Ashover: History project

A new book, called Barms and Battleships, which chronicles memories of childhood in the village of Ashover, has recently been published by Derbyshire Libraries. Home, family life and schooldays are recalled by a host of people including those who, as pupils at Derby Boys’ Grammar School, were evacuated to Amber Valley Camp during the Second World War. Here we publish an extract from the book along with some fascinating pictures.

Schooldays during the Second World War were something of an adventure for children who were evacuated. The Amber Valley Camp was one of several which had been built pre-war to allow city children to enjoy holidays in the country.

When the war threatened the safety of children’s lives, the Derby Boys’ Grammar School was moved to the camp.

Little now remains of the site, for it stood on ground now covered by Ogston Reservoir. Only the school dining room still stands, now the clubhouse for Ogston Sailing Club.

Elisabeth Bowden (nee Grime) went with her family to the camp when she was a young child because her father was a resident master and chaplain.

Although she was not at the school herself (she attended Handley School) , she enjoyed being “mothered” by the boys and has fond abiding memories of the atmosphere of the camp.

She recalled: “We came out to the camp at the start of the war. The camp wasn’t ready so we spent six months at Overton Hall.

“When we moved into the camp, in June 1940, the school numbered about 300 boys.

“We were the only family in the camp and we lived in a bungalow which was very, very small for three children and two adults.

“Mother had a very, very small kitchen with a stove and a hob and she would cook for us, or we’d have camp meals.

“We spent only the term-time at camp. During the holidays, we’d go back to Derby to the house we had in the centre.

“Father was the only resident master – all the others were billeted at farms dotted around.

“Mother had petrol because she drove the emergency vehicle. Several times she had to take boys with broken arms, limbs and that sort of thing to hospital.

“I thought the camp was an idyllic place. I absolutely adored it. The camp had kitchens, a dining hall, an assembly hall and a sanatorium with a trained nurse and a doctor.

“Then all the other buildings on the left-hand side were dormitories and school rooms. During the time we were there, air-raid shelters were built. But I remember only one occasion the sirens going and having to run down into the shelters.

“There were showers which were not heard of at that time. The buildings were timber, on brick stilts. I remember, in winter, with the wind blowing, the carpets would rise up and down.

“There may have been central heating but the insulation was very poor. The main dining hall was the central bit. A tiny bit at one end was the tuck shop where you could buy sweets, although they were all rationed, of course.

“At the other end was another small building which was the senior common room for the men. The bungalow that was attached to ours was the camp manager’s. He was a Mr de Dain and he was very, very strict.

“I think he was a Naval man and he terrified us. He saw to all the gardens, the upkeep of the camp, everything. We weren’t allowed to walk on the grass.

“I joined the organised walks from the camp every weekend with one or two masters.

“The favourites were the Whale’s Back (Ashover Hay) and High Oredish. This was quite a long walk but I loved High Oredish and White Hillocks, Cocking Tor, Gladstone’s Nose (the Snitch).

“At the weekends I would also socialise with the boys. There would be film shows in the Assembly Hall and they’d do plays. It was quite a lively time.

“Swimming in the river was a great treat. The summers always seemed to be hot and it always seemed to snow in the winters when we could go tobogganing.”

Gordon Lancaster came to the camp as a schoolboy and remembers the evacuation.

“Originally, some of the school stayed in Derby but, eventually, they all came out. I didn’t go straight to the camp. I went to Ashover first. I was in the Old Bakehouse, near the church, with Mrs Annie Hopkinson and her son, Eddie.

“I was the only boy boarding there but there were other lads in other houses in the village. The Old Bakehouse was very primitive. There was no flush toilet; it was an earth closet.

“I used to have to go out to the outhouse to clean my shoes. That was her rule.

“We used to have a candle to go up to bed, like Wee Willie Winkie. There was no light upstairs.

“In the village, there was one classroom upstairs in the Parish Rooms.

“In the bad winter of 1939-40, we had to help with snow clearing because we had to get from Ashover to Overton Hall for lessons.

“Then they moved us to Overton Hall. It was very nice at Overton. We used to play games on the lawn outside Overton Hall.

“Perhaps not so enjoyable were the compulsory walks to church in Ashover every Sunday. While we were at Overton Hall, we had to go. I remember Mr Nodder. I thought he was just about as old as the church.

“I don’t really remember the services much. I think most of the boys were looking at the choir girls more than anything else.

“One day, at the end of June 1940, we moved to Amber Valley Camp. There were four houses in the school: Fullers, Gateley, Tanners and Grimes. They were named after present or old members of staff.

“Parents used to give you pocket money, although it wasn’t very much. You could buy sweets at the tuck shop.

“We had to take our cod liver oil. The masters would dole that out. We knew quite a bit about the war. In fact, when we were at the camp we saw a German plane go across the top of the hillside towards Stretton.

“The teachers would let us know what was happening. The discipline was fairly strict. It had to be really. We had a school uniform with a white-edged black blazer.

“As far as I can remember, the food was good. Although it was wartime rations, we did fairly well. Some of the lads had their parents bring little treats out for them, perhaps a tin of baked beans that they would get the cook to heat up for them.

“Parents used to come out and visit us but it was a bit awkward to get there if you hadn’t got a car. My parents didn’t manage to come very often. I was rather homesick really, but it wasn’t too bad.

“We used to go home at half-term on a train which we caught at Stretton. At the end of the autumn term, we used to have a Christmas concert before we went home.

“Once, in the summer, some of us stayed at the camp and worked on the farm for a while.

“The farm was on the road from Woolley to Woolley Moor and we used to work in the field, pulling docks up out of the wheat.

“We were paid for it, although not very much. There was a master with us once or twice and he used to say ‘Don’t tread on that corn; it’s another loaf of bread’. You didn’t work on the farm all day. You could do what you liked during the rest of the day because there were no lessons.

“We would play games in the woods. We used to build huts in the woods, too. There used to be a prize for the best one.

“I’m not sure when school went back to Derby. I think they went back fairly soon after the war finished.

“I wasn’t in school then. I left in 1942. When you left school at that time there was nothing like they have these days at some of the schools – the limousines and end-of-term parties. No, just more or less, ‘Cheerio, then, that’s it’.

“I think it was an idyllic place to have a school. Some of the boys didn’t take to it. I’ve spoken to some since and they didn’t like it, but I thought it was a marvellous place.”

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