Fishy Friday at The Brown Jug

It's Fishy Friday at The Brown Jug this Friday, December the 9th. 6:30pm – 10:00pm.

Freshly cooked fish, chips and peas available at only £6.50 each. For further details or to book, Please call: 01634 366543.

Upchurch Matters
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Thank you from the PFHS

Thank you very much to all the businesses that donated to the school christmas fayre last Friday.

Julie Pike
Chairperson of the PFHS
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An Englishman in Colombia

David Wood.

Upchurch resident  David Wood has recently had an online version of his book 'An Englishman in Colombia' published on the internet which can be accessed at:  colqat.weebly.com

It's about his experiences in that country over a ten year period from the late 1980s to the late 1990s and a description of the problems there between the drug cartels and the government and the everyday problems experienced. The book begins with David and another Upchurch resident Nigel Barling from Poot Lane going to Colombia for an adventure on the Caribbean and in the Amazon and then about David's experiences while working in Bogota and travelling around the country which includes six muggings, the murder of his business partner, an earthquake and a bomb explosion.

It was an action packed experience in one of the most violent and uncertain periods in Colombian history.


Upchurch Matters
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Memories of Working in the Brickfields

From the mid nineteenth century for about 100 years many local men were employed in the Otterham or Lower Halstow brickfields including the late Cliff Wanstall before he became a well known and long serving Upchurch village postmaster during the early 1950s.

“I worked in the Lower Halstow brickfields for about five years during the 1930s. My father had worked there as a moulder and setter and I used to travel to London in one of the brickfield trucks and helped the driver unload. I also ran errands in the brickfield during the school holidays. My first full time job as a ‘crowder’ was physically hard. I had to push a barrow full of bricks along a rail then load the contents on to a lorry. I also worked as a ‘flatty’ making bricks by hand in the brick shed.

Memories of Upchurch.

Men usually worked  full time in the brickfield and women worked there as barrow loaders during the summer months but sometimes workers were laid off during winter because of wet weather which made brick making difficult. Work usually began at 6 a.m. and finished at 5 p.m. with a one hour lunch break. Workers were paid on a peace work basis per thousand bricks. Unfortunately, if rain came after working hours a whistle sounded and workers had to return to the field to cover the bricks, even late at night. Work was physically hard but relations between workers were good.

Local Upchurch men I remember working in the Lower Halstow brickfield included Bert Smitherman and Wally Edmonds from The Street and Bert and Ashley Edmonds from Twinney but there were others.

Safety precautions were quite good but several times I remember watching an inexperienced worker running downhill with his wheelbarrow too quickly only to let go when losing control causing the barrow and its contents to tip over on the ground. However, the older workers looked after the younger ones and advised them. Work was difficult to obtain during the 1930s depression so the brickfields allowed a regular income and many men worked there for the whole of their working lives.

After the war I worked at the Otterham Brickfield for two years and my first job was in the chalk pit just off Canterbury Lane. Work in the main brickfield area was easier than at Lower Halstow because you didn’t have to run so far with the bricks. We also had to provide our own transport and many of the workers cycled to work and some took a bottle of cold tea to drink. I got laid off for a month after I crashed my bike into the back of a lorry at the bottom of Windmill Hill on my way to work and got injured but I soon recovered and returned to my job.

The greatest benefit of working for ‘Eastwoods’ at the Otterham brickfield was that if you were a member of a gang that produced one million bricks the company would provide each man with a new pair of boots. The work was very hard but I enjoyed it and worked there until the late 1940s.”

David Wood, who was born and raised in Upchurch, is able to write from personal experience about many people and aspects of the village and of changes that have taken place over the years making ‘Memories of Upchurch’ a very readable book and a detailed historical study of the village.

David Wood's book ‘Memories of Upchurch’ is available direct from David on:  david3702001@yahoo.co.uk  price £12 + p+p £2.

David Wood

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Upchurch Fifty Years Ago in December 1961

Memories of Upchurch.

The East Kent Gazette reported Christmas 1961 as the coldest for seventeen years with bitterly cold winds, frost and burst water pipes. To make matters worse tragedy struck on Funton Marshes when a group of Upchurch and Halstow boys went duck shooting. Using rubber dinghies they split into two pairs but after 90 minutes the second pair consisting of Graham Daniel from Oak Lane Upchurch and Peter McKenzie from Lower Halstow watched a hat float past and an upturned dingy floating on the water. After searching for their friends they called for help and the drowned bodies of Peter Shrub and John Gooding were recovered from the river. Because of their waders, heavy clothing and cartridge belts the boys had been pulled under the water after their dingy had capsized. The tragedy caused great sadness for local people.

With a surge in building there were many requests to Swale Rural Council and Kent County Council for planning permission in Upchurch. An attempt to have a site for 100 caravans constructed on a 5½ acre field next to the brickfield in Otterham Quay and another in Poot Lane were both rejected. There was also an application to put the defunct slaughterhouse in W. H. Hales butchers yard in Forge Lane back into use. Swale Rural Council refused fearing that residents would complain and that the building was not in good repair.

In social affairs the Darby and Joan Club held a Christmas party in the village hall where members were presented with gifts of biscuits and small parcels of groceries. The horticultural society held its annual dance in the village hall and raised £12 for a local charity, while Mr and Mrs Stevens from Holywell Farm presented the church with a Christmas tree. Rich Boakes of Chaffes Lane continued organising the weekly village youth club. Acting as doorman and DJ he spent much of his time playing loud musical hits. He even organised a football match between the youth club boys and girls on the recreation ground which the boys just won 3-2. Meanwhile, the village football team was performing very well and scored their 50th goal of the season when they defeated East End 6-1. Les Woolley scored four goals. Two weeks earlier he had scored four in an exciting 5-4 victory over Medway United.

While the village footballers were banging in the goals members of the Women’s Institute spent their December meeting listening to Mr Cooper talking about wine then after some sherry tasting elected their new officers for the year. Mrs Smith was elected president, Mrs Watson secretary, Mrs Gore treasurer and Mrs Tress auditor. A competition for the most articles in a jar was won by Mrs Tress.

Finally, only one funeral took place when Florence Robinson aged 75 of The Street was buried in the churchyard while birthdays were celebrated by Leonard Sketchley aged 13 from Chaffes Lane, Elaine Stokes aged 10 from Holywell Farm Cottages, Cristine Cripps aged 13 from Twinney Cottages, and Anne Clemons aged 11 from Gore Bank.

David Wood, who was born and raised in Upchurch, is able to write from personal experience about many people and aspects of the village and of changes that have taken place over the years making ‘Memories of Upchurch’ a very readable book and a detailed historical study of the village.

David Wood's book ‘Memories of Upchurch’ is available direct from David on:  david3702001@yahoo.co.uk  price £12 + p+p £2.

David Wood
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Stay Vigilant

Upchurch residents are reminded to stay extra vigilant over the Christmas period after a car was broken into in Woodruff Close at the weekend whilst parked on the owners drive. A Sat Nav along with some loose change were taken in the theft.


Sally Cushing
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