Cosy Corners in Depression and War
Autobiography of Joan Hughes
The story of one person's nests
THE WAR YEARS
War - 1939 to 1942
A SCHOOL YEAR STARTING IN SEPTEMBER 1939
It was
September 1st 1939. My parents had ordered a taxi. I don't think
we had ever used one before. My father seemed to have money in his pockets,
and I could hardly believe it, because by the end of most weeks, he was
usually broke. It was Friday and he was not at work, which was decidedly
queer.
"You've got to go away because there will be a war soon",
I was told.
"But, they've been saying that for a long time. Why is any worse,
now?"
"Because Poland has been invaded."
However, I could not understand why we were not taking the Circle Line
to Liverpool Street, as we usually did, when I was being taken to the main
line steam trains at Liverpool Street, ready for the journey to
Manningtree, the nearest station for my grandmother's house at Lawford.
This was the wrong time to be visiting Nana. I should have stayed with her
for the whole month of August, but this year I had missed most of this. I
had stayed for one hasty week at the beginning of August, and then returned
to London to prepare for going to a Girls' Grammar School. However, my
mother heard that this school was being evacuated to somewhere in the
country quite far away, and she did not want me to go, but preferred me to
stay with relations.
The taxi almost reached Liverpool Street; then the driver said he could
go no further. There were barriers. My father produced a few pound notes,
gave them to him, and mysteriously we passed through.
"What a waste of
money",
I was thinking because I had very few clothes, and my mother was
often so short of money, that a visit to a cinema just at the bottom of our
road was a rare treat.
"We have to get you on a train somehow, because
there's a war coming,"
said my father. So I was put on the train and my
parents returned to West Kensington.
I was met at the other end by some relative, I don't remember who, and
taken to the house Gordona, where Nana lived. The next thing I remember was
the solemnity of listening to Mr Chamberlain's speech on the wireless,
declaring that war had begun at
11 am on Sunday, September 3rd. That phrase
of Mr Chamberlain's
"No such undertaking has been received"
echoes down the
years, when referring to asking Hitler politely to withdraw his troops from
Poland.
Of course Mr Churchill's speeches were more memorable; but during the
time he was making them, I was probably staying with my great-aunt, who had
no wireless set. I gained my knowledge of the progress of the war by
reading the front page of Aunt Kate's newspaper.
When I heard Chamberlain's speech, I had been with Nana only two days,
and my only possessions were a few clothes, and a gas-mask in a square box
with a plastic carrying case. I had no toys and no books. There had not
been time or room in our cases to bring them from London.
The
great-aunts (and uncle)
Aunt Kate [Great-aunt Kate]: Selina Kate Nevill, born 3.7.1879, sister of
Joan's grandmother,
married Alfred Edward Broom [Uncle Ted], born 10.9.1875, in Manningtree,
late in 1917. He was a timber merchant's labourer.
On
29.9.1939
(National Registration Day) they lived at 37 Colchester Road,
Manningtree, in 1939, with Annie Nevill
(sister), an invalid, born 20.10.1883 and with someone whose record is
blocked. The blocked name is presumably Joan (eleven years old). Joan's
parents (and a lodger) registered at
59 May Street in
London.
Annie Nevill (aged 28) was acting as "housekeeper" for her widowed father
(67) and brother (36) at Brook Street in 1911, when Joan's mother (aged 13)
was also in the house, which was next door to her parents' house
Alfred Edward Broom of 37 Council Houses Colchester Road, Lawford, Essex,
died 10.3.1945. Administration Ipswich 12.5.1945 to Selina Kate Broom,
widow. Effects £134.0s.10d.
The death of Annie Nevill (aged 63) was registered at Harwich in the late
summer of 1946.
