THE SON of one of Britain’s last cave dwellers has revealed what life was really like in the tiny homes.
Stuart Reeves’ dad Bill grew up with his family all living inside one room in a rock house at Kinver Edge in Staffordshire in the 1930s.
The tiny commune, burrowed away amongst lowland heath and woodland, consists of several rock houses carved out of the soft red sandstone and dates back to at least the 18th Century.
The most famous are the homes at Holy Austin Rock where Bill lived as a teenager with his parents and sister.
They shared a single room, top and tailing in just two beds at night, and didn’t have a toilet – relying instead on a pot under the bed.
Stuart revealed the family was forced to lime wash their home every couple of years to stop dust, damp and condensation forming.
The dad-of-one, 70, told The Sun: “There was one bedroom, and a pantry to keep food cold. One main room to live in.
“To limewash the house they had to take all the furniture out and put scarves and hats on and get very stiff brooms and get up all the dust.
“They got a wallop brush, similar to a paint brush painters and decorators use – seven or eight inches wide – to spread on the paint.
“But, of course, the more you put on it the more you’re insulating it.”
The caves have incredible temperature control.
He added: “In the summer months it can be 30C outside and it’s nice and cool in there, even with a fire going.
“In the winter months, when they’d closed the doors and windows and had a fire going it would be nice and warm and toasty.
“In those days the clothing was different, you had all woollen clothing, you washed them once a week and that was it.
“You put your socks and boots on in the morning and you didn’t take them off until you went to bed. That’s the sort of era my dad lived there.”
The family had a range for cooking and heating, a fire in the bedroom and lighting through a gas supply.
Any water was found outside.
“Facilities-wise, it was very primitive but in those days that sort of situation was bog standard,” Stuart added.
“There weren’t many places with a flushing toilet or a tap to turn on.”
The fire was heated by coal because the family and other occupants didn’t want to “abuse the site trees”.
Stuart said: “They would only use wood if something was damaged or felled or whatever, that’s the only time they would cut the wood up.”
Bill and his sister would have spent their years there helping out on weekends making cakes and handing out cups of tea to tourists who often came to the site.
Stuart has remained almost all of his life in nearby Kinver village.
His relationship with his dad eventually deteriorated and they didn’t speak from the early 1980s until Bill’s death in 1993.
But Stuart started collecting photos and information about the houses after retiring five years ago, in a bid to learn more about his family and feel more of a connection.
The homes were abandoned in the mid 1960s.
The upper Holy Rock houses were eventually opened up again by the National Trust as a heritage site after restoration work in the early 1990s.
Photographs from inside the homes show stoves, furniture, windows and doors – all set into the sandstone, just as they were when the houses were lived in.
The Nanny’s Rock and Vale’s Rock homes aren’t restored but they can be seen from the rock houses centenary walking trail.
The former can be explored by visitors while the latter can be seen from behind a fence barrier.
After the final families were moved out, the National Trust began compiling audio recordings of previous occupants speaking about their time there.
Sometimes when I go up there and hear my dad’s voice I still get goosebumps and shivers because it’s so eerie. From the recording, I hear he was quite happy there
Stuart Reeves
Stuart eventually started volunteering a couple of days a week and showing visitors around the restored site.
He came close to welling up and needed some fresh air when he suddenly heard his dad’s voice on one of the tapes.
“One day I just sat in the chair in the room there, all of a sudden my dad’s voice came on,” Stuart said.
“I didn’t expect it. It cracked me up because he’d never really told me about what it was like and here he was explaining it.
“I had to go out the building, straight outside for a good 10 or 15 minutes.
“All of a sudden a female voice came on, it was my auntie, my dad’s sister.”
The tapes are so emotional Stuart hasn’t been able to listen to them all the way through.
Stuart went on to say: “Sometimes when I go up there and hear his voice I still get goosebumps and shivers because it’s so eerie.
“From the recording, I hear he was quite happy there.”
