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Lock Cottage |
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Ouse valley from Hamsey church, 1905. Reproduced by kind permission of Rendel Williams |
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When Fred Freeman, the under carter at Hamsey Place Farm, handed in his notice John Harmer offered me the job which I jumped at because it was so close to home. We lived at the time in the old Osier bed cottage which went with father's job. It was situated on the east side of the river bank below Hamsey Place Farm. It was a nice house but not really big enough for father, mother, myself, Bob, Jack and Lillian. There were three rooms downstairs, a scullery, a living room and a front room, which my parents used as a bedroom. Upstairs were two bedrooms, Lillian in one and myself and my two brothers in the other. It was originally built as a lock keepers cottage and the sides of the old lock were still visible. I believe at one time there were eighteen locks between Lewes and the source of the Ouse. Immediately opposite the cottage, below Offliam Church and at the end of the Brooks was an osier bed which was being worked by an old man named Sid Holdstock, a basket maker. Two bakers called at Hamsey, Holloway's and Richard's, both from Barcombe. A butcher also came but for other things mother had to go to Lewes. She used to walk into the town along the river bank maybe once a fortnight. We grew all our vegetables in the garden. As there were three of us bringing home a wage we could afford to eat quite a lot of meat. Beef was pretty cheap in those days compared to today, we had mutton and pork but it was a rare treat to have chicken, and sometimes we would catch a rabbit or two. |
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Floods at Lock Cottage in the 1920s |
©2007 Sussex Archaeological Society
