CONNECTIONS
This page has been created to bring together news and information about people who no longer live in the Chishills but still feel a connection to the local villages and their residents, past and present.
If you have a connection with the Chishills but no longer live here, we would be pleased to hear about you and your memories of friends and relatives. Just email webmaster@greatchishill.org.uk and we will take it from there.
The Andrews family
If you click on the picture you can see five generations of Andrews. The youngest male, Murray is my brother who sadly passed away at the age of 33 with cancer.
The Cane family
The Past
The Present
I am in contact with a grand-daughter of Henry and Eliza Cane whose grave is near the church porch as we are both keen on family history. Henry and my great grandfather Philip were brothers, born in Chrishall.
There is also a good contingent of Cane descendants in Australia, with several of whom I am in touch. In the mid 1800s, 7 families from a family of 11 came to Australia, also Thomas Judd and Elizabeth (Cane) and his family, from Shaftenhoend, came to Tasmania.
My mother's godmother was Annie Purkiss, who lived opposite The Gables at Church Farm. Her daughter Maud was another great friend of mother's as was Bill Purkiss although he was a little older. I used to play with Maud's daughters Judy and Kathleen when they were visiting their grandmother, and I especially remember the wonderful old farmhouse, with many stuffed animals in glass cases, (Bill Purkiss was Crossman's gamekeeper) and the wonderful smell of the 'apple room'. In my childhood, Little Chishill was 'Heaven'. Sadly now, The Gables are altered, the outbuildings demolished, the beautiful internal pine lining boards all painted over, and grandfather's prolific and well kept garden reduced in size to a small and unloved 'yard'.
When I visited Lily Negus in 2000 she took me into the Barley shop and introduced me to Mrs. Howlett's grand-daughter. She explained that Mrs. Howlett lived in the farm above 'The Gables', and I had to laugh as I always thought that lady's name was Mrs. 'Owlett' since that is how my grandmother said the name!
My many memories of Little Chishill are too numerous to write down now, but I was pleased to see that the old 'chalky walk' track from the letter box over the fields to Great Chishill, my mother's route to school in fine weather, was still there, and I walked a little way up it and found cowslips still growing under the hedge.
I shall bring your website to the notice of all my Cane relatives (and Carters, since my grandmother was a Carter of Barley!)
Lily Negus (Weeden) has actually been to Alexandra as she visited in 1985 to stay with my mother after my father died, and we had Lily and Mum at the cottage for several weekends.
Incidentally if there is a copy of that book by Lorna Prior, 'A Tale of Two Villages' I would love to have one. I do have 'Two ears of Barley', full of names and places I recognise and love.
