Noble Street

Initial information from Clive Dalton, New Zealand with permission: http://woolshed1.blogspot.com/2008/11/bellinghams-noble-street-kids-weshin.html

Noble Street Houses

Noble Street - Recollections by Clive Dalton

Information supplied by Clive Dalton Jan 2024, edited by Stan Owen and Steve Gibbon.

Noble Street was built to house workers for the thriving iron works. Those of us who lived in Noble street didn’t like or use what was its former name of ‘Snoggy Gate’, which folk seemed to us to reinforce the class system in the village and put us down. We were the ‘Snotty-nosed Snoggy Gate’ kids and when suspected of being the cause of any mischief in the village – the inevitable first questions always were – ‘Wee’s yor fathor?’ and ‘Where de ye live?’

The houses in my day were owned by the Duke of Northumberland and Geordie Breckons of the Foundry Farm was the Agent to call weekly for the rent. His dairy herd of about a dozen cows also supplied us with milk in lidded cans each day, which we then washed before returning to him the next day when he called. If we ran out of milk we used to get it from Peggy Johnstone at the corner shop whose father milked 3 cows on their fields below and behind Percy Terrace.

There were the ruins of another row of what looked like half a dozen houses on the fell beyond Noble Street, but there was nothing left but their foundations mostly covered in grass. Where the dressed stone to make them had gone nobody knew. The sheep kept the grass around them short and my Dad used to pinch turf from there for the boxes in which he grew tomatoes in his greenhouse. We kids never played there.

There were 10 houses in Noble Street. Every two shared a solid stone built toilet or ‘netty’ attached to an ash pit. Each house had a single room downstairs that was dining room, sitting room and had a large fireplace to provide heating, a large oven for baking and a set pot with a lid to heat water. Today it would be called ‘open plan’! The ceiling was not lined so you could see the exposed heavy oak beams which were especially useful to pin Christmas decoration on, and sticky fly papers as we lived under their constant invasion especially with the toilets and ash pits within easy flying distance. The beams nearest the next door house could be knocked on to give and receive wake-up calls or requests for help. Dad used to hang his leek and onion seed heads on them to dry before rubbing the seed out for next years’ sowing,

There was a single bedroom upstairs with a tiny window with hinges on the side to provide a very small opening. There was room for two double beds and a single, a wardrobe, chest of drawers and a ‘washstand’ on which was a jug for water and large bowl to wash hands – especially needed by the Doctor after a visit and before he left. No rubber gloves in those days. I still have memories of Dr. Kirk’s heavy steps coming up our stairs humming a tune before sticking a thermometer under my arm, and inevitably ending up with some awful brown ‘tonic’ from the chemist George Cordiner or some horrible gargle. We even had a brush to paint our sore throats with some magic product to cure tonsillitis. The whole family lived with boils all our young lives which required the failed magic of poultices of all kinds (especially bread) as there was no antibiotics in those days! There was nothing Dr. Kirk like more than to lance a boil when ripe and squeeze out the pus.

There was enough room on the bit of carpet we had in the middle of the floor to lay out our small Hornby train set into a rail loop. We had an engine and 3 wagons which must have been bought for brother Geoff well before the war. We also had a wooden rocking horse, which never left the bedroom, and a metal pedal car, which the street kids used to help us race along the wide path in front of the houses.

As soon as war started mother must have bought a full sack of flower in case we were invaded. It sat upstairs thankfully unopened. My favourite toy was Dad’s .303 Enfield rifle (with no ammunition thankfully) for his Home Guard duties. I used to poke it out the window and select a target like one of Hedley’s sheep, adjust the sights and pull the trigger after loading it with the bolt and hearing the click of the trigger. I didn’t dare think how often Dad would have heard that click in all the years his life was on the line in WW1. I used to love cleaning the barrel with a pull-through which was a brass weight which pulled a string and a bit of oily rag through the barrel. The rifle was so heavy l couldn’t lift it and certainly not with bayonet fixed. Today, the thought of what that bayonet was used for doesn’t bear thinking about.

