My Memories by Jackie Kelsey
The above Goodrich Road school photo is of my father Richard Charles Lampard born 1921. Dad said it was taken outside the school by a photographer. The photo is behind a glass frame and is quite big and it always hung from the picture rail in my Grandparents dining room by the chain connected to the back of the photo.
My GG Grandfather, Grandfather & Dad were all Tin Plate workers and could turn their hand to making anything as regards this. I do ancestry research and have all the Census`s where they lived and their professions. Dad was an Engineer and did most of his training in the Army, which he carried on eventually when he left after the war finished. A very clever man where Engines and Boilers were concerned.
When my Dad came home on leave he used to go and have a pint with my Grandfather down at the Herne Tavern. There was a lady in there a few times whose son had been killed and she said my father reminded him of her son who used to like a pint in there also before the war . Very sad.
The first photo shows my Grandmother Ada Mary Victoria Lampard third in from the right, her older sister Edith Ingle is far right. Nans best friend is at the bottom left. We knew her as “Aunt Doll”. The second photo is years later when she was a school cook at Friern Road School when I attended there. She is in the middle of the top row and I just love the hats! The Head Mistress was Mrs Bromley at that time.
My pal and I used to sit for ages up on Dawsons Hill you could see right over London.
I used to go up Dawsons Hill, I remember me and a couple of mates went up Dawsons Hill, found a corrugated metal sheet, we bent the front up and pushed ourselves down the hill, we hit a small tree stump on the way down and we flew off into a load of stinging nettles, very painful as you can imagine, good times though.
John Chinery
How funny we played in the same areas John. Can I ask you what year you were born. It’s sounds roughly the same time or maybe after 1948. By the way what schools did you go to John. I went for a short while to Heber Road after Friern. Jackie
I was born in 1952 in a basement flat in Rodwell Road, East Dulwich, we lived there until I was about a year old then we moved into our Prefab. I went to Heber Road School and then onto Thomas Calton Secondary School, my Mum, Dad, Uncles & Brother (who was born in 1947) all went to Heber Road School, I still have most of my School Reports (examples on website)
I lived in one of the Prefabs in Underhill Road, just down the road from Dunstans Road, one of the ladies that worked with my Mum at Everitt Vero’s in Crystal Palace Road still lives in Dunstans Road, her name is Maureen Flannery.
John Chinery
I have been trying to find out about Dunstans Grove to see if it was bombed during the war as my grandfather Alfred Lampard was born at 4 Speldhurst Villas there but then it was Herne Grove then. I have his birth details and during my Ancestry research I came to a halt with where his parents Richard Lampard and Harriet Ann were married. After a few years of searching and using name varients, a grandaughter of my fathers cousin Harold White found it under the name of Lenford! Guess what they had married in Speldurst Kent. It was 1864. Why they were there all the way from off Waterloo Road London I don’t know but probably work. Harold was the son of my grandfather Alfreds school teacher sister Mary Ann Lampard. They lived in Uplands Road. Harold and his brother ended up going to University and teaching there too. It is such a puzzle why number 4 Dunstans Grove is no longer there on the corner as it hasn’t got a listing on the bombed areas around there. I have just spoken to my mother bless her and I write down everything she tells me before her long term memory goes too. She said there used to be a bombed area down Dunstans going down on the right hand side so it could have taken my GGrandparents house too when that exploded. My father thought they owned it as my GGrandfather had his own business in Ironmongery. He also thought they kept a horse and carriage/cart at the back of where the corner shop is at the very end of Dunstans on the left. Oh dear getting carried away here!
Would be grateful if anyone knows why number 4 Speldurst is no longer standing. Its the only one that isn’t! I loved all the Villa type houses down Dunstans and all the years I lived there and visited never knew they had Villa names on them. Well some of them.
Hi Jackie, I knew Herne Grove (later changed to Dunstan’s Grove), where your Great Grandparents lived at number 4. My Grandmother, Mrs. M. Smith, lived at number 16. Next door, at number 14. lived another ‘Smith’ family; Mr. Smith the local policeman, and his two daughters, Barbara and Lilian. You probably know that 4. Herne Grove was demolished years’ ago and that a small block of flats now stand in its place.
All the best, Mike Mills
There are facts where my Grandmother lived and GGrandparents who all came from Herts. My Nans brother Thomas Managed the Carlton Arms, spelt differently in the Vitular records and mum said they had a parrot that swore!!! That was down the other end of Peckham. Well you can imagine in those days cant you!
My mum said she had a friend who lived in the Prefabs in Underhill Road called Betty Kidd and her husband Joe. Children Susan, another girl and a boy with curly hair. Betty was Welsh and she thinks they went back to Swansea.
We used to come down Underhill road on a book and skate and if we had enough speed after turning into Rydale would make it into Balchier Road! No cars in those days John!
Me and a friend of mine came down Underhill Road on a boxcart about 1961/62, I was on the back controlling the brake, my mate was steering, we were going quite fast, he said “Hold on I’m gonna turn into Ryedale” I shouted “No” he turned anyway and the boxcart just rolled over, luckily we wasn’t hurt and as you say Jackie not much traffic on the roads then.
John Chinery
My Grandfather Alfred Lampard made me a “Go Cart” and my friend and I did exactly the same too.
We also used to go to the dog pond on Peckham Rye and catch the Red Throats with our homemade nets! Although I left living at Balchier Road from the age of nearly 9, I visited and stayed with my much loved Grandmother when I could in the school holidays. My mother used to put me on a 137 bus and Nan would meet me outside the Kings Arms bus stop as you could in those days as the conductor would have been told to not let me off before then! I continued this for a number of years and when I started work I went every Wednesday and stayed the night. We slept in her big bed in the room that used to be our living room and my parents bedroom as they had a put u up! Nan and I would be giggling until late as we had the same sense of humour! My dear father was always joking around too. Happy days.