Heather Bellamy spoke with Jim Ford about his violent life and his first encounter with Jesus

Jim Ford

Through the trauma of moving city as a child and struggling to fit in at his new school, Jim embarked on a life of violence from just 10 years old; before he was 15, he was a bouncer and a barman and by 17 he'd had his first encounter with Jesus. Heather Bellamy spent time with him hearing his story.

Heather: Jim, you live in Stoke on Trent, but you had a 'Darling Buds of May' upbringing, in the New Forrest area, didn't you? Tell us how life began for you.

Jim: I was born just outside of Bournemouth in the New Forrest, a couple miles from Ringwood, which is on the edge of the New Forrest. That's where I started life. It was very idyllic and as you say, really 'Darling Buds of May' kind of stuff.

Heather: Were you a good little boy?

Jim: Yeah, apart from running away from school a couple of times when I was younger, but I left there when I was nine years old. I suppose I was what you would call a redneck.

Heather: What's a redneck?

Jim: A redneck is somebody who's a country bumpkin; somebody that doesn't really know what city life is all about.

Heather: What took you out of that area?

Jim: It was my father. He used to work for a local steel company down in the south. There wasn't very many of those and work dried up and he came from Stoke on Trent. My mother comes from down south and he came from here. He got transferred to another company up here in Tunstall in the north of the city. I was dragged screaming from my idyllic country life to inner city Stoke-on-Trent.

Heather: What changes did that bring for you?

Jim: At the time it was very traumatic; I didn't want it one bit, although obviously we used to come here for holidays every now and again. Two weeks in a city was an adventure, but then you'd go back to living life - normal life. However here we were moving to the city and I'd lost all my friends and I talked with a funny accent. Stoke-on-Trent has developed its accent over the years, but back then it was a really broad potteries dialect and I spoke with a really southern accent. It was traumatic in more ways than one.

Heather: Was it hard making friends?

Jim: Yes it was. I didn't have many friends when I went to school. Obviously they put me straight into school. It was just very difficult. There was a whole different curriculum and all that kind of stuff. The whole transition was very difficult. Learning to live in the city was more difficult than learning the dialect. I couldn't understand people and they couldn't understand me, which didn't lead to making friends very easily.

Heather: And you got picked on a bit, is that right?