165 whitby road, wakefield.ketetasman.peoplesnetworknz.info/documents/0000/... · he started out on...

Narrative of Mrs Elizabeth Maude Sampson (Maudie) of 165 Whitby Road, Wakefield.Mrs Sampson was adopted by Mark and Elizabeth Lammas at the age of three. Mark Lammas was a blacksmith in Richmond. Mrs Sampson was born in January 1895 and was brought up in Richmond until the end of her schooling years.Mrs Sampson was interviewed on 31 v 84 by Louise Charters for the Richmond Borough Council. Typed by Louise Charters.

Mark Lammas had four brothers - Thomas, William, Jessie and Edwin. Their father was John Lammas.

My father was a blacksmith, the best blacksmith I know of. It was very hard work. He had an apprentice and he and his brother had the blacksmithing business. I remember he made me an iron hoop it was a perfect circle and you could use it with a stick or with a guide, which you hooked onto the hoop. The apprentice was so sorry for me havingan iron hoop that he bought me a wooden one, which I didn't value nearly as much, because it was so wonderful that my father had made it.

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2 (Mrs Maudie Sampson, nee Lammas)

Anyway, I used to spend a little time poking around the back of the shop when I was allowed. My father started the business up.

My father's name was Mark Lammas. He was 19 when he started out on business on his own. He learnt the trade in Nelson. They lived in Richmond when they first came out from England, and he used to walk into Nelson to work and at the weekends he'd walk home.His full name was Mark William Lammas and he came from Clapham in London. He was born on 22nd March 1846 and he was 89 years when he died. My mother's name was Elizabeth. My grandfather was John Lammas.

I was adopted by the Lammas family when I was aged three and there were seven girls in our family, which was rather wonderful; but they were all grownup it seemed to me. The youngest was still a schoolgirl. They were wonderful people. The girls names were - Louisa, Minnie, Ellen, Sarah, Rose, Isobel and Fannie. The eldest one had left home and married and lived at the French Pass and I really never knew

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her - she was a teacher. She married a farmer who


had one wee boy, and some years after this she had twin boys, but the twin boys died at birth and she did also. She was buried at the French Pass and her husband later married again. Everybody was mourning and I felt I should, but I didn't even know her.

There were no brothers. Minnie was the one who lived at French Pass; she was the oldest. Then there was Ellen. Ellen was married when I came to live with the family - to one of the brothers who kept Robertson's mill in Nelson.

It was a great day when I went to Nelson to stay for a while with Ellen. For the first time I saw a water-cart and such-like, that we never saw at Richmond.

Then there was, I used to say my favourite sister, Sarah. She was a draper's assistant. Louisa was a schoolteacher, and a real school 'mam - you didn't come in without wiping your shoes on the mat. If she wasn't there at the door downstairs when you came in, she would call out 'did you wipe your shoes?' She

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taught at Wai-iti school. Then there was another U)^'SCHOOL.

school teacher - the youngest girl, Isobel, and she\bch4lL £■

$Ch ooltaught at Aniseed Valley, among other schools. Rose was the second youngest, and she was a draper's assistant. So they were really a lovely family.And then there was Fannie - she was always sick. If we had a nice rosy apple given to us, we took it home to her. Some years after Fannie got faith healed by Ratana, the Maori healer. From then on, the

(t-}c*ori Hea >cr)invalid sister looked after the mother and fatherin their old age. Fannie never married.

Sarah and Rose, the draper's assistants, worked at May's Store in Richmond. There was the millinery part there too. It was a great establishment.

Then there was the Richmond School - we went to R„; School. just the girls' school. The boys and girls school were then separate. Miss Papp's was my teacher when ]M\S% PiAPPS I first went to school. It was so orderly. You never thought of doing things like they do nowadays. Then there was another teacher - a Miss Johnson. She was


the real school 'mam type of teacher, but very niceand very highly respected. Then the school amalgamatedand we had mixed classes. We had Mr Clark as head- ClA£i<master - a fine old teacher. Oh it was a long timeago.

