and reading the word ‘triumph’ he said trumpet by mistake!  Everybody laughed, even Parson Nash!  He used to go to church and on church outings to Lyme Regis or Seaton.  The people who went to chapel used to go to Weymouth and places like that.  His family changed from going to church and went to Methodist chapel.  
His sister Eileen used to play the organ at the Methodist chapel – and she used to have her own band, Eileen Male and the Moonbeams.  His uncle, also named Sid, was the shepherd on Manor Farm; he kept dogs and Sid used to play with them.  There were 250 sheep on Manor Farm; six lambs were slaughtered every week on the farm.  The meat was sent to London on the train packed in wicker baskets.  His father used to take the basket down to the train in Crewkerne every Sunday; the horse that they used for this trip was an ex-army horse called ‘Maxy’.  There used to be a pub on the main road as you go down through Merriott on the way to Crewkerne station and his father used to stop off for a pint on the way back.  One day his father was ill and unable to take the basket down to the train so the farmer said he would do it; so he set off for the station and on the way back the horse stopped off at the pub as usual to the surprise of the farmer.  He said to Sid’s father George afterwards, “I see where you call into every Sunday now!”  
When Sid first started working on the farm it was all horse work and there were about 15 horses on the farm.  His father was the carter on the farm (looking after all the horses).  When Sid was young he used to work with the horses.  In the winter, when his father had to go into the fields to take up the swedes and wurzels for the sheep, Sid used to go to lead the pony. One year for his month’s holiday – when his father had a new pony which didn’t know the route, Sid had to lead the pony every day for his whole holiday. He said he walked miles and miles.  After the war, tractors came along and the horses disappeared.  Sid used to drive the tractor home for his lunch and park it up outside!  
Sid left school when he was 14 at half-term at the end of October.  He started work on the Manor Farm hauling out wurzels for feed for the sheep and cows.  His mother did not want him to work at Manor Farm as two brothers were already working there.  He therefore went to work at Dillington House to do gardening.  He didn’t like it there and gave his notice in the next week.  He was put off because he was put in a little dark shed on his own and was given hundreds of little flower pots to clean just because it was a bit wet outside.
Next he went to work at Paulls at Martock, with marquees and tents during the summer months – and making deck chairs.  When he first started work he earned ten shillings – (50p) a week.  Then it used to go up 3 shillings every 12 months.
When he was 16 he had 16 shillings a week. He worked at Paulls for the summer months then got laid off.  He came back and worked on Manor Farm because they needed somebody.  Sid also worked for Frank Jeffery in South Petherton at times.
Sid talked about tractor driving on Mr Madge’s farm.  Sid said that that was a good job, when he was due to retire at 65, Mr Madge asked him to stay on  and he stayed on for another 10 years.  He was 75 when he finished altogether.  Sid said Mr Madge was a good boss.  
Sid married Barbara in 1942 during the war.  He got called up in February 1942 and went into the army joining the Royal Artillery. He was sent to Exeter Barracks for training and had only been there a week when Exeter was bombed, he’d never seen anything like it – Exeter had been flattened.  They had to get out of their hut and dive for the trenches outside. He remembered his friends Ernie Cox and Arthur Hallett who used to live in Bridgwater and Chard, and who as far as he knows have now both died.  They were shelled and bombed every day, they had many escapes. Ernie was in the trench with Sid and they only had one allied Beaufighter up in the sky and with bombs  coming down.  The first plane came over in a circle then the next ones following dropped flares and that lit up Exeter just like daylight.   The guns brought down one German plane and it landed near them and they could see it in the barbed wire.  He will always remember that he was in a trench with his mate from Chard, Ernie, and the plane and the bomb came down 50 yards away!  By October 1942 he was abroad.  His job in the Artillery was a driver taking ammunition up to the front.    He went to North Africa and Sicily, Italy, Germany, France and all over the place.  He was shelled and bombed every day and had many escapes.   ‘You had a job to get through it,’ he said.   
After the war he came back to Seavington and the Madges asked him to go back to work on Manor Farm and he said he was very well looked after.  Anything he wanted he could have. He had a big circular saw that worked off his tractor for cutting up wood and he was allowed all the wood he wanted.  Sid has lived in the bungalows at Rowdells Orchard in St Mary’s since 1946, 63 years. He is the longest serving person in the bungalows!  The bungalows were built in two stages. George and  Sis Derrick were the first ones to move in, then Henry and Eva Clarke moved into No 4.  The other four bungalows were built in 1950.   His sister Eileen lived in the end bungalow – No. 8 with his mother – Granny Male (Blanche) who moved in during the late 1950’s.    
Sid met his wife Barbara in South Petherton.  They used to go to dances in South Petherton at the Hall.  He would go over there on his bicycle and take Barbara home on the cross bar!  Sid and Barbara lived down Dark Lane at Owly Farm in those days (while Sid was in the war).  He and Barbara got married at the Methodist chapel in South Petherton.  While Sid was in the army Barbara did gloving and she used to take them into South Petherton every week on the bike.  Barbara was very good at gloving, in fact Sid said she could turn her hand at anything, he particularly remembered her Easter Cakes; she was a very good cook!  Sid used to grow vegetables in his back garden – he used to dig it all with a spade – no rotovator! He used to grow a wide range of veg including cabbages, carrots, beetroot.  After work he used to work until about 8pm in his vegetable garden.   His daughter and son in law grassed the vegetable garden down for him now.  
Sid has two daughters Jane and Myra who visit him regularly and he has 4 grandchildren and 6 great grand children.
Sid says he is full of aches and pains these days and he can only walk very slowly, he has to watch his step.  Sid talked about having sorted some photos out for us and that he has other albums of photos. He describes a photo of himself with horses when he worked on Moor Farm in South Petherton (see Sid’s photo album). Sid worked on Manor Farm in Seavington St Mary for many years.  He talks about how the milk churns were put outside the cowshed in days gone by to be picked up.    In another of Sid’s photos, of the ‘gypsies’  (the village Coronation celebration 1953) one of the gypsies is Sid’s mother.  The horse and cart in the picture is from the Manor Farm.  

Ry Coffman 14th December 2010.

Sid Males photos can be viewed here