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MONDAY, JANUARY 14, 2008. The Northern Echo northernecho.co.uk
SOUTH DURHAM NEWS page 11.
The Shepherds
IF anyone has any information about my grandparents, Thomas and Florence Shepherd, who ran Barningham post office between about 1910 and 1920, I would be very pleased to have it.
I know my grandmother was a Foster whose family had a butcher's in Barnard Castle called Thompson and Foster's.
I would also be grateful for any details of their son Leslie Shepherd, who attended Barnard Castle Boys School (he held a swimming record there at some time and also played cricket), or of their daughter, my mum Gladys Shepherd.
I remember her telling me about the parties held at Lartington Hall for all the children at Christmas and how they all used to walk into Barnard Castle.
I did visit Barningham not so long ago, it's a lovely village, and I'm sure my mum went the little school there for a time. I went to see the old post office shop where they lived, funnily enough it was up for sale at the time. How odd... But my husband didn't want to move!
ROSIE YATES
rosyat@aol.com
We have been contacted by Mrs Myra Lycett (nee Kavanagh) of Ashford, Kent about her dad - J.T. Kavanagh (Jack) on the roll of honour - more details below. Click
Jim McTaggart, Teesdale Talk Columnist and Northern Echo Reporter, responded to our appeal with this article in the Echo.
Teesdale Talk: Planning for a green future
From the Northern Echo, first published Saturday 25th Dec 2004.
...
A faded booklet which turned up the other day tells the story of Bobby Wrangham, surely one of the most remarkable postmen who ever pushed mail through letterboxes in Teesdale.
He went all over the area on foot to deliver letters and parcels for a small fee from the 1820s onwards. He trotted everywhere at an astonishing speed, completing local routes in the morning then running to Bishop Auckland, Darlington or Kirkby Stephen after lunch and getting back in time for some evening work.
It was recorded that he was passing through Winston one day on his way back to Barnard Castle when the horse-drawn coach service operated by Joseph Fawcett caught up with him. He was offered a lift but said he was in too much of a hurry to accept.
He ran straight on, while the coach had to divert to Staindrop and other points to set down and pick up passengers - and of course he reached the town well before it. Bobby, who also served as an Army volunteer each summer until well past the normal retiring age, kept on delivering until the winter of 1849, when at the age of 70 he took a parcel to Brough.
He got lost in a fierce blizzard on the way back over Stainmore, and was found dead in the snow, a few feet off the road, the next day. Friends said it was the sort of end he would have chosen for himself.
* I'll be glad to see anyone who calls with snippets of news at The Northern Echo office at 36 Horsemarket, Barnard Castle, on Mondays and Tuesdays, telephone (01833) 638628.
Jim McTaggart's 'Teesdale Talk' column of Saturday January 12, 2008 refers to Bobby Wrangham running all over the dale delivering parcels and letters.
Jim - was he a postman ? Was the horse-drawn coach a Royal Mail coach or a private contractor ?
Could Joseph Fawcett be related to Fred ?
Frank Smith was the first to leave a message on our answerphone but forgot to leave his telephone number.
Frank is undertaking a project to recognise the bravery of all those men who served their King and Country.
If anybody knows Frank please ask him to get in touch again. [Jim McTaggart seems to think he lives in Startforth Park.]
Mrs Heavisides contacted Fred with details of J. Walton - Jack. Her farther is pictured, on the Home Page, in the late 1950's Safe Driving Awards photo.
She has also been able to identify other family members in this photo:-
Clarence (Clarey), George and John Alderson.
Mrs Heavisides has supplied the following photos from the Family Album:
1916 embarkation postcard, postmarked West Hartlepool 11. 45 AM 11 FEB 16 from 'Jack' Walton to his 'Mother & All' at Stoney Keld, Bowes, DARLINGTON.
[Ed - N.B. Barnard Castle wasn't a Post Town for Teesdale in 1916. All mail for Bowes, and surrounding 'Barney' villages, was sorted at the Darlington Head Post Office and despatched directly to Bowes on the Railway Train.]
On checking back through the Guestbook Mike Heaviside left the following entries:-
May 9 2006 09:02 am
Just to rectify my previous error re John Walton's address... it was called Stoney Keld [as in the address of the 1916 Postcard] and not Stony Gill as typed... sorry! Thanks in anticipation of me finding some more info on John within your web-pages!
Mike Heaviside (Cockfield)
May 9 2006 03:15 am
I have been seeking information about a certain John Walton born at Stony Gill, Bowes, who was half brother to my own distant relative, Valentine Heavisides of that place. John's mother was Hannah Walton of Middleton who married Joseph Heaviside in 1894. It appears that according to the 1901 Census that John Walton (aged 8 years) was living with Joseph and Hannah at Stony Gill in Bowes.
I have noticed a photo of John Walton on your site although I have no other to compare it with, and would like to know when John started and finished for the Post Office... excellent site!
John (Jack) Walton
Joined General Post Office (GPO) before WW1 and served in France.
When the War was over he returned to the GPO as a postman delivering in the Holwick area of Barnard Castle.
BBC - Remembrance - Ninety Years of Remembrance 1918 to 2008.
Thank you BBC for uploading our commemoration to 'Jack' Walton.
Wounded circa 1916 in Ypres. When recovered he returned to France and served in the 'Fleet Air Arm'.
In 1960 he received a medal for 20 years of safe driving.
He delivered to the Cotherstone / Baldersdale area.
His son Clarry, pictured above in the RAF South Africa during WW2 as a Mechanic, followed in his fathers foot steps delivering to the same area.
Jack Walton - retired reparing clocks and watches.
Carol was the third person to get in touch following Jim McTaggart's article in the Darlington and Stockton Times.
Once she has removed home (all her stuff is in packing cases) she has some info on her grandfather John Edgar Wearmouth.
He was a postman at Newbiggin and featured in a Look North article in 1968 (don't suppose anybody taped it?).
More details to follow once Carol has unpacked!
We have been in correspondence with Myra Lycett (nee Kavanagh) of Ashford, Kent about her "lovely dad", John 'Jack' Thomas Kavanagh - the 'dog man'.
Nov 2009 - with the release of WW1 Service records online Jack Kavanagh's details have been move to a dedicated webpage - link:- click
Teesdale Talk: Postman tale stirs memories of tragic day
From the archive, first published Saturday 14th Jan 2006.
A dreadful tragedy has been recalled following a report in The Northern Echo about a display featuring Teesdale's postmen in decades gone by.
Harold Howe, who lives in Barnard Castle, contacted me [Jim McTaggart] after reading it to relate how his father, Fred Howe, was killed.
He was a popular postman who cycled all over Marwood and Langleydale delivering letters and parcels when the sorting office was on The Bank. But while pedalling on his round on a Saturday in May, 1928, when he was 37, he was fatally injured in a collision with a car near Kinninvie.
[Fred Howe is listed as F.W. Howe on the Barnard Castle Post Office Roll of Honour - to have survived the war only to be killed in a car crash is a dreadful tradegy indeed.]
Carol,
Please get back in touch we'd love to share some more info with you!
