When the dust of the post-war settlement had settled the residents of our estate started going their separate ways. In the run-up to Prefab Demolition Day mouldy drawers had to be prised out of mouldy drawers; bath tubs and flat irons lifted on to the scrap metal merchant's van; rolls of frayed black and white squared lino bundled up in canvas bags; and the priceless paintings by Turner, Rembrandt and Canaletto sent off for secure storage. (Just kidding on that last one).
The demolition of Henry Fielding's fine house left a legacy of civic guilt in its wake, and it was agreed that a prefab should be preserved for posterity and housed in a Museum Of Lost Memory. On the day of its official opening Messrs Oblivion and Void (Curators-In-Chief) gave welcoming speeches to the invited guests. Past residents of Woodhedge and Newtin Roads were there (all sat in the museum's balconies and wearing the fashions of yester-year) plus such iconic figures as Sir Isaac Pitman, Sir Isaac Silk-Farr, Mortimer Wheeler, Mayor Ray Rosewarn, Venanzio Rauzzini (what a voice!), Yehudi Menuhin, J.A. Roebuck (radical firebrand), Peter Panton (scholar and the stonemason), Angela Carter (who we had last been seen leaving the Bell Inn in Walcot Street with a surreal gothic pint of beer in her hand.) As the guests assembled Alberto Semprini played on the piano. The Bath-born maestro's Semprini Serenades were broadcast on the Light Programme for twenty five years from 1957 on. As soon as it was switched on 'Tubby' Lard would cry out: "The tedium! The tedium!" or - following Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1902) "The horror! The horror!" Of course this was all an act: in truth 'Tubby' really loved his Semprini. When The Last Surviving Twiverton Prefab was unveiled (how I gasped when I realised it was prefab number twenty-four!) - the inspired jazz musician from The Bell Inn gave out a final blast on his trumpet. The Museum of Lost Memory is really worth a visit. Unfortunately no one can remember where it is. The elusive presence of the prefabs is still felt today. It tugs away at their former residents' thoughts, peers over shoulders, brushes against coat sleeves, queries acts of bad faith, leaves a scented hint of consolation in the crevices of lonely evenings, and provides balm and solace for those who find themselves adrift in more evasive times.