1953 floods in Lincolnshire: 'I opened the door and it was like the house was in the sea'
Today we share more memories of those who suffered the horror of the great flood of 1953. Richard York and Dan Russell report.
"I STEPPED out the front door – and into the sea."
-
LOOKING BACK: Kathleen Bickley, of Grimsby, who remembers the floods of 1953, when she was a teenager living in Elliston Street, Cleethorpes, which was flooded to the tops of the garden walls. Picture: Rick Byrne
-
NATURAL DISASTER: A exhibition has been held at the Meridale Centre in Sutton on Sea focusing on Mablethorpe and Sutton on Sea during and after the floods of January 1953. This picture shows flooding around the Savoy Cinema.
Kathleen Bickley was just 13 when she witnessed the sea lapping at the front step of her home in Elliston Street, Cleethorpes.
Now aged 63, she recalled: "I had been looking after the little boy next door at my house and realised he had left his teddy behind.
MAYFAIR ESTATE AGENTS
If we cannot find you a tenant within one month, we will find you one for FREE, yes FREE, you will pay no fees
Contact 01472 355553
Terms: Terms and Conditions Apply
Contact: 01472 355 553
Valid until: Thursday, May 23 2013
"It was about 6pm and I said to my mother that I would take the bear next door to him.
"I opened the door and the water was up to the step. I was aghast – it was like the house was in the sea.
"I climbed over the garden wall to give the bear back and told my neighbours about the water.
"I then tried to tell my mother, but she was reading the paper and dismissed what I was saying at first until she realised the water was coming through the back door."
Kathleen said it was a rush to get as many belongings as possible upstairs.
"We had the settee balancing on my grandma's bed and belongings spread across all of the bedrooms. We tried to put the piano on bricks but the water came too quickly.
"My grandmother was living with us as she had severe rheumatoid arthritis, so my mother, two brothers and me had to help get her upstairs.
"And my father had to walk on the coping on the garden walls to reach us, but had to turn back because the water was too high.
"It came up about 3ft in the house which meant all the plaster, carpets and my mother's lino flooring had to be removed. It took months before the house was sorted as we had to wait for it dry out before any work could start."
People driving through Cleethorpes to witness the devastation caused problems for many like Kathleen.
"It was really annoying," she said.
"People driving by in their cars caused the water to flood back into our home after we had swept it all out."
Comments
by GerrySixties
Tuesday, February 05 2013, 1:25PM
“How can she be 63 when she was 13 at the time and events happened 60 years ago? This is the second story I've read that is complete and utter drivel. I also lived through these floods and in this same neighbourhood. There were very few cars around in 1953 and I am completely unaware of cars causing flood waves down Elliston Street - how could they? Water at the Grimsby Road end was waist deep and therefore over the bonnet of most cars of the time. No car would have been able to drive through that. By 6.30pm on that night water was still only half way down Elliston Street. My father had left the house to get a newspaper from a shop on Grimsby Road. It was very windy and he was shocked to find the sea coming down the street. He would have been shell-shocked to have seen a car coming down the same street and through the water. Stories like the account the Telegraph has given here are completely unreliable.”