All posts tagged Charles Hill

Mon Sep. 18. 9 30 pm [1944]
# PARATROOP LANDINGS BEHIND GERMAN LINES
# SWARMS OF AIRCRAFT OVERHEAD
# ENCOUNTER WITH TOM’S SISTER
# SUNDAY AFTERNOON VISITORS

Invasion of Holland by Paratroops. Sep. 17 /44

Yesterday, Sunday, we made 3 Paratroop landings behind Ger. troops. Gliders and Parachutists landed with guns and probably small tanks. Considerable supplies for them have been flown there and landed to-day. To-night round about 7 o’c planes flew over here, going out over the sea and a little to the N.E. As far as the eye could see, between sea and wolds and N. and S. planes swarmed like flies for some time. We can hear a drone of planes now and wonder if they are returning.

I have been to Rene’s for dinner and tea to-day. Mrs. Young was tired so we stayed in the garden. She is not really easy to talk to, and is very puffed up with her family connections, ahem, some of them. She has travelled and read a lot and is very musical. She is looking better for her holiday. I called at Mary’s as I went. Gordon has joined the forces and is in Scotland. Annie Graves is in a very poor way with sciatica and both lungs affected by T.B. What a lot of trouble there is in the world even apart from war. I washed two blankets before I went. Ciss helped me wring them, also I washed two of Jean’s blouses. Rene came after tea to get wool Jean was getting for Mrs Y to knit Tom some socks. She was not able to get real wool but got some kind of grey yarn 6 ozs of it as they said it needed more than wool. 4 oz 1 coup. It has been a lovely day fresh and breezy and it was lovely yesterday. Farmers are getting on with harvest now. Red + Sale and garden party realised £80. Rene won a gilt necklace in a raffle. I went to Chapel Sun night. Mr Noble sang two solos. Jean was with G.L. [Girls’ Life Brigade] parade to Hogs[thorpe] Church. Ted B[rown] and Eric and Bessy came Sun. afternoon. Bessie looks older tho’ well. Mrs. B will probably come on Thursday week.

Operation Market Garden’, involving thousands of Allied paratroopers and other forces, was a daring attempt to secure key bridges across rivers in Holland, intended to enable a rapid advance into the German lowlands. However the outcome was disastrous as will be reported in the next Diary entry (27th September 1944).

Annie Graves was presumably related to Mary, née Graves, the wife of Will’s one surviving brother Charles Hill, but the connection has not been identified.

Mr Noble, the accomplished singer, lived in Newark but often visited his mother who lived in a permanently-sited ‘caravan’ at the furthest end of Landseer Avenue (see Village Map).

Have you read an introduction to May Hill & family (includes photographs) and explored ‘The Casualties Were Small’?

Sun May 7 7.45 P.M. [1944]
# DIARY RESUMES AFTER THREE WEEKS
# PREPARATIONS FOR HOUSE MOVE
# RECOLLECTION OF PRE-WAR SUBMARINE TRAGEDY

We got No. 3 Council House and this is the last Sunday at Lenton Lodge. It is fine but cold. My anemones have been so beautiful this year. I sent G’ma all the blooms to-day, as I want to transplant them to the new home. I wonder, will it feel like home but think so, with all the old things round us. After all, it is the old familiar furniture, books and pictures that make the home, not the house which after all is somebody else’s. At first I thought it would not ever be home as Father had never lived there but it was Rene who reminded me that we would have all the same old things. Oh! What a lot of things too, to sort and pack. I had so dreaded to move again even with Will to help and now we have to move without his help. Frank and Charles and Charles H… [en? arn?] moved and re-erected shed yesterday and carted a lot of things beside. Rene has just been. She has been to Church as it is R[ed] + [Cross] and St J[ohn's] Sunday. There is a service on the wireless to which Jean and I are listening. Pole is taken down but Hallgarth hung wire on clothes props.

