John Winchurch

  The Tenby years 1954 - 1961 I first set foot in Pembrokeshire aged about seven or eight in 1950 or 1951, I cannot remember exactly which year it was, but I went with my Grandfather, Percy Winchurch. Percy, with a rather scared looking John Sutton Park. About 1948 Percy, who with h is brother Roland, had built up a very successful motor business, Winchurch Brothers Limited, in the West Midlands, was planning partial retirement to Saundersfoot. He had bought a small caravan ( a Berkeley Messenger ) which he proposed to site on a field belonging to Mrs Howells at Dun Cow Hill at Wisemans Bridge, grandmother of TTT member Sue Griffiths who is still a good friend – many decades later ! Margaret Winchurch standing by the Berkeley Messenger 1961 I travelled with him that summer to stay as Bed and Breakfast guests of Mr and Mrs Watts next to one of the entrances to Hean Castle Estate between Wisemans Bridge and Saundersfoot.. From that first visit I formed a childhood bond with South Pem...

  The Move to Hagley In the summer of 1950, we left Handsworth and move to the much more rural location of Hagley in Worcestershire. My mother was particularly enthusiastic about this move and it proved to be a mainly happy and stable four years of our lives. In addition to the four of us we were now joined by Annie, my grandmother, who would be with us until her death in Tenby in 1958. Hagley primary school was a world away from Handsworth. It was a modern, low building, situated next to fields. The headmaster. Mr Owen was a Welsh speaking kindly man who had been active in the teaching branch of the trade union movement and was now moving towards retirement. Another notable teacher who encouraged me as I approached the eleven plus exam was Madge Mills, who was from Kidderminster and had previously worked in a school there with my great aunt, Nellie Downing. I very quickly made new friends in Hagley. Close by were Robert Hatcher and Richard Hince John, Robert and Richard in 1952 We...

  The Nineteen Forties Alice Plucknett Brown née Sternberg, with John Summer 1944 When I was born on 27 September 1942, the Second World War was entering a critical stage. Hitler had made the fatal mistake of unleashing the horror and might of war machine on the Soviet Union. A combination of  resistance by its people and the deadly cold of the Russian winter would lead to the ultimate defeat of his forces and the collapse of Naziism. But that surrender was still over two years away. I spent my early years with my mother and grandmother at 49, Topsham Road Smethwick, an industrial inner suburb of Birmingham. My grandmother, Annie was a tenant in the terraced house, which she had lived in since her marriage to Arthur Downing in 1914. Margaret was twenty one at the time of Arthur’s death in 1938 and living at home. She worked in a secretarial role at a local engineering works  Bellis and Morcom   Margaret and Vic Winchurch met, I think, because they had mutual friends,...

  The Beginnings This is intended to be my story – John Victor Winchurch, born on 27 September 1942 up to the present day, but as an amateur family historian, I feel the need to begin with the basic details of my origins. My main vehicles for recording family history are  Ancestry.co.uk   where you will find my family tree under the user name John Winchurch and the tree name is John Winchurch 20170730 and also my blog sites :- On Wordpress the URL is   https://jonvic42.wordpress.com/  with various sub headings leading to different family branches. On Blogger you can find similar material on  http://winchurch.blogspot.com/  . This tends to be updated more often and is now the site I use most after Ancestry. Here is a basic pedigree version of my family tree as it currently stands John Winchurch - Family Tree Here is a link to a much more comprehensive tree : https://www.ancestry.co.uk/family-tree/tree/114014145/family/familyview?cfpid=170127301157 ...