The Colley Family

MEMORIES OF  THE COLLEY FAMILY

 My grandfather was William Colley and he was a monumental mason.  His father was one of three brothers who came down from Yorkshire and helped to build the Martello towers in the Dockyard.  They also built the Dockyard Church.  (This would have been around 1820). They were Master Stonemasons and I gather that they specialised in building marine buildings.  

 

They settled down here and after that my grandfather started the Monumental Masons’ business in Holyland Road.

 

Leading Businessman

 “After his death, my father took over the business.  He was only in his early twenties when his father died and he had 5 brothers and sisters to take care of, so he set about expanding … setting up a builders merchants business just off the station so that the trucks could run straight into it. 

 

In addition he owned 3 or 4 quarries and supplied all the stones for the County Council roads. He owned rollers, and Stephens’ had rollers as well – they overlapped there but co-operated: if one couldn’t do the job the other would and of course all the stones came from the quarries.  When the County Council decided to do all the roads themselves he had to sell the quarries …one was at Grove, (also) Catshole quarry and others.

 

So this became quite a big business …he started at Holyland Road, then the Station yard which was later carried on by Reeves, now Jewsons”.

  

 

  

The Timber Business & Horse Power

 We were about the biggest employers in the vicinity at one time we had 24 horses before motorised lorries came into being, wagons - team of 4 horses used to work in the woods to drag the trees then they had to be kept a few years to season – always seasoned timber.  We also imported timber and in the old days when the old Pembroke Quay was in use we used to have ships coming in with cement and timber, and  various things which were used in builders merchants.   Then it was all hands on deck to unload them … lots of casual labour about then and coal merchants as well delivering all over south  Pembrokeshire.   This was before the 1920s and, after that, when steam engines came into being, we didn’t use the horses so much.

 

A different world then … it was lovely “

 

 

 First World War

 “ In the First World War father was appointed by the War Office to oversee the cutting down of trees as they needed the wood.  He used to go around the estates selecting trees for felling but whenever he took a tree he invariably planted back with the same trees.  He bought Orielton Estate once expressly for the trees but if he took an oak he’d replant an oak.  Father was very precise about conservation.  He always insisted that the timber be well seasoned - would never use newly cut trees and gained a good reputation for timber.  In the yard he had built a purpose built timber shed with vents to air the wood.”

 

 

 

  

Social  Benefactor

 Joyce remembers the East End as a very poor area with much social deprivation:

 

“The East End was a poor area and I think Father and mother used to take them all under their wing, the whole of St Michaels Parish and anybody in trouble they’d go to mother and father… the doctors would say if the children were ill or undernourished  “Tell Mrs Colley”.  And mother would be making milk puddings and all sort of things like that … we were a big family and any left off clothes they were always glad to have them.  My parents would always look after them and anyone in trouble would look to my father … he was a lawyer to them – he looked after everybody, nothing was too much trouble  …

 

 I remember Christmas Eve. Mother used to do up little parcels and we had to go off after dark, not when nobody could see us go.  Most of the doors down there had funny little holes where you used to lift the latch – no doors were ever locked.  People used to say  “Come in my dear”.  We’d give a parcel to each – but I remember it was after dark we had to go and that was our Christmas Eve job. 

   

I can remember mother making soups and puddings … they really were wonderful ... if anyone was in hospital father used to send someone up to see them and, at Christmas time, father would always see that they had coal and some logs – a couple of weeks before Christmas they would be chopping up logs for them and the cart used to go around with them.  They were marvellous my parents … they had a big family of their own but they always had time to help somebody else.”

 

                          

 

 

Public Life

 

“My father became a Town Councillor and was twice Mayor of Pembroke, once when he was young, and then he gave it up, and then when he was older

 

 

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