This article first appeared in MARK MAG November 2008

HENLEY HALL MEMORIES

Henry Hall, strict tempo dancing?...... Goodness no, Henley Hall, on Portland Street. Although the odd rug was cut and a shimmy or two were shaken.

There was that time around 1951-52 a number of us youngsters spruced the place up for a series of fundraising dances. The secretary of the Musican’s Union from Perlethorpe Avenue suggested we had a shindig every Friday with a different band each week (Gigs for the boys all round). Tickets were printed in delicate pastel shades with hopes of heavy sales. The bands were geared up. All local amateurs. None of this Westlife stuff. Alas the punters were less keen and despite scrubbing the bogs and sprinkling the ballroom powder our orange cordial was no match for ‘Golden Drop’ from Littleworth. Society had started that downward slide with temptations of Eve beckoning like mad. We had grown up.

Back in 1938 I accompanied a friend to St Marks that set me off on a lifetime’s pilgrimage. God rest David he never returned. Twelve months later Portland Street was blacked out, uniforms were all over the town and a state of war existed. The Henley Hall became a services canteen. Ladies of the parish like May Kirby poured ‘char’ from a huge teapot and buttered ‘wads’ (made from the unpopular National Wholemeal Loaf) for the ‘Squaddies’. As I grew older I tried to poke my nose around the door to see the Sunday concerts and be rewarded with such gems as ‘The Sally Gardens, Silent Worship and Sam pick up thi musket.’ Nevertheless despite this we won, with help from Yanks in more comfortable uniforms.

Peacetime and the parish hall took on a lesser role teapots became fusty, dish cloths pungent and conveniences became well…… inconvenient. Very briefly youngsters tried out a D.I.Y. basketball. Trevor Hardy’s dexterity at ping pong was hard to match and league hockey made an impact on me. In my mouth! For a while the classless kamaraderie of common good in conflict continued. Fr.Tom Leach stayed on as curate and his brother Albert held the Youth club together. I kept in touch with both until their deaths and nowadays when I periodically cross the five road intersection near Clare Avenue Bristol or stroll across Clifton Downs I remember Albert and Tom Leach with affection. (No relation to Algernon Leach who lived nearby, before he went to America – or so Albert always said.) The theatre, opera, ballet, serious music, play reading, Compline at Kelham’s peaceful Society of the Sacred Mission and the Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. All these priceless aspects emanated from good friend Albert the Bevin Boy from Bristol and our club in the Henley Hall.

Questions of direction arose after this decade of stability and I moved on.

There are still a few of us left though, who recall those camps at Anderby Creek, Elkesley and Barton under Needwood. Then there was that VE day bike ride to Southwell. Adolescent years a very long time ago and the Henley Hall was the centre of our young lives. Great days, great memories!

Grateful thanks to Wilf Woolley for the above.

Wilf Woolley as a choirboy at St Mark's (left) . . . and in more recent times (right)