I and a friend Micky Penfold lived in a village called Smallfield and were hitchhiking to attend a youth club in the nearby town of Horley, as we always did on a Friday.

It was winter, around 6.00pm I guess so it was dark and the road we were walking was unlit. I was on the outside and according to Micky I just took off and flew through the air having been hit by a Renault 4 traveling at about 40MPH. I landed face down on a gravel driveway, taking most of the skin off my face before rolling into a ditch unconscious.

I was carted off to hospital to get stitched up and when discharged the next day there was only one shoe in my possession. I asked Micky to return to the scene to recover the missing shoe but to no avail, it was simply gone.

My shoe was a black, leather soled loafer and in 1971 I can vividly recall cost me £35.00 bought in Petticoat Lane market… I’d not been expelled from school at that stage so it took a number of weeks’ money from my paper round to buy them so it hurt, as did all the stitches in my face!

A true story.

 

Michael Youles

December 10, 1971