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That summer was good for me and I got into a good working relationship with the whole of the family and friends, wrote retired lighthouse keeper Harold Taylor. Mrs Falles was in her nineties, and the following year moved into a nursing home in Guernsey where she eventually died.
There was a tragedy before that however, for Reg went to bed one afternoon and never woke up. She was a well qualified woman, having been an accountant with a London firm. She was forced to give that up to support her mother running the pub. Stan had only recently returned to the island.
He had had a disastrous marriage to a girl Pat who I had met, but did not know at the time was his wife. She was an heir to one of the Scottish Whisky distilleries. They had met and married as she was with child, although there are those that say it is not nor ever could have been his. These were the views of the late Dame of Sark. However Pat occupied the tenancy to which Stan was entitled, and under local law the daughter would inherit it.
Poor old Ma Falles felt the loss of her daughter badly, and again I would spend a lot of the time I should have been working talking to her in the sitting room which led off between the bar and the kitchen. It gave some of her carers a break to do other things and I could also keep an eye on the bar.
It was unfortunate in several ways as Stan was now effectively in charge and he was irresponsible despite being the official Guardian of William the elder son. It was a great cross for Ma to bear and in many ways the business went down hill. Mainly because Stan engaged a disreputable gang of toe rags as staff.
They took him and the premises for a ride and encouraged all types of degenerates and Hippies. Oddly enough many of these also found Pat's premises a hospitable rendezvous. There was always a rumour that her establishment was rife with drugs, Voodoo and anything strange or gypsyish, as well as a hang out for homosexuals and lesbians, of which Pat was alleged to be one with her South African friend Mary.
I met with Pete in the Mermaid bar one evening, I had been in the company of Pat until Mary had joined her. Pete had taken a fancy to Mary, when she left the bar he made a bee line to follow her. I told him what the reputation was but he ignored me and continued on his quest. It was not long before he was back, a bit shame faced having been sent packing by her.
Pete fancied himself as a ladies' man. In fact there had been a number of humorous incidents as the result. One had been during a months duty, when the crew had been in the water tank cleaning it out. Pete's duty had been outside, removing the buckets of rubbish and brackish water that the other two were gathering up.
He disappeared. It later transpired that some delectable female had arrived on the scene and in no time he was in bed in the lighthouse with her. Apparently she was the wife of an air line pilot on holiday. She obviously found her visit satisfying as she came back for more.
The biggest laugh though was when his wife came to stay on the island for a holiday.
The locals were used to his conquests, but did not know that his present companion to the bar was his wife, and made several remarks, which his wife could take in no other way than that he had been a philanderer in her absence. She caused such a stir which left him with little alternative, but to ask for a transfer.
Wherever it was to, he did not remain long because he resigned. The reason for me being in the pub at the same time as him, when we were not on the same rota, was byway of a convenience.
If I remained in Guernsey overnight I would have to pay lodgings. I would be on my own. If I was able to get across to the island I would have a free bed on the floor of the lighthouse store. I would have a convivial evening with people I knew and I would be on hand so that the keeper going ashore could get away on the first boat, giving him a better chance of getting home, otherwise he would not get to the airport until about 2 p.m.
It provided one also with a little funds to finance the month by the savings, and was also an opportunity to discuss with the keeper one was relieving, any problems they might have been encountered during the previous month, which now there was no overlap of crews was difficult to ascertain. The attitude seemed to be, ' let them find out the difficulties I have had.'
I can quite understand it in some cases, because not only were there a lot of idle sods, who never attempted to get themselves out of trouble, but there were as many ignorant sods who did not know how to. Most keepers if they were more intelligent would not have finished up as keepers.
I have often been asked what makes a good keeper. This is very difficult and complex. I think a person who is self reliant is 50% of the need. Another is to be fairly conversant and intelligent enough to either know how things work, or deduce how they do. To be content in ones own company, and not craving someone else's ear to bend. I have likened the recruiting of keepers to plastering mud on a wall. Some sticks and most falls off.
Unfortunately not all that sticks is really compatible. There is usually one element missing and that is the one to be amiable to your companions and be as helpful whilst being so. Probably less than a quarter of all keepers who stayed in the job met those requirements. Perhaps some will say I did not.
