Flora Day and Ladystreet
There was a time when the pubs only opened from 12.00 until 3.00 and then 6.00 until 11.00pm so unless you found somewhere to go that stayed open later you were fairly limited to the amount of alcohol you could consume in a public place. So when May 8th came around every year, there was great excitement in the air station for what is known as Helston Flora Day – a day of Cornish traditions such as flowers and greenery bedecking the buildings, dancers in ball gowns and top hats and musicians dancing gaily around the town, in and out of houses and generally acting a little odd by modern standards.
Shenanigans started very early in the morning and went on through the day. The main attraction for us naval folk however was the fact that the pubs all opened at 10am and pretty much stayed open until midnight – with just a couple of hours mid-afternoon for the landlords to stock up their bars and replenish their supplies of plastic pint glasses. It also meant we could relocate our mates, change beer soaked clothes or crash out in the park, boating lake or gutter depending on which was closest.
Most naval ratings based at Culdrose back then would probably have difficulty recalling a full days
events. Most can remember arriving in the town by taxi, maybe their first couple of pints of
Scrumpy or snakebite and then possibly waking from a deep drunken sleep, throwing up and starting
all over again. It was messy and very unpleasant for observers who weren’t partaking in the
merriment. They would mainly be the tourists, certainly not the locals who were pretty much in the
same state as us.
We were fortunate to live in Helston, and far enough away to not be bothered by dancers and
flower throwers at the crack of dawn, but close enough to provide some comfort and a place to
crash when needed. Those early enough might have even been able to make an egg banjo with our
weekly supply of a dozen eggs and two loaves of sliced bread, but after that they would struggle to
find anything edible in our kitchen.
The three of us who shared the house (Pam, Mo and I) were used to the lads from the squadron calling in after the pubs to crash on our sofa or floor, but I have to admit to being a bit taken aback one year to find four strange sailors helping themselves to tea and coffee. Assuming at the time that one of the
other two had let them in, I said “Hiya” and went back out. It was only a few days later when re-living the day that we all realised that none of us knew who they were. We never saw them again and they didn’t steal or damage anything. That was what it was like in the Navy back then.
Most of the day was spent moving from pub to pub with one or two plastic glasses in hand. If you’d
had three hands you would have had three glasses to save the long wait at the bar to get a drink,
which was probably a good thing as it meant you had times when you had no drink left. Groups of
people got louder and sillier and more unstable, people began to fall over and escorted to a safe
place or propped up against the wall.
The day after was a much quieter affair. A large part of the population recovering, cleaning or still
under the influence. Obviously being the senior service and on duty protecting queen and
country, RNAS Culdrose ships company were expected to turn out as usual and do a proper days
work - and we did. Hangovers were nothing but a minor inconvenience, and something that could
easily be remedied with another couple of drinks at the end of the watch while swapping stories and banter about the event.
The other 364 days of the year, the pubs did their usual legal thing and left us high and dry after
11pm. Sometimes in the summer you didn’t get away from work until 10.30pm and had no chance
of getting a drink in the pub by the time you got showered and changed. So the only option was to
head off to Ladystreet – the one and only ‘club’ in Helston. Most of the members were
from Culdrose who paid their annual membership fee and then £1 every time they went in. A bargain as you also got a crusty cheese roll wrapped in cling film for free - presumably to satisfy the 'food' and drink licensing regulations.
You had to be in there before 11.00 and was open until 1am, giving us chance to get tipsy, drunk or very drunk depending on where you’d been all night. There was a little wooden dance floor on a mezzanine above the bar with a disco set up at the side. Not the best place because as soon as more than six people began to dance the records jumped. Sailors being sailors made the most of this opportunity to ‘have a laugh’ at the expense of the DJ. One song in particular has us in stitches, ‘Come on Eileen’ by Dexy’s Midnight Runners has a bit in the middle where everyone did this running on the spot thing. Imagine a packed dance floor doing this and a frantic DJ trying to stop a vinyl disc flying into the air. That song was requested a lot more than any other in the charts at the time.
