In search of the Hampshire years
 

I'm hoping to make a jaunt or two down Hampshire way in the New Year.

I hope to walk up the road past Benifols (even though I have already done so in Street View) and try and pass Headley Grange perhaps too.

I want to go into the Crown pub and see if there's anyone there who remembers when FM were in town so to speak.

I'd also be fascinated to find the exact spot where John McVie took the Bare Trees cover photos and to see if anyone knows what became of Mrs Scarrott - I'm sure she'll be long dead but if there's any local source that published her poetry in small pamphlets.

If anyone already knows any of this info I'd be interested to hear from you.

Oh and did FM actually record anything at Headley Grange? I know they were the ones who recommended it to Led Zeppelin but most of their stuff from that time seems to have been recorded at De Lane Lea.

I know Kiln House was in Alton but that's all I got.

If you could get Mrs. Scarrott's first name for me (for the discography) that would be great. :)

John

There's other threads on here that show where you can find Benifols.

It's in Bordon, Headley Down, not all that far from where Hampshire, Surrey and West Sussex meet.

I'd rather not give the street address here but a cursory google will reveal it.

Hi Murrow,

See my thread :- Benifolds-home of FM 1971/74, for further info regarding Benifolds.
Good luck with your visit in the New Year.

Blue Horizon

Thanks BH will check that out.

Think I might have seen the thread before but nice to have a recap.

Thanks but I'm not looking for the address. By all means though if you come across Mrs. Scarrott's first name, feel free to PM it to me, that's what I meant. :)

John

Her husbands name could have been Judas *




* (not to be taken in anyway as a serious suggestion and posted only for comedy effect !)

I thought she was just reading something out from a book, not that she'd written the poem. :shrug:

She was described as a neighbour so possibly lived next door?

Wish I could visit too!

You're probably right but until we can find the source of the poem...and as a "performer" it would just look better having the name instead of "Mrs." as a first name is all. :)

John

The way Mick's heard complimenting her at the end, plus the fact that she's credited in the brackets would suggest to me that she did indeed write the piece. Probably inspired Danny to write the title track.

You see now why I want to see the place in winter. I so wish I knew the exact spot John took the cover photos.

Well I did it!

Yesterday I made my trip to Headley. A bloke on the bus pointed out Benifold on the hill, I had a pint in the Crown and then following what I'd carefully studied in street view, I made my way to Benifold.

The road it's in is now a neighborhood watch area and while I managed to find it and snap it quickly from either end, I had to do the "Just having a walk" act when I had to stop right outside to let a lady drive past, only to find she was in fact turning into the house opposite.

I left the immediate area by means of a designated footpath that slopes down past the lower end of the house - I had to slide down on my rear-end. But once you get to the bottom you can turn right and follow the narrow footpath (treacherously muddy in winter) and come out near the Crown again.

From there it's not that long a walk to Headley Grange either.

Can post a pic or two but will be doing so with respect for the fact that both buildings are now private homes.

Plenty of trees so bare and yet so beautiful though - and someone in the Crown told me they still get spectacular sunsets round there.

P.S. Oh yes and the official spelling is BENIFOLD. There's a D but no S, despite other spellings I've seen.

Wow, that's great. I take it the house had a name sign. Is Benifold on the Hill the proper name of the house or the name of the street? Or both? Did you speak with any punters in the Crown about the band? Do they have any pictures on the walls?

PS. Any news on Mrs Scarrott?

Sadly the only lowdown I got from anyone on the band was the guy on the bus who remembered being a kid and seeing Mick and Christine around the place. No-one in the pub was around in those days but a couple of guys told me the guy who'd been Peter Green's bass player was now in the band that had played the village New Year's gig and that once Pete Townshend had dropped by on his bike and popped in for a pint.

The name of the house is just Benifold and yes it is signed.

Owing to lack of those around at the time, I couldn't really ask anyone about Mrs Scarrott. I do however know a Headley-related website where the webmaster might be able to look out the info for me.

I have corresponded with a resident of Headley who knows a lot about the area. He contacted a Benifold expert but could only ascertain that Christine's paintings are no longer there.

He did however tell me the following story:

"Funnily enough, I was leading a walk past Benifold this morning and two of the walkers had first-hand Fleetwood Mac stories to tell me - one about a birthday party for one of the daughters in the local church hall - her daughter (aged about 3) was invited - there was no food other than rock cakes and people were smoking funny joints!"

Deduction tells me it would have been Amie's birthday probably in January 1974 when she herself turned three - only months or even weeks before the band moved out.

Ha, very appropriate... though the guests might have enjoyed some bluesberry tarts too! :woohoo:

I note that in the other thread about Benifold there was a poster whose grandfather had owned (and named) Benifold.

