I was born in the small Herefordshire village of Coddington, on the eleventh of March 1917 at around half past five on a Sunday evening. This, so my mother later informed me was known to her because the bells of Coddington  church were ringing for evensong.

Tom and Polly Price, parents of Molly Goodwin, nee Price

At the time I had two older sisters Dolly and Nelly, and an older brother Jim who was killed in Italy, in 1944 ,during the  second world war.

We lived in a house called Kettle Brook, and I started school at the age of three. My teachers were Mrs James, Miss Polly Armitage and Mrs Philips. All of these women were in the church choir. The choir sang three times on a Sunday, and also sang at weddings, funerals, and any other special occasions.

Both sets of my grandparents also lived in the village. The Prices at Coombe Hill, and the Webleys at the Branches.  My father was a farm labourer working mainly with horses at Prices farm, Woofields Lane, and my mother was a domestic servant mainly at Coddington court.

To make our family complete we were later joined by my younger brother Jack.  Every year in September we all went hop picking at the Slatch Farm in Coddington, to earn the money for clothes and shoes for the coming winter. To do this we had to start at 6 in the morning, and Dolly being the eldest was in charge when mother was not there, and she was very strict.

Fish and chips in the field were brought round to us on a cart, and only needed warming up. Unfortunately we could not always afford them. Living in Coddington, meant that I could wander everywhere as long as I behaved myself, shutting gates after me etc.

Lover’s bush was a popular place for pic-nics, I remember being on a pic-nic with Auntie Edie who had a huge black bag in which she carried everything, cakes, bottles of pop etc. Every thing to make a pic-nic. No wonder we thought she was a magician, conjouring  things out of thin air.

I also remember baking bread at Aunty Edie’s house. She had a matchwood kitchen and someone had to stand guard in order to prevent fire from occurring.

One day a week we had a pig killing day. The noise of these pigs being killed could be heard all over the village.  After the pigs had been killed, and the blood used for making black puddings, chitterlings could be made, and I helped my granny to wash and make them.

Grandfather Webley was injured, and later died, when a horse he was leading was spooked by thunder and lightning. He died later, in Ledbury Cottage Hospital.

We had no mains water, and either had to fetch  water from a pump at Jobey Smith’s cottage or a pump in Jim William’s yard. The water was not really fit to drink but we had buckets and the like all round the house to catch rainwater, which  we used to wash in.

Written by Molly Goodwin nee Price (edited by her son David Goodwin).