Part of the
www.staffshomeguard.co.uk website

STREETLY, STAFFORDSHIRE MEMORIES  (1936 - 1961)

A HOUSE IN MIDDLETON ROAD
(January 1943)

by Chris Myers
 


A HOUSE IN MIDDLETON ROAD, STREETLY
Saturday, 31st January 1943

It's a dull and chilly day. I'm walking with Mum along Middleton Road in Streetly. I'm six-and-three-quarters. So I don't hold her hand any more. Or not often, anyway. Mum is 44 but she wouldn't like me telling you that. We've just turned into Middleton Road and  Foley Road and All Saints Church are right behind us. We are walking along the pavement on the right-hand side. It's one of the usual ways home for us, after we have been to something in the Parish Hall on a Saturday afternoon.

If I look over to the left in Middleton Road there is a line of oldish houses on the other side of the road. They all look much the same as each other. I don't know who lives there except for one person. That is Heather Craik who is one of my elder sister's best friends at Sandwell School in Blackwood Road. She is a nice, gentle girl who I like. She isn't bossy. (This is a picture of her taken five years ago with my sister at Sandwell, in 1938. She was 10 or 11 then. She's on the left).

I think that Mr. Ralph who is in the Home Guard with Dad possibly lives in one of these houses as well. But I am not sure. I'm not even sure that this is a picture of Mr. Ralph either but it probably is. Mr. Ralph has his own anti-aircraft gun and that's him aiming it. I don't know if he has ever shot anything down. It's not in his back garden of course, here in Middleton Road.  It's in a field the other side of the Chester Road.  I could show it you on a map but you probably wouldn't be interested. And anyway, I don't think it's used much, now, because the Germans don't come over very often any more. Mr. Ralph has a daughter named Pat who is older than me.

It's all a bit different on our side of the road. There are houses here as well. But not so many and there are big gaps between them which are fields and you can see the farmland stretching right across and down to the Chester Road and the big hawthorn hedge which is there. These houses are a bit bigger than the ones opposite and have more garden around them.

As we get near the end of Middleton Road I know that we will soon turn right into Manor Road which will eventually take us home, on to the Chester Road. It's quite a long walk. But before we get to the end of this road, just before the corner into Manor Road, there's a long privet hedge. Behind it is a large house. You can hardly see it although there is a gap in the hedge so that you can walk up to the front door. Not that I have ever done that. I do know what this house is, though. It's called "The Greylands".

"The Greylands" is the only house in Middleton Road that I know anything at all about. Quite often, in an evening, when I am about to go to bed, Dad puts his head around the living room door and says to Mum and my sister and me "I'm just popping down to The Greylands. Shan't be too long". We all know that he is off on Home Guard business and he'll be in his Home Guard officer's uniform which proves it. And off he goes. I've no idea what he does there. Although I know a bit of what he does on other evenings when he's sometimes out nearly all night, and every Sunday morning. It's not just "The Greylands" he goes to. I know that for certain.

The Home Guard men, here in Streetly, have two sorts of headquarters. Or HQ as they call them. It's where they mainly do whatever it is they have to do.

Dad has something called a Platoon HQ which is in a rather smelly stable at Little Aston Hall. There are always men there at night. They've been doing it for nearly three years. Every night. They take it in turns to go there, probably once or twice a week. Their job is to keep an eye on everything which is going on in the area. They climb up ladders in the dark, up onto the roof of the Hall. Then they watch out for German parachutists or strange lights or just about anything which doesn't look right. Sometimes they can hear the bombers overhead and watch the flashes and fires as Birmingham burns. Sometimes the bombs come down much closer. Other men will be doing patrols in the countryside, to check up on things. They'll all come and go at the HQ during the night, sometimes warming themselves up by a coke stove, sometimes having a couple of hours sleep. It depends on what's going on. Then, when it gets light, they'll gather up their things and trudge off home, or even straight to work.  They are usually there on Sundays as well. Learning drill and how to use a bayonet and that sort of thing. I can tell you quite a lot about all that. But I had better keep to the subject.

