My first school was at Elvetham (footnote 1), the estate of Lord Calthorp. The church was in the park close to the mansion, and we used to go on Sunday afternoons in the Summer time by way of an outing, and in that church was a barrel-organ, which I played 6 times only, the handle being turned by the sexton.
The schools were outside the park; a boys school, a girls and infants. The boys had a man teacher, and the girls each a young lady teacher; my teacher was a Miss Mitchel. Our dog, a black retriever, used to follow us to school sometimes, and was locked in the woodshed until we went home at 4pm.
How old was I
when I first went to school, and walked 2 miles there and 2 back? I don’t know,
but I remember, my mother came to [20] fetch us home one afternoon, when a
thunderstorm came on and took us home in a pram, so we could not have been much
more than babies. Fortunately for my mother the workmen from the Park were
going home on account of the rain, and the foreman being a near neighbour of ours, pushed the
pram the whole way home. A neighbouring widow also schooled us for the
Winter months, less than ½ mile from home. And then to the National School for
me, and my sister Maria went to London to live
with our grandparents and was sent to a private school in the Albany Road kept
by the Misses Laslett, who would have given my sisters lessons free in return
for her services as music teacher to beginners in which they regarded her as
successful. She continued for some time, but my parents required her help. She
used to accompany our Uncle John, who gave violin [21] recitals at neighbourhood concerts, and when
weather has been very bad I have known him to carry her to the place of
entertainment. She had great facility on the piano in early life, and when at
Fleet she
played the organ at church and trained a choir, using the tonic sol-fa system.
Transcriber’s footnotes:
1. A few miles Northwest of Fleet (see map near diary page [22])
Click here for the title page, previous section or next section