DICK MURPHY
Surname
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Murphy
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Forename
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Richard
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Date of recording
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Feb 2008
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Year of birth
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1947
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Place of Birth
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Orford
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Occupation
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Carpenter
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Fathers occupation
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Barber and Groundsman
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Present Address
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Orford
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Location Interview
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Sawmill Butley
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Interviewer
Summary |
Debbie Bone
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Duration
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60 mins
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No of Tracks: 4
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This recording consists of 4 tracks.
Track 1 [37 secs] Introduction by Debbie Bone interviewing Dick Murphy at his saw mill on 28th February 2008. Confirmed he lived at William House, Orford and was born on 26th February 1947. Track 2 [40 mins. 41 secs.] Mentions his father was born in Orford and was groundsman on the Ness, basically a rabbit catcher, this was after the war. until the mid 1960's His father was also the local barber which was how he earned his living. Describes his mother who came from Great Blakenham and worked in domestic service as a cook. Describes how she came to Orford to work at Castle House and his father at that time was working as a gardener at the Crown and Castle Hotel and they met and were married. Describes how he attended Orford School and at the age of 12 went to the new Butley Secondary Modern School and did general studies. Describes how he has always wanted to be a carpenter and was not quite old enough when he left school to go to college so he worked on a smallholding at The Broom, owned by John Seymour. Describes milking cows and ploughing with horses. Describes how he was there for about six months and then went to City College for one year. Describes leaving college and getting a job at Woodbridge and travelling there every day on his motorbike. Describes having a 5 year apprenticeship. Mentions a selective employment tax which meant that the builders had to reduce their workforce so he left and became self-employed as a carpenter and joiner, he was about 22 years old. Describes how he built his own workshop in his mother's garden in Baker's Lane and was there for about 15/18 years. Describes one of his biggest jobs at the Jolly Sailor public house in 1975, where he had to refit the bar and did various alterations which took several weeks. Mentions that all his work was in Orford and he very rarely worked anywhere else. Mentions his older brother, who was a teacher, and eventually became headmaster at Saxmundham Primary School. Describes going shooting with his brother and wildfowling on the river. Describes building a duck punt in 1972, which was a copy of a gunning punt. This was 19' 6" long, had a 3' beam and had a draft of only 2/4 inches. It also had a rocker bottom so that it could not get stuck on the mud. Describes how a man called Thomas Brinkley, who used to be a professional wildfowler, also had a boat called Pandora and used to visit and give him advice when he was building his punt. Thomas Brinkley used to take wildfowlers down to Iken Cliff on his boat. Mentions that MacFisheries had a native oyster farm in the river, just down from the Quay, and Thomas used to manage it. Thinks that was possibly in the 20's. Describes a tiled shed towards the south of the Quay that had two pits inside and remembers a hard track down to the water's edge. Describes how you can still see the 'old bones' of Pandora on the edge of the saltings. Describes how he used to trawl for fish in the river, and sometimes at sea, and used to catch a few oysters but they always had red worms in them and that perhaps was the reason the oyster beds were no longer in use. Continues talking about his duck punt and describes how Tom B used to come to have his haircut by his father and helped him to decide where to put the rowing blocks by sitting in the boat. Describes how there were no seats and you sat on the floor of the boat; Tom also showed him how to rig a sail. Describes how he had this punt for about 25 years, kept up at Butley Creek, and how he, his brother and Chris Martin would go wildfowling with a couple of dogs. Mentions that they were not allowed to stand on the saltings but were allowed to stand below the high water mark. Describes how they used to shoot teal during an evening flight which