"The Greylands" is a bit different from the Little Aston HQ. If we peer through the gap in the hedge, past the gate, I can see that it's bigger and grander than a stable - or a scout hut or the back room of a pub. They call this house "Company HQ". I know a quite a bit about what goes on at Little Aston Stables but "The Greylands" is rather a mystery to me.

I've told you that Dad goes there a lot. I know that Graham, my elder brother used to as well. That was before he got called up, last June. Here's a picture here of him coming out of the front door of "The Greylands". It was probably taken more than a year ago now, last winter (which was a very cold one). Or a bit before. He was 18 or 19 then. He's told us one or two things that he did at "The Greylands" and I have been trying to work them out. I suppose I should have asked him more questions - that would have been easier. But he's being sent abroad now and I shan't see him again for ages and ages.

What Graham said is that he learned a lot of things at "The Greylands" which will be useful to him. (What he actually said is that he learned a number of essential life skills. But that's just the way that grown-ups use long-winded ways of saying the same thing). One of the things he learned, he said, is how to change a barrel. I can understand this. I know that Home Guard men have to look after their guns. I sometimes clean Dad's rifle and I used to clean Graham's as well, when he was here. It is super when you have used the pull-through a couple of times and you look down the barrel and you can see how clean and shiny you have made it. So I can understand that sometimes things like that have to be taken apart and bits replaced if they have got broken.

But the other thing he learned, he said, is how to draw a pint. I can't yet work out what that can possibly have to do with the Home Guard. I'm still thinking about it. So far, there is only one possible reason which I can think of.

They must do art classes there as well........ In that picture of Graham coming out of "The Greylands", I can't see his sketchpad. But perhaps it's under his greatcoat or in his haversack.

We walk on past, without stopping. Past the gate which we've seen my brother approaching, two years ago. I'll show you a little bit of what goes on inside the house. It's all I know, really.

Here are a couple of pictures of some of the men inside. I don't know their names. And I don't know what they are doing.


It looks as though they are playing Ludo, like I play at home. But I bet it isn't that. It's something serious and important and Ludo isn't that.

And here are some more pictures.  They were probably taken at the same time.




Crikey, is that the time?

Dusk approaches and we mustn't hang about. We'll leave the men inside to get on with whatever they are doing. We walk on past the tall hedge as we have done so many times before and hurry on home.

Once we're there, up go the blackout frames, the curtains are drawn, the wireless is switched on, and there's the prospect of toast and dripping shortly. Around the fire, the four of us. Not my brother though.  He's waiting to be sent to the docks at this moment.  To go up the gang-plank with his kitbag on his shoulder and on to a troopship which will take him to Burma or India or Africa or goodness knows where. He might already have gone and is now heading out into the Atlantic.

We at least, here on the Chester Road, are warm and cosy. And not in any danger. Unlike my brother. I wonder if he is thinking about us.  Or about "The Greylands" and all his friends there. I suppose he has more important things to worry about.

**********

Eighty years later.....

No memories, images or facts relating the use of "The Greylands" in 1940-1944 seem to have survived, apart from those appearing on this page.

There are two further references, both transcribed below. One is a memoir by a young man who was a regular visitor there until 1942 and is part of the Webmaster's Family Archive. The other appears in a booklet published in early 1945 entitled "Home Guarding". The latter, written by the Battalion C.O, Lt.-Col. C. Cartwright, M.C., commemorates the efforts of many hundreds of local men, and a number of women, to defend their homes and community against a real and terrifying threat.



A memory from Vol./Pte. Graham Myers (recalled in 2001)

".....Around this time (during the winter of 1940/1941) the unit acquired the use of a large residence which was standing unoccupied. Known as "The Greylands", this was situated on a corner site between Manor Road and Middleton Road, Streetly, and was taken over to provide a suitable Company Headquarters. The evening training sessions on weaponry, map-reading and other skills were henceforth held here. A three-quarter sized snooker table was obtained and set up for recreational use. In another room a well-stocked bar appeared, available for the use of members and some of us – myself included – took on the additional rota task of bar-steward, which office entailed the acquisition of useful new talents, such as how to draw a pint and how to tap and change a barrel.