Selina Kate Broom of 4 Victoria
Crescent, Manningtree, Essex, died 8.9.1966 at St Marys Hospital
Colchester. Probate Ipswich 10.11.1966 to
John Fredrick William Beeson
police constable. £600
Manningtree High School, Colchester Road. Joan describes as a
secondary modern school. She was ther before and after her return to
London.
school history
|
Nana could not have me staying with her for long. I went to stay with
Aunt Kate, her sister who was 10 years younger, just sixty. She lived with
her husband Uncle Ted, and her disabled youngest sister Annie, at 37
Council Houses in Colchester Road, a long road which terminated at a
crossing in Long Road, where Gordona was situated. My great-aunt's house
was opposite a secondary modern school. This was the term used for schools
taking pupils who had not passed exams for Grammar or Technical-Central
Schools. I had to attend here, though I was told by the teachers that I was
not officially regarded as a member of the school. This disconcerted me. I
was placed in a double desk with Margaret Newell, another lonely
"Scholarship" girl. We were isolated from the rest of the class, and given
a few arithmetic problems to work out, while the rest of the class was
taught elementary arithmetic.
I believe I stayed a year with my great-aunt. Two news events in
particular stood out while I was there, as depressing. The first was the
fact that Russia had signed a pact with Hitler's Germany. The second was
the fall of France. I read the newspapers closely that day, and wondered
how we would survive. My reference book says officially this took place on
June 25th 1940. During the war, I attached a lot of importance to official
dates, rather than how things were going in general. But there had been no
air raids to speak of. The battle of Britain had been won by our side.
Aunt Annie, Kate's sister, had an injured hip which prevented her from
walking more than a few steps. Kate took her out in a wheel-chair as often
as she could manage it. I helped with this, by pushing the chair, to give
Aunt Kate a rest. Annie started each day, after breakfast, by washing out
the canary's cage. This was an elaborate process, at which I learnt to
assist. Four removable glass inserts in the side of the cage, two seed
trays, the base of the cage, all had to be separately washed, dried and
replaced. A major occupation, when walking with Aunt Kate and Aunt Annie
was looking for plantains and groundsel, both growing wild in road side
verges. This was additional food for Dixie, the canary.
When indoors, as long as there was daylight, Annie spent the rest of
her day in making needle-cases, pin-cushions, lavender bags; "old-world"
useful items for gifts to friends, but principally to raise money for the
Church at "Bring-and-Buy" sales.
Sometimes we played cards, chiefly Whist; Aunt Kate and Nana sometimes
went to adult Whist Drives. There was another game called Pelmanism, at
which I usually won. This involved picking pairs of cards from an upturned
pack, spread out over the table, and depended on memory.
On walks down Long Road, which had no houses on one side, we picked
blackberries in September. There was a hedge and a ditch. Aunt Kate and I
used Annie's walking stick to reach the higher branches. Blackberries were
usually eaten in pies or as stewed fruit not made into jam.
The autumn hedges were a delight to the eye, full of purple sloes (too
bitter for us, with our limited wartime sugar ration) , red hips and haws,
as well as blackberries. Hips and haws were not palatable for eating; the
people who urged us to make "Rose-hip Jelly" forgot that we were short of
sugar. I was warned against the bright red "Lords and Ladies", growing in
the ditches. (Arum maculatum, also known as Cuckoo Pint). They were deadly
poisonous. They shone brightly through the searing bracken. Stinging
-nettles were everywhere, but also the soothing dock-leaf. Many times
children playing would be stung; a friend would bring dock-leaf to press
over the sore place.
At school I found I was backward at Domestic Science lessons. The first
lesson was "washing white wood". I was astonished at being made to use a
scrubbing brush on long tables. The girls were made to wear caps and
aprons, like housemaids while thus occupied. Aunt Kate kindly made the
apron, with elaborate straps and loops crossing over at the back. My feeble
needlework skills were just sufficient for me to make the cap.
I envied the boys; having done the weeding in London and at Gordona, I
longed to learn the more creative aspects of gardening. When cooking, I was
a slow worker; therefore got cold corners in the communal oven. My bread
was a failure. Mending and ironing were included in the lessons. I took a
man's sock with an enormous hole in the heel to school, because I was not
clued up, like the other girls, who provided themselves with items
containing minute holes! Cleaning irons heated on an old black-leaded
stove, heated by coals, was arduous. By 1938 my mother had acquired an
electric iron, which I had used, under supervision. I had never used
flat-irons. Even when Mother had used them, she had never had to clean them
with scouring powder. Everything at the school seemed so dismal.
