Jennifer Dillway & Yvonne Durrant

How long have you lived on the island?

Yvonne: All my life

Jennifer: 50 odd years, not quite all my life, I’m seventy five

Can you describe what the church by the dockyard looked like?

Jennifer: It was a beautiful church

Yvonne: It was a beautiful church, right before we’re go into the actual docks you know, we’d go in there

Do you have any jobs? What were your jobs before you retired?

Yvonne: I was a local government officer and I used to use the big machine, I used to be the only one that done it. I loved it

And yourself?

Jennifer: I’m a nurse, that’s all, simply a nurse, a qualified nurse

Were you always a nurse?

Jennifer: Ever since I left school yeah, just carried on the general nursing for the elderly and the disabled, general nursing

Did you always work on Sheppey?

Jennifer: Not always, I worked at the Brook hospital, don’t know if you know it, we specialised in brain surgery and chest surgery. That’s my life, and I’m a mum, my kids have grown up and left

Do you want to tell us about your children?

Jennifer: Well, I have a son whose dyslexic, and I have a daughter whose a teacher and they’re both grown up and left home

Yvonne: I fortunately haven’t got any children, or brothers and sisters, I’ve got nobody. (laughing) husband died three years ago

Are you interested in this history, and if so can you tell us any memories about the church?

Yvonne: Well apart from we used to go to weddings there

Can you tell us about a wedding?

Jennifer: Well as far as I know, and I’ve only known this a few years, my best friend, she’s the last person to be married there, her and her husband of course, and my husband was best man. Yes so that’s all I can say really. She came from Blue town, so she was married down at the church

Do you have any memories of the church?

Yvonne: Not actually of the church, there is a row of white houses those were the dockers houses, for the dockyard

Jennifer: That was years ago

Yvonne: Many years ago, before my time

Jennifer: My husband was a docker, well he’s still a docker with a cruise line, but with the heart surgery he had to leave, but he was there twenty odd years

Yvonne: Yeah my husband was an electrician and he worked with the steel industry and he kept the electricity going, he kept the island going, so he said, probably true

Can you describe what the interior looked like?

Yvonne: I’m afraid I can’t sorry

Jennifer: It was big on the inside

Yvonne: Oh yes I remember that it was very big

Jennifer: That’s all I can remember, It’s an imposing building

Yvonne: Yeah it’s big, did I say the white houses? They were the dockers

Jennifer: yes

Yvonne: There’s some stories that go back about that, memory gets bad as you get older. Well my memory is pretty bad already, so

Should we keep the Church, if so, why?

Yvonne: I would definitely say yes I used to see plays on a Sunday when I was your age, but I think it’s something from the past and you’ve got to keep it going

Jennifer: Yes I think I agree with that, it’s history and that’s what we learn from, we learn from what our elders did

Yvonne: Definitely

Jennifer: It’s nice to look back on, don’t you think?

Yvonne: It’s like the water tower, as I said, I know it’s a massive building, I know I went in there once you know to look at some books, and there’s something about that now, they’re keeping it

Jennifer: I hope you get a chance to go in and have a look, and a read

What would you like the church to be used for? Because of course, before it burned down it was being used for things other than religious services.

Yvonne: I don’t really know

Jennifer: Yeah, I suppose I don’t really know

Jennifer: It’s nice to keep these things, learn from them. Well I suppose it could be used for a place for kids to come and view, a learning centre

Do you know how the church burnt down?

Yvonne: No I can’t remember, no

Jennifer: No I can’t remember either, I suppose there are all books and studies

Yvonne: I have a book on the island.

“It’s nice to keep these things, learn from them. Well I suppose it could be used for a place for kids to come and view, a learning centre.”

If you have your own memories of the dockyard church – as a church, a social club or as it is now, we’d love to hear from you. We're also keen to build an image archive by making copies of photographs and memorabilia of the church.

If you’d like to contribute memories or images to the archive, please tell us a bit more about what you have using the form.