I WONDER if Joe Walter realises what he has started in his references to some of Worcester 's colourful characters?

"Do you remember Mouth Organ Annie ?" one reader asked me." Of course," I replied.

Dressed in a myriad of Union Flags she not only played the mouth organ but simultaneously managed to dance, performing somersaults and cartwheels.

Her stage was any roadway in daytime. After dark it was not unknown for her to entertain customers of the Berkeley Arms in Bank Street.

"How about Annie Salt?" However, that was not her name. It was the call she uttered while trundling a handcart loaded with huge blocks of salt through city streets.

Wielding a rusty wooden saw she reduced the size of a block to suit customer's requirements with all the dexterity of a master carpenter.

Then there was the vegetable vendor strangely nicknamed "Three Exes", a huge man probably weighing all of 20 stone.

When he sat on the front nearside corner of his dray, it nearly touched the ground while the rear, offside corner was high in the air.

One could only sympathise with the poor little pony hauling such a load.

He must have been around in wartime because I distinctly remember his stentorian tones singing the popular song, Somewhere in France.

JOHN HINTON,

Worcester.