including
Woolwich & Districts
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Purrett Road Primary School

Purrett Road c.1900. Photo: Greenwich Heritage Centre

Children’s Play at the Purrett
Road Primary School. Photo: Barry Gillmore
The class group was leant to me today by Barry
Gillmore. He was the year below me. It is
taken at Purrett Road School
Lawrie Jupp
reminisces:
I remember Mr
Abel well. He was an inspiring
teacher. We must have had Bunsen burners
in the classroom for we heated glass tubes,
blew bubbles on the end and made “submarines”
in used medicine bottles under his
instruction. Press the cork and the
“sub” went down through the water, ease the
cork and it rose.
St. Nicholas church being half destroyed and a
girl in our class surviving under one of the
steel kitchen tables when her house was badly
damaged by the same bomb. I think a
V2. She was back in school after a
couple of days. No PTSD then.
The Head’s name in my time was Mr. Clarke.
A job enjoyed because of the freedom was going
to the basement to re-fill ink wells.
A short cut into the playground was up a
plane tree and along its branches to access
the wall at the back of the boys toilets.
Girls skipped a lot, dismissed by boys as
being girlie. It was not until I found
out that Joe Louis trained for his heavyweight
contests by running and skipping that I
realised how much fitter the girls were.
Skirts tucked into long knickers.
I left Purret Road in 1946
See also the stories:
Growing Up In The Prefab Village
On Winn’s Common
by Barbara Biddle.
Growing
up in Plumstead in the war years by
Jennifer Mellor.
Memories
Of A Childhood Stay In Plumstead by
Valerie Cunningham.
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Valerie as a 11
year old schoolgirl |
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Valerie at age 13
with her younger brother 11 and older
sister aged 16. |
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