Lifting the Latch

by Sheila Stewart

Sheila Stewart’s classic account of rural life is now back in print in a new expanded edition to commemorate the centenary of the birth of Mont Abbott, whose remarkable story the book tells. This new edition contains previously unpublished photos, and a new section by local historian Graham Binns, giving details of some of the people and places mentioned in the book.

I can just remember in 1915, the last year of my schoolhood, playing all down the street in the dusk one evening when the old Super comed down the Lidstone Road in his horse-drawn police vehicle. The way he reined in his nag by the village school and plodded slow and heavy across to us children, summoning us to all to gather round, us knowed he were about to make an important announcement. “Childern! Motors is coming. After tonight all you 'ere childern must no longer play in this ’ere road.” He warn’t upset over the job; he were just solemnly a-warning us like, for our own safety. But somehow, all us knowed it be the end of an era.

From Lifting the Latch by Sheila Stewart

978 0953 2213 3 2; 256 pp + 16 pp photographs; £8.99 softback

Published by Day Books