Asked if his dad told him anything about the rock houses while he was alive, he said: “Just occasionally, I don’t know how the conversation would come up because it was a long time ago.
“All I can remember him saying was he used to live in the rock houses. That generation was one where they never talked, especially about the war or that period. It’s too distressing for those people.”
Stuart first became aware of his dad’s ties to Kinver Edge when he was a teenager.
But the site had always been of interest to him and he would venture over there as a younger child.
“I would go and climb up all over the rocks, saw some of the caves and most likely my name’s still carved on some of the rock there anyway,” he said.
In a folder, Stuart has collected some old press photos from the 1930s, including a couple showing his grandmother sitting at the table and another in the porch outside.
“I just go in this one room, where they used to live with my folder and all the photographs in and I go through them in sequence,” he said.
“I feel a connection,” he continued. “My grandparents died when I was very young. My grandfather was basically a gardener and I love gardening, so I think it’s skipped a generation because I don’t think my dad was all that into gardening.”
History of the Kinver Edge rock houses
It is not clear how the rock houses at Kinver Edge came to be there.
The first record of people living in the dwellings was in 1777 when Joseph Heely took refuge from a storm and was given shelter by a “clean and decent family”, according to the National Trust.
By the turn of the 20th Century, the site had become a tourist attraction, despite people still living there.
Some were owned by occupants and others rented.
Scores of visitors arrived by the light railway and trams, and the families who lived there took advantage of the influx of tourists and sold refreshments.
A café continued on the higher level until 1967, a couple of years after the occupants had all gone.
After that, the houses became derelict until the restoration work in the early 1990s, which was based on photographs of how they looked in their heyday.
It is now run by the National Trust as a heritage site with a walking trail.
Stuart’s dad Bill left the rock houses in his late teens to go fight in Burma before moving to London and then back to Kinver village once he was married.
As far as Stuart knows, his dad and grandparents moved into the rock houses purely out of a lack of availability of other accommodation.
“In Kinver there wasn’t that many houses being built and council housing was in it infancy,” he said.
“They just advertised, that place was available and they moved in. My dad was about 11 or 12, and moved out at 16 or 17, and he went to war.”
The first record of people living in the dwellings was in 1777 when Joseph Heely took refuge from a storm and was given shelter by a “clean and decent family”, according to the National Trust.
By the turn of the 20th Century, the site had become a tourist attraction, despite people still living there.
Scores of people arrived by the light railway and trams, and the families who lived there took advantage of the influx of tourists and sold refreshments.
A café continued on the higher level until 1967, a couple of years after the occupants had all gone.
After that, the houses became derelict until the restoration work, which was based on photographs of how they looked in their heyday.
Describing the visitors who would’ve come in the 1930s when his dad was there, Stuart said: “People most often came from the Black Country.
“They used to come to Kinver Edge for the day for the fresh air and exercise. Go to the tea room, have a picnic, have a walk around, exercise and go back into the smog.”
Stuart has learned a lot listening to the audio recordings.
“They tell you how much they charged for the tins of cakes,” he explained.
Did you or your relatives live in the rock houses? Please contact [email protected]
“Half a crown for a pot of tea for four, a couple of slices of cake, a couple of slices of bread and a small pot of jam.
“If you returned all your china you had a refund of six pence.
“When my dad lived in the rock houses he used to help make the cakes. Simple things like scones and Victoria sponges. They had to do those sorts of jobs. My auntie used to help take the teas out for people, sitting outside.
“The proper name for a caveman or a cavewoman is troglodyte. People who come to visit are fascinated that I descended from one.
“When I’m talking to people and showing them the folder with the photographs, then my dad’s voice comes on, I say ‘hang on a minute, I just need to step out for a minutes. That’s my dad’. They stop in awe. They can’t quite take it in.”
William Turner is a seasoned U.K. correspondent with a deep understanding of domestic affairs. With a passion for British politics and culture, he provides insightful analysis and comprehensive coverage of events within the United Kingdom.
