Here is a short extract from one of our many Oral History audio files. In it, RAF veteran Albert “Bim” Champness includes a summary of his extended family and also recalls Wychwoods village characters, in a clip from a 45-minute conversation. The full 23rd March 1995 interview covers wide-ranging details of an interesting life from difficult beginnings.
Always known as Bim. Served in the RAF during the Second World War servicing aircraft used by the Dam Busters.
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Transcript
After a ten-year gap, Steven arrived and then four years after that when my wife was 39, Sarah arrived. But of course, we were very thankful for her because, as I said, we were to lose our eldest daughter.
I got my leg pulled with a friend on gapping out the children, as he put it, and he very cheekily said, “Well if you will go to bed on Sunday afternoons, what do you expect!” I didn’t touch him, but I felt like whacking him one!
Anyway, so that’s a bit about the family.
Well, what have I done in the village? I’m afraid I’m guilty of not taking too much interest in village life, although I did really. I used to love to watch the cricket and the football matches. I became, I suppose, more engaged with the Chapel than any other activities, but I thoroughly enjoyed village life.
In those older days we knew everybody and there were real characters in those days — Jackie Miles the Postman, Ridley the farmer, Wally Rawlins who owned half Milton, Shipton, Bournemouth, Reading and I don’t know what else he didn’t own but was a real character, and some of the men who worked in Groves’s Yard too, I remember well.
Not to mention the sportsmen — Perce Bridge who was a superb fast bowler, Doggie Pritchard who could mix it up with speed and spin and could act the fool at most of the matches, and one or two fine footballers, such as Frank Miles who played for the County on one or two occasions, and I remember another sportsman from Shipton, Buckney Slatter, who was urged to turn professional but played for one of the famous London amateur clubs which I think was called the Corinthians in those days.
Summary of the Full Interview
The interview is by Janet Wallace and covers Bim Champness’ life story. It includes his early life after being adopted in London, his adoptive family’s move to Milton in the early 1930s when he was 12, following many family visits to grandparents in Fifield, his apprenticeship and early working life in Milton, his marriage, wartime service in the RAF, subsequent career and retirement, family life, and involvement in village activities especially the Baptist chapel.
More Extracts
- Cissie Carpenter and the Good Doctor
- Dorothy Thomson, Hathaways and Mrs Wiggins
- Dorothy Thomson and the Tale of Mr Samuda’s Model T Ford
- Dulcie Arundell and the Tale of the American Soldier at Shipton Station
- George Bradley and his London Wartime Deliveries
- Megan Bradley and the Canadian Soldiers in World War II