We had to go to Nelson to sit our competency,(the same as school certificiate I suppose) and we had a teacher who came out from Nelson for cooking and for dressmaking which I enjoyed. We also did plastercene modelling and clay modelling which was quite good.

We used slates with a bottle of water to clean them with hanging on the side of the desk. We also had inkwells. Everything was run so orderly. The teachers would come out sometimes and join in the skipping and hold the rope for a while. Skipping was a great pastime.

We also did club swinging and every year we had a school concert held in the Oddfellow's Hall, ODDfStLQWS Viftuand many an afternoon we would have to go down and


practice. One of the items in the concert was club swinging and action songs and so forth. Then there would be the prize giving. Only the girls did the club swinging and the boys had their cadets.

When I left school I had no special desire to do any special thing. You just did what you could.By this time my people were ready to shift to Nelson and I worked in a cake shop in Nelson. I stayed home until I got married and worked in the cake shop.

Then the war broke out. My husband went to war and I was left with one child. He was away two years. It was a worrying time.

I remember May's Store on the corner of Queen Street and Gladstone Road; and Hesseltine's on the corner of Queen Street and Cambridge Street. I used to be sent to Hesseltine's shop for six cakes of black ink. We used to have to clean our shoes and boots with black ink. We'd put water on the black ink and we'd put it on the boots with a knife. As it dried you polished it with a dry cloth. Hesseltine's was

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a grocer's shop. They were good country stores. Mr Hesseltine's shop changed hands, but May's never did while I was there. And then Fittali's bought it.

I remember when the first motor car went down Queen Street - I was behind a high macrocarpa hedge and never saw it, but it was really a great day when the first car drove down.

My father was in the fire brigade but not in f-iKf CK 4P- my time. My grandfather was also in the fire brigade, and my uncle. I went to the opening of the new fire station in Oxford Street.

Children were seen and not heard in those days. Children never left the table without asking. You sat on a form at the back of the table. They were days when father was really head of the house. Not stern, but kind and always called us 'pettie' and gave us rides in the wheelbarrow when he was carting wood. Wonderful he was, and mother was too.When you came home from school, it was mother you first wanted. I was really on my own because my sisters were so much older. I used to spend quite a lot of time on Oxford Street spinning a type of flax with a wooden top - I got quite expert at it and the children really enjoyed it.


Having an invalid sister I used to take her out in the wheelchair. At weekends my sister who was teaching at Dovedale, she used to come home at weekends.If it was a strong wind she couldn't bike against it easily and my father would hire a horse and trap and take her to the top of the Dovedale. And I'd get a ride with them - it was quite an event.

Show Day was a great day - you generally had a new frock and my chief delight was smelling the cigar smoke - I used to like that as a child, and the fruit; the lovely banana's, strawberry's and things. And I remember one time my father took me and there was a chappie there who built a Noah's Ark. I forget who it was who built it. We paid to go on the ark. But Show Day was a great day.

People bfought their produce along, and you had a look at the cows, pigs, and the horses jumping.

We went on blackberry picnics on the train each ryuKk year, and I remember my father's advice was - ’If you're going to pick blackberries, stick to your bush.'


And it was better than running around saying, 'here's a bigger one and here's a better one.' But we used to go in covered trucks - trains. We'd go up to Belgrove or a bit further - it was a great day. I would go with the school.

I belonged to the Baptist Church with my family, 6Bi of course. There would be an Easter tea-party for some reason or another. We used to call it 'the bun fight.' That was another great day and my mother would help there. I don't know why we called it 'the bun fight.' But it used to seem to me that they only had heavy fruit cake and things that didn't appeal to me in those days.

When anybody died you went into deep black - even little children. I remember when one family in our church lost a son and they didn't go into black; they still came into church with their pinks and greens. We went into black for six months and then into black and other colour in part mourning for another three, and then you could wear what you liked.


The mourning was only for the immediate family. But what a lot of work it made. All this material was made up and everyone had to wear black. You see when I was three and my mother died, I had a black frock.

