Transcription
Mrs Sykes: And that was the Church of Christ Baptist church, or chapels then, in Canal Street, South Wigston. Well, everyone in my, well all my friends had to go to a place of worship, albeit what it was.
Interviewer: Did it make any difference to your friendships as to which church they went to?
Mrs Sykes: Oh yes. On Sunday my mother would say to us as young children, say seven onwards, don’t talk to that so-and-so, she goes to the Methodists. You weren’t allowed to talk on Sunday outside to anybody that didn’t go to your church. Your church was the church. But it was more or less like a class distinction. The Baptists stood by the Baptists, and each chapel, there was the Congregational, the Methodist, the Weslyan, St Thomas’ Church of England, and then right away over the village - it was a village albeit it was a very big one and an advanced one – was the Roman Catholic church of which of course we knew absolutely and utterly nothing. I myself, at 16 years old automatically went to the bible class, and from the bible class we automatically became Sunday School teachers. That was quite a recognised thing. And we feared God; we had a real, we had a real respect for everything I think in those days.