Has anyone tried contacting them with a PM to see if they or a relative knew of Mrs Scarrott?

Scarrott as a surname isn't all that common.

According to the Find-a-grave website, there is a Mrs Scarrott buried in the All Saints Churchyard in Headley. She was born in 1918, so would be 54 in 1972 - the Mrs Scarrott on the record sounds a little older than that.

Of course, Find-a-grave relies on user contributions, and not all cemeteries are complete - some just have the few entries individuals have posted.

Unfortunately its not the Mrs Scarrott laid to rest in All Saints Churchyard. I managed to contact that lady's daughter who confirmed it was neither her mother not her grandmother.

However, she did say;
'fleetwood mac were very well known in those days,they would spend time in two places one was headley grange in liphook road and the other was in headley road but alass cant remember the name of the house,im so sorry but it was not my mother or grandmother, but there was another mr and mrs scarrott that lived in headley road'

I suspected it wasn't the Mrs Scarrott buried at All Saints. The information about the other Scarrotts in Headley Road is interesting.

Taking note of the names of the couple buried at All Saints, I had a look to see if I could find another Scarrott family in Headley. I thought I was on to something but the trail went dead. Here's what I found:

The 1957 electoral roll for Headley shows Henry S and Grace Scarrot living at Laurel Cottage. The address for Laurel Cottage on the 1957 roll is "Parish House Bottom". However, on later records the address is Headley Hill Road.

Harry Samuel Scarrott and Grace Tietjen are married in nearby Alton in 1939. It is the 2nd marriage for Harry, his first wife dying in 1938.

In 1932 Harry Scarrott is listed as the father of the bride for the marriage of his 23 year old daughter at All Saints. Their address is Laurel Cottage.

Harry, his first wife and their daughter aged 3 can be found on the 1911 census (living elsewhere at that time).

When Harry dies in 1974, the probate index lists his address as Laurel Cottage, Headley Hill Road, Headley.

So we clearly have a Mr Scarrott living in Headley Hill Road. But have we found Mrs Scarrott? Sadly, Grace Scarrott died in 1964, so it can't be her on the album.

I cannot find a good match on FreeBDM or Ancestry for Henry/Harry Scarrott marrying again after 1964.

Unfortunately the probate index does not tell us to whom the probate was awarded. The full probate file would tell us who that was, but it would cost £10 to obtain a copy.

I'm not in a position to put up the full £10 on the off chance the file would reveal a third unknown Mrs Scarrott - probate may have been awarded to the daughter.

Or - could there have been a 3rd family of Scarrotts in Headley?

(Note: Just to save anyone going down a possible dead-end, Ancestry suggests the birth of a possible son named Harry Samuel Scarrott born in 1905 the year after Harry Snr's first marriage, but I can't find a matching birth (or death) on FreeBDM to support this, and no son appears with the family on the 1911 census. I think the reference on Ancestry is an error.)

I was wondering whether there were any ideas as to who Mrs Scarrott is speaking to at the end. I'd always assumed it was Mick as he is supposedly the one who went around to her house with a tape recorder. However, listening to it back it isnt Mick. It sounds like somebody with a Northen English accent- Yorkshire?? Is this Mr Scarrott?

By the way, what exactly is being said...

Something about cake/tape?
'Theres a lot of pudding...'???
'If I didnt think so I wouldnt say anything'

If it is a Northern accent it is unlikely to be Harry Scarrott as he appears to have been born in Alton.

I have posted a message on The Pump message board at http://www.headley-village.com/ to see if that attracts a response.

Ha. I did that too.

The Headley Village web site has a list of all monumental inscriptions at All Saints as of 1999. The only Scarrotts listed are Thomas (excluded above by his daughter) and Henry.

Henry is buried alone, and no wife or other family member is named.

I'm just not certain about the italicised line - maybe thats what I think it should say.

Not sure I agree it's a Northern accent.

I agree with your transcription, in fact I think the italicized part is the part I'm most sure you're right about, perhaps it is "'cos there's a lot I put into it" describing to him how hard she worked on it and his remark is his way of assuring her he genuinely likes it.

Not sure on his accent but she always sounded Australian to me, the way she says "ours" in the poem reading. Maybe this is why she's been hard to track down, maybe she was buried back in Australia and not in that area? Just a thought. :)

John

Hmmmmm. I dont know where that comes from but Metro Lyric has the writer listed as Mrs E. Scarott

a) Her first initial isn't listed anywhere else
b) Everywhere else (including the sleeve notes obviously) its listed as Scarrott rather than Scarott

Is this website just wrong? ...I suspect so.

With the almost infinite variation of British surname spellings anything is possible, however it appears that Scarott is even less common than Scarrott.

