Barbara Greenshields (nee Jupp), born in 1924, started off life in 'Britannia Cottage', a part of the 'Britannia Inn' that had been converted for Barbara's parents when they commenced married life.

'When Dad left the village school he was apprenticed as a carpenter and joiner to Drake's of Rustington. There was a children's convalescent home, Millfield, near the seafront. Sometimes a child died there and it was Dad who had to deliver the little coffin, an errand he hated.

His apprenticeship was interrupted during the Great War of 1914-18 when he spent some time in the Mercantile Marines. He was based on a Prison Ship at Liverpool where conditions were very unsatisfactory. Hammocks were so close together that no one dared get out at night. If they did so, those on either side would immediately swing together, filling the space and making it impossible to get back in again.

Eventually the crew mutinied and was told to leave Liverpool - they would be arrested if they returned. Perhaps that's why Dad never expressed any desire to travel very far northwards!

Nan (Auntie Hilda, Dad's sister) left her job in service and went to work at the Thompson Flight Company too. Mother was Dad's riveter ('and a jolly good one too'). He enjoyed motorcycling, having obtained his first one with some financial help from Nan when he was sixteen or seventeen. It was a second hand machine, having previously been owned by a young army officer who sadly had been killed in the war. Mother would sometimes ride side-saddle as a pillion passenger.

At some time Dad added boat building to his skills and worked for Osborne's of Littlehampton. A favourite dinner break pursuit was to swim across the river Arun and back - (this is no longer allowed). He was proud of his own boat the 'Lancashire Lass', a seventeen foot six beach counter boat and the fastest in its class.

By this time Grandpa had become landlord of the 'Britannia Inn' having succeeded his sister, Lizzie's husband, the previous licensee who died about the time the war ended. He inherited John, an elderly barman who lived in and I understand had been 'rescued' from Petworth workhouse by Lizzie's husband. With his white hair and little beard he seemed very old to me and died when I was about seven or eight.

Nan agreed to stay at home after the move to the 'Britannia'. She cleaned the bars, helped with the housework, did the shopping, washed glasses and helped prepare bread and cheese and pickled onions for the customers. This was about the only pub food available at that time, apart from packets of crisps, biscuits or nuts.

All this for the princely sum of ten shillings (50p) a week, and 'all found' of course. To add to this sum she successfully bred canaries and kept chickens. She had made it very clear to Grandpa that she would never work in the bar during opening hours. 'And I never did', she was to say with satisfaction in the years to come.'