Taken in their garden of the cottage near Eydon Hall gates on the Green - part of which is now 2 The Green
Marion Wheatley, his daughter, wrote :- “John as he was always known loved his time in Eydon, he loved the outdoors. He was born 9th February 1920 and died April 14th, 1978. Not long before he died, he wrote down the things he could remember as a child in Eydon: He talked of his grandad’s small cart and riding on top when it was loaded with potatoes and his grandad pulling between the shafts. Beehives and honeycomb.
Peaches and nectarines in Eydon Hall garden. Water from the pump near the stocks on the Green, pigs, chickens and cats, his rabbit that got out of its hutch and was chased by a cat and died of shock. The garden full of red and white currents, raspberries, strawberries, apples, pears, plums, greengages. The smell of damp paper in the outside toilet. Playing cards around the table with an oil lamp. Taking candles to light his bedroom. His grandad’s bristles and his work as a platelayer, the smell of his thick twist tobacco.
He went otter hunting but never saw one, being carried home on his grandad’s shoulders. He played cricket at Eydon Hall with Jimmy Brand who was killed during WW2. The son of Robert Brand later to be made Lord Brand, Baron Brand of Eydon. His mother Eliza Ann was a marvellous cook who had learnt so much from working at Eydon Hall for Sir John & Lady Dashwood, and she had been in service in other houses too, even an Indian Maharajah who had a flat near Harrods in London and he wanted her to move to India to work but Eliza Ann’s mother thought it not appropriate.
If she had gone then the Gubbins history could have been very different. She had brothers who died in the war and she lost touch with her sister Bella until her son John, got in touch with the Salvation Army and they tracked her down and they were reunited at her East Leake home just before she died.”
See also KL284 & KL288
Photographer unknown.
Image lent by Marion Wheatley