On the back of the houses the roof came right down to above the back door which provided space for the pantry, space to do the laundry and wash the dishes. The stairs were just a good solid ladder with wide steps, and some like my father had built around them to provide space to keep the coal and firewood underneath. When the snow started to melt you had to be wary of it sliding off the extended long roof in an avalanche into the back lane.

A hand rail on the stairs was an important feature when going in each direction, especially with an overfull chamber pot which was an essential piece of equipment with no inside toilet. It really needed to be emptied when no more than half full of No1s, but it was always tempting to use it for one more time, and hope that some other family member would do the kind thing and carry it down the stairs and up the stone steps to the netty! It was always tempting with No1s just to empty it down the sink below the drinking water single tap in the back lane if it was dark and nobody saw you. Carrying a brim full chamber pot with both hands was an art indeed.

In the back kitchen there was enough space between the last step of the stairs and wall to park a bike. The space above the pantry was used as a loft to store things, and was a permanent home for mice which we kids loved trapping. We would set a trap with cheese or tied on bacon rind and when we heard a click, we’d stand on the stool (cracket) to remove and commit the victim to the fire before setting the trap again. We always knew when mice arrived by their footprints across the layer of fat left in the frying pan in the pantry. A vital item in the pantry was the two buckets of water filled from the street tap for filling the kettle kept on the fire hob and other uses to save going out to the street tap all the time.

The other important part of the downstairs room was the ‘bratish’ which was a lightly made structure usually of plywood and wall-papered to look solid around the front door to stop the draught coming in below the door. It could also be used to hang coats inside or an upright pipe to hold walking sticks and umbrellas. My Dad’s WW1 uniform hung in there behind the front door till the moths did more damage than the Germans did and it ended up in a mat. We kept our three deck chairs in there to be taken out in summer when the sun shone!

The houses were built with 18-inch thick stone walls with no damp-proof course which caused water to be drawn up from the ground in winter, causing a permanent damp stain on the lower parts of the walls. This stained the wallpaper and probably didn’t do our health any good either.

They say it takes a village to rear a child – the same applies to a street as far as we Noble Street kids were concerned. We generally had free entry to the houses where there was always a jam sandwich (the Scottish term – a piece) or scone, which we enjoyed as it was wartime and it was the world of coupons for all foods except Roddy Thompson’s fish and chips!

Gardens

There was a garden in front of every house which went from the path by the doors down the hill to the fence with Breckons’ field. This was where the Lancashire Fusiliers camped in their bell tents during the war and before D-Day. Everybody grew a range of vegetables and put them in a pit before winter. Root vegetables were piled up before coving with straw and then a thick layer of soil was well patted down. To preserve a cabbage it was buried upside down in the soil. Dad had fenced off the bottom of the hill in our garden to keep the rabbits out, and he made a seat to enjoy the peace. In some early days folk must have thrown their ashes out their front doors as the soil was poor and there were endless numbers of clay pipes with the stems broken off.

Visiting services

Those were vendors called to sell their wares which was extremely useful for families that didn’t have to go to the village and carry their purchases home. Examples were:

Nichols the bakers from Wark with bread, cakes and the like.
Allen the grocer from the village.
Collins the fish man from Eyemouth.
Roly McVeigh with ice cream in summer from Wylam.
Ringtons tea van from Newcastle.
Stanley Telfer butcher from Bellingham.
Billy Forster ‘Billy Butcher’ from Lane head.
The Rag and Bone man with his pony and flat cart taking anything you wanted rid of, and gave lumps of sandstone used to decorate the back steps in return.
The knife sharpener. He had a bike where when the back wheel was lifted on to a stand, it allowed his grindstone to go around by pedal action and sharpen a knife for a small fee.
The French onion man who arrived on his bike adorned with straps of onions that he carried to each door on either end of a pole across his shoulder. My father loved the onions and ate them like apples. How the bloke got from France to Noble Street could not be imagined. Dad used to try his half a dozen French words that he had learned in the trenches that the bloke could not understand!
Hareshaw coal.

