Thundersley Village Cobblers

A trip down memory lane

Gwyneth with her father Cyril Wiggins by St Peter's Lych gate
FW Ward from the 1946 Benfleet Official Handbook
47 Hart Road, Bungalow
Gwyneth Craze (neé Wiggins)
Déjà vu - Gwyneth at the gate in 2013
Bill Craze

Mrs Gwyneth Craze, (born 1933) daughter of Cyril Wiggins (Thundersley builder of great repute) revisited her childhood haunts, in the June of 2012, and writes:

I paid a nostalgic visit to Thundersley recently and looked at various premises which have altered substantially, one of which being the Garage attached to 47 Hart Road. In my childhood it was a Shoe Repair Shop, next to Wiggins Yard, now Godden Lodge, run by Mr Hartman, a disabled man who wore callipers on his legs and could only walk a short distance with the aid of two sticks. He lived with his parents in the bungalow. A door had been made between the shop and the living room, and to do his work he was lifted on to the counter where he shuffled on his bottom to get to the various equipment to do the jobs. Each time he moved he grunted, as no doubt he was in pain, and I was rather afraid of him I remember. On his days off he had a three wheeler Invacar to get about in.

After I moved away I lost track of events, but in the 80’s Fred Cable lived in the bungalow and acted as chauffeur to my father Cyril Wiggins when he no longer could drive.

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