Violet & daughter Margaret (Peggie) Gowings outside Rose Cottage.

The housename must have changed from 'Rose Cottage' to 'Millside' while in the ownership of my family but not sure exactly when. It doesn't look very different externally from our time to the present time except for the modern double garage replacing the stable and coach house (and now the conservatory. I do not recall any stories of it originally having been a pair of semi detached cottages - the internal arrangements during our era did not suggest that.

There must always have been a front door because it would have been extremely difficult to gain access through the little back door because the field was so close. Above the porch; with its partly stained glass inner door; was a space - always known by the Prince girls as 'the landing' and when my sister was born my father made it into a little bedroom for her.

As a family, we used the dining room for most activities. This was partly because my father used the 'drawing room' a good deal for his singing practice, and in the winter particularly, it was somehow a much cosier room. There was an oak bookcase, made by my father, beside the fireplace and I had a little stool on which I sat to read everything (more or less) in the bookcase. This was undoubtedly my favourite occupation. I think I used to badger the grown-ups to read to me and made myself such a nuisance that they taught me to read as soon as possible. This room overlooked our front gate which was very convenient. The sitting room wa very pleasant in the summer and I remember it had a lovely window-seat, with cupboards underneath, and there was a delightful view of the garden.

Just beside the staircase there was a narrow passage leading to a sort of lobby. This back lobby had three doors, the left-hand one was to the working kitchen, in middle one was the back door to the outside and the right hand one was to a dark little room, down three steps, known as the back kitchen. I believe all this back extension to the original house was built during my grandfathers time. The kitchen was a reasonable size and had a coal or coke fired kitchen-range, which was used for cooking and also to heat the water for use in the bathroom. All the cooking was done here, and much sitting and chatting over cups of tea. The back kitchen was so dark because the only window, which was over the sink, faced into the wash house. This was typical of the period, a boiler which has to be filled with cold water and a fire lit under it etc, There was a small gas cooker in the back kitchen and beyond that was the larder, called the pantry for come reason.

The back door opened on to a passage-way, partly walled in and roofed, but with part of the outside wall open. Turning right by the door, you entered the wash house, which had a door the other end which led into the garden and the clothes line. If you turned left as you came out of the back door into the passage, you came to the yard which contained a kennel for our dog, Bob, a boarded off part for the coal, an earth closet (originally the only sanitation) and a ladder up to the loft.

My grandfather had had a pony and trap, used basically I think for him to visit the various place where he had to collect Taxes or rates, so there was a stable and coach house. The loft was for the pony's hay, and I found it tremendously interesting. Once I discovered in it three full sized bows with arrows and a target. I was told that archery was a very popular sport for 'young ladies' when the Prince girls were young.

Now we return to the first floor of the house, up those very steep stairs. There were originally four bedrooms, two the same size as the living rooms sown below, and two tiny ones squeezed in behind them. I had shared my Aunt Daisy's bedroom when I was very small but later I had the smallest room of all, with a window so high up that you couldn't see out. When my sister was born, my father made a little bedroom for her in space above the porch. He did this by making a sort of wooden frame with opaque glass walls. There was already a good window above the front door. To get from this oldest part of the house to the extension, you went down two steps from the top of the stairs. On the right (over the back kitchen and wash house) was a room that my father used as an office. He was employed by two local Councils as well as the work he did as Secretary and Treasurer of Upton Park Proprietors Association, so he needed an office. I can well remember the enormous safe that was there and also one of those original telephones, which were black and you hung up the receiver on a sort of stand. The other room was a bathroom. It was over the kitchen, so the kitchen range provided the heat for the water, and the tank was surrounded by an airing cupboard. It was fairly large and also contained, beside the bath and wash basin, a chest of drawers, a small wardrobe and a medicine cupboard. Between these two rooms was a WC, a genuine water closet. I think that my parents had the bathroom and WC installed when they took over the house, because my mother and aunts told me about the baths they had in a tin bath in-front of the kitchen fire when they were children.

Gas was installed and most of our lights were gas, with gas mantle, though a few of the bedroom ones seemed to be just blue flames. Our bedside lights were just candles and often I read far into the night by candlelight. Of course there was no electricity and I think the Prince family must have managed with oil lamps. Heating was by coal fires and every bedroom had a small fireplace, though I never remember them being used.

Molly Gowings in the garden of Millside c1923 - showing the tennis court.

Most of the garden was in a sort of triangle to the right of the house. We had a 'Cabbage Rose' in front of the stable block - this was dark red and had an exquisite perfume. There was a Monkey -Puzzle tree almost opposite our front door and the front boundary hedge was very close to the house. There were several large fruit trees, many gooseberries, raspberries and current bushes, and I particularly remember two Victoria plum trees on the small lawn right next to West View. They fruited every other year and on each occasion the yield of plums was so great that small branches were broken off. One of these trees was still there when I visited the house a few years ago. To explain about the garden extension I have to digress outside the boundary of the Park. Upton Mill, a windmill, was used mainly to grind wheat etc, for the making of bread. Edward (Ted) Dean lived in the house there and was a very successful miller and baker. 'Dean's Wrapped Bread' was the first that anyone had heard of and of course it was sold in the shop next to the Mill, a very popular place. It was very much the era of the horse and they had several huge cart-horses to dray their huge wagons. They owned two fields behind our house, one of which came right up to our house boundary wall. One of my great delights, as a small child, was to wait by our back door in the evening until two to the horses came galloping towards a large farm gate through which, when the carter had opened it, they charged into the field and rolled on their backs, so glad to get out of the harness that they had worn all day. Then they would quietly graze and during many summer days when the horses were not there, I loved nothing better than to wander in that field sometimes trailing a huge bow and arrow. At the end of the first World War, my parents bought a piece of that field from Ted Dean, enough to make a tennis court, build a summer house, create a good vegetable garden and grow more flowers. At least we had a garden that we could get into from the back door, which was wonderfully convenient. Poplar trees were planted round the boundary, which I am sure would be there still, probably also the passage way that was left for the horses when the garden was extended.