Fielding for free

In answer to a question about where to spend a typical summer weekend day, "somewhere exciting" would be the required comment, especially if our group includes children.  An afternoon with a picnic in the park probably doesn't cut it these days.

I was reminded of this yesterday when a friend sent a picture of his family group relaxing near the edge of a field.

His message to me includes "Apparently my family and assorted Uncles and Aunties would travel down to the Barley Mow (no idea how we got there as  nobody had a car) and sit and have fun by the river at the back. I am not sure of  the  details, I am the baby on my mother's lap in the photograph, but it was obviously near the pub as the men are drinking beer. Apparently a good time was had by all and I think we did it quite often in the immediate years after the War. Simple times!"

A family gathering at the field next to the Barley Mow.

I then realised that I had no other photograph which records such field pleasures that you would enjoy frequently.  So, actually seeing the picture is a rare pleasure.  To bring us up to date, the Barley Mow as a pub is no longer open, though the building remains.  More to the point, the field in question is still a field, as shown in the second picture.  The Barley Mow stands at a T junction, although the little lane now goes nowhere, and hasn't since the bypass was dualled.  Before then you could walk to the Colne and Coursers Lane, picking up a drink on the way at the Rainbow filling station.

The river mentioned – actually a small stream which has become even smaller in recent decades – rises, like nearby Butterwick Brook, from within the chalk of these parts and trickles towards the river Colne.

My friend asks: "Was it just my family who indulged in this fun in a field or was it a regular outing for St.Albans folk? I would be interested to hear of any memories people might have of  the Barley Mow at this time."

The field today; courtesy Google.

There were many fields I can recall enjoying myself in, either with my family or my friends, or both.  Regular Sunday walks would find us at Jersey Farm, where we would picnic in a field where we were the guests of a small herd of dairy cattle.  Then there was a rather undulating field – again picnic oriented – where St Luke's School was then built at the top of Hixberry Lane.  Possibly not a field exactly, but very popular was the river bank in London Colney, and the spaces around the gravel pits at Frogmore, Park Street.  We took our food with us, so no need for snack bars or restaurants; we cycled or walked so needed no lifts or driving licences,  and as long as we had a cricket bat and ball we were happy.  Such days out therefore cost us nothing.  Just as well.

Today there is an expectation that we have to pay to be made happy.  There is a national sport which grew from a field and where most of the time most of the participants are fielding; it may have been cricket – or not – but it was free fun.

Incidentally, the Barley Mow had been well known as a cyclists' watering hole.