Cattle Market 1950s

On the left of the picture auctioneer Charlie Nightingall (trilby hat) assesses stock with local butcher Curly Bell (bowler hat)

Geoff Hoath “…there was a market every Monday without fail, all through the war – there was selling of livestock, but mostly they used to grade it, by size and quality, then it was stamped and sent off to slaughter. There were cattle, pigs and sheep, but no slaughtering was happening in Westerham after the war, it was all shipped out to commercial slaughterhouses that the butchers would buy from…”

Peter Finch “…the old market buildings were by the market field and the market would happen there every Monday – it was quite an attraction for us boys coming home from school, we used to muck-in and help load up the cattle and pigs and sheep which were brought down there and auctioned-off. Sometimes a bullock would escape by jumping over the pens because it didn’t want to go into the lorry, and we’d be haring up and down the field, rounding this heifer up which was all jolly good fun for us lads. With a pig they’d get hold of its ear and its tail and it would squeal like anything as they dragged it onto the lorry…”

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