Cabra History.Com

‘Do you ever remember seeing the lamps like this by the side of the road when the Corporation would be laying down the Tar? They’d all be thrown in a heap until the watchman, “The Gotchie” came on duty and he’d light each one up and place it along the road. They used to shine like little Red Eyed Devils at night. Me and the brother would be hiding behind the hedging in our garden looking out at them, afraid in case they saw us. Then the “Gotchie” would sit down at his fire and he too would turn red from the light off the coke that he was burning. I used to love the smell from his fire. Sometimes he’d let the bigger lads toast bread on it and we’d be watching them. And he’d be puffing on a fag and coughing and spitting into the fire and all of a sudden this great bit “Hiss” would roar out all over the place and he’d shout out, “Get out you bastard” and start laughing at the top of his voice and we’d see his gummy mouth go all red like the lamps on the road.

A man that lived near us had a bad chest and his wife used to ask the workmen for a bit of hot tar and they’d put it onto a bit of brown paper that she’d have and when it was cool enough she used to put it on her husband’s chest. Other neighbours used to do it for a child with a bad cough. We used to scrape the fresh tar with an ice pop stick and light them off the “Gotchie’s” fire and we’d be running up and down the road pretending to be Indians setting fire to Fort Laramie. One night some of the lads got over excited and set fire to a neighbours hedge, it was great, the flames went shooting up into the air like they do on the Pictures and we were all whooping like Indians until the Oul Fella came out with a basin of water and threw it over the hedge.

We had gangs of kids on our road and in the Summer we’d all be allowed to stay out till real late playing “Reliefy I Oh” and “, ‘Red Rover” ‘Red rover, red rover we call Maureen over’ and then when it was real dark we’d play “Kick the Can”, ‘You have to count up to a hundred in twos and then try to find us’. My sister’s loved playing “Shop” and we’d go rummaging in all the bins looking for broken delph to make the “Chainie” with and to try and find empty tins and stuff. Our neighbour worked in Bachelors and she always had loads of oul tin cans in her bin. And the boys always came in handy when the girls were playing skipping with a double rope because the boys would turn the rope and all the girls would take turns running in and skipping, ‘Look whose coming down the street, Mary O’Brien with Wah Wah feet, she was married seven times before and now she knocking at Jimmy Murray’s door’, and the laugh would be great if the lads roared out the wrong name of the boy whose door she was knocking on. I was never as good as the sister at “Piggy Beds” because I kept losing my balance after the “Rest Bed”.

Then the Ma’ would be at the hall door shouting ‘Come in, it’s time for bed’ and then everyone would just disappear off the road, leaving the oul “Gotchie” on his own with his red lamps and red fire and a bottle of Stout to keep him warm throughout the night as we all cuddled up together in our beds, dreaming of the Red Eyed Devils outside our window. For me, summer nights back then were always great because it stayed bright for ever and ever and we went to bed tired from playing out all day long. And sometimes you couldn’t wait to wake up in the morning to go out again and play some more…’