Some notable village characters
Teddy Ratcliffe
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Teddy was born in Potterspury in 1871 and is remembered mainly as the village carrier who for many years pushed a large hand-cart between Potterspury and Stony Stratford collecting orders from the shops for a small fee. He could neither read nor write, but he could remember all the orders and who placed them.
Teddy was much admired for his hard work by the grateful shopkeepers of Stony Stratford who, seeing this slight figure barely visible behind the mountain of goods on his hand-cart, clubbed together and bought him a donkey to assist him in his labours. Alas, Teddy was not very good with animals and his troubles with the donkey became a village legend. One day outside a Stratford shop it collapsed and after examining it, a shopkeeper said, “I’m sorry Teddy, but it’s dead”. Teddy is said to have scratched his head and said, “That’s funny, it’s never done that before.” So he had to go back to pushing his hand-cart.
For many years Teddy was the organ blower at the church. For much of his adult life he lodged in Blackwell End, but ended his days in Danetre Hospital in Daventry. He was buried in a pauper’s grave much to the disgust of the Rev. R. G. Richards, the vicar at the time, who was most annoyed that the authorities had not let anyone in the village know. Had they done so, the church would gladly have paid for a funeral for this man who had served faithfully both the church and the people of Potterspury for so many years.
Teddy (top) with his donkey and cart and (above) in later years with local children.
Hilda Faux
Hilda Faux Collecting for Northampton Hospital on "Pink Day".
Hilda Elizabeth Faux was born in Potterspury on St Valentine’s Day in 1906, the daughter of Benjamin, a carpenter, and Mary Faux. After leaving school she trained as a teacher and taught for many years at Wolverton where her pupils remembered her as firm but gentle, much loved and admired. Hilda was a regular church-goer and helped with the Sunday school. She also took an active part in village life outside the church and was at various times involved with the Women’s Institute (WI) and the Girl Guides.
In the 1950s she set down her childhood memories of village life under the title “Memories of a Villager”. They are a delightful, warm account of a way of life long gone and show the love she had for her village and its people. Her recollections played an important part in the writing and publication of the book "Potterspury, The Story of a Village and it's People".
Miss Faux’s memories end with the following poem which she wrote about the village; they were winning lines in a WI competition in 1946.
​
A village not void of beauty, in South
Northamptonshire.
To the passer-by not striking, to its own folk
very dear.
Its houses, both ancient and modern, are like its
inhabitants too.
Some young and gaily painted, some mellow,
some aged, but true.
​
Dr Hugh Arrowsmith-Grierson
Dr Grierson lived in Rose Cottage, Church Lane. He was chief medical officer of Brixton prison. In that capacity he was involved in some of the most notorious murder trials of the 20th century. He was frequently called to give evidence which resulted in the passing of the death sentence.
Edward Peasland
Edward Frederick Peasland was born in the village in 1876 and grew up in one of the cottages that adjoined the Schoolhouse, a row which was demolished in the 1950s. His first job on completing his education was as a school monitor. Later he was employed as a clerk in the stores at Wolverton works. In the late 1890s he became interested in photography and set up his own darkroom. Through his attendance at church and membership of the choir he befriended the vicar of the day, Rev. Walter Plant. For nearly 30 years he recorded the people and events of Potterspury and kept meticulous records of over 400 photographs he had taken.
By the mid 1920s he retired from the works and his love of his family and his garden left little time for photography. He left his darkroom as he had used it and locked away the negatives which he had accumulated over the years. His widow Gladys, who died in 1961, told an eerie story to her children. She was, as a child, an attractive girl with dark curly hair. In the 1920s she went with her sister to visit friends in North London. Whilst there, she went out with the friends who were collecting rents from some large properties in that part of London. She particularly remembered visiting one house where the friendly doctor who lived there sat her on his knee and made a great fuss of her. She was not to know until many years later that her friendly doctor was the notorious Doctor Crippen, later hanged for the murder of his wife!
After Gladys’ death, her daughter Mary opened up the locked attic room and found all the photographic materials, including the negatives still there. We are greatly indebted to her for allowing us to use so many of those photographs.
