Published in the digital newsletter on 14th September 2024.

Growing up in Boxted in the 50s

By Richard Green

Early childhood 

7-8 years old 

My first memory of becoming friends with Mac was at Boxted Primary School. We played a rough and tumble game called ‘horse and rider’. One boy was on the back of another, the boy on the back was the rider. You played against another pair who tried to dislodge and pull you off the back. The one who stayed on was the winner. I always had Mac as the horse because he was big and strong. We were good at this and we became good friends. This had to be played on soft grass! 

At around this age, Mac invited me to his house to play. We spent all our time outside. Mac’s Dad’s small holding was like an adventure playground compared with my small garden. There was so much to do there. Large orchard, sheds, fields and other things. We climbed trees, made swings, dens and played with anything that was lying around. Mac’s Mum was so kind and gave us lovely cakes and drinks. I always looked forward to going there. We were never bored. 

9-10 year old 

All country boys had homemade catapults even when they were quite young. We made our catapults and soon became good shots with them. This was the start of our love of shooting. 

10-14 year old 

My older brother Peter left school at 15 and worked full-time at Redhouse Farm* close to Mac’s. We were allowed to roam anywhere around the farm when we liked. Boys of our age had few restrictions on where they went. We crossed over George Nicholls field ** onto Redhouse Farm, this gave us a huge area to roam. 

We both managed to get air rifles at about 13 years old. This gave us a great improvement over catapults and we used these all the time. Mac’s Dad had a large flock of chickens for eggs. They roamed around and also attracted a lot of rats, mice, starlings etc, so we became our own self appointed pest controllers! 

The chicken shed’s were made of bales with raised nest boxes all around. We would wait until dark, enter the shed, close the door and see the rats feeding on the floor, and then we would shoot them. As we walked around the edge rats would jump out the nest boxes and jump on us sometimes – not very nice! 

We also had to keep the blackbirds off the strawberries. 

[Editors note: Mac, as an adult, had great difficulty killing any animals, saying they had as much a right to live as us.]

13-15 year old 

At this growing age, we used to cycle to the King George playing fields at Boxted Cross and meet up with some of the lads from school. We used to play games and generally have fun. We had a rough bike race track where we raced. There was also an old motorbike, I don’t know where it came from or who it belonged to. If it started we had a little ride on it. 

Another game. We divided into 2 groups, often as it was just getting dark. One of the groups would run off and hide. We would go after them. When we found them, they would jump out and we would have a friendly fight. When the losers surrendered we changed sides. This was very exciting. 

By now we were introduced to shotguns. Mac’s Dad had a No. 3 garden gun and an old double barrelled hammer gun. He let us have a few shots at rats and pigeons on his sprouts. Soon after we left school we had our own basic 12 bores and were allowed to go out with them on our own. There were very few restrictions in those days with shot guns. 

Bird scarers were driven by carbide, which was a material when added with water would form a gas and when put in a sealed container would explode with a loud bang. We made bombs out of this in tins and bottles, rather dangerous!

16 years + 

The age of growing up was upon us and we quickly bought motorbikes. Then the world was our oyster, we were out and about all the time and life changed as we visited other villages and we had a great time. Cars at 17 years old and we were away. 

Boxted was a great intro into country life and we learnt a lot. 

53 Straight Road in the 1950s

By Cousin Keith McDonald

For most of my teenage years, and a little before, I spent nearly all my school summer holidays at Boxted. 

During that time I was adopted into the McLauchlan family (aunt, uncle, and cousins Ann and Pat) and only returned to Tiptree in time for the new term.

Daily life at 53 was a mix of work and play – the work enabling us all to earn some money and the play was the rest of the time particularly the weekends.

The smallholding comprised three main elements – the field, the fruit trees, and the chickens which needed 7-days-a-week attention for feed and egg collection. 

Since it was August the main activities for both field and fruit trees was the gathering and harvesting of produce. By and large this was done by hand and seasonal workers came in to assist. I can recall there were 2 sisters and a nearby neighbour who were involved. 

There was also equipment to help out, primarily the tractor where the younger ones took turn to drive and bring the produce back to the shed. I also remember an elderly truck with a totally unreliable gearbox. 

With the soft fruit over, the main produce was vegetables including runner beans, marrows, lettuce, etc, although I seem to think that in at least one season a sizeable part of the field was used for a cereal crop.

Moving on to the fruit trees, this consisted of plums and the early season apples. Picking the fruit was not without risk – ladders were needed to reach much of the fruit and wasps really liked anything that was overripe or rotting, but they did not like being disturbed.

The gathered produce was then collected by and traded through local wholesalers, and I don’t think any serious attempt was made to trade direct with the public, and there was no pick your own. Over the time I was there tried and trusted methods were the order of the day and it seemed to work. 

* Redhouse Farm in those days I believe was owned by Essex County Council (as were the smallholdings on Straight Road). All the land, apart from that immediately surrounding the farmhouse, was sold off and is now farmed by a local farming family. 

** George Nicholls was one of the smallholders with a strip of land off Queens Head Road. We later purchased his 4-acre field and connected it with the land at 53 Straight Road.

53 Straight Road, Boxted. Circa 1950/1960

It was approx 10 acres in size, the only smallholding of double the normal size of about 5 acres. 

The house, which was originally built for the foreman of the Salvation Army Scheme, had eight rooms as opposed to the usual six and had two families living in it prior to Mac’s parents moving in. There were 6 electric light bulbs in the property which was a luxury.  At one time the front room had been used as a doctor’s surgery.

All the properties that accompanied the smallholdings were of a similar design and build which made for uniformity. 

Boxted Smallholdings

In 1906 the Salvation Army bought 400 acres of land on Boxted Heath and launched a smallholding scheme to put ‘landless people on peopleless land’. 

The estate was divided up into five- and six-acre blocks each with its own semi-detached house. Many of the first smallholders came from the East End of London, but despite help from the Salvation Army, most found it difficult to pay their way. In 1912 there were harrowing descriptions on the local press of evictions of the smallholders by the police who had to force their way past the barricades. 

The scheme was wound up in 1916 and the estate take over and administered by the County Council. 

Over the years the supermarkets took hold and of the original 60 smallholdings there are now only 4 that are still allied to horticulture.

Aerial View of 53 Straight Road, Boxted taken in 1964

Some of the original outbuildings still stand today including a stable which I believe most smallholdings had as horses were used to pull ploughs etc. 

One of the large sheds that Mac’s father built to house chickens was partly damaged and subsequently reduced in size in the great storm of 1987.  

The pair of semi-detached houses were renovated in the early eighties by Mac to become two detached properties.