only lasted about ten minutes and they would shoot about 4 or 5 birds. Describes the season as being from September to January but below the high water mark the season would end on 21st February. Describes how you could shoot wild geese but there were not that many and you were not allowed to sell them. Describes how there were not that many geese about then, just a few Brent geese and Greylags, but now there are plenty of Canada geese. Describes how he sold some of the teal he shot together with some pheasants. Describes wild pheasants then as being much smaller than they are today and they would settle on the saltings at night. Remembers when gutting the birds the crop would be full of small white snails, whereas today they are mostly corn fed. Describes Sir Peter Greenwell having small shoots on his land with a few friends and they would sell a brace of pheasants for about £3.50 (1965). Describes how he worked at the saw mill from about 1981. Thought that the mill had been set up on the old estate in 1930. Describes how he now buys in the timber and saws it into planks, mainly for boatbuilding. Mentions that as he is self-employed he is exempt from a lot of the rules and regulations. Describes the various machinery in the workshop. Describes fishing in the river and at sea and catching mainly sole during September and sometimes bass and sea trout. Describes draw netting - he and a friend would row down the river and crossing over the Crouch public footpath towards the North Sea where he would have a dinghy on the beach. One person would stay on the beach and the other would row out to sea for about 150 yards, pulling the net, and letting the tide take the boat then rowing back into the beach. Describes how, with all this effort, they would only catch 3 or 4 fish, but they would be quite large, perhaps 12lb. You also needed a licence to do this but now it is illegal. Describes how he once caught a salmon in the net. Describes learning to swim in the river. Mrs. Beth Chambers from Orford School would walk the children from the school to the river, like a column of ants, and teach them to swim. Describes how an old headmaster, Mr. MacMillan, built a swimming pool in the river by laying telegraph poles into the river. Describes how there were two changing rooms, one for the boys and one for the girls and even a diving board. Describes how in 1957 the sewer outfalls were built and ran close to this spot so the swimming had to stop. Describes catching eels in the river and remembers some Dutch people fishing for eels in the river and ditches on the marshes during the 60's. Remembers as a child smelling sprats being cooked in Orford. Describes how the landing craft from the Ness used to come over to the Quay and the skipper would drop the door just before the Quay and this would scoop up 'no end of spratts'. Describes being in the Sea Scouts when he was 14 or 15. This was run by a man called Reg Partridge, and they would meet every week at the Watch House on the Quay. Remembers learning about knots and sailing in a couple of old wooden boats. Remembers that the Ministry had placed a large buoy in the middle of the river and he would swim out to it and then over to the other side of the river. Also remembers collecting cockles in the mud. Remembers a man called Major Stuart Raton, who lived in Quay house and had a big launch in the river with a small tender to get to it. Describes how he and his friends were allowed to use the tender sometimes, and sometimes without permission, and row about the river. Describes that there were not many moorings or boats in the river then. Describes the Quay then as being a wooden slope and they used to play underneath it and catch crabs, and one he caught a small lobster. Remembers in 1962, it was very cold and the river had ice flows in it, but it did not completely freeze over. Remembers climbing on these flows and travelling down the river, not realising how dangerous it was. Describes how the flows would jam together and they could climb off. Mentions that he was told that in 1947 there was an army bailey bridge across to the Ness which was choked up with ice. The army were supposed to blow the ice away but ended up blowing up the bridge. Describes in 1953 floods and waking his mother up to tell her that there was a flood outside and his mother telling him that it was 'only mist'. Remembers Quay Street flooding. Remembers when the flood subsided what a terrible mess was left. Describes how Reg Partridge rowed out in his pram dinghy to rescue some policemen who were stranded on a roof on Ness. Describes how he earned about £15.00 a week in the 1960's and sold the pheasants he shot for about half his weeks wages. Describes how he made his own cartridges. Mentions that Thomas Brinkley left him his guns and a very good cartridge bag, which he had obviously won from one of the London guests. Describes how he does not shoot any more for various reasons. The RSPB bought Butley Creek so he could not shoot there. Then the National Trust bought the Ness, so he could not shoot there. Mentions that he joined a local shooting syndicate but did not really enjoy it. Describes how pheasants are not reared like they used to be and are not