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Local Stalwarts: Connie Robson

From the Barwicker No.69
March 2003



A new series describing how individuals in Barwick and Scholes reflect their own times, through their life and work.

Constance Louise Robson was born in Sunderland in October 1917. She attended Bede High School, leaving at 17 to work in Boots' lending library in Sunderland, transferring two years later to manage the Durham branch. She was always interested in medicine and would have liked to have worked in a hospital. Like many young people, she met her future husband Tom at a dance; he was reading medicine at Newcastle University and was friendly with her brother. After Tom qualified, he worked temporarily at Newcastle hospital for six months; Connie was still living in Sunderland at this time. The outbreak of the war in September 1939 changed their lives completely as they were caught up like everybody else in the maelstrom of danger and uncertainty. They decided to get married prior to Tom being called up into the army.

Connie describes how they married at a Registry Office; life was so hectic for Tom he could only be spared three hours away from work. She wore an ordinary dress and their wedding breakfast was a snack in a local caf‚; Connie was nursing a heavy cold at the time and spent her wedding night at her parents' home sitting with her feet in a bath of mustard and hot water! Tom was soon after drafted into the Army Medical Corps to lead an exceptionally demanding, responsible and busy life.

Tom was posted to Liverpool and to be together, Connie moved into rented accommodation there. Later, she moved again to a house near the Fairey Aviation Works and it was here she suffered food poisoning from eating infected meat paste, being so ill that she was unaware of the Luftwaffe dropping incendiaries and heavy bombs as they missed the targeted factory, but damaged the adjacent golf course. This was a very difficult time for them as Tom was posted to different camps, all the while trying to find accommodation for Connie and Brenda his newly born baby daughter, the first of their three children.

He was later transferred to Aldershot and Connie and Brenda moved again into a nearby house; they settled in well, but after a short stay the householder gave them two day's notice to leave, as their rooms had been rented to another party. Connie's resilient spirit together with her ability to make friends easily came to her rescue and by five o'clock the same day, she had made a new friend and moved to a new house. When Tom was eventually posted to the Field Ambulance Service to serve overseas, Connie returned to her parent's home in Sunderland.



Connie at the Church Gate (photo Martin Tarpey)

The date 21st June 1942 is etched deeply into Connie's memory, for on that day she gave birth to Anthea her second child, her brother was taken prisoner at Tobruk and Tom sailed to the Middle East for a two year posting; being subsequently recalled to take part in the D Day landings. This was a momentous time for Connie; her father died in 1944, the war ended in 1945 and her son John was born in October. Tom had survived the rigours and dangers of working in field hospitals, but after the war he was taken ill himself and sent to a military hospital in York. Connie anxious to bring the family together rented a bungalow for a year, from a friend who was getting divorced. She noted wryly that when Tom was demobilised he had a wife and three children to support, but no job, no money, and no home of his own.

After temporary work in Sunderland hospital Tom secured a position in General Practice at Throckley village, near Heddon on the Wall, in 1946. Connie said their living and working conditions were ghastly at first, they moved in a cold November into a kitchen with uncovered stone floors, there was no cooker and coal was scarce. In these pre-National Health days the surgery was an outbuilding, but they converted a room in the house into an examination room; sometimes patients had to queue outside the house on the earthen driveway.

6 Conditions rapidly improved with peacetime and a replacement surgery was built in the village; there was a great deal of pressure on Tom and Connie as the practice changed and expanded. She helped increasingly with medical administration and clerical work, carrying the added burden of looking after her mother, who was seriously ill for fourteen years. Both Tom and Connie responded to the challenge of the times and situation, finding happiness in their thirty-eight year stay. They involved themselves in church affairs, Tom became a churchwarden and Connie edited and produced the parish magazine.

When the time came to retire, they wanted to live near Anthea who was living in Aberford. Connie wanted a bungalow, but as with most house hunters they couldn't find quite what they wanted; eventually choosing an old farmhouse, adjacent to Barwick Church, which was being radically renovated. After much heart searching and disappointment they decided to buy the property, but there was a discouraging delay before the house was fit to occupy. They moved into Church Farm House in the summer of 1984, but tragically Tom collapsed two days later and died in August. Connie was distraught, she was now on her own in her beautiful new house but it did not mean much to her and inevitably she withdrew into herself. Glynn Wilkinson, the rector, helped her a great deal as her warm and hospitable nature began to re-surface. Gradually Connie made new friends and became involved in parish life, assisting with social events and helping Jimmy Causton, the verger tidy up the church grounds and cemetery.

Initially Connie invited a few people to spend the odd hour a week weeding and planting bulbs in the church grounds; she found that working there was a therapy. Children from Barwick school came, together with some other villagers who contributed to the newly emerging team spirit, which was tackling long-standing neglect. Soon Connie involved Tony Shinn in repairing the church wall and she became an expert at mixing cement. Attendance at the weekly Wednesday morning communion began to grow as she helped provide coffee after the service, adding a drop of rum at Christmas time, to keep out the cold.

The old church didn't have a toilet, so Connie brought her house key to services, enabling members of the congregation to use her facilities at Church Farm House. The system worked perfectly she commented, and if there was a small group at one time, able bodied people went upstairs and the less mobile downstairs. Her friendly house has become an open meeting place for people and she sometimes accommodates overseas guests who are visiting friends and families in Barwick. She is always delighted to show visitors round the church and give a potted history of All Saints' and Barwick.

In summer months, Connie is often seen in the church grounds, serving tea to workmen in the church and volunteer gardeners in the cemetery. A toilet and kitchen well known as 'Connie's Kitchen', was constructed during the recent church re- ordering and this welcome development has made her life easier.

Whether she is counselling rowdy youths, or chatting to villagers, Connie is an institution in Barwick, popular and immensely proud of her three children, nine grand children and one great grand child. She describes herself as, 'not churchy, but a happy Christian', and pleased with her good health and continued independence. Connie has been extremely happy living in Barwick and has thoroughly enjoyed the very friendly and hospitable atmosphere in the village. She is a very gallant lady who has lived through a tremendous period in history; she is a true stalwart of her community.

MARTIN TARPEY


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