The continuing story of the house Joe and Mary Ann Scott lived in for over 50 years and the families that have lived here since. *
Now I grant you my mystery would never make the Edgar Alan Poe Book of Scary Mysteries, but I have long wondered where Joe and Mary Ann were on the night of September 29th, 1939, because they were not here.
And that is odd because they had moved in when the house was built in 1915, and can be tracked through the decades residing here until their respective deaths in 1968 and 1974.
Of course the date is significant, because just weeks before Britain and France had declared war on Germany, after Germany’s failure to withdraw its invasion forces from Poland.
So, the absence of Joe and Mary Ann from the family home during those first few tense weeks of war was a mystery.
There is no reason to think that they fled abroad, after all with mainland Europe in the midst of a conflict which threatened the entire continent, no where directly across the Channel might be safe, and a voyage further afield seemed unlikely.
Any way I had no reason to doubt either their courage or their patriotism, so the answer lay elsewhere, and the solution was in the very document which had provoked the mystery.
In 1939, the Government conducted a national registration of the entire population which was undertaken on September 29th.
Forty-one million forms were issued, and enumerators were charged with the task of visiting every household in Great Britain and Northern Ireland to collect the names, addresses, marital statuses and other key details of every civilian in the country, issuing identity cards on the spot.
The identity cards remained in use until 1952, when the legal requirement to carry them ceased. Until that point, every member of the civilian population had to be able to present their card upon request by an official and submit them when they moved home.
My own identity card records a bewildering change of address from when I was born up to 1952.
And here is the mystery because on that day in September 1939, Joe and Mary Ann’s house was shown as vacant, but undeterred and using the same online search I found them in Wales, at the Court House Hotel, Forden in Montgomeryshire.
They were the guests of Mr. and Mrs. Bayley. Mr Bayley described himself as a publican. I didn’t expect to find the hotel today, and as yet can’t find a reference to it, although back in 1911 there were three pubs in Forden of which one still survives.
This is the Railway Inn, and so I guess we are looking at the other two which back in 1911 were the Cock Inn and the Church House Inn, and of these given the other properties listed in the 1939 Register, I am tempted to plump for the Church House Inn, which had eight rooms.
Of course, we will never know, and given that I am far from Forden I don’t think I will find out. But someone with access to the street directories of the period might just offer up an answer.
In the meanwhile, I think Joe and Mary Ann chose well. The village had a railway station which ran to Welshpool where the Scott’s could have changed for Shrewsbury, with onward connections to Manchester.
Now I say onward connection, but I will await to be corrected by a railway buff.
But I do know that from Forden railway station, Joe and Mary Ann could have gone on Aberystwyth and the coast.
The railway station closed like so many in 1965, and was demolished, although the station house still exists. There are some fine pictures of the station on that excellent site, Disused Stations.**
Or they might just have stayed in the village, which was populated by those who made their living from the land.
As for other holidays, I have no idea what they might have done. Either way I am guessing they were back in Manchester for the blitz of the following year.
But that is another story.
Location; Chorlton and Wales
Pictures; the day out, date unknown, from the collection of Ron Stubley, the identity card, 1950, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and Forden station (remains), 1993, © Copyright Ben Brooksbank and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence
*The story of a house,
https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/The%20story%20of%20a%20house
**Disused Stations, http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/f/forden/index.shtml
 |
| On holiday, date unkbown |
And that is odd because they had moved in when the house was built in 1915, and can be tracked through the decades residing here until their respective deaths in 1968 and 1974.
Of course the date is significant, because just weeks before Britain and France had declared war on Germany, after Germany’s failure to withdraw its invasion forces from Poland.
 |
| An Identity Card, 1950 |
There is no reason to think that they fled abroad, after all with mainland Europe in the midst of a conflict which threatened the entire continent, no where directly across the Channel might be safe, and a voyage further afield seemed unlikely.
Any way I had no reason to doubt either their courage or their patriotism, so the answer lay elsewhere, and the solution was in the very document which had provoked the mystery.
In 1939, the Government conducted a national registration of the entire population which was undertaken on September 29th.
Forty-one million forms were issued, and enumerators were charged with the task of visiting every household in Great Britain and Northern Ireland to collect the names, addresses, marital statuses and other key details of every civilian in the country, issuing identity cards on the spot.
And here is the mystery because on that day in September 1939, Joe and Mary Ann’s house was shown as vacant, but undeterred and using the same online search I found them in Wales, at the Court House Hotel, Forden in Montgomeryshire.
This is the Railway Inn, and so I guess we are looking at the other two which back in 1911 were the Cock Inn and the Church House Inn, and of these given the other properties listed in the 1939 Register, I am tempted to plump for the Church House Inn, which had eight rooms.
Of course, we will never know, and given that I am far from Forden I don’t think I will find out. But someone with access to the street directories of the period might just offer up an answer.
In the meanwhile, I think Joe and Mary Ann chose well. The village had a railway station which ran to Welshpool where the Scott’s could have changed for Shrewsbury, with onward connections to Manchester.
But I do know that from Forden railway station, Joe and Mary Ann could have gone on Aberystwyth and the coast.
 |
| Forden Railway Station, 1993 |
Or they might just have stayed in the village, which was populated by those who made their living from the land.
As for other holidays, I have no idea what they might have done. Either way I am guessing they were back in Manchester for the blitz of the following year.
But that is another story.
Location; Chorlton and Wales
Pictures; the day out, date unknown, from the collection of Ron Stubley, the identity card, 1950, from the collection of Andrew Simpson and Forden station (remains), 1993, © Copyright Ben Brooksbank and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence
*The story of a house,
https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/The%20story%20of%20a%20house
**Disused Stations, http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/f/forden/index.shtml
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