Cherry Rogers’ memory reflects back on the railway …
For some reason the station was a favourite place to walk to. Mum and nana used to push me down there in my pram to see the trains and I in turn used to take my kids down to see the them. It was a nice walk and the pink flowering chestnut trees along the meadow opposite the Great Eastern were lovely, with horses kept in the field. They were lovely steam trains. You could sit on the platform to take the names and numbers, while watching all the parcels and livestock being loaded. There were cages with rabbits, chickens and ferrets. I didn’t like the ferrets much, I thought they were smelly. People came off the train and often collected a bike, a parcel or a suitcase from the guards van. When the guard blew the whistle, what fun it was to rush to the footbridge and stand over the top of the train to get covered in smoke and little black smuts. Not so much fun when mum saw the smuts and I brushed them. We would watch people go to the bookstall and the train fill up with water. If stood in the right place, when the pipe swung back you could wash the smuts off, followed by a smack when you got home. It was expected and probably deserved so it didn’t matter. Definitely wasn’t bad enough to stop us doing it!
I can remember there was a large turntable up by Redbrick Cottages, with lots of busy sidings where they turned and loaded trains. There was a lot of activity with goods. Really long trains used to go through which were open goods trucks carrying iron, steel and timber. The covered trucks carried livestock, sheep and cows etc. The railway was used for most things. I remember the convoys of British and American troops which went through by road, but also large troop trains. Some soldiers were bound for the battle area and they all got off the train, formed ranks and marched away. Sometimes there were trucks waiting for them at the Mundford Road side in the station yard.
When I went to work, Mr. Blanchflower worked in the Booking Office and Nellie Lewis was in the Goods Department. I used to have to do consignment notes for all the gates and timber leaving from Calders sidings. And for the pheasants. It was thought that a brace of pheasants would be a good Christmas present for regular customers. Whether the recipients thought the same is another matter! I did labels to tie on the necks of the pheasants. I didn’t tie them on, Geoff Southgate did. He used to purse his lips up and say “bloody kids“, but he still did it! I did the consignment notes and Harold Lockwood put the pheasants in the van. Then we went over to the Goods Office to check them in. If there was an odd brace to go I was made to carry them over, but I wouldn’t do it unless they were on a long bit of string so I didn’t touch them.
The very first porter I remember was Mr Bob Fowl. He was a short white haired gentleman who lived in the station cottages on Mundford Road, near to the crossing gates. Mr. Brand, the signalman, always called him ‘Bob Chicken’. Mr Fowl’s wife made things out of raffia covered milk bottle tops and he always carried a shopping bag made of them. She used to make Christmas chains out of old wall paper and give them to everyone. We were the proud owners of some.
The signalman in the signal box, Stanley Brand, was my fiend Ivy’s dad. We always called him Herbert. He used to heat a shepherd’s pie, or cheese and potato pie, or something, for Ivy, Beryl Philpot and me. Our mums took it in turn to make something and we dropped it off at the signal box on the way to work. ‘Herbert’ would bring it over at lunchtime. You see he had an oven and we didn’t, not until some years later. We only had a hotplate.
Parcels were delivered and collected by lorry by a chubby man called Geoff who was based at Thetford. My great aunt Nell worked in the refreshment room at Wymondham Station, so I am told, and my aunt Crystal worked in the Goods Office at Thetford for years. When I was about ten I used to go on the train on Saturdays to Thetford, to go in the Goods Office to see ‘Aunty Crys’. We would then go on to Norwich shopping. Her boss was a man called Sydney Raven. She also worked with a man named Dougie, but I can’t recall his surname. They always gave me a shilling to spend in Norwich.
My Great Grandfather Walter Randall was a signalman at Brandon for the Great Eastern Railway. He came from Tivetshall and lived on London Road.
After I married I travelled to and from Thetford on the train every day to work. Things started to decline on the railway. The Booking Office and Goods Office were closed, first at Brandon and then Thetford. The bookstall disappeared at both stations. The waiting rooms closed at Thetford, but I was always allowed to sit in the Porter’s Room to wait. At the Brandon end, if the train was going to be late I sat in the signal box and waited. The train driver would wait for me in the morning if I was late and the buffet car man poured me a coffee before they got to Thetford so that I could drink it before we got to Brandon. I used to sit with the postman and chat while I waited for my train home. All the post was sent on the train and would collect a bag of mail to send off. The mail always arrived on time. We had three deliveries a day at one time – early morning, mid-day and five o’clock. When Norwich City had the cup run, 1959 I think, we decorated the office windows with green and yellow. When the trains full of fans stopped at the level crossing, we went out and shouted “Up the City!” It’s a shame it’s all gone, because it was efficient and kept the traffic off the roads.
