Published in Windlesora 18 (2000)
© WLHG
I’m the latest volunteer at the Royal Borough Museum Collection in Tinker’s Lane. The curator, Dr. Judith Hunter, shows me how to use the photocopy machine and where to fill the water jug. I spend the first Wednesday making photocopies and drinks – and then washing up. Judith stresses the importance of taking our own tea towel to the kitchen. We share it with the rest of the building which seems to be entirely occupied by smart offices furnished with polished desks, healthy castor oil plants and important-looking men in suits. I meet one of them in the kitchen and ask him his occupation. His job is to prepare the potential defence of the Borough in case of possible future disaster (fires, bombs, floods etc.)
I ask the other five volunteers their names, find out if they prefer tea or coffee and whether they take sugar. The photographers are Leslie Ritson Smith, and Pamela Marson, who edits the Friends newsletter and this magazine. At the moment, Leslie is photographing a piece of Burnham Abbey. It is a 13th century moulding with mason’s mark. Pam is taking the opportunity to photograph old paintings without glass in front of them, before they go to be reframed. Judith explains “It’s our aim to photograph and file every piece in the Collection.”
Colin Hague, who’s been a volunteer for about four years, on and off, is collecting together two boxes of memorabilia from World Wars I and I, to be loaned out to schools for special projects. Using the Collection’s computer programme Catalist to locate suitable items that are packed away on various shelves, he has already compiled a comprehensive list including a baby’s gas
mask, a khaki battledress, letters from the Front, clothing coupons, national savings stamps, medals, identity cards and lots of old photographs – but he’s not finished yet.
At the far end of the room, where the researcher’s table is surrounded by shelves of boxes and books and electric light is needed all day, sit two meticulous volunteers. Leslie Grout and Ron Hudson are sorting out piles of higgledy-piggledy, unmarked negatives to the background music of flushing water pipes (the Museum Store is in the bowels of the Borough depot). The negatives seem to be mainly of people and places in Windsor and the surrounding area. Ron works slowly and methodically through his pile. Leslie, who seems to be the fount of all knowledge, is constantly being interrupted from his task by people who want to ask him questions. Between fascinatingly detailed and anecdotal answers, he holds up glass plates to the light and writes notes about the content of each – a 1922 Australian bowling group, a single pub beside the old bridge at Datchet, three photos of an anonymous, solemn gentleman in a suit with a thick black, handlebar moustache.
Judith suggests that Leslie G should use the light box – but where is it exactly? The rooms bear more than a passing resemblance to Aladdin’s Cave even down to the lamp – though in this case it’s a Victorian street gas lamp. The Collection has been housed in this building for twenty years, and although the space has expanded three times, as it grows so it fills up again. New bits and pieces arrive most weeks – maps from the basement of Maidenhead Library, a plastic bag of buttons and buckles dredged from the Thames by a diving club, four large green plastic bread baskets filled with a selection of assorted worked flints of the Mesolithic period rescued from a site near the Braywick and Maidenhead M4 junction 8/9 in 1972 by the Maidenhead group. Other gifts, such as a 1950s washing machine, a dentist’s drill with attachments and eight mannequin dummies have all been reluctantly refused because they were too big, too heavy or not appropriate to the Collection – and anyway there is nowhere to put them.
“We need somewhere at least twice this size,” remarks Judith mildly as she locates the light-box. A tiny baby in a car seat and its doting mother suddenly appear in the open doorway. Everyone else knows who they are and gather round to admire. It seems the baby’s name is Alexander Hodkin. His mother, Debbie has only recently resigned from the position of secretary of the Friends of the Royal Borough Museum Collection in favour of her new occupation. Pam puts a copy of last month’s Newsletter into small clutching fingers and photographs the latest and youngest ‘Friend’ for the next issue.
Leslie and Ron are laughing together over an old photo mislabelled ‘Womble’s Menagerie’ instead of Wombwell’s Menagerie and pretending they can recognise Uncle Bulgaria standing behind the animals.
“Oh yes”, says Leslie, “Wombwell – he was the Billy Smart of his day. He’s buried at Highgate with a stone lion on his tomb”. Leslie used to wander around this particular cemetery long before the right hand section of it closed to the general public, except by appointment. That was at the time that the Friends of Highgate Cemetery was formed. He tells us that he is a Friend of Kensal Green Cemetery. On open days there some of the Friends dressed up as undertakers. Last year there was even a tightrope walker (because Blondin is buried there). Leslie is pretty interested in necropolises. I discover that he gives a slide talk entitled London Burial Grounds, and would like to attend the next one – but it seems they are booked privately by specific groups for their members. I note down his name and phone number just in case. “How come you don’t know Leslie Grout?” whispers Pam after he pops into the other room for a moment. “Everyone knows Leslie. He’s a Mastermind champion and International Mastermind champion as well!”
I explain that I have only recently moved to Windsor with my new husband who works in Slough, and I’m just beginning to find my way around and getting to know a few people. It’s still thrilling to meet someone I recognise in Marks and Spencers. I thought that I’d get to know some like minded people by working at Tinker’s Lane every Wednesday and – for that same reason – I’ve become a volunteer steward at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle.
When I get home I find a letter waiting on the mat. It is an invitation for the Voluntary Stewards Spring Lecture, to be held in the Chapel. By amazing coincidence the speaker is Leslie Grout and the subject is Royal Burial Places.
Damaris V Graham
Windsor Local History Group 