From the archives - Back to school!

THIS week we make another trip up the hallways of always and into pastures past. First we take a bite of a familiar chestnut in the shape and form of Hereford Road School and we also make a brief detour into uncharted territories and much murkier water.

In other words we’ve got one pic from times past we possess plenty of info on and another one which we have but the barest of of bones waiting for you dear readers to clothe in the fancy finery of flesh.

As Sherlock Holmes once said to the wild-eyed man with a big bloody knife in his hand, “Let us begin with what we can ascertain as fact.”

Here’s the lowdown. The first picture is the class of 1940 at Hereford Road School and was brought to the Chronicle’s attention some years ago by Donald Davies and his wife Pat.

Don is featured in the photo, dead centre in the front row (sitting). The surly looking chap in the pic is a teacher called Billy Powell.

Don explained, “It so happened that I was in Billy Powell's class for three years, alongside older boys who hadn't reached the ‘Standard’ to go into the next class.

“Boys who were considered good enough went into the top class with ‘Daddy’ Parsons where they were prepared to sit the Scholarship exam for the Grammar School. Boys who didn't take, or pass the exam stayed on until they were 14 years old and then left to get a job. This was before Secondary Modern Schools and before the leaving age became 15, then later 16.”

Don’s time in Mr Powell’s class was time well spent. He later became a teacher and a headmaster himself before retiring at the age 56 because of, wait for it, “too much paperwork.”

Next up we have a slightly older picture. It looks likely it’s from the Victorian era and Don and Pat would hazard a guess it could be of Castle street infants but the jury’s still out on that one.

What we do know is that sitting pretty in the front row is Don’s uncle Fred Williams.

Don explained, “Fred was my mother’s (Dorothy) brother. He would later die of consumption in his early 20s.

“My other uncle, George Williams, left Abergavenny during the First World War and after he landed in France no-one ever heard from him again until the family received a message that he had been killed in action. There was no body to bury and his name has since been added to the many on Menin Gate.”

Don, whose own father, George Davies fought at Gallipoli, remembers growing up in Abergavenny, and in particular his grandfather Edwin Williams who lived in the same household for years.

“Edwin began his working life down the mines in Blaenavon,” explained Don. “He worked with the horses and soon realised although he liked the horses he didn’t like the mines so much, and so he got a job above ground as a coachman for the Baker-Gabb family in Abergavenny.

“And it’s something he never regretted.”