A Helmdon Song

Words & Music: Mary Turnham & Tom Pomeroy for the

Helmdon Christmas Party 1995

HELMDON SONG

I remember, said Mary Turnham, standing in the rain

Waiting for my friends to come, from the Banbury train

One from Culworth, one from Greatworth and further on again

I remember, I remember so well

I remember the good old days

I remember the olden ways

I remember Helmdon in the good old days

Dairy herds walking through the village,
Children playing in the brook,

Timber wagons from Silverstone going through the village, drawn by eight shire horses.

Flocks of sheep, herds of bullocks ; cattle driven to the Station yard to be loaded no trucks for Banbury market by train.

I remember the village shop. Emily Hawks kept the one in Wappenham round when you could buy anything from shoelaces to bacon.

And the Post Office – always the smell of paraffin in there. Where folks would fetch a can needed for lighting the lamps, where candles were always in great demand. No electric in those days.

Verse and chorus

I remember the postman cycling from Brackley.

And Mr Bartlett, the village vicar, coming to read the school register with his dog Bingo.

And the May Day celebrations. They were always fun.
The Maypole and all the garlands we made, decorating hoops with blossom and flowers.

The telephone came in 1926. And the first van and car.

I remember milk being delivered by Jim Jessett, first pushing a three-wheel truck with a churn on it and later with a float drawn by a white pony.

Drawing water from the well at the bottom of Field Way. I wonder how many buckets were lost off the pole down the well.

Verse and chorus
Repeat last time