My sister Rose played hockey - I've got photo's of that hockey team with their long skirts on playing hockey.

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Not many ladies rode horses in those days. I didn't. It was farm horses that my father mainly used to shoe. Trap horses too. Some of the jockeys would bring their own horses, but some would have their own blacksmith on the racecourse.

My father was a blacksmith until he retired and we went into Nelson. It would have been more than 40 years. His premises were right opposite the Star & Garter Hotel in Queen Street. We lived behind the shop and the property went right through to Oxford Street.

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My father had a pair of scales, very intricate, with the weight on an arm. What he had those in a blacksmith's shop for I don't know, but I spent many a time weighing myself. The work was so varied. He would do some wheelwrighting. It was also demanding.He used to work at night and he must have worked with just an oil lamp to work by. In the daytime his brother worked with him, and he sometimes had an apprentice. That was his brother Thomas. Thomas and Mark had the blacksmith's shop.

The brothers were - there was Mark William• [7 I

Lammas (my father); Thomas Lammas; William - he worked in an office; Jessie Lammas had a turkey farm and Mr Edwin Lammas was just a farmer. They all lived in the Nelson Province.

It was always a great adventure when I went into May's Store. The drapery side - I can see it now - they had the wool stacked in partitions and how they could take it out and do up a scane of wool so deftly always amazed me. There always seemed to be wonderful things that you'd see that you wished you could buy


and never could. On the grocery side, even the floor seemed a bit worn where the customers went. If you had a penny to spend they made a packet out of a bit of paper and put a few lollies in out of the glass jar.

Mr and Mrs May worked in the store, and their son, but I don't remember Mr May so much. Mrs May was so business-like and busy always. But she'd have to be with a business to run like that - dressmaking and so on. There were quite a few employ ed in the dressmaking field. They had a millinery department as well.

They had a delivery horse and trap that used to come around. I remember I had a pair of shoes and they were delivered to me. Why they were ever delivered I don't know. Mother must have been busy. You'd wait anxiously for the grocer to come with your new shoes. You were allowed to wear them that day to stretch them ready for Sunday. It was the joy of my life. It was very simple and very easy to please children in those days.


I remember Miss Louise Croucher going to Germany A-OuCXouo if&

to further her violin lessons. (Mr Croucher of the flourmill's daughter). And Mr Hayes Croucher had a cake shop. I remember when the Croucher's built an up-to-date bakery place for their bread-making. It

e ’ .had big letters up "Hygiene in Bakery." It was all done with machinery instead of by hand, which it had been for years.

Mr Saywell, he was the cobbler - you took your $ AWioJEU-(Cohorts’)shoes there, or rather your boots. If you didn't

take your laces out, he would stitch them in! We used to have protectors on the bottom of our shoes.They would last longer because of all the skipping in the winter time. I

I remember Mr Coleman, he was the butcher.Mr Coleman, Mr Cross and Mr Little they were all

,v K i i TTi-JTbutchers. Cross's were our neighbours on one side, , (^ O U. 'O'Sl.C-')and Little's you might say on the other. Mr Coleman used to deliver our meat. He'd come round on the horse with the meat in a basket and he and the family spared brooks because he would ride his horse up the


front path instead of carrying the meat up. But it was all very nice and all very pleasant - no complaints.

Christmas was a big occasion because my cousins O-'AfS'11 usually came to stay. But you didn't get big gifts - you'd get an orange and a few lollies in your stocking, and just little wee things like that. And the same thing happened when my children were young at Depression time and I remember putting in some lovely young green peas for them to eat. Anything at all to fill up a stocking. But it was always enjoyable. You didn't moan about what you didn't have or wishing you did have things. It was a time of contentment.

7On 5th July we used to go down to Wix's and have a Guy Fawkes. It was a great time. They lived in Beach Road. We would always have a big fire and crackers, but we never bought crackers. Nothing so frivolous! But I don't know who supplied the fireworks, but the bon-fire was always available withoutmuch cost.