Kids’ games and pastimes

Soldiers. Preparing for invasion by Germans.
Cowboys and Indians.
Cricket and football on the sloped grazed area behind the ash pits.
Golf on the grazed sloped area behind the ash pits.
Bird nesting and egg collection from birds on the fell and hedges.
Climbing the big oaks near the houses to make lookouts.
Setting snares to catch rabbits along the sod cast boundary between the Foundry farm and Demesne.
Running our metal hoops along the back lane and on the main road.
Running with a tyre driven by a short stick similar to hoop.
Digging a hole on the fell and spreading the clay on sheep tracks pretending they were roads. Then with a round tin lid as a steering wheel we could be a driver going to distant locations.
Playing trains by having a long rope pulled behind us along the back lane with instructions from the guard on the other end. I had red and green flags, a whistle and a paraffin guard’s lamp from Dad.
Catching butterflies in a net in the flower beds along the front of the houses.
Catching bumble bees in a jar making sure the lid was a good fit as they got mad and then set free.
Going to Hareshaw Linn in Spring to pick primroses and bluebells and hazel nuts in Autumn.
Making sure were home by dark as our parents had no idea where we were and what we were doing! Home for the nine-o-clock news to get the war situation.

Bellingham's Noble Street Kids: Weshin Day & the claes lines

By Clive Dalton - 16/11/2008

When I see my grandkids, constantly within sight of a carer, playing in protected areas approved by Health & Safety authorities, I often wonder how we Noble Street (Snoggy Gate) kids ever survived.

The “fell” (field/moorland) was our playground – and it provided a world ranging from childish fantasy and grownup reality. All you needed for action was the words – “hey, get the footbasll oot,” or “Aam ganin te the Blue Heaps – are ye cumin”?

The fell behind the 10 houses in the street was part of Breckons’s Foundry Farm and had endless possibilities for us kids. Its different types of herbage had a big influence on what we could do and where - and what we could find.

There was the green area next to the houses which was like a lawn, kept short by the grazing sheep. As a result we had to accept the “sheep dottles” as a normal part of this. Further out the herbage changed to bent grass with its “bull snoots” among which you could find the nests of skylarks and curlews. Then there was the heather at the back of the fell next to the Woodburn Road where you may find a red grouse.

If we fancied a bit of “moor burning” (without Breckons’s permission) this is where we would try to “git the fire ganin”, and then panic to try to put it oot! You could guarantee a good gollarin when we got heme that night as we stunk of smoke.

The slightly scary frog ponds were at the back of the fell as nobody dare plumb their depth and we were always scared we fell in to a bottomless pit which devoured all the “product” dumped from the street’s five ash pits and netties two or three times a year.

The grassy area next to the houses was used primarily as the drying green for the houses on weshin day, again with two houses sharing the one wire washing line and claethes prop. On Mondays you never failed to hear the possin (pounding) of the claes in the wooden tubs (barrels) that every house all had for the job. Where the barrels came from I never knew. The wooden poss sticks were turned on a lathe, probably from ash or sycamore that could take constant wetting and drying. The business end was cut into four sections to aid pounding the wet clothes, and the top end was nicely rounded with a stick handle inserted right though to give a good grip.

After possin the clothes were put through a large wooden roller mangle, with great big cogs protected by a cover from small fingers. It was a two person job where the feeder of the claes could easily get their fingers squeezed by an over zealous mangle handle turner.

Later on, progress was a galvanised tub, and a posser made of a copper with holes in it like a colander which let water in and out when you possed. Then, when you really got rich, you went fully mechanical with a Ewebank washer where you turned a handle to agitate the clothes in a square tub or tank. This had a small mangle with rubber rollers fitted to it which sat on the top. The handle folded in when not in use. What luxury it was just turning the handle in half circles with no thumping of the posser in the tub.

The clothes line was a permanent stranded wire stretched from a netty (through the ventilation hole) to a long post at the other end which always worked loose in the ground as Breckons’s horse (Tom) loved to scratch his hint end on it. Stapling bits of barbed wire around the post didn’t seem to stop him – in fact he seemed to enjoy the experience even more! In wet weather, water got doon the hole and eventually it would faaall ower or cum oot.

You prayed for a good drying day on the Monday or else you had to face a steamy Monday night as the clothes hung up in the house on the line infront of the fire. And you could guarantee that “fettles” would not be good either!

