A new boys memories !
Only just found this site. I am not a Bermondsey boy - but my mum is a Bermondsey girl, and spent a lot of my childhood in Bermondsey.
I could go on forever about "The Blue" where I went shopping and Shuttleworths chocolate factory. Feeding the ducks in Southwark Park. The "new" Coop on the corner of Southwark Park Road and St James's Road. The Colleen Bawn pub, where my grandad used to partake of a pint or two. Peek Freans of course in Drummond Road, where he worked for 50 years. He was "down the Blue" one day during WW2 when a V2 rocket landed nearby, and he was blown up onto the railway lines ! He always used to joke that it saved him the walk to South Bermondsey station !
The laundry ( Maxwells ? ) also in SPR was where we took the bagwash. And Lorings the dry cleaners, right opposite the Colleen Bawn. Lorings is where I stood at the top window in 1953 to see the Queen go by, a few days after her coronation. My Nan worked there at the time.
But does anyone else remember a small newsagents / tobacconists / sweet shop in SPR opposite Littlington Street, run by a woman who I only knew as Mrs Beale ? Littlington Street is long gone, but was roughly where Frankland Close is now. I always got my sweets there, and she would give me an extra one "for being a good boy" !!
Ah well - memories. I still get to see the area occasionally. Anyone else got anything that might jog my memory ?
Hi Juma, I remember Beale's sweet shop very well , near the Holly Tree pub. Mr. Beale was a very large man who kept his car an Austin Princess[ I believe] parked in Layard Rd., can't recall any other cars parked there {1948-50}. As I recall the Beales had a son named David who was also well built for his age. David must have been a bit of a scholar as he went to St. Olaves Grammar School.Regards Jim Roll.
Hi, I have been trying to remember the name of the couple who owned this sweet shop/newsagents. Yes it was the Beales so thanks for that. He used to hire out his Austin Princess for weddings and my dad hired it out for mine (1967) and took me to the church (St. Crispians) in SPRoad near junction with Jamaica Road.
