For this was his father, his own father, going slowly down into the brown earth, the father that in earlier days had carried him on his shoulders many a mile.
It was his rough but kindly hands that had rubbed his grazed knees when they were trying to bleed.
Awd man was scarcelins cawd afooare Henry painted his name on the broad workshop doors.
His father's death was a loss for which he had been to some extent prepared, but even the most anticipated troubles can take preparations unaware.
Henry's father had always said there was no need to have his name on his workshop, 'Ivveryboddy knaws wheear Ah lives.'
The lad was now master of a spacious workshop, scented with the breath of pine from fresh planed wood, and a whiff of turpentine and rosin. The big bench was fitted beneath rays of light that fell upon it through a skylight, curtained with spiders' webs.
Sharp shafts of sunlight pierced the roof through tiny holes in the pantiles. Henry threw open the double doors in the morning to reveal that one was marbled on its inside with the daubings of paint brushes, which had tried experimental tints or rubbed wet brushes against the woodwork.
In most East Yorkshire villages there was a wheelwright since the continuance of the agricultural economy depended on his skills, not only to keep the carts and waggons on their wheels, but also to maintain ploughs, ladders, feeding troughs and all the other implements necessary to complete the farming calendar.
His skills were also needed in the farmhouse, making new tubs, repairing chairs, making butter boards, window rollers, clothes props and sharpening knives. In a small village he was also the coffin maker and builder.
Henry's tools were relatively simple although he followed so many trades. In the workshop his father had made an elaborately fitted tool chest, measuring three and a half feet by two and a half feet. It had separate drawers and compartments. The bottom of the chest contained many moulding planes.
Prominent, hanging on the wall above the bench was a jointer plane, the largest type of plane made at the time, five feet in length. This was used upside down by pushing the staves over it so that the shavings dropped out underneath and at times built up knee deep around Henry.
Other tools on Henry's bench were a large framed turning saw, for cutting out wheel felloes and other curved parts, a side axe and an adze. Henry used the side axe for shaping and it was sharpened on one side only, like a chisel, which was why it was called a side axe. His shaping axe did not have to be swung hard to make an effective cut but was used with a paring or slicing movement. A short light chop was usually sufficient and unlike using a chisel and mallet it left his left hand free to hold the work. This was very useful when he was out on farms without a proper workbench and vice.
The adze was used by Henry as a shaping tool and for smoothing. Henry could leave the adzed surface as smooth as if he had used a plane. A gouge adze was fequently used on the farms to hollow out every day objects like gutters, pig troughs and chair seats. For guttering Henry took straight pine poles and split them down the centre and then hollowed out the half moon shapes.
A prized possession of Henry's was an ebony brass framed brace with a collection of bits, which had belonged to his grandfather. His grandfather's name was carved in its head.
Henry was always thrang when folks came to him with jobs to be done and a favourite comment of his was: 'Deean't waste tahme. Ah've a lang day i' frunt o' mah. Ah hev hawf a dozen mair jobs aboot spot waiting to be done.'
When Henry locked up the workshop for the night the key went in bottom side up and you had ti tonn the key gently.
A page from Henry's account book, written in pencil, will give you some idea of the range of jobs Henry completed and what he charged for them.
New gate making. £1. 4s; one pair of hames (fastened round a horse's collar) 4s 6d; tumbril mending (for feeding beasts) 5s 6d; butter board 1s 6d; stea spills (ladder) 10s; pig troves (troughs) 6s 6d; new creel (killing pigs) 8s; cratch (crib or hay rack) 5s 6d; pump swape (pump handle) 1s 6d; swath rake teeth 1s; close props ( clothes) 2s; waggon painted and repaired £2; new gun stock and iron ram rod 8s 6d; four-day saw sharping (sharpening) 12s 6d.
- Retired Driffield schoolteacher and local historian Wally Simpkin writes fortnightly in the Driffield Times on the life and times of East Yorkshire, its people and places.
- Wally Simpkin's latest local history book - Driffield And District Through The Times - is on sale at the Driffield Times offices on Mill Street, Driffield, at a price of £10.
