Caroline Stride, Transcript1, Part 6
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Caroline Stride Trans 1 CH6 Duration: 6:43
CB: Okay. Right. So number twenty (CS020)
Caroline: This is another picture of the Lyndhurst Fair and you can see Grandad Penny with his boater now pushed back on the back of his head
CB: Slightly to the left of the picture –
Caroline: To the left of the picture
CB: Just in front of the tree.
Caroline: Yeah, and we think the next one holding the whip here on his shoulder, is Bill, his brother; and the gentleman with the stick is George Henry, so there’s the two boys and their father in the picture. Now this picture, as I’ve already said, was before there were any organised auctions within the Forest. And of course all of these little Forest villages would’ve had Fairs, or a lot of them would have and certainly Lyndhurst was quite historically important within the Forest, you know, being historically the capital of the Forest, we still tend to link it with the Court and of course the Forestry Commission still think of it as being quite an important village within the Forest environment.
CB: Yes. So, number twenty-one (CS021)
Caroline: Now this is Aunt Marth or Marth Penny as she would’ve been before she married an became Mrs. Baker; she was George Henry’s daughter, so it’s Charlie Penney’s sister, and as all Forest families or farming families, everyone got roped in to do the jobs. And as a young woman as you can see from her uniform or her clothing here, she was a dairymaid and that is outside of the barn here at Blackwater Farm with her two milk pails and the milking stool in her left hand and she would have been waiting to hand milk the cows here because the cows went out to forest, they grazed on the forest grazing and they were milked twice a day and it would have been someone’s role, someone’s job to go out and round them up. And that followed through, you know, my in-law, my mother in law, you know, she would spend her time going out and getting them when she wasn’t out at work or previous to that at school.
CB: So when do you think this was?
Caroline: Well again, I think this was probably before the First World War, Edwardian times; looking at her clothes really, as much as anything.
CB: Mmm, yes. That’s absolutely fabulous, and to think she’s in front of the same barn I’ve just parked my car near –
Caroline: Yeah
CB: Just brilliant. (CS022)This is number twenty-two, this one’s got some print on the bottom, what’s that?
Caroline: It’s a picture of Lenn Witt who I never knew myself, but he was an old forester up in the north of the Forest and he was a smallholder as I understand, a lover of New Forest ponies and he spoke a very fast dialect that was old English dialect. As I understand – sadly, I never knew him but it was in my photographic collection and I thought well you really ought to have it.
CB: Yes, lovely. Number twenty-three (CS023) Oh, look at that!
Caroline: Now this picture is taken as I understand at the Fair at Lyndhurst. And obviously this one didn’t really want to comply to the rules about walking along nicely with its handler! But again, a New Forest pony; it always fascinates me the interest that there would have been in ponies at the time, but really this was just before the motor car really started to take hold so in actual fact this would have been their only way of transport. Again, I think this is probably late Edwardian. It absolutely amazes me you don’t see many women in these pictures, so it’s very much just a man’s world.
CB: A man’s day out, okay.
Caroline: Yeah.
CB: So number twenty-four (CS024)
Caroline: Now this is a picture of Ted Penny, on the left; and it’s outside of the Waterloo Arms here at Pike’s Hill, Lyndhurst, and the gentleman to the right of the picture is …. Kempton. Was it Freddie Kempton? And he was well known for his grooming ability. He really was a wonderful groom and he worked – I think I’m saying right by – he used to work for Rachel Poultney who lived in Minstead; and he could turn out horses and ponies like no other person. And his knowledge of remedies for a sick animal, sick pony in particular – sadly he took to the grave because he was one of those people that, you know, didn’t share his information particularly well. But I know he would have given Ted a lot of assistance with this pony that he’s got and I think this picture was taken just after the point-to-point, the Boxing Day Point-to-Point here in the New Forest and I think he’d just won, so they’ve probably just gone in the Waterloo to
CB: Celebrate.
Caroline: Celebrate. Yes, celebrate.