The Lincolnshire Village

I have a friend in Lincoln, Ken by name. He was 65 the other day and was born and bred in the city.

He's a man who seems to know everybody and it's amazing how he can find a link between newcomers and people he already knows. Another friend returned to Lincoln from New Zealand and Australia after nearly 10 ten years and tried to look me up. He went to a pub where I used to be a regular a decade ago and asked after me. The one barmaid left from those days said, 'He doesn't come here anymore - he think he drinks in Wetherspoon's.' So he went there and was told, 'He usually comes in at 1 o'clock.' And sure enough I did. You can't have secrets in this place.

I introduced Dave to Ken and of course, though they'd never met, they had lots of people in common.

The same thing happened when Ken and I were talking to one of the barmaids in Wetherspoon's (this is the Ritz, formerly a cinema) and when she mentioned her surname, he was bound to know someone with the same name. 'Hildred' was the name, and I thought I knew it too.

'I'm sure I know that name from Boston,' I said, and wasn't surprised to hear that, yes, there were lots of Hildreds there. But I was sure I'd heard the name from one of my relatives. I had a feeling that a Hildred had been a local councillor when I was growing up. And after checking on the net I found I was right. Councillor John (Jack) Hildred had been Mayor of Boston from 1979-80.

And what's more he'd come from Benington, and that was my connection, because my step-father, Herb, came from Benington (a few miles north of Boston) and knew Jack.

Herbert Millard was a close friend of my father, Ernest, and stood as his best man. At the time he was 'courting' my mother's sister, Nellie, but that never came to anything. After my father died, Herb, himself a widower, married my mother. Herb was another man who lived and died in the same place and seemed to know everybody in Boston.

He died just over two years ago. While he was in hospital, Nellie herself died.