Then there were the Cresswell's. My first schoolmate was Elsie Cresswell. She has just recent-

Cly passed on. I used to go and play at Elsie's house a lot or she would come to mine. I always enjoyed going to her place. We'd play with dolls and those sort of games.

Once in a while my mother would say she was going up to the Richmond Cemetery and that seemed like a world tour! We'd go up and do up the graves.

I had an old aunt who lived up the top of Queen Street, Mrs William Hart, and she used to make rag «vt mats which she would sell for a pound a piece and give the money to the missions. She made 100 that I know of, so that was quite good for those days.She was a tiny little woman and Mr William Hart was quite a big tall man. They went to the Baptist Church - one of the pillars of the church.

Then there was Mr Talbot. He went to the Baptist Church and he used to wear a swallow-tailcoat and I would sit about two seats behind him and


it was quite intriguing to watch him get his handkerchief out of his pocket with his swallow-tail!

Opposite the Baptist Church (which is still where it has always been), there was a doctor. I remember going there for a smallpox injection. I can't remember who the doctor was. If the injection took you felt very miserable, if you didn't feel miserable, it hadn't taken. I remember coming out of the Baptist Church and the old injection was taking and I felt very sick. Anyway, the doctor was opposite, and then there was a little lane which went down, and they called it Pillbox Lane. Old Richmond people would remember it.

Mother kept me in boots in those days to strengthen my ankles. There was nothing wrong with them though, but she did it as a preventative measure. We wore warm underclothing and little knitted petticoats, bodices with buttons - so different from today. They weren't uncomfortable, but the buttons would come off and garters would be lost.


Mother used to wear a little lace cap and always £L-\zA6i a high collar - not comfortable looking clothing.When things got a bit, perhaps you'd torn a stocking or something, mother would run her finger round her high collar. You could tell she was a bit distressed.There was never any growling.

When we used to go up to Mrs William Harts, it's lUrv funny but it seemed out of bounds. Funny how you just lived around your own little quarters.

My father used to go on the Sutton property Surro/i F‘ collecting mushrooms at mushroom time. It was a great event. I suppose people still do.

When the girls got married. I was only home when two of them, I think, got married. It was quite an event, but not as big as people make it today.We juHt had the wedding at home. They would wear white, but not always a veil - I remember one sister was married with a hat on. But always with mothers and fathers approval.


I was married and then the war broke out. You did have to fit in wherever you could and help where- ever you could. I was helping on a farm at the time. And then after the war, you faced up to the Depression, making do, but you were not unhappy - not miserable.

We used to make our own soap - the children used to li'Kt to see if it was set and get growled at for poking their fingers in. We made the soap in the copper. We didn't make candles. But breadmaking, when I lived up in Murchison, breadmaking1 was quite a business - you hoped it would rise.

I lived in Murchison when my husband came back from the war. We took a farm. But that was a bit hard away back. It was a bit dreary then for a woman. Moss on the paling fence and trees that were still standing dead^-doleful it was really at times. We were there for quite a time and then we came down into Brightwater and lived next to Tom Newland's.


And then from there, the Depression. We went to the Howard (on the way to Murchison). I didn't live on the gold fields, I lived in a little cottage and my husband came home each week from the goldfields.But the country people were always so thoughtful. We always had nice people, and there's no part of it that I regret. I count my blessings.

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(S £ ot.& t-died about 4 years ago but he went to the war.That was hard for Dad to see him go, knowing what he was going to.

But my husband was old country - came from Wa<<- Devonshire. And when he went to the war he went to see his people, and when my son George went to the war he went and saw them also. So that was nice.

My husband was about 2 0 when he came to N.Z. V\}tu_i<Ah^ from England. His name was William Sampson. He was in the German Occupation Army.


So the two years when my husband was away at war; I stayed part of the time on a farm and helped - you just fitted in really. But it was a great day when they returned, but it made you sad for those who were not so fortunate. Wars are terrible.

