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As Old as the Century

Barwicker No.18
June 1990


We have been privileged to record the reminiscences of one of the grand old ladies of the village, Mrs Emma Peaker (née Reed) of Chapel Lane. She recently celebrated her 90th. birthday but she is as active as many who are years younger and her memory is still incredibly sharp and accurate. Her reminiscences have provided us with lots of information about past years.

She was born on Easter Sunday, 1900, so depriving her mother of the opportunity of attending the opening of the new Methodist chapel, which occurred that day. Her parents were Fred and Annie Louise Reed (née Perkin), both members of large families, so that she was related by marriage to many people in the Village. She had an older brother, William, who was killed in the First World War, an older sister Annie, and three younger brothers, Fred, who died aged four, Jack and Alfred. They lived in Potterton Lane where Fred Reed ran the horse transport business described by his son Jack in 'The Barwicker' N0. 3.

She started attending Barwick School when she was three years of age and went on to Standard VII. Mr Booth was the headmaster and the other teachers were Miss Antcliffe, the head of the infants, Miss Shi11ito, Miss Grimshaw and Miss Turton. The school was very crowded at that time with one classroom and the large room divided by a screen. When she was in Standard VII, Mr Booth taught her class and Standards V and VI on one side of the screen. She was taught needlework - sewing and knitting - two afternoons a week by Miss Turton, whilst the boys had drawing lessons.

Mr Booth loved music and singing lessons so much that be neglected teaching grammar, which he always hated. An inspector's report drew attention to this failing.

So Mr Booth took the class for a grammar lesson - just one - and then returned to his musical ways. Once a year some of the scholars were taken to York by Reeds' wagonette. The school children were involved in the May galas. On one occasion, she was a member of a group on one of the wagons dressed in Japanese costumes. Like countless generations of Barwick children, when her turn came she plaited the maypole.

After leaving school, she worked in Leeds for a while but then bad health kept her at home. When she was 21, her mother died so she took over the job of running the house for her father and two brothers, Jack who was then eight and Alfred six. It was a fu11- time job. There was no mains water. Rainwater was collected for the sink in a huge barrel. A well in the yard was used for the animals and other purposes but she had to bring/drinking water in cans from the Town Pump off Aberford Road. It made 'the best tea in Barwick'. On washing day, the water was heated in a large, fire-heated copper in one of the outhouses.

Cooking was done over the fire and in a fire-heated oven, later augmented by a gas ring when Barwick was connected to the mains supply. One day was set aside for baking bread, tea cakes and pastry. A cow ('not milked by me') was kept for milk for the household and a few friends. Any left over was used to make butter in a hand-turned barrel churn. They kept a pig or two, like many in the village, and these were sent for slaughtering to Butcher Hewitt in Main Street. The meat was brought back to the house and the bacon was cured in salt and saltpetre before it was hung from one of the ceiling beams.

She did not work on the farm but she liked driving and from time to time she would take people in a single-horse trap to Scholes or Garforth station or to Killingbeck for the tram. One horse was her limit but her sister could drive the two-horse wagonette. Threshing involved extra work. The two men with the thresher arrived at 6.30 and had breakfast, dinner and tea in the house. The whole team of about a dozen men had their 'drinkings' at about 10.0. Pint pots were borrowed from the Black Swan and tea was carried out in buckets. The threshing machines were owned by Armitages from Scholes and Coopers of Syke House Farm.

Her eldest brother, Wi11iam, volunteered for the army in the First World War and was called up into the 251st. Siege Battery of the Royal Garrison Artillery, where his knowledge of horses was put to good use. His letters home from France were censored but he managed to let the famlly know where he was by code. 'Remember me to Mr Harris' told them he was at Arras. One of his officers who lived in Garforth told the family that after the battery had been under fire all day, William was sleeping in the dug-out when a stray shell fell and killed him. This was only six weeks before the Armistice. He is buried at Arras. War however was not the only cause of death in those days. His wife had died in childbirth, followed by their young son in an influenza epidemic at the age of two, a short time after the end of the war.

The family were strong supporters of the Methodist chapel. Fred Reed as a boy attended Sunday School at the old chapel, now the Institute in Chapel Lane, and sat in the gallery during the services. Her mother and aunt rented seats in the first pew an the right hand side in the new chapel. The young Emma and her younger brothers went to Sunday school there. The leaders in those days included her uncle Harry Bramley, William Silvey from Back Lane and John Robinson Brown from Woodhouse Farm. After Sunday morning school, they all had to go to the service in chapel, where the boys were kept in order by George Hewitt, one of the Sunday school teachers. He was deaf and couldn't hear the boys talking, but he could see their lips move and he clipped their ears to silence them. William Gough and his sister Caroline were strong supporters of the chapel at this time. They lived in Bank House behind the Black Swan and the young Emma would buy bunches of camomile flowers, from his long immaculately-kept garden, to be dried and used to make camomile tea for headaches.

During the First World War, rationing did not pose much of a problem with so much farm produce available, but Barwick was bereft of young men who were away in the forces. It was an unnatural situation and she says that 'I was never a teenager'. She cannot remember any troops billeted in Barwick, but later in the war, there were American soldiers camped near Headley Bar on the road to Tadcaster. One day, she and her cousin cycled over to have a chat but the news of her escapade got back to Barwick before she did. They had been spotted by the postmaster Fred Lumb who had cycled over to deliver a telegram. That put an end to the excursions.

James Walker, who was known by the village as 'Uncle Jim' was her uncle in fact, as he had married her mother's sister. They had a furniture shop in Leeds but he was advised to live in the country for health reasons. Troubled by quinsies, he grew the beard which was so well-known to Barwick folk. She remembers him as a nice quiet man. He had a shop in some very old property in Main Street on the site of Poppy's and he sold and repaired bicycles. He had a cupboard full of musical instruments though they were rarely used. He also sold flowers which he grew on his allotment.

When her father died in 1932, she continued to run the house for her brothers and when Uncle Jim died in 1935, she took aver his shop. The properties were so old that they were condemned but she refused to move out as she wished to continue her business there. Eventually, the Second World War intervened and the plans were shelved. After a while, she moved the business to a lock-up shop just inside the rectory gates on Aberford Road.


Main Street in the 1940's. Uncle Jim's shop is just to the left of the car. The newsagents and post office were built in 1939.


By this time her brothers had left home. She met and ultimately married Stanley Peaker, a policeman, who had come from the south of England and was lodging with the Kirk family in Chapel Lane. Subsequently they moved to Poppleton, where they lived until his death when she returned to the village to live in Chapel Lane. Here, with a vigour that belies her years, she keeps in touch with her acquaintances and entertains relatives, friends and neighbours. In between, she keeps her memory green for the lasting benefit of future generations of Barwick folk.



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