Friday 16 October 2020

council house



I grew up in a Council House on an estate in Alfriston a little village on the South East Coast of England.  Known for its history of smuggling in the time of Neopolian. The notoriously violent Alfriston gang used the Cuckmere river to bring their illegally landed duty-free goods in to the village ready for distribution inland. Rumour has it there are a network of underground passageways that lead from the Pubs to the River. You can still find the fake doors built into the walls of the Smugglers Inn fitted to deter the police who would knock on the wrong door giving the smugglers time to escape. My friend and neighbour was baby sat by a ghost as her Mum poured pints in the bar.

The village was haunted and we lived with the spirits of the past. At primary school our music teacher Mrs.White was a ghost who wore Edwardian clothes, long velvet skirt, crisp smocked shirt buttoned tightly at the neck with a cut crystal brooch, hair as white as her face done up in a period style. She hit some of us and told my olive coloured Sister to wash her skin thinking she was dirty. This was though the 1980's not the 1880's...