The girls were slow to include me in playtime games, because I was a
stranger from London. Eventually they taught me a game, which depended on
the letters in one's full name. Every time someone called out a letter, the
competitors moved one step if they had this letter in their, name, two
steps if the letter occurred twice. A girl with the name Diana Helene
Arthey usually won the game, because she had three "E's and three A's in
her name, the letters which the caller used most often.
In cookery, my one success was a batch of rock-buns. The reason for
this was that I had accidentally tipped twice the allowed amount of
currants into the mixture, which made the buns particularly tasty. The
teacher did not notice. Aunt Kate enjoyed them when I brought them home.
In the afternoons, Aunt Kate had two hours rest, when I had to be
quiet, which meant not speaking and trying not to make a sound. The house
seemed filled with a deathly stillness. I had not been able to get any
books to read. Therefore I was bored.
During holiday afternoons, if it was fine, I sometimes asked a girl
from the "Backward" class who lived nearby to play with me outside, and
taught her the elaborate ball game I had learnt in London. But I missed my
London school-friends, and my cousins. Leonard had been evacuated from
London to a farm in Devon. My cousin John was at school in Ipswich; he only
visited Lawford in school holidays, usually at Christmas and in August.
In that winter of 1939, I found out that the countryside was not so
appealing when the trees were bare, and the wind whistled round the houses.
I missed the comics, the "Girl's Crystal" and books from the children's
library which I had read in London. Aunt Kate had no children's books and
those she had looked forbidding. In elaborate bindings meant to kept on a
bookshelf rather than read. Unlike my mother who was an avid reader she did
not appear to read anything except the "Daily Mirror" and the prayer-book
in church.
I read the "Daily Mirror" my Aunt's paper from cover to cover. I
enjoyed "Live Letters" edited by the "Old Codgers". Then I went to my
grandmother's house and read the Daily Express, all the cartoons and
Beachcomber first. I was puzzled when Beachcomber continually mentioned
"Dr. Strabismus (Whom God preserve) of Utrecht, always using this full
title. Why should God preserve this Doctor in preference to anyone else, I
thought? In the end, I realised that it was meant to be funny, and just
laughed. In this paper, I noticed that someone was always writing
preposterous articles about "Keeping the Empire".
In the winter evenings I played dominoes with Aunt Kate and Uncle Ted,
by the light of an oil-lamp. Gas-light was available, as in Nana's house;
but Aunt Kate never used it, because Annie declared that it hurt her eyes.
Even the oil-lamp on the centre table had a piece of paper pinned to it
with one of Kate's hair-grips. This was to prevent much light from reaching
Aunt Annie, where she lay on her couch in the corner of the room in the
evenings.
I was pleased to sit in the spot where I could get most light from the
oil-lamp while playing dominoes. When Uncle Ted was absent, we played
Whist, Happy Families or Beggar my Neighbour, or Pelmanism, including Aunt
Annie in these games. These games and our country walks were the high spots
of our day. Most of the time, I was very bored, especially at school, even
though I was very fond of my Great-Aunts and Uncle, who seemed to be
delighted to have me living with them in that first, quiet year of the war.
In the summer of 1940, I took the end of year examinations, and not
surprisingly, came first in the girls' section. I say, not surprisingly,
because apart from myself and Margaret Newell, the girls had been entirely
selected from those who had failed entry examinations elsewhere. Margaret
Newell had disappeared midway through the year. Occasionally there was a
late developer who was transferred to grammar, technical or art school at
the age of 12 or 13. Derek Page was one of these. He came first in the
boys' section that year and was transferred to technical school in the
nearest town, Colchester. He was a friendly boy. Years later, I recognised
him, when visiting Manningtree. He was 60 then and still doing well.
