Luggs in 1950: romantic memories from a very special guest

Somehow half term has been and gone, along with three short break bookings back to back, so we've been as busy as ever! All our visitors recently have been lovely, as have their dogs, and we consider ourselves very lucky to meet so many great people. Monty and Ted, as usual, have adored all the company and the attention.

This weekend has been particularly exciting as we've had a very special guest staying in Luggs Barn. Six years ago, a lovely lady knocked on the door of the farmhouse and told us that her late husband had proposed to her here - his family owned Luggs for many years. At the time we were planning the conversion of the Barn into a holiday let and since that first visit while on holiday from her home in Sussex, we've corresponded several times.

The current Bill is threatening to re-enact this athletic pose one day - watch this space! 

Along with her two sons and daughters in law, Valerie has finally been able to enjoy another holiday at Luggs! This morning, she came in for a chat and brought with her some wonderful photographs of the family visiting their aunt here back in 1950.

Our special guest here at Luggs back in 1950!

Auntie Sybil (Griffin) was the owner of Luggs. I think the Edward Griffin who we know undertook a lot of work to the main house in 1920s, installing the bathrooms and so on, must have been her husband.

The beautiful young lady called Valerie in these photos was barely eighteen years old then and is our lovely visitor. Her late husband was Tom; he and his brother used to visit Luggs regularly for holidays as children. Tom proposed to Valerie here around this time, adding even more to the romance of this story!

It's amazing to see the thatched porch on the farmhouse and the wooden hayloft doors at the top of the stone steps on the Barn, but even better to be able to welcome a visitor with such a strong connection to Luggs. We have various names in the deeds, but learned today that many of them were related to the Griffins. We had no idea that various branches of the family were custodians of Luggs for so long. 

What a lovely way to start a Monday - fascinating for us, and hopefully a wonderful break for Valerie and her family revisiting old haunts. We hope it won't be long before they, and plenty of our other guests, are back again!

I'm inspired to start putting all our treasured memories in albums - although my writing's not quite up to Tom's standard!