SOME Ledbury householders found themselves entangled in a minor bureaucratic nightmare a quarter-century ago.

More than 50 residents of Elmsdale Road and Pound Meadow found themselves issued with orders from Malvern Hills District Council to change their house numbers - or face a £20 fine.

The council had decided it was time to sort out the roads, which it seemed had developed haphazardly, leading to "such anomalies as No 28 appearing next door to No 10".

As the Gazette & Reporter pointed out at the time, some residents coped with the situation by swapping the "attractive display boards carrying the numbers" among themselves.

"Many of the residents are angry because they received no advance notice of the council's intention," said the paper.

"Those who are to be taken into Pound Meadow complained that the day after the order was delivered, council workmen arrived and erected their new street sign

"Others point out that they will be put to the expense of having their notepaper reprinted and they feel there will be an inevitable period of confusion over their mail deliveries until all their correspondents are notified of their new addresses."

The town's postmaster said that the postmen would be issued with a revised list of numbers to help them.

But the paper said that some residents feared the muddle would last much longer because of yearly insurance premium demands, half-yearly dividend payments, three-yearly driving licence reminders and some even more occasional happenings such as notification of a Premium Bond win.

And if people born in one of these houses wanted their birth certificate changed, they would have to write to the Registrar General in London to make the correction.