Apparently the winter in 1963 is probably still the worst UK winter recorded since records began a couple of hundred years ago. We didn't know that at the time of course. Keith talks of it but I don't really recall to many details of the weather.

Sure there were piles of freezing snow everywhere and it went on snowing for a few weeks. Yes, it was freezing cold in the flat and the only gas fire was in the front room where Brian slept. You needed to put a coin in a meter to get it to work - although it was only around 20cents for an hour it did not get much use - and Me, Mick and Keith didn't sleep in there anyway.

I don't think we were really aware of how severe the weather was - the sea
freezing over, cars driving on the frozen River Thames, trains frozen in etc, all that kind of stuff was going on without us knowing. The reason being we had no TV and never used the radio part of the record player. We also didn't have newspapers delivered. The only papers that came into the house were Melody Maker, NME or Jazz News.. They didn't do weather or carry other news media. So we were somewhat oblivious of how bad it really was apart from what immediately affected us.

We knew if you went to bed some nights with your clothes on it was still cold - and I did that a few times. During the day we'd be walking around the flat wearing our street coats to stay warm. Making a warm drink in our kitchen was also hit and miss, That required a search through the sink area for the least dirty cup that you then washed or rinsed out under the cold tap. Next step was to boil some water in an old tin kettle or saucepan corroded with water scale. Then if there was any instant coffee left you were in luck - if not, then you either tried stealing some from another flat or going without. Same deal with milk - anything we had was likely to have mould growing in it - so never let anyone else make your coffee. Don't even think about the sugar side of things. Quite often we just ended up with black coffee. Some days it was just good to go for bus ride to get warm. So all I can say is - we noticed the cold but didn't notice the weather too much.

There were some midweek evening gigs that got blown out as nobody or not enough people turned up, either because of the weather or public transport cancellations. Pity, because they were at Ealing. Once it got to March it then seemed like summer.

That's a snap of how Edith Grove life was that January. There is a nice newsreel here of that winter,this shows what was really going down and worth watching if you want a more authentic snapshot of the time. Skip the first 3.30 mins

[www.youtube.com]

Excellent post, James.

.......and I thought I had it rough at that age.

Awesome, thanks for the story, James! Nankering with the Stones is still one of my fave Stones books, and this reminded me a lot about it (I last read the book in 2004, I think).

Thanks James...the youtube link is great too...worst winter in 200 years, yikes!

Great Story James .. and indeed your book, still my fave Stones read.

Thanks

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Keep On Rolling

...cool story .thanks James



ROCKMAN

Thanks James

It was cold as well on the other side of the North-Sea.
I was 11 in 1963 and there was 1 heater in the living room, extra Jackets helped a bit in our bedrooms.