We actually found the house we are in now, Tombrec, Briar Close 46 years ago.  It needed an awful lot of work doing to it – the garden was a jungle.  I moved in November 1976.  I remember Dave arriving – he was actually still, at that point, working in Orpington.  He would come home for weekends.  The first time he came in with his suitcase and a bag of tools – he put them both down – there was a wall at the front of our house – he got a hammer and a bolster out and he started smashing the plaster off!  He wanted to find out how the house was constructed! We had deliberately bought a house to do it up.  The first two or three years we literally camped out in the house.  The first day Dave bought me a cooker and fridge and someone gave us a ghastly MFI green sofa thing.  We had two single beds delivered as we didn’t think we’d get a double bed up the stairs as it was so narrow.  My dining room table was a camping table and chairs, and a sink on four legs. Gradually we cleared the garden and Dave started work on the house.  

The day I came to look at Tombrec there was one of those old, wooden garages that looked like it would fall over (rare in Fairlight), a little parking space in front of it, with a funny little wire and wood fence and a path that went up round the back of the house and back down again (worn by people viewing the house). We moved in in November 1976 and we have lived here ever since.  Bit by bit the house was done up, we have extended it and the garden was landscaped by Dave.  It was very different when we first came here.

When we first came here the roads were unmade.  I had an MG Midget car and the first day I came to see the house I parked it in a lay-by up the road and walked down as I didn’t think I would get it down here.  The roads were awful, the house wasn’t fenced and if you walked down towards Stream Lane, all those field were open, no fences at all over there.  There wasn’t much Wood.  It wasn’t that long after we moved here, probably a year or so, that we got our first dog so I would walk him all over there, and planted in that first field was barley.   We used to get all sorts of different wildlife then.  We would see red-legged partridges in that field.  One day we had two snipe in the garden here.  We would get fieldfares in the holly tree, we would always hear a cuckoo.  Further up, not sure if this was all the time, the top fields were planted with potatoes which were planted by Griffens Farm shop. 

The other thing I remember quite clearly my mum and dad (who were retired by then), they would come and stay.  My dad and I went for a walk down to the Smugglers. We walked across the cliffs along the path which was in a very different position to what is there now; in fact you’d be walking in mid-air as the original one went a long time ago.  To the right of the existing path further up beyond John’s Seat (which wasn’t called John’s Seat in those days), there was National Trust land.  To the right there was a guy called Jimmy Cook and he was a Rep. for the National Trust and what he used to do was cut tunnels into the Blackthorn up there, so in Spring you could walk through these wonderful tunnels with all the blossom out.  Dad and I followed these tunnels and all of a sudden we came out of these tunnels and our dog was walking along the edge of a precipice which was about 18 inches wide! So dad and I crawled on our hands and knees and this joined up with the path down to Pett Level.  There was an existing path, but we were being a bit adventurous!   There is a bit of a pond down there as well, but not sure it has water in it now.  I think he just did it for a bit of fun. 

It was common in those days to walk over to Pett Level to the Smugglers for lunch, and of course there were four or five cottages (The Haddocks) and we hadn’t lived here very long when the first one (which belonged to a writer) he had been in America – he came home and looked out of his lounge window and was looking straight down onto the beach! This was when they started to demolish them one by one.  None are left now except what was the garage and outbuildings.  For a long time, the last one was there which was open on the path. They had a retriever dog and he would wait for anyone walking along to Pett Level, and the dog would go with them! What amazes me is how much the trees and bushes have grown up from being so very open land.  The other thing that has gone is all the hedges. In the middle of the two big fields there was a hedge right along there but, of course, as soon as they put sheep in there their little hooves damage all the roots and they die.  There were far more bushes on the edge of the first field.

Erosion of the Cliffs: This was quite shocking to us, as we did not have any idea at the time.  I think it was the Daily Mail published a map which had 50 houses shown to be at risk and ours was one of them!  Although we are away from Lower Waites Lane, if this lane had gone, we would have lost our access.  It was really quite frightening.  I would walk the dogs often, up Lower Waites Lane, up Cliff Way, right down the full length of Sea Road and round.  Of course, it was still open then.  At the end of the Alleyway was a piece of land and years ago  Colin Gotts told us there were fields all across there with horses in, and a small Cafe at the top of the cliffs.  Someone I had worked with had bought a piece of land at the end of the Alleyway and she had a caravan on it, and then of course it started to erode. 

The cliff falls were incredible at times.  Lyn Cooke’s dad, Fred Cooke – he heard one of the cliff falls and he threw himself under the table simply because it reminded him of War-time.  At one time they lost 100 feet all at once! George Morris, not sure if he was Parish Council or something, and a few others, set up what has now become the Fairlight Preservation Society and started to raise money and get the ball rolling. We had an afternoon tea in Lyn Cooke’s dad’s back garden to raise money and there were lots of other similar fundraising events. I remember having a horrible dream – I was walking down the Alleyway and I could see the cliff falling.  I had recently done a jigsaw puzzle and you know when you slide a jigsaw back into the box when its finished – well the cliffs were falling over like a jigsaw puzzle!! I’ve never forgotten it, I was terrified.  I thought we would lose our house and everything as I doubted there would be any compensation.  It was fraught and we had not been here that long. 

Now of course we have the berms which was an amazing thing to see.  It was around about the time of Live Aid in the 1980s.  They would work with the tides, bring granite from Norway.  Beautiful rocks – pink and black.  They were brought in on a flatbed and while it was high tide they would just drop the rocks, and as soon as the tide went out, all these massive machines would start moving it. It was like watching Tonka Toys.  There were floodlights up on the cliffs and down on the beach so you could go and watch it.  I remember my friends coming for dinner and we were watching Live Aid and we walked up and watched it on a summer evening and it was like watching a Bond movie! The size and the noise!  The machines picked up the massive rocks and dumped them. Arthur Green of course had started to try to do something to protect the cliffs – putting posts in and tyres over the posts and every time there was a high tide, the tyres were blown away.  I must say the berms have been very successful and amazing how it has filled in and if it gets to 45 degrees which it may be by now, it is a really good defence.  There are obviously still small falls. There has been a massive difference since the berms have been here.  They took advice to plant trees and bushes on the edge as well so as you go up to John’s Seat – all that growth was put there as a further defence.  As you go up Cliff Way, that was why the steps and rope was put in so the men who were working on the sea defence could get up and down to work.