However, my main aim in carrying out of my job was to do it efficiently and eliminate any of the unnecessary and prehistoric procedures that I encountered. Making the job easier and simpler to carry out for myself and those around me. Sod tradition. There were those of course who could not work with initiative. This I found most after the big influx of ex service personnel when double manning came in. That is not to say there was not a lot of tares among the wheat before.
One was always due for shocks. I returned after a good night out, to be met by Geoff, who said that the central heating had broken down. Any attempts by him had failed to restore it. I made my own try and after undoing some couplings found that I was getting water out of the supply pipe.
I therefore left investigation till the following morning; or was it later. If I describe the set up perhaps it will help you understand what had happened. The oil store was on the lower stage of the lighthouse, and beneath my bedroom. On shelving around two sides of this room were 7 square vertical tanks holding about 200 gallons of fuel each.
All these tanks except one were coupled together to feed the central heating boiler, the other fed direct to the stand-by lighting engine. There were individual taps from each tank that fed into this fuel line.
To fill these tanks when the lighthouse was built in 1922, they had hit on the ingenious idea of taking a pipe line down from the top of the island straight into the oil store.
Instead of carrying the oil, can by can down the 200 steps. To facilitate this there was a sump at the top of the steps in which the oil was poured. It then travelled down this pipe underground at first until it met the flight of steps where the pipe now became the hand rail. On entering the oil room the pipe was above the tanks, but a draw off pipe was situated over each tank with a stop valve.
When I checked all the tanks the following day I found that they all had water in them up to near the draw off level, but the tank which was open and directly into the fuel line had water in up to tap level. My first task was to drain all the water out of the boiler pipe line.
Here I met some problems because as I have complained before, mechanics etc. who had connected these things up with coned joints, were not plumbers or pipe fitters and believed that if a joint leaked you just added more pressure which might work. If it did not, too bad. I was aware of many leaky joints. When I came to disassemble them, the cones had been forced into the copper pipe so hard I could do little to rectify the damage.
Having cleared the line I now had to clear the water in the tanks which I did using the same method that I had used at the Hanois, by means of suction and syphon. When this was accomplished all was reconnected and supply to the boiler restored and put into successful operation.
The next was to deduce how the situation had occurred. My reasoning decided that the exposed iron pipe down the steps; due to fluctuations of temperatures probably accrued condensation within them which gravitated down hill and either led straight into the tanks or was flushed into them every time that oil was poured down.
What I did to overcome this was to drain all oil out of the first receiving tank, by using it up first. Then taking the tank out of service. Having done this, I then opened the valve over the first tank so that any water percolating down would drain into this first tank.
When a supply of oil in future was received the valve over the first tank would be closed allowing only the other six to be filled. This proved my theory, because over a short period of time quite a bit of water gathered in the one tank. I passed this information on to the Supt. when he next visited and he approved my recommendation that until a leak off pipe was fitted this tank was to remain empty of fuel.
It was sometimes difficult to observe this because when we got down to a minimum stock of fuel, the office would order a requisite amount and ignore any statement that you could now take 200 gallons less. We were sometimes saved by arrangement with the supplier to delay delivery. My opposite number did not observe the rule either.
I have told of one of my past times on the island. Geoff had quite a different one, but then he was engaged in many. His main one was to help in the cycle hire shop owned by John Jackson a mainlander who had married a local girl and set up several businesses. On his days off Geoff would work there all day in the season, but only half day if he was on duty, morning or afternoon.
He also worked on restoring the cycles during the winter in preparation for the following summer. In this manner he was able to put a bit of work my way. Many of these cycles were 3 speed, which were always becoming damaged, but they did not have the time to deal with them, so they were hired out the jammed in single gear.
I was asked one day if I knew anything about these gears, being game for anything I took on the job. I think they were to pay me 75p a time. They had little in the way of spares, and I was to discover that the biggest problem was the pawl springs.
I could only repair one by robbing another. However when I was home on leave I managed to get a supply, so I was better able to earn myself a bob or two.
Harold Taylor's memoirs continue in part 4.
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