Memories From the Islands - Chapman Lane

Chapman Lane, adjoining Emerton Alley, where the houses are small and close together.

"I was born in a wooden house like this in Barbados. Inside, the house had different sections; there would be a front room with nice chairs and a cabinet, two partitioned bedrooms in the middle and the kitchen at the back of the house. The floors were wooden and the roof was made of shingle or galvinised zinc so you would hear the rain really loudly.

The floors were always polished and at Christmas and Easter they were varnished to give a clear glossy appearance. The house itself was suspended on stones for foundations. The side gates were galvinised and the windows louvred. You didn't use locks on the doors, you just used the latch.

The roofs used to blow off easily in the hurricane season. Poorer people would have cheaper roofs made of plaited layers of wood. The wood was good quality, usually cedarwood or 'mahoe'."

Chapman Lane, Barbados Catalogue Reference: () INF10/50/001

"In Guyana, if somebody was moving and they wanted a small house moved, they'd take the house off its pillars and put the main part of the house onto a large cart, and pull it along and move it to a new location. Men would be pulling from in front and some would push from behind. You had to know what you were doing." "The houses weren't always in rows like in this photograph. This area was obviously quite built up. Often you would have a field with crops, coconut trees or sugar cane in the back yard. Everyone was very clean and tidy. People walked around barefoot - not because they didn't have shoes but because it was hot. Shoes were usually for going to school or Church." These memories came out of a project involving Haringey Third Age, Moving Here, The National Archives and Bruce Castle Museum Haringey.