School and Games

The interior of St Mary's, Barkby, 1911. The banner beneath the organ reads: 'Rejoice and Give Thanks, Seed Time and Harvest Shall Not Cease'. Courtesy of the Record Office for Leicestershire, Leicester & Rutland. Photos of the church exterior can be seen in the picture gallery.

Mrs Baines: We never had time for school, my mother wouldn’t give us tuppence to go wi’ so they wouldn’t have us at school.

Mr Bentley: Did you have to pay to go to school?

Mrs Baines: Tuppence (1p).

Mr Bentley: A week?

Mrs Baines: Yeah. Miss Green and Miss Croft were there then. But if we hadn’t got us tuppence they wouldn’t have us there ‘cos we hadn’t got tuppence to pay. My mother wouldn’t give us tuppence ‘cos if she gave us tuppence she’d be all that short for ale for her. Miss Croft and Miss Green, I can remember them two, they used to live in house against the school.

Mr Bentley: Were they very strict with you when you went?

Mrs Baines: No, not as you might call strict. They tried to learn us as well as they could. But when we went in school we always had to say us prayers, they was all out, we always had to say us prayers before we went into the class. They’d perhaps give us the cane a time or two, ‘cos of course we didn’t learn like some children. One or two children as went regular, they learnt, well such as us didn’t learn as we should have done. She’d perhaps go a day or two when our mother felt fit to give us tuppence to go wi’ but that wasn’t very often.

Mr Bentley: When you were children with the other children, can you remember any of the games that you ever played, what sort of games did you play?

Mrs Baines: Well, when it was pancake day then we, the farmhouses, used to come out with the battledores and shuttlecocks, you know, drum battledores… and then I went in, they were selling them for a penny, a battledore and shuttlecock, and I went in and my mother swore she wouldn’t give me no money. My dad made me one out of some wood, then he got me a cork and got some feathers to put in, and I went to play with mine, but none of them would play against me; ‘course they were nicely dressed and I were in rags, as I say, with these hobnail shoes on.

©EMOHA with permission of Barkby Local History Group