IT was with sadness I heard of the recent death at 98 of Edward (Ted) Clissold, who has twice featured in Memory Lane in recent years.

Having lived throughout almost the entire 20th Century, Ted had a treasury of memories to impart, and I was privileged to tap into just some of them.

Born in 1902, he spent his childhood and youth at High Park, a hamlet just outside Worcester, and near Norton and Whittington.

Ted vividly recalled the intense activity at Norton Barracks during the First World War and of watching trainloads of troops leaving for the battlefronts.

"The men who went to war suffered but so did the women and children at home. Shortage of food left them with not enough to keep body and soul together."

Ted remembered many a visit to Worcester, as a boy, either with his mother or aboard an aunt's pony and trap.

The big attraction for him was Marks' Penny Bazaar near the railway bridge in Foregate Street - forerunner of Marks & Spencer.

The Shambles, too, was always a place of fascination for young Ted. "It was full of butchers, fruit shops and pubs. After dusk on Saturday evenings, it became something of a fairyland to me, a blaze of light from end-to-end with a big array of paraffin Valour lamps.

"Shopkeepers seemed to vie with each other to produce the greatest number of lamps. The lamp vessels were of brass and copper, well-polished and giving a yellowish flame."

Another big draw for young Ted too, was the Public Hall, where he saw his first silent movies at the Royal Cinema De Lux.

"Though the images projected on to the screen may have been primitive by modern standards, it was breathtaking to me to see moving pictures," recalled Ted.

He spent his working life on the railways, mostly as a passenger guard, retiring after half-a-century of service.

He and his wife, Laura Grace celebrated both their golden and diamond wedding anniversaries, but she died in 1995, after they had been together for 66 years.

Ted is survived by their two children - son Philip York Clissold and daughter, Mrs Marion Jane Wheeler of Worcester.

Even in his mid-90s, Ted still retained a remarkably sharp and detailed memory and continued to tend his garden avidly and to redecorate and maintain his home in Mortlake Avenue, Worcester.