Z1205/021

Male brickwork driver/chief fire officer b. 28.08.1925 SIDE A (00 Mins)Family background. Walking 2 miles to school. Parents married 1924. (5 mins)Father's World War One experience. Stewartby Secondary School. Free school meals. (10 mins)Father - railway track maintenance ganger, doing local work around Kempston Hardwick brickworks. Left home 1943. (15 mins)July 1939 - started work as office junior at Stewartby brickworks. Got job through father's connections with resident engineer. 1940 - German plane straffed Stewartby village. One person hit in leg. (20 mins)Transfer to London Brick Co. estates department. Wartime labour shortage. Need to bring some company land into arable farming for war effort. Farms department set up under Mr. Cornwall. Maintenance of farm machinery. (25 mins)Wartime brickmaking severely curtailed. Main activity - servicing American tanks for D-Day landing preparation. Women workers operated brick pressed. Joined army, 1943. (30 mins) South Pillinge Farm maintenance workshop END OF SIDE A SIDE B (00 mins)Army training with Beds & Herts. regiment as driver, in Bury St. Edmonds. Transfer to Royal Army Service Corps. and motorcycle training. Salisbury Plain. (5 mins)Training with landing craft for D-day landing. Crossed later into continent. Met future wife in Belgium. Married in 1946. (10 mins)Demobilisation in 1947. (15 mins)Belgian experiences (20 mins)Loading Belgian bricks on to ships for transporting to England. Working n Belgian engineering works until 1949 & return to England (25 mins)Living in Stewartby village. Van driving. Part-time fireman for London Brick Co. (30 mins) Fire brigade - staff and area covered. Call-out from home & work END OF SIDE B(Continues on 021C2) CS021C2 (00 mins) Pay and duties of London Brick Co. volunteer fire workers. Joined 1952 & spent 30 years in brigade, finally becoming Chief Officer for about 10 years (10 mins)Responsible for fire service coverage for LBC property at Stewartby, Elstow, Coronation, Kempston Hardwick, Ridgmont and Millbrook sites. Appointed Chief Fire Prevention Officer for the whole company, including Peterborough area. Modernised facilities and equipment. Redundancy following Hanson takeover of London Brick Company. Emergency fire cover now left to Beds. Fire Service. (15 mins)Comparison of workforce from previous maximum of 200 with current 250 approx. Reminiscence on fire brigade competitions locally and regionally (20 mins)Son took over his plumbing tools. Then became driver. Wife worked at brickworks from 1952. (25 mins)Sir Malcolm Stewart Homes. Life in Stewartby village, built 1926 & 1936. Housing Association houses built in 1951. (30 mins) Housing Association houses built in Stewartby in 1951. Transport to work during Stewartby heyday. End of Side A Side B (00 mins)Post-war influx of European workers to fill vacancies in Brick works. Volunteer Sunday work, loading lorries with bricks. (5 mins)Procedures for loading kilns with bricks for firing. Block of bricks bound with metal bands for loading on to trucks. Gradual mechanisation. Attitudes to redundancy. Reflections on possible future of brick making. (10 mins)End of Side B.End of Interview Original intwerview 100 mins

3 July 2001

From: 1920 To: 2001

item

Hanson Brick Ltd,
London Brick Company,
Marston Valley Brick Company Limited

Germans, World War One, World War Two, farming practice, American Army, brick worker, Royal Army Service Corps, motorcycles, lorry driver, fire brigades, Stewartby Housing Association Limited, TRANSPORT, STEWARTBY, RIDGMONT, MILLBROOK, ELSTOW, Peterborough, Kempston Hardwick, South Pillinge, Bury St Edmunds, Salisbury Plain, Belgium