In this secondary modern school, there was more rigid grading than I
had met elsewhere. Boys and girls in the same class were graded separately
even if the exams were the same. We were made to sit along tables, each
seating eight, in the order in which we had been graded in the termly
examination. Girls sat on the left of the room; boys on the right. Social
mixing was discouraged. In this coeducational school, I spoke to boys as
rarely as in a single-sex school. Besides sports, playtimes and many
practical subjects were segregated.
Nevertheless, the girls did take elementary science in a mixed class.
Distilling coal-dust in a test-tube with a bunsen burner was the sort of
science we did. "Be careful to light the gas at the end of the tube as soon
as possible," shouted the master. "It's poisonous." Equipment was
rudimentary in such schools. No chemicals or books were provided for
science, which was why we often fell back on nature study, providing our
own materials. I searched keenly for a twig from a silver birch tree, when
on walks with Aunt Kate, when we had been asked to obtain specimens from
eight different trees.
I also remember being kept in after school because "I could not do
arithmetic". This was nonsense. The reality was that I was totally bored
with long multiplication sums and suchlike exercises, and after a time,
could not be bothered to work on any more of them. I kept asking to "learn
something new". "But you don't really belong to this school and you are not
on the official register, so you can't," I was told.
A LONDON INTERLUDE in 1940
Summer holidays came and my mother visited. She decided to take me back
to London in mid-August 1940. "There have been no air raids. It's nice and
quiet," she told me. "You might as well be at home and go to the West
London Grammar School."
On August 15th 1940, 12 high explosive bombs fell in Harrow. (Ref:
Living through the blitz by Tom Harrison). It must have been the first
sizable raid on a London district; the noise would have been heard
throughout West London. I know this because my mother said that I had
arrived back in London in time for the first raid.
[I think the Harrow raid is
probably not what her mother was referring to. More likely the
24.8.1940
bombing]
[My mother said that I had arrived back in London in time for the first
raid.] I don't remember hearing much news on radio about this; the details
were probably minimised to avoid helping the enemy. We did read about what
was happening in Europe, and North Africa in newspapers. Throughout the war
little sketch maps showed us the progress of the opposing armies.
I was given advice about what to do by my father in the event of an
air-raid, while I was out in the street. "Don't go into one of those brick
surface shelters", he said. "They're useless. "Come straight home and get
into the Anderson Shelter. The Anderson shelter will save you from any
bombs except a direct hit by high explosive bombs. Of course nothing saves
people from a direct hit. Direct hits are unlikely. They are looking for
factories, not people's houses."
Among people left in May Street, it was commonly thought that bombs
would fall elsewhere, not here. People still seemed to think there were
some kind of rules about war; that the enemy were aiming for military
targets. These were early days. But of course there was always a danger of
bombs falling on our street "by accident".
"Sometimes they just get rid of their bombs and drop them anywhere if
they've missed the real target", Dad said. "However it's only High
Explosive that will kill you. Incendiary bombs are not dangerous because
the fire-watchers will put them out". My father was not always with us at
nights and was probably out fire-watching.
For a few days there were no more raids, and life seemed almost normal.
We had plenty to eat. Rationing had not yet reached its severest point. My
parents had got me into a Grammar School and the first day in September
1940 I started here. This West London Grammar School was for the rump of
children who had not gone to board in the country.
I can only remember the French lessons because they terrified me. I had
not previously learned French, unlike many girls who had from an early age
attended fee-paying preparatory schools. This French was entirely oral. The
mistress was herself a French lady, like the "Mademoiselle" I had read
about in school stories. These school stories were set in a fantastic
world. Fantastic, at least, as far as I was concerned. I read them eagerly,
but in my mind I pronounced "Mademoiselle" as "Maid"- "Moy"- "Sell". In
school stories the Mademoiselle was usually an unsympathetic character.
No-one except people like me who read about far more than they talked about
would have invented such a mispronunciation. So when the lesson was
entirely in French with no English being used in the lesson, I felt all at
sea.