It was a high day when we got a letter from our loved ones away at war. All the letters were censored. I'm not sure who by, but I suppose it was by the army. Our letters to them were also censored, so you couldn't write a great deal - only just the little family things that they wanted to know. But it was difficult for them writing.

We were living in Murchison at the time of the rationing - I had to give up having sugar in my tea. Dad said that we shouldn't have more butter than people were allowed - although we could have made it. He had that idea, but I don't say that we didn't have it. But on the farm you had your own milk, you had your eggs, so it wasn't quite so bad. But tea; if someone didn't drink tea and gave you coupons, that was a big help.

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I think I was in Nelson for D Day. I was in Nelson of course when they farewelled the troops that my husband went away with. And then when they called into some Port in Australia they had a great reception.I remember my husband saying they were boosted up a bit - 'we are going to win the war, and you are the troops that are going to do it.' But war is just not fair.

I was living in Spring Grove at the time of the Murchison earthquake. I was washing at the time t. ri rVTH t<and the washing was splashed out of the tubs. And the night - the moonlight night seemed extra bright.And there was a shake and you'd look out down the orchard, and the trees seemed to touch the ground as they shook. It was terrifying. It didn't do any real damage to our place though.

I remember going to Nelson on the train and Iwas about the only passenger because of the Influenza iNHJUEttpibefvi\cepidemic, because no-one travelled. The carriage was awash with disinfectant. It was a shocking time. I lost a step-brother then.


I didn't go into Nelson much when I lived in Richmond. We would go in for school exams and there was Royalty in the Botanical Gardens.

I moved to Nelson when I left school and started working. My parents moved there when they retired and I went with them. They lived in Collingwood Street.An electrician has turned our house in Collingwood Street into an electrician's shop.

When my sister was healed, my family were living to.* in Collingwood Street. This miraculous healing - my sister wrote and asked Ratana to pray for her, and in the early hours of the morning, she felt the healing come. She got out of bed, which she wasn't able to, and called mother. When mother went in she was standing, leaning on the mantle-piece. So it was a marvellous day. And then there would be people come, who couldn't believe it. Quite a number of cars outside our place.

When we were sick in those days we used eucalyptus. If you had toothache you rubbed painkiller on which was nearly worse than the toothache. Then for


colds mother used to put a brown paper plaster on our chests, rub tallow or something, on the brown paper to get it nice and warm, and put it on your chest.It was most comforting, until it got cold. Just plain simple remedies we used. I can't remember having a doctor, but I remember going to this doctor on the corner of Pillbox Lane to get a tooth out. I was only small but I remember saying to the doctor, 'you can put something on to deaden the pain can't you?'And he said 'well let me see which tooth it is.'And of course he just put his forceps on and took it out!

The School Inspector used to come round - he was a Mr Harkness. I used to ask my mother if I could P'K- wear my best frock to school on that day and she would say no, as I would be paying more attention to my clothes than my lessons.

My parents were strict in the fact that if they said no, it was no; but there would be a concert on - Mrs May used to put on concerts - and I would be dying


to go because my sister would be in it, but no, I wasn't allowed out at night with the girls. But still, as I say, I had a happy childhood.

I used to go down to the swimming pool at the ! iU beach at the end of Beach Road. There was a dressing shed and the pool was fenced in. We used to go swimming from the school, but by the time you walked back from way down the end of Beach Road you were hot and tired - the swim hadn't refreshed you any. I don't think we learnt to swim, we were just allowed to go to the beach.

As a tiny child, I found time would hang on a Sunday when my father wanted to rest and the big sisters were out and the invalid sister resting, and mother tired; and I would pick flowers - periwinkles and flowers that I was allowed to pick - and decorate

1^) if wV ifX ̂my father while he was resting, until he got a bittired of it and he'd get up and say he'd take me fora walk. Sometimes we would go up Hillcrest and some- W'U-C&G*times down Beach Road - wherever I wanted to go. Butyou can't expect a young child to sit like an old-age


pensioner, can youI My parents had a grandchild older than me -■ it was tough for them, plus frustrating for me being active. But as I say, they were happy days.

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