Maurice Goss

Farm Boy Tales Maurice Goss

Mr. Cheeseman, my teacher, said that I had no aptitude for school. I agreed with him. An unintended consequence of Hitler's European war strategy was that there was little notice taken of the education of a young Calverton boy, troublesome at school but useful in the fields. Maurice Goss, a farmer's son from North Buckinghamshire, was born in 1928 and lived through the depression and wartime. He parted ways with formal education, aged 13, in favour of the war effort and two-pence a day. A note on his school transfer stated that, "Goss is a useful boy in the gardens and with the school boiler." These stories tell how school failed to foster his artistic and thespian potential, of his short-lived career as a highwayman and his role as a go-between to some unromantic lovers. His experiences include working on local farms using horse and steam power, determined to keep up with the farm men, threshing, haymaking and shearing. He describes schemes to make money or provide food-rabbiting, gathering mushrooms, berries and other peoples' fruit. He tells of how Hitler's plans to destroy Calverton were thwarted, how the closing of Bletchley Park enabled him to leave Young Farmers (Too much like school) and how he was exiled to Aylesbury to work from dawn to dusk for his Uncle. This book also explains how Maurice arrived in Weston Underwood where Italian POWs looking for rabbits roamed the woods carrying shot-guns. Included in this story is a local paper report on the court case that arose from Weston Underwood's VJ night "fireworks." Maurice describes the reality of farm work of the time, experience gained working for the eccentric and diverse characters who farmed in the villages of: Calverton, Marsh Gibbon & Weston Underwood.