Race worker good as new after horror at Windsor 100 years ago
Old Memories Revived: A look back at the NWN archives
The partygoers pictured above were dressed to the nines in Thatcham in 1947.
The revellers were out to celebrate at the St Mary’s Church YMCA annual dance – and they made every effort to dress up for the occasion.
150 years ago - September 23, 1869
The Newbury Horse Show opened at ten o’clock, when the judging commenced simultaneously in the three rings.
During the earlier hours, the attendance was not very great, the spectators being principally exhibitors and those who take a delight in picking out the points of a good horse.
After lunch the visitors began to pour in, and by the time that the more popular portion of the programme was got in hand, the attendance appeared to compare favourably with that in previous years.
Certainly the grandstand had never presented a more animated appearance, and it is not too much to say that a more fashionable assemblage has not been previously seen in Newbury.
The sun was shining with great brilliance, and the scene was one to be remembered.
125 years ago - September 20, 1894
The Annual Harvest Thanksgiving was held in Compton on Friday.
A service, for which special psalms and lessons had been selected, was held at a quarter before three o’clock, when the church was entirely filled with a numerous and most attentive congregation.
All the employers of agricultural labour in the parish having given their labourers a half-holiday to enable them to attend.
The prayers and lessons were read by the Vicar (the Rev JS Wasey), and the sermon preached by the Rev EM Chaplin, rector of Chilton, after which a collection in aid of the funds of the Royal Berks Hospital was made to the amount of £7 2s 1d, showing that the labouring portion of the congregation were not unmindful of the benefits conferred on their class by that excellent institution.
The church was prettily decorated for the occasion with flowers and leaves, interspersed with bunches of corn, oats and barley, miniature sheaves of which, as well as apples, were introduced with very good effect.
100 years ago - September 18, 1919
An unusual story was related on Friday at King Edward VII Hospital,Windsor.
A stable boy named William Robertson, aged 38, of the Roadway, Lambourn, was preparing a horse to run in a race when a skylight fell and cut his nose clean off.
He was taken to King Edward VII Hospital without his nose.
It was stated that it was left behind in the stable at the racecourse.
A messenger was immediately despatched to the stables, where the nose was found in the straw.
It was taken to the hospital, where an operation was performed and the nose was put on again. It had been off about an hour.
On Friday, Robertson was discharged from hospital.
He said it was a miracle, and he could not speak too highly of the skill of the surgeon and the attendance of the nurses at the hospital.
75 years ago - September 21, 1944
Mr William Perdaux found the flags out and ‘Welcome Home’ greeting him when, with his wife and two children, Michael aged six and William, four, he reached ‘The Chestnuts’, East Ilsley, where his wife and family have been staying with friends for some time.
They had been reunited at Reading station, but had not seen ‘Billy’ before.
Mr Perdaux, aged 32, joined the RASC as a driver in May, 1940.
In 1941, he was in a salvage company which linked up with the 8th Army in North Africa.
Then came the call to Greece, and Driver Perdaux was engaged in rushing food, petrol and munitions to the troops trying to hold the Germans north of Salonika. With many others, Driver Perdaux was captured.
He was taken to Corinth, Salonika, Marlberg in Yugoslavia, Wolfberg in Austria, and there he remained for three-and-a-half years.
He worked 10 hours a day on road construction.
The treatment wasn’t too bad, but the food was scanty and certainly not enough to sustain one for hard work.
He was in hospital from February until July, then moved to Bavaria, and with a view to repatriation, took the long journey to Sweden.
He boarded the Arundel Castle for Liverpool. Yesterday he got into ‘civvies’ for the first time for four years.
50 years ago - September 25, 1969
Newbury and District Agricultural Society left nothing to chance when planning their diamond jubilee show on Saturday – except the weather. That they could not guarantee.
To their relief, the weather fitted with the occasion, bringing an almost record crowd to Henwick for a show considered by a crowd of over 20,000 as the best ever staged in Newbury.
From the early morning until late in the afternoon crowds poured into the ground to see a show that will long live in the memories.
25 years ago - September 22, 1994
The steps of Newbury’s historic Town Hall are being used as public toilets, the town’s mayor has claimed.
At a meeting of the town’s Charter Trustees in the Town Hall on Monday, the mayor, Mr Phil Barnett, also said he had found vomit spattered on the Town Hall steps.
“It does worry me how the outer door is left ajar and various people do use it as a latrine,” he said. “Then, on one particular morning, I met the cleaners having to clean vomit off the front steps.
“As mayor, I have visited at unusual hours and I was surprised at the number of other people there were around and I feel that we cannot try and keep some sort of heritage for Newbury without some sort of control.”
10 years ago - September 17, 2009
Plans are afoot for another Tesco supermarket in Newbury.
The supermarket giant has entered into a contract with the landowners of the retail park on London Road, which currently houses Comet, Harveys and Sleepmasters.
All three units are set to close in the coming weeks to make way for the 23,000 sq ft store, which would be about a third of the size of the Tesco Extra store in Pinchington Lane.
Tesco spokesman Felix Gummer said: “The landowner had an aspiration to unify all four units on the site, one of which is currently vacant. The landowner has planning consent for the site and we are now contractually linked to the site.”
Mr Gummer said that the store, which would sell mainly food items and employ around 150 staff, would not affect the town’s Tesco Extra store on Pinchington Lane.
Mr Gummer added that Tesco could aim to have the store open next summer, although no date has been confirmed.
Meanwhile, the companies currently occupying the units have confirmed their impending closures.
A Comet statement read: “We can confirm that the Newbury store on London Road will be closing on Wednesday, September 23.”