as tasty; they are fed mostly maize and wheat and when gutted have lots of yellow fat inside. Describes being frightened sometimes on the river and at sea when the fog comes down quickly. Describes how you have to note which way the tide is flowing. Remembers one time at sea with Chris Martin the fog came down very quickly and they very stupidly did not have a compass. Remembers that they listened and could hear the waves breaking over the shingle and this helped them find where they were. Remembers other times when he was on the Ness and the fog would come down. Describes how he has built 4 or 5 boats. Describes how trees sometimes grow with a curve and these are good for boat building. Mentions that another local saw mill will sell him the curved ends of larch as they do not use them. These are ideal for boats. Track 3 [18 mins 22] Describes how the river has altered in some parts saltings and grown and in other parts the banks have eroded. Describes how, in his lifetime, the saltings have grown north of Pavilion House and now stretch perhaps 50-60 yards from the bank and 300-400 yards down the river Describe how they grow and survive by having a channel of water along the middle which feed them. Remembers that in 1953 the saltings were not there as concrete had been laid to stop erosion. He thought that the breach at Slaughden would break through and remembered going on picnics at East Lane, Bawdsey but now the beach has gone. Also remembered working on the Martello tower at Shingle Street in 1976, the year we had a very hot summer, and going for lunchtime swims in the sea which was only about 25 yards from the tower and now it is 300-400 yards. Remembers an old bricklayer who was the last pilot to pilot boats into the river, a man named Eric Andrews, who was also a fisherman, and he remembered lakes of sea forming in front of the coastguard cottages. Describes how the saltings at Slaughden have been eaten away whereas further down the river by the B.B.C. building the saltings seem to have grown. Describes how the Martello Tower at Shingle Street was originally at the river mouth and that in 1888 there was a great storm which knocked about a mile off the Ness. He mentions a book called 'Pebbles' which gives a history of Orfordness. Describes how when he was still at school they would find stones at Shingle Street that had tags on them. These stones had been tagged in Yorkshire and would end there because of Long Shore Drift. Describes how he has built four boats, all clinker except for the duck punt. Describes how in 1970 he bought a large barn in Orford but Suffolk Coastal refused to let him use it as a workshop so he decided to built a boat. Mentions that he thinks Suffolk Coastal have killed off Orford with all their restrictions and no-one can start a business. Thinks that Orford has turned into a dormitory town. Describes how he thinks Quay Street was a causeway as it drops down quite steeply both sides. Describes how the corner stones of the castle were brought from Caen in France and the infill all came from the mud stone in the river bed. Describes his latest boat as being 26' long, 10' beam and 3' draft. He will have a 100 h.p. 6 cylinder engine and he has an ex wartime bronze shaft. Mentions that he has sold his 30' boat called 'Islander', which had been built on the Clyde. Describes that Orford is not the same now as there are many people now launching their speed boats from the Quay as it is a deep river. Describes how the people who lived at the top of the village were mostly farm workers and the people that lived near the river were more fishermen. Remembers that in 1978 the estate had about 92 workers and now had only 20, if that. Describes Chantry Farm and the cows grazing on the marsh land in the summer as the marshes flooded in the winter. Remembers men from the Catchment Board arriving in lorries to repair the river wall and keep it in good repair but that has stopped now. Mentions that he does not think the tides are as high as they used to be as the Quay does not flood as it used to. Describes how once the landing craft from the Ness landed by the wall of Quay House. The Quay has only been flooded recently in 1998. Describes how Orford has changed and the people living there have also changed with so many empty houses. Says he can walk his dog at night and hear the boilers starting up in the empty houses and it seems a waste of energy to him. Describes how his mother lived to be 95 but was quite lonely as the people in Orford had changed and moved out due to the Council's rules and regulations about running businesses in Orford. Mentions he has a four year old son, says he was a 'late starter!!' Does not know what changes his son will see. Track 4 [1 min. 10] Talks briefly about seals and describes going on a picnic with his wife in the duck punt at Butley and a blonde seal followed them for about an hour and a half, every time he stopped in the boat the seal would stop and come up and have a look around. Then it vanished. Describes it as being a golden colour very much like his Golden Labrador. Remembers there was a small colony of seals on the shingle spit about 10-15 years ago, but believes the fishermen must have moved them on. |