Our Mademoiselle was only using babyish language at the level of the
"cat is on the mat", - i.e. 'le chat est sur le mat!', but it was beyond my
comprehension. She would march up to the door, open it and say "Ferme la
porte". Frantically, I wondered whether that meant "Shut the door" or "Open
the door". When she pointed to me for an answer I froze into silence, and
looked enviously at the girls who knew what to say. Unfortunately, I had
had no preparation, and I had no books!
The lessons were usually interrupted by a trip down to the school
air-raid shelter. All warnings were heeded. At home, we took no notice of
day-time warnings. I began to think it was no use going to this school,
because we spent most of our time in the air-raid shelter doing nothing,
even though I never heard any bombs falling or any untoward noises during
these "raid alerts".
Life at home would have been more comfortable than it had once been,
had it not been for the air raids. We occupied the upstairs flat, and the
rooms downstairs were let to another family, Mr and Mrs Wiltshire, who had
one son, a boy who was about 5 years old, when I met him in 1940.
Upstairs, Mother had an all-electric kitchen, and no longer had to cook
or clean for lodgers. The electric iron, kettle and stove were a delight to
her, and she pronounced them "much cleaner than gas". She could relax a
little, and one day made "cheese straws". For us, it was an exotic
delicacy, but unfortunately, Dad and I declared we did not like them. So
Mum said, "They were very hard to make, and took a long time. I won't make
them again." And she never did. The cakes, half seed and half fruit
continued until she could get the seeds no longer. Many other items
disappeared from the shops for the duration. Bananas were no longer
imported, except for a very rare shipment, which was kept for children
under seven.
Most meals were rushed. At the grammar school, I no longer had time to
come home at mid-day and took sandwiches; and we had to rush the evening
meal in case there was an alert. But rationing was not yet too severe. Dad
and I still enjoyed a big cooked breakfast on Sunday mornings. Dad stayed
in bed, but I got up, in order to listen to a children's programme, run by
a commercial station. It was called the Cococubs and promoted Bournville
cocoa. The main feature was a secret code. The rivals, which Leonard
supported, were the "Ovaltinies" with a more complicated code. I could not
join this as my mother did not buy Ovaltine, though when I listened to the
programme, I thought it more exciting than the Cocoa programme, so managed
to take a sneaky look at Leonard's code-book, and I was soon translating
from both codes. But at eleven years old, I was beginning to lose interest
in this and in comics, preferring school stories in the Girls' Crystal. But
such publications were drying up. Newspapers had also shrunk in size.
[7.9.1940] For a few nights after the the first raid, all
was quiet,
even though the siren usually sounded and we went into the Anderson. Then
came the terrible night of September 7th. My father was at home this night.
Besides our family, Mrs Wiltshire brought her son to share with us, so the
Anderson was crowded. The little camp-bed in one corner was claimed by the
little boy. I sat uncomfortably in a canvas chair, furthest inside. A
wooden bench had to suffice for my mother, Mrs Wiltshire and my father, who
remained nearest the entrance. There were constant sounds like explosions;
this was mostly gun-fire, but the sounds were so loud that I could not
believe that no bombs had fallen nearby.
When I emerged in the morning there was an unnatural red light in the
sky. It was a cloudy morning, and this, I knew, was nothing to do with
sun-rise. "So I said, "What are all the lights in the sky?" "Turn round.
Don't look. Look the other way," said my mother. "But what is it?" I
persisted. "Its the London Docks on fire", said my father. "Its a long way
away." It was a long way away, for me. I had never been near London Docks.
Except for a trip to the County Hall, home of the London County Council, I
had not visited the River Thames at all. I have looked up a reference book
to confirm that this happened on September 7th. 1940. Otherwise I have
relied on my memory alone. That morning, though tired, I went to school as
usual. From that day forward, the siren sounded every evening, we spent
every night in the Anderson shelter, and every night we heard the sounds of
the air-raids, not knowing whether any damage had been done near us until
morning, and miraculously, it seemed as our part of London was escaping.
The Wiltshire family often joined us in the shelter at night, except
for the husband, who I don't remember seeing. But sometimes the Wiltshires
stayed indoors. My mother and I never did. One night I rebelled. "There
haven't been any bombs lately," I said. "I'm just going to sleep, