Over the past year or so I have caught up (via a UK schools website) with a few people from my school days. These are all people I haven’t seen for about 48 years and the ranks of the remaining are a bit thin compared to ‘what was’. It seems many of my early friends were not destined to make old bones.
Anyway this particular lady (now living in Wales for some unfathomable reason – I didn’t know people actually went to live in Wales) was talking about the changes she had noticed on her last visit to the old place and she said “It’s sad that Little Duddleswell is gone, it was such a grand place”. Reading on I found that a new bypass had ripped right through where Little Duddleswell (circa 100 ad) had been. Now, you are wondering why I should even bother to mention a vanished village that nobody would of heard of anyway … well, it’s because I never got there.
11 (ish) year old Harry
The village of Duddleswell itself lay between the Sussex Coast and our house outside the village of Oxted – not exactly in a straight line but pretty close to it. There were no important roads on this area no A1s or A2s definitely no M1s, as Motorways still lay in the future. I think the most important road that you briefly crossed before falling back into country lanes was the A25 or something. There was an old railway spur line about 5 miles away but it only ran about three trains a day between ‘nowhere’ and ‘nowhere else’, I seem to remember it was called ‘The Bluebell Line’ because of the wild flowers that lined the side of the rails during the summer.
As to Duddleswell? Well it was really one small country lane that briefly widened to show off a few (about 12) buildings, six or so on each side of the road. This was not a sleepy place, it was a sleeping place, had been since used as the hub of a staging post for regiments forming to fight the Napoleonic Wars back in 1730 something. The village had been there since about ad200 but briefly awoke to play this vital role, then it was back to sleep again. There was a stream that ran beside the village that also widened into a sort of big pond and on this pond could be found ducks and geese – no swans as they were far to regal to visit this unimportant place. The pond, indeed the village itself was not a place of oak trees, here soft weeping willows, silver birch and elms ruled the land.
Actually as you entered the village from the coast end, there was a small sign that said “Beware of Mad Angus” and underneath a drawing of a goose with wings stretched and head thrust forward in the attack position. I had met Angus he was the ‘boss goose’ of the pond and made a great village watchdog. If you offered him bread you could just pass the friendship test, however if you had some Lincoln Biscuits for him you were a friend for life. I do remember with a big chuckle that one of my friends teased Mad Angus by offering him a biscuit and then pulling it way at the last moment. The next second Dickie was running for his life with a 'not amused' goose painfully latched on to the seat of his pants - he had to push his bike almost all the way home. Dickie 0 - Mad Angus 1.
But I am getting way from the core of things. The one thing that really intrigued me about Duddleswell was a tiny road that branched off from the not quite so tiny road that ran through the village and at the branching there was a small sign that read ‘Little Duddleswell 1M”. Now considering that Duddleswell was no more than 12 buildings, including, pub, grocers and bakery come sweet shop, you have to wonder what ‘Little Duddleswell’ would consist of. Naturally the problem was that during those pre teen years there is always so much to see and do. I had a small circle of friends and we all had bikes, heavy iron frames, straight handlebars, no gears and dynamo lights just to make actually moving just that bit harder – still they were our flying carpets. We had hundreds of small country roads to explore (and get lost in) and sixpence in your pocket made sure you got a drink and a bun when hungry. We often cycled through Duddleswell and I always intended to ‘one day’ branch off to see Little Duddleswell, but always something got in the way.
Once, in company of a couple of friends, we set out with the express intention of finally getting to Little Duddleswell, which, I must confess, was starting to become something of a mystery place to our young minds. Needless to say, again, we never got there, a broken chain, punctures, broken pedal, and last but not least a severe summer thunderstorm that swept out of nowhere and had us seeking shelter in the Duddleswell pub that, I think, was called ‘The Forrester’s Arms’. By the time the storm was over it was twilight and time to head home.
Thirty years later I again ignored the urge to change course and try and find something, only this time it was a person and it’s something I have had to live with every day since.
So that summer passed and then the next and the next and Little Duddleswell faded back into wherever it emerged from. The sign was still there but I no longer actually saw it when passing. My old bike turned into a little MG sports car and Little Duddleswell didn’t, to my young arrogant eyes, seem a sports car sort of place. Now Little Duddleswell is gone - as has the way of life that, in its innocence, created it. What is slightly annoying is that I couldn't find even one pic of Little Duddleswell in any search engine, you would have thought that an almost 2000 year existence would entitle the place to something, just to acknowledge it once was there.
You know it’s funny, I can still see that sign and Dickie with an angry goose attached to his pants – but I can’t see yesterday.Anyway, I guess we all have a few ‘Little Duddleswells’ in our lives, those things we always meant to but never quite got around to until it was far too late. In fact life seems to be made up of a series of Little Duddleswells’, it’s the way of things isn’t it? Harry
