Glimpses of post-war Exeter
By Ron & Janet James
Cold winters
There is no doubt that the winters in the years after the war were much colder than they are now.
My wife and I can remember when the river Exe was frozen over. We were on the bank opposite the Port Royal Inn, just outside the canal entrance.
The ice across there was so thick it could be walked on, and There were rings in the ice where, we were told that someone had cut birds out of the ice that had been frozen in.
We did stand on it ourselves just off the edge, but didn't risk going any further.
Free coke from the gasworks?
Just a short walk along the canal past the Welcome Inn there was a row of terraced houses just outside the very high perimeter wall of the Gasworks.
On the other side of that wall was an enormous pile of coke, which was produced from the gas making process.
This pile was so big that it spilled over the wall, and virtually filled the back gardens of the houses.
We always thought that possibly the tenants had free coke to burn for their inconvenience, they may have been employees of the works.
The canal
The canal used to be quite busy with ships, two names we can remember was the Frank M used to bring timber, and the Esso jersey brought fuel to the Esso depot at the head of the canal.
Sometimes when we were fishing in a competition near the top end of the canal the Esso Jersey would come past, and being quite a large ship, would virtually fill the canal, and you could just hear it scraping the bottom in places, this would spoil the fishing, but we would still soldier on to the end of the competion.
One day when fishing on the Topsham straight length of the canal, the Frank M came along.
It was wandering from side to side, and when it got to where I was fishing, it hit the opposite bank and the bows came right out of the water, and I thought it would get stuck.
After a while it managed to free itself and carry on it's way, but the water was like cocoa, so I had to go and find another place to fish.
My thoughts at the time was that the helmsman was possibly under the influence of too much rum.
Exe Bridge
Sometimes in the summer during a hot spell, if you looked over the old Exe bridge, there would be a large shoal of bream basking just under the surface.
Also if you wanted a go at rowing on the river, you could hire a rowing boat from a place just down stream of the bridge.
Ron & Janet James have moved to Frome, Somerset.