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Fred Iles, Meter Fixer

August 9, 2013
by the gentle author

Fred & Marie Iles with Smudge

Fred Iles was born half a mile from his allotment in Stepney and his wife Marie grew up in Garden St that once stood where the allotment is today.  They were married in St Dunstan’s, just across the road, and today live fifty yards away in Rectory Sq. As for Smudge, she is a local too and gave birth to two litters in the allotment shed.

Fred grows potatoes, cabbages, strawberries, gooseberries, runner beans and nasturtiums to draw the bees in his allotment, which is a small enclosure at the heart of Stepney City Farm. Surrounded by on all sides by other plots, this is a secluded corner sheltered from the wind where Fred can pass his time gardening peacefully in the company of his cat.

As gardeners will know, the growing season has been very late this year, but Fred had a good crop of strawberries and, as he was telling me his story yesterday, while boney old Smudge patrolled the territory, Marie searched among the runner beans and discovered the first pickable specimens of the season.

“We never had a garden of our own. My grandfather Edmund lived with us when I was a child, he had come up to London from Bristol originally with two children and he ended up with four sons and three daughters. He was a great pigeon fancier and our backyard was all pigeon lofts where he kept three hundred pigeons – that’s a lot of pigeons. He was very successful at it and when he was dying he called me into his bedroom and showed me his box of medals and asked me to take one. I picked the silver one because it had a picture of a pigeon on it. There were gold ones I could have picked but I was too young to understand. He told me that Iles is a French name and that my ancestor fought in Napoleon’s army and was brought over to Bristol as prisoner of war and then stayed.

I was born in 1926 just half a mile from here in Hartford St, in a little cobbled yard called Wades Place. My father William was a seaman in his younger days and he went all over the world. I don’t know how he learnt about classical music but he was very knowledgeable and he used to play the Gounod’s Faust and Viennese waltzes on his harmonica for me.

I was here for part of the Blitz. It started on a Saturday afternoon at 3pm. I was in the yard and I heard the roar of the aeroplanes. I was thirteen and I thought it was our planes coming back, but it wasn’t. My father took me inside and we sat under the stairs which we thought was the safest place. I couldn’t see anything but I could hear the sound of the anti-aircraft guns and the engines of the planes and, at my age, I found it very exciting.

By the time they came back to bomb the docks, we had an Anderson shelter in the garden and we sat there listening to the sound of bombs dropping. My father decided it was too much and sent me and my mother and my sister to his brother in Oxford. He worked in the Morris factory which, at that time, was building  aeroplanes and he got me job at fifteen making cowling panels for the side engines of Hawker Hurricanes. It was exciting work but it was miserable waiting in the cold for the bus to go to work at seven in the morning.

I got called up to the army on D-Day, June 6th 1944 and I was eighteen years old on my birthday, 30th June. They summoned me for 20th July, the day they tried to assassinate Hitler, so I had three weeks freedom before they put me in the army. By the time I’d learnt to shoot a gun, for some unknown reason they put me in the Royal Electrical Mechanical Engineers. I was posted to the anti-aircraft guns around London and then they sent me to an experimental laboratory in Shoeburyness where they were working on radar. I found I had an easy time for three and a half years until I was discharged in 1947.

I went to the Labour Exchange and the man said, ‘There’s not much going but I like the look of you so why not come and work on this side of the counter? And when a good job comes in you can get it.’ I worked there for six months, and my father was unemployed and he came in and signed on the dole. After six months, the London Electricity Board came along and I worked there for twenty-six years, at first in the office and then as a meter fixer.

When I started here at the allotment, it was quite hard. It was still a bomb site and I had to clear the bomb damage before I could plant anything. There were just six of us pensioners then and I needed something to do in my spare time. They retired me at sixty in 1986, but I started my allotment here four years before that. Smudge turned up on the allotment one day, fifteen years ago. And I thought ‘poor old cat’ and decided to feed it, so she made the allotment her home and now I have to come and feed her every day.”

Fred aged five with his sister Phyllis and cousin Rosamund in 1931, taken by Griffiths in the Roman Rd

Fred in uniform at eighteen  years old, 1944

Fred and his pal Gimlet in Shoeburyness

Fred stands at the base of the aerial in Shoeburyness.

Fred (left) enjoys a pint with Bernard & Jack at Shoeburyness in 1946

Fred (top left) with pals on the beach at Shoeburyness

Fred & Marie get married at St Dunstan’s Stepney, 1st August 1953

Fred & Marie on their wedding day.

Fred in the seventies.

Fred & Marie with their prizewinning dog Rufus, in July 1984 at Stepney City Farm – when Rufus won the dog with the waggliest tail and best mongrel.

Fred grew some magnificent hollyhocks on the allotment in the nineties

“Smudge turned up on the allotment fifteen years ago. And I thought ‘poor old cat’ and I decided to feed it, so she made the allotment her home and now I come every day to feed her.”