Despite the leisure-time attractions now on offer, the serious business continued as before. Over the months – and now years – the platoon had evolved from a motley band of enthusiastic but unskilled volunteers into a highly trained, effective infantry unit. Numerical strength had been maintained, sufficient new recruits having joined to offset losses from the resignation of a few less able-bodied elderly men and from the ongoing effect of the call-up for regular military service. My own turn came in June 1942; in the following October, whilst on leave, I paid a visit to the old platoon and gave a short talk at "The Greylands" on the complexities of providing artillery support in the field, with the help of my new-found knowledge in that area. That was the last occasion on which I was to meet them as a serving unit....."


(Webmaster note:
The maitre d' at "The Greylands" was almost certainly Corporal Perry
(right), a member of the Little Aston platoon. Joe Perry lived on the Chester Road and was described in a contemporary photograph as "Mess Steward" which must have related to "The Greylands".



A tribute from Lt.-Col. Cartwright, M.C., C.O. of the 32nd Staffordshire (Aldridge) Battalion, Home Guard of which "B" Company and the Streetly/Little Aston Home Guard platoons were part (written in late 1944):

".....My old friends at "The Greylands".

From the beginning, "B" Company was stiff with potential officers and N.C.Os. In fact, one is tempted to call it the Battalion O.C.T.U. (Officer Cadet Training Unit) when one remembers the number commissioned from "B" and transferred to B.H.Q. and elsewhere. In this way came about the migration of Myers
(left), Pitt, Thatcher, Moseley, Mills, Pepper, Kendall, Chaplin, Murray, Fox, Dodd, and Hooper. A fair number to lose from one company, but I must say that Athey and, later, Yates always took the broader view and never stood in the way of their advancement, although they were losing such good men. There are two more names to be added to the list, Naylor (right) and Farrow, who transferred to the H.A.A. Bty. R.A. (Heavy Anti-Aircraft Battery, Royal Artillery).

What a tower of strength Athey was in the early days! He was badly missed when he found it necessary to retire from the Home Guard in February 1942, but he left behind a tradition - "All the help in our power" - which has been more than maintained by Yates who succeeded him as Company Commander.

This glance at "B" would be incomplete if it did not catch sight of Ralph
(see above), that lover of the Lewis machine gun and devoted Welsh Fusilier, and John, the able and most helpful Q.M., also of Richards, whose official appointment was Intelligence Officer, but whose heart and soul seemed to be in Bombs and Bangs if one judges by the very successful way he ran his "school" at Mill Green, and Carr (left), who did so much to help with his cinematograph apparatus.

I cannot leave "B" Company without mentioning those who transferred to the H.A.A. Bty. I do not believe that any one of them really wanted to go, but, like their O.C., they also took the broader view and did their appointed tasks...."

**********

"The Greylands" survives in the 21st century, unlike everyone in these pictures; and the house happily retains its name. Did the original owner return after the Home Guard vacated it in 1945? Why was it empty and available anyway? Let's hope that generations of different families who have lived in it have been happy there over the last 80 years.

We'll say T.T.F.N. ("ta-ta-for-now", a 1940s catch-phrase) to it as it looked in 2018. Recent (2022) estate agent particulars and images describe it as a lovely, desirable home - and mention its function as a venue for "Home Guard parties". One would certainly agree with the former. But, as for the latter, well, even if there was ever a party, there was certainly rather more to it all than that: for more than four years the house, like its temporary occupants, "did its bit".




   BACK to 
  The Streetly Memories Index Page
    FORWARD to
   6th February 1943 - THE VISITOR

This family and local history page is hosted by www.staffshomeguard.co.uk 
(The Home Guard of Great Britain, 1940-1944)
Please see INDEX page for main acknowledgements.
(Grateful acknowledgement is made to Kate Cutler for the Greylands and Ralph images from her family collection.
These images are © Kate Cutler 2023
.
Acknowledgement is made, too, to the present owners of this house, part of whose early
history is recorded here).

All text and images are, unless otherwise stated, © The Myers Family 2023

INDEX
Home Guard of Great Britain
website

INDEX
Streetly and Family Memories
1936-1961


L8V Jan 2023

web counter web counter