There doesn't seem to be a lot of Scarotts recorded as living in Hampshire and none recorded in Headley, Alton or nearby.

How it was determined the initial was E might be interesting to know.

Is it possible to look up British copyright? I think I saw in one of the recent Tom Petty articles a breakdown of the copyright percentages - would that information be publicly accessible?

Thanks, John. I started to wonder if I was just making it up to make a sensible conversation rather than really hearing it.

I'll have to listen again tonight with my Australian ears. If she was buried in Aus it would make the search harder - each of the States has it's own separate Registry, and the search functions on some of them are not great.

The other thing that could be an issue is whether she is really Mrs Scarrott at all?

If the man is Harry as I suspect and this is his 3rd relationship but there is no record of a marriage it could be a de facto arrangement - perhaps people just knew her as Mrs Scarrott when it wasn't actually her name.

Good point, never thought of this. If this is the case, I wonder why they would say in the BT liner notes thanks for "her readings, recorded at her home" if it's not her though. I guess like you say, FM may have referred to her as Mrs. Scarrott as the others in the community did when she may not have been, on paper anyway. It sure would make this scenario more believable in context of the times as well. Sure in 1972, it wasn't as big a deal as it had been to live with someone and not be married but I'm sure it was a bigger deal then than it is now certainly so it's more of a chance this kind of set up may have existed.

Yeah I would ignore the E. 1st initial listing. It may very well end up being right but based on my work on the discography here, I have found many of those to be erroneous so I don't even use those as a source to stretch out this kind of info for the listing here now. Hopefully we can find out from a better source soon anyway. :)

John

And the answer is:

Aileen!

Born Aileen Katie Mary HUGGETT, 1904, Eastbourn, Sussex

1st marriage: Alfred F Cager, Brighton, 1935

2nd marriage: Charles E Smith, Willesden, 1947

3rd marriage: Harry Scarrott, Surrey S W, 1966

Died: 1984, Cannock Chase, Staffordshire.

So, the 3rd marriage for both Harry and Aileen.

Evidence can be provided on request.

Great! Thanks. Now I can amend the discog to give her a first name! :)

John

Hey, great work!!!
Is there enough evidence to merit an amendment to the main Bare trees wikipedia page? would an extra line or so about Aileen Scarrott be of worth?

What's immediately available is a copy of the official GRO Index of Marriages for 1966. Unfortunately, Wiki will want a link and the marriage isn't publicly indexed on Free BDM yet. The link on Ancestry requires a subscription.

The next step would be to purchase the actual marriage certificate. That'd be £9.25. I'd be happy to chip in a pound or two but not put up the whole pot myself. It depends on exactly how "official" the group want to get.

Perhaps some confirmation will still turn up from the Headley Village Pump.

It appears Aileen had a daughter from her 1st marriage. The daughter had 2 sons born in 1964 and 1967, both in Leicester. I wonder if they know their Gran was a rock star?

I also found the answer to the mystery of a son for Harry also named Harry - Harry's birth and that of his brother were just registered very, very late for some reason.

I'll have to take a trip to see Benifold and the house where the band recorded Kiln House. I did find the latter on Google maps, but it seems that it's on a private road. Benifold really interests me. I think it's cool that the band lived there communally. I remember Bob Welch talking about the electric going off in the winter due to the strikes. I can imagine the band sitting around trying to keep warm with lots of candles lit and snow outside. There is some cool footage on YouTube showing the band in the house and on the grounds. It's a shame they sold it.

As the starter of this thread, shame on me for not checking back more recently. But top marks to Neb for finding out Mrs S's details. I wonder if she wrote any other poetry.

I think the conversation at the end is with Mick and he is being asked what he thinks of the poem.

The owner of the Scarrott family tree that confirmed the final details for me believes the male voice is Aileen's husband Harry Scarrott.

She was not previously aware of the recording but had named her daughter Rhiannon after the song. Once she heard it the voice reminded her of when she had met Harry as a child.

She was going to see if her father had a photo of Harry and Aileen. The photo she had on Ancestry was of Harry's previous wedding.

Yes, I don't know Harry's voice but it's certainly not Mick at the end of the recording. The voice is of an old man and even the way Mick sounds now doesn't sound like that and this was 1972 and it doesn't sound like Mick or his accent anyway.

John

I still think that the person speaking sounds older than 67/68 years old.

GJK

Can somebody assist-

I've been reading 'Play On' again.
There's a picture in the book at Benifolds showing the band and friends in winter 1970.
I can't quite work out who everyone is. Is the man to the right Peter? I wouldn't have thought it would have been Peter but it does resemble him.

any thoughts?
thanks

Any chance you could scan and post the photo?