Fred and Smudge

Gooseberry time in Stepney

Fred & Marie Iles celebrated their sixtieth wedding anniversary on 1st August

Stepney City Farm runs a Farmers’ Market every Saturday from 10am – 3pm, selling food from local producers at affordable prices. If you would like to join their Urban Farmer scheme and learn about growing vegetables and caring for livestock contact karen@stepneycityfarm.org

You may also like to read about

Vera Hullyer, Parishioner of St Dunstan’s

Ian Lowe, Blacksmith

19 Responses leave one →
  1. SBW permalink
    August 9, 2013

    Beautiful wedding photographs. Thank you.

  2. Pussy-Wussy permalink
    August 9, 2013

    Dear Smudge,

    Miaow! Sisterly greetings: you did well to pick an allotmenteer. They’re generous and reliable. I know because I did the same!

    Loving purrs and kisses
    from Pussy-Wussy

  3. August 9, 2013

    What a beautiful story, thanks for sharing and thanks for helping make the Farm the wonderful place it is.

  4. August 9, 2013

    Congratulations to Fred and Marie on their 60th anniversary. Lovely story and photos, and lovely Smudge, one lucky cat.

  5. Valerie permalink
    August 9, 2013

    Lovely photos and garden – thank you for letting me share them.

  6. Elizabeth Venables permalink
    August 9, 2013

    Thank you very much for this. Incredibly moving stuff.

  7. August 9, 2013

    Frankie Howerd was also based at Shoebury – as a gunner. Wonder if Fred ever crossed paths with him. Frankie used to return to the area to test out new material at the Palace Theatre, Westcliff.

    I saw one of his last shows at the Palace in the late 80s

  8. Michelle permalink
    August 9, 2013

    Wonderful. Not much more I can say.

  9. jeannette permalink
    August 9, 2013

    happy anniversary and thank you for keeping the home gardens, and their cats, burning. <3

  10. Gary permalink
    August 9, 2013

    True East Enders !
    Gary

  11. Jacqueline Sarsby permalink
    August 10, 2013

    I think this is a delightful story, beautifully photographed, beautifully told.

  12. August 10, 2013

    long may you continue Fred and Marie , a happy full to brimming life , keeping young by being busy and productive and appreciating the small things in life , feeding smudge every day what a lovely profile .

  13. Ian Lowe permalink
    August 11, 2013

    It’s been my pleasure to yell ‘EYUP Fred!’ in broadest Yorkshire everytime our paths have crossed over the past four years, and he’s never failed to smile and quietly say ‘ello or ‘awright’ back in pure Eastender. He’s a lovely bloke and truly the heart and sole of the place for me. Here’s to many, many more years of ‘our’ Fred!

  14. Elizabeth cornwell permalink
    August 11, 2013

    What a lovely story!Smudge looks much sleeker now in the second picture,a lovely couple,Happy Anniversary to them!

  15. June 25, 2014

    Thank you for sharing your story and photo’s, Smudge looks like a lovely cat. I’m not being rude but is there anyone to take care of Smudge when you or your wife die, if not you should have someone inform the RSPCA, so Smudge can still live a long happy life.

  16. Maureen Cocklin permalink
    June 19, 2019

    The photo of Fred and Marie on the allotment, with Sir John Cass & Redcoat school in the background, is exactly where my house used to be in King John Street. I remember the back stairs of the school lined up with our house. I would wave to my mum, if she was in the garden, from the stairwell. I started that school in 1966 when it first opened. I spent one year at Redcoat school in Stepney Green. Sadly we had to move out in 1970. The ruins that Fred spoke about was what was left of our house after they knocked down the street. I live in Norfolk now but would go back to King John Street like a shot if it was back to how it used the be. They were sturdy houses so don’t know why they knocked them down.

  17. John winters permalink
    June 21, 2019

    Just to say ,read this again as sadly Marie has passed away on 16th of June 2019.
    This is a wonderful item that reminds us all what this generation lived through
    But somehow they made a much better lot of it, than most do with far more privileges
    Nowadays, we need to remember this generation with the utmost respect that they deserve
    If we all did the world could be a much nicer place. Remembering Marie with love and fondness.Deepest sympathy for Fred’s very sad loss.

  18. Janice Iles Kaluza permalink
    September 29, 2022

    Dear Fred, My maiden name is Iles and we may be related as it an uncommon name. Also I heard my late dad talk about Wade’s Place and that the family originated from Bristol with French ancestry. Dad was named Jimmy Ilex (James) after his father, my grandad. His wife was called Jane and they lived in Ducket Street when I was a child, opposite Kate Hodfers pub. They had four children – dad was the oldest, then Eddie, Connie and Blanche. I am sure my dad said he had a cousin Freddie – but we never knew any of dad’s relations, I only heard mention of one or two, such as his aunt Amy, who dad was fond of.
    I read your story with interest, and was fascinated to hear that your father was a seaman sailing the Severn Seas. Dad served in the Royal Navy in WW2 from start to finish and received many medals for bravery. I was very proud of him and he was the loveliest dad to me and my twin brother Jeffrey, please email me I would be happy to hear from you. With best wishes, Janice (Iles) Kaluza. ❤️

  19. janice Iles permalink
    August 14, 2023

    If Fred Iles could contact me, I believe I am related to him. My email address is: jkaluza@gmail.com
    Thank you, Janice Iles Kaluza.

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