Rene has seen Aunt Mary who says she is coming to help us sort new house out tomorrow as far as we can. I shall be glad when we are in and settling down. I am getting very tired and Rene looks tired too but is coming back to sleep. I ought to make her stay at home but I am so nervous. When I get moved next to Cis I expect I shall be better. It is rather lonely here with only Miss Sykes at the end. We are almost packed, at least I hope so, we seem in a mess. Hardly know whether to feel flattered or flabbergasted at Mrs Fletcher’s request to us, to leave some old curtains up to keep soldiers from getting in before she comes. How does she think we run to extra curtains in these days? However there are still a few of the old things she left and a pair of lace ones at kit. window that are falling to bits so must see what can be done, but the effect will be far from artistic I am sure. As there are no soldiers here now I don’t think her house will be wanted and in any case they don’t commandeer them without a notice except in an emergency. I hate leaving young poplars and gooseberries and roses but we can’t take everything. It has been a lovely day but cold.

I have looked round Mrs Wilson’s house and packed up her keys. It is too far to feed her mice from Coun. House and I don’t feel like coming back here yet. Ted Brown has “Sara”. We are keeping “Jane” as Emmie named “Lady’s” daughter. Roy is home for week-end. It is Jo[an]‘s birthday. Being sta[tioned] at Strubby [RAF] he can cycle over. Eva is home ill. Grace has had a week’s holiday. Daisy’s dau-in-law here for weekend. Norman has an A.P.O address. Talk, talk, talk of Sec front goes on and on. There is a lull in Italian fighting. Terrible bombing goes on in Germany.

Emmie wrote this week. She has knocked her hand at work and been busy cleaning. Hopes to come at Whit[sun] with her mother and daddy. Do hope it’s nice for them. Shall be nicely settled then if all is well. She sent a photo of Ron, a snap and £1 from her and Ron she said. Jean has a cold and I am afraid I have a bit too. Asthma not bad so far. Jean went to Chapel this morning, Tom preached. She went to S.S. [Sunday School] too. I have not been, I am tired and the wind is cold.

Mr Gutteridge preaching. What a long time it seems and what a lot has happened since he fetched L[ord] and L[ady] Addison from here in June 1939. She asked me if I had got my store cupboard well stocked! They knew then no doubt of this war. We only vaguely guessed and hoped for the best. Well the store cupboard has been nearly emptied now, after nearly 5 years of war, not of necessity but because we feared the goods would deteriorate! They were here when the Thetis went down and her crew except one perished thro’ negligence in the first place then muddle and dilettantism. Every news time they came to hear the news of it. It was agonising to us. What it was to the relatives I cannot guess. The memorial service was broadcast, a sacrilege I think, and I can never forget the agonised cry of one distraught soul “Oh dear, oh dear”, as it rang thro’ the church and echoed all over the world. God comfort all such, and their name is Legion since then. Deep as our sorrow is and desolate as we are, we have much to be thankful for, even in our grief.

The three helpers were probably Frank Simpson, Charles Hill and Charles Harness. It is believed that the shed at Lenton Lodge was taken to Amy’s at Trusthorpe for use as a hen-house.

‘St. J.’ refers to the St. John’s Ambulance Association.

The wire was for the radio aerial which had been strung between the house and the pole.

Ciss and Percy Ranson, and children, lived in Council House No. 4 (semi-) attached to No.3 earmarked for May (see Village Map).

“Sara”, “Jane” and “Lady” were rabbits.

Will’s sister Daisy’s daughter-in-law was Freda, wife of Norman Lammiman.

Theo Gutteridge was a ‘local preacher’ and friend of Rene’s husband Tom (Mr. A). He farmed at Middlemarsh, between Skegness and Burgh-le-Marsh. ‘He’ in the related sentence may refer to Will or to Mr Gutteridge who may have taken the guests to his home, or to visit their relatives in Hogsthorpe, or to a station for their journey home (see East Lincolnshire Map).

Lord and Lady Addison were earlier mentioned in the Diaries on 21st January 1942 as ‘paying guests’.

In June 1939 a junior officer had opened the inner door of a flooded torpedo tube and inadvertently sank the submarine HMS Thetis. Ninety nine men were lost.

Have you read an introduction to May Hill & family (includes photographs) and explored ‘The Casualties Were Small’?