Photo: The Noble Street kids - Weltons, Cowans, Smiths, and Masons sitting on the fell having probably their first photo taken on Clive's Box Brownie given to him by neighbour Margie Davidson. The exposed films had to be taken to George Cordiner the village pharmacist and you got them back in a few days after they'd been to Hexham for processing.

Noble Street Rabbitin

Memory by Clive Dalton

Catching rabbits was a very serious business for us Noble Street kids, as a rabbit pie was an important dish during the war, and we had a good hunting ground about 100 yards on the fell up beyond the well-grazed area behind the ash pits and the Nettie’s used as the washing drying green.

This was the ‘sod cast’ which held the wire boundary fence between Breckons’s Foundry Farm fell and first Hedley’s then Beattie’s Demesne fell. The sod cast was a low structure made from earth and large stones, and was ideal for rabbits to dig their burrows, ending up in a massive continuous warren. The rabbits were helped at the Noble Street end by easy digging among the roots of a massive oak tree we used to climb.

Few folk in the street had ‘gin traps’ and wee kids didn’t dare set in the entrance to the holes in case we caught any cats, (and our fingers) in the sprung jaws, so snares were less of a risk as cats didn’t hop like rabbits.

The older lads taught us how to set a snare, and there was quite a bit of science in the process. You could buy snares at the Northern which were a stranded wire loop of stranded wire, which when the rabbit went through, was pulled tight around it’s neck and choked it. There was a cord on the end of the wire to which you attached a solid peg to hammer well into the ground. A more humane model was invented in later years, that had a block on the wire to prevent total suffocation so the rabbit could remain alive till painlessly euthanased.

The plan:

Locate the rabbit’s run into or out from the hole
Note the points where it had landed in its hop as the grass would be flattened. but not between the hops.
Knock the peg in beside the hop point.
Then open up the snare at that point and set it upright so the rabbit will hop through it.
To keep it in position you needed one or maybe two short Hazel sticks to knock into the ground with a split in the top, to hold the wire and keep it in place.
Check the next day after school.

Setting a snare around the entrance to the hole always seemed a good idea but was never successful. It was far more successful to set it on a run or where the track went through the fence on top of the sod cast.

We were often lucky to get a young rabbit out of a hole in a wall, where it had learned to hop in and hide in the middle that had not been filled properly with small stones. You could see where it was through the gaps and pull a stone out and grab it by a leg, remembering to replace the stone. These were always young small rabbits, and always welcome in the kitchen.

It was interesting how farmers viewed the rabbits on their farms. They were considered a pest but also a source of cash. I used to be sent to Dunterley farm before mother and I went to visit relatives in Wylam or Lemington during the war, to buy a couple of rabbits from Franky Bell for ten shillings. They were gutted but I got the job of skinning them when I got to Tyneside. Skinning a cold rabbit was much harder than when they were warm.

Some farmers hired a professional rabbit catcher like Jack Wanlass from Wark who charged a daily fee and made more money from selling his catch. So we kids could be viewed as poachers, and I remember Jack Beattie always on the warpath to catch Basil Meadows from Percy Terrace who had a gun, and hunted rabbits on the Demesne much to Jack’s annoyance.

Our neighbour Tommy Davidson had a ferret but never invited us kids to go ferreting with him when he dealt to the rabbits on Blakelaw. In any case we didn’t like his ferret and I don’t think he did either, as he always caught and carried it by the root of it’s tail, and never at the other end where the teeth were. There were plenty folk around that could proudly show you thumbs through which ferrets had met their teeth!

Lancashire Fusiliers

Anecdotal memory from Clive Dalton.

During the war there was a platoon ?? of Lancashire Fusiliers camped in about 6 bell tents at the bottom of our gardens at Noble Street - probably before D-Day. Each family along the street sort of adopted a group and gave them an evening meal and a bit of family atmosphere.

We kids used to grab their water bottles after a route march and race up the garden to the tap in our back lane to fill it for them to cool off.

They enjoyed our company and it and gave them a chance to play the fool - like in this pic of our adopted group -with me in the background wanting to be a ’sowldger’!

Wonder if they all survived the war and got to home to their families.