Browsing on the computer a few weeks ago I came across a most interesting story on people’s recollections of Hertford.
This extract from a story a Mr Paul recalls. He reminds us that originally he was from London but as he grew older his family
moved to Hertford and recalls his time spent in Hertford and his lifetime, but what interested me was a small passage from it
which concerned Goldings which is set out below, and do any of our Old Boys remember the incident and what happened to
the boys concerning this incident.

Hertford in the 40s
At around this time, two boys from the local Dr Banardo’s home, Goldings, ran away after breaking into the School Armoury and
stealing two Mosberg .22 Rifles and ammunition. They ran riot around the local woods and did Kill one poor old man in Panshanger
Woods, a Tramp I believe, but at last they were cornered in the quater-mile rail tunnel by our local PC Baker. Evidently, as he ran to
arrest them, they fired with one of the Bullets, cutting his uniform belt in half.
At the rear of Simson Shand's was Hertford Castle Wall, and from a small Window upstairs in the stores it was possible to exit onto
the top of the wall, which was around five feet wide, and in Lunchtimes some of us used to climb out and sit on it to have our Lunches,
and sometimes run or walk around the top.
I graduated before too long onto the much larger Machines Called Meihles, and these were very big Presses that enabled 32 pages of
a book to be printed on one sheet at a time. One of the complete Books I printed, of which I am very proud, was Winston Churchill's
Speeches of the War, and all of the Author's Finals (pass to Press) were signed by that Great man himself. If only I had kept some of
them, they would be worth a fortune to-day!
My next well-known print Job was the first edition of the Which Magazine, and we all thought it would be a five-minute wonder.
How wrong can you be.