Clock And Coronation (25 March 1977)

About this time of year in 1937 – 40 years ago – the people of this district and of every other place in the British Isles were busily preparing to celebrate the coronation of King George VI, father of our present Queen.  I was not living in North Bucks at the time.  In fact, I have never heard of Bletchley, not even as a railway station.  So most of what follows is at second hand.

The day everybody was looking forward to was May 12.  I, too, was looking forward to it because it was my birthday as well as Coronation Day.  Came the day and everybody set out to have a good time, despite the fact that unemployment was then running at 11 percent over the country as a whole.  One thing I remember is that there had been such a quick “turnover” of monarchs that on Coronation Day you could go into any post office and buy a George V stamp, an Edward VIII stamp and a George VI stamp all at the same time.

On the Saturday after the Coronation the Gazette published a special souvenir issue.  Its feature was a cover of fairly stiff dark blue paper with “gold” printing on it.  I believe a good many copies are still in people’s homes around the town, so advertisers have had 40 years of gold-printed publicity for their money.

I am looking at a copy now, lent to me by a friend, and find it still very interesting, both for its reports of the local festivities and for other unrelated items, not least the advertisements.

One shop invited people to come and see demonstrations of “the latest marvel of modern science” – television.  You could have a Saturday evening train trip to Northampton for 9d return.  Best seats at the Studio Cinema cost 1s 6d and the cheapest 6d.  The late Lady Leon’s fat lambs were sold at the market for 52s each.

And the price of this spacial (sic) issue was only 2d, gold printing and all.

For the coronation celebration Bletchley does not seem to have known whether it was a town or just a collection of villages.  True, there were big crowds and considerable goings-on at Fenny, where the Bletchley Council Offices were situated, but the only real whole-town event of the day seems to have been the unveiling of the council clock.  This took place from the rebuilt balcony and was performed by Cllr Harry Dimmock in the absence through illness of the “father” of the council, Cllr A.J. Stevens of Simpson.

A big united service was held outside the council offices and after a break for everybody to go home and listen to the Coronation ceremony itself on the wireless a fancy dress and vehicles parade was held which is described as the best and biggest since the Armistice.  Pictures show more people in the procession than watching it.

Another picture shows an ox-roasting, with Mr Jim Ramsbotham, Mr Tom Brace and Mr Hedley Clarke prominent.  The supply of ox ran out after 510 platefuls had been distributed.

Teams of women served teas to hundreds of children at the Bletchley Road (Queensway) Methodist Church, St. Martin’s Hall, Albert Street Methodist Church (now part of the Co-op), Spurgeon Baptist Church (now demolished) and the Bletchley Road schools.

All this was in the Fenny Ward, which had much the highest of the four populations.  But Simpson, Water Eaton and “Old Bletchley” were not to be outdone.  They too, held united services, had fancy dress parades, teas for children and adults, sports and the like.

At Water Eaton the tea party was held among builders’ materials, as the village hall, later called the Coronation Hall, was then being rebuilt.

At Old Bletchley – so-called, I presume, to distinguish it from the all embracing new Bletchley – a watch had to be kept the previous night on a big store of beer in a marquee.

Some people must have had a busy time owing to all these separate festivities.  Like the Rev. A H Partridge, who in his capacities as rural dean and rector somehow managed to perform at three separate services.

There are also group pictures and reports of similar celebrations at Newton Longville, the Brickhills, Loughton and Woughton, where a coronation tree was planted.  Is it still there, a remainder (?sic) of old times in the new city?

One group picture is of the Bletchley Organising Committee.  There are 35 people on it, including only three women.  I came to know practically all those people later, but most of them are now dead, though I saw the committee’s chairman, Mr E.C Cook, fairly recently.

There was no sunshine and in the evening it came on to rain so heavily that planned events like open-air dancing and firework displays had to be cancelled or postponed.  But on the whole, it seems to have been a memorable day hereabouts and no doubt many of the children involved still look back on it with pleasure.