Peggy the owner of the club had very manly hands. There was a lot of discussion regarding her sexual orientation. She was a tall, slim, stylish peroxide blonde aged 50'ish, although an 18 year old has a distorted impression of an older person – she could have been younger or older than that really. Her
catchphrase was “Come on, drink your drinks” as she did her best to throw everyone out. No easy task with a large number of merry sailors with no desire to go back to a cold accommodation block – but they didn’t mess with her, just did as they were told with nothing but a few grumbles.
No one messed with Peggy.
Shenanigans started very early in the morning and went on through the day. The main attraction for us naval folk however was the fact that the pubs all opened at 10am and pretty much stayed open until midnight – with just a couple of hours mid-afternoon for the landlords to stock up their bars and replenish their supplies of plastic pint glasses. It also meant we could relocate our mates, change beer soaked clothes or crash out in the park, boating lake or gutter depending on which was closest.
Most naval ratings based at Culdrose back then would probably have difficulty recalling a full days
events. Most can remember arriving in the town by taxi, maybe their first couple of pints of
Scrumpy or snakebite and then possibly waking from a deep drunken sleep, throwing up and starting
all over again. It was messy and very unpleasant for observers who weren’t partaking in the
merriment. They would mainly be the tourists, certainly not the locals who were pretty much in the
same state as us.
We were fortunate to live in Helston, and far enough away to not be bothered by dancers and
flower throwers at the crack of dawn, but close enough to provide some comfort and a place to
crash when needed. Those early enough might have even been able to make an egg banjo with our
weekly supply of a dozen eggs and two loaves of sliced bread, but after that they would struggle to
find anything edible in our kitchen.
The three of us who shared the house (Pam, Mo and I) were used to the lads from the squadron calling in after the pubs to crash on our sofa or floor, but I have to admit to being a bit taken aback one year to find four strange sailors helping themselves to tea and coffee. Assuming at the time that one of the
other two had let them in, I said “Hiya” and went back out. It was only a few days later when re-living the day that we all realised that none of us knew who they were. We never saw them again and they didn’t steal or damage anything. That was what it was like in the Navy back then.
had three hands you would have had three glasses to save the long wait at the bar to get a drink,
which was probably a good thing as it meant you had times when you had no drink left. Groups of
people got louder and sillier and more unstable, people began to fall over and escorted to a safe
place or propped up against the wall.
The day after was a much quieter affair. A large part of the population recovering, cleaning or still
under the influence. Obviously being the senior service and on duty protecting queen and
country, RNAS Culdrose ships company were expected to turn out as usual and do a proper days
work - and we did. Hangovers were nothing but a minor inconvenience, and something that could
easily be remedied with another couple of drinks at the end of the watch while swapping stories and banter about the event.
The other 364 days of the year, the pubs did their usual legal thing and left us high and dry after
11pm. Sometimes in the summer you didn’t get away from work until 10.30pm and had no chance
of getting a drink in the pub by the time you got showered and changed. So the only option was to
head off to Ladystreet – the one and only ‘club’ in Helston. Most of the members were
from Culdrose who paid their annual membership fee and then £1 every time they went in. A bargain as you also got a crusty cheese roll wrapped in cling film for free - presumably to satisfy the 'food' and drink licensing regulations.
You had to be in there before 11.00 and was open until 1am, giving us chance to get tipsy, drunk or very drunk depending on where you’d been all night. There was a little wooden dance floor on a mezzanine above the bar with a disco set up at the side. Not the best place because as soon as more than six people began to dance the records jumped. Sailors being sailors made the most of this opportunity to ‘have a laugh’ at the expense of the DJ. One song in particular has us in stitches, ‘Come on Eileen’ by Dexy’s Midnight Runners has a bit in the middle where everyone did this running on the spot thing. Imagine a packed dance floor doing this and a frantic DJ trying to stop a vinyl disc flying into the air. That song was requested a lot more than any other in the charts at the time.
Peggy the owner of the club had very manly hands. There was a lot of discussion regarding her sexual orientation. She was a tall, slim, stylish peroxide blonde aged 50'ish, although an 18 year old has a distorted impression of an older person – she could have been younger or older than that really. Her
catchphrase was “Come on, drink your drinks” as she did her best to throw everyone out. No easy task with a large number of merry sailors with no desire to go back to a cold accommodation block – but they didn’t mess with her, just did as they were told with nothing but a few grumbles.
No one messed with Peggy.
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