Over the past ten years the Creekmouth Preservation Society has collected countless memories from former residents of the village. Here you can read a small selection of nostalgic recollections of life in Creekmouth.
Winnie Machell recounts her early memories of Christmas in Creekmouth: “Mum would make rag dolls for us , sewing buttons for eyes. She had worked as a machinist in her younger days. At Christmas we would get an Apple, Orange and a toy Baa lamb wrapped in lots of newspaper and placed inside a Christmas
Charlie Hussey remembers early life by the river: “The majority of Creekmouth families worked on the river. My Gran’s family originated in Faversham Kent. They had come up to work in Barking’s fishing industry. We used to make our own rafts out of railway sleepers and other bits and pieces. we’d row across the river
Jessie Sleight was born in Creekmouth in 1922 to Alice and Robert, Jessie was one of eight children who lived in the village at numbers 30 and 35. Charlotte and Bill Carter were her maternal grandparents, and Jessie’s friend was Doris Shelly. When attending the local village school, her Mum would bring her a warming
In the late 1850’s a firm called Lawes opened a factory at Creekmouth producing chemicals, artificial manures and sheep dip. The raw materials used, such as Guano could easily be landed at the local wharves along the River Thames , the area was isolated enough for there to be no locals to complain about the
“During the war you could only get the same amount of beer as you took back in empties, ie 2 empty pint bottles in, 2 full ones out, no extras. I went to school with John Stubbs (son of the Crooked Billet landlord). Our school was in Barking as the one in Creekmouth had already
The first pub was on the other side of the road to where it is now, just below the river bank. I don’t remember much about it, but I’m sure my Dad knew it very well! It wasn`t a very big place. Lawes offices were there later. Winnie Machell
‘Miss Downs was my teacher. I remember Miss Kirkwood was also there. I don’t think there were more than four classrooms – (author’s note – there were two). – My older brother and my two sisters also went to Creekmouth School.’ – WINNE MACHELL
“I was born in 1926 and lived in Westminster Gardens. Creekmouth was like Southend to us; a nice place for a day out! Mum used to make rock cakes for us to take and we would have big bottles of lemonade powder, with stoppers in. I don’t remember ever seeing any men at Creekmouth, just
“When I was a child in the 1950s we lived in Westminster Gardens and my dad worked at Pinn & Wheeler at Creekmouth. I used to go with my sister and friends to play on the Creekmouth beach, known locally as, Sandy Beach. We used to skim stones across the water and sit and watch
Gwen Soper (b.1919) remembers an illness striking Creekmouth School ‘I went to Creeksmouth School when I was 4. The teachers I remember were: Mr Matthews, Miss Downs and Miss Debenham. During an epidemic of Scarlet Fever the school was taken over as a hospital because so many people in the village had it. My mum
