Manifold Wick Farm,Tolleshunt Knights Essex

[Dawn Higgins-Brown]

Hi I was borne in Manifold Wick Farm, in 1946 and was christened in Bushes Church, I can tell you the cottages were there in the field also two cottages on Barnhall road. the bungalow was built for my parents in the middle 50s we didn't live there long. we moved to Oxley Green Farm. My uncle built the golf course.

[essexalan]

Hello Dawn,Wow how great .So you were born at Manifold Wick Farm and remember the cottages.Well as I said my mother was in the Womens Land Army and the Cottages are shown as her address on her marriage certificate.I don't suppose there are any photo's of the cottages and or would you know of any records of the farm employing Land Army girls during the war?Any way I was born a few miles away at Great Wigborough.But it was not until after my mother died that I started to research her Land Army days.

[Dawn Higgins-Brown]

I think they had land army girls as my uncle Morris married one I believe he met her when she worked on the farm she came from Colchester.sorry I have no photos.

[essexalan]

Oh OK Dawn thanks,that is some help.I think my mother was moved to the cottages after her first posting,as she was firstly at a Land Army Hostel at Great Braxted.She did tell my it was named Littlewoods and was not far from Braxted Park.But I have not been able to find anything out about it yet.There are no records of the Land Amy left,only index cards with names of the girls that joined up.
By the way I was born in 1948 and went to the Thurstable School at Tiptree.How about you,where did you go to school?   

[Dawn Higgins-Brown]

Hi just spoken to my sister she can't remember land girls on the farm but they had Itailian POW working on the farm. she thinks the Mellows family lived in one of the cottages. also might have been used for evacuees. and yes I did go to Thurstable school. we were living in Oxley Green Farm then.

[essexalan]

Hi, yes my mother spoke about Italian POWs and  working with them.Wow so we both went to Thurstable school then and you were a couple of years ahead of me.Would you remember any of the Theobald family that attended Thurstable .We were from Great Wigborough.Layer Marney and Tollesbury.

[Dawn Higgins-Brown]

Yes I can remember your family was here a David? seems to ring a bell.don't know if any one will remember me I was Dawn Bath.

[essexalan]

Hi yes Dawn I seem to remember your name.David is my cousin from tollesbury was a couple of years older than me. His brother Dennis was in the same class as me all through our Tiptree years. Dennis died last month.There was also my cousins Brian and Barry from Layer Marney.Myself Alan and my sister Gwen from Great Wigborough.

[Dawn Higgins-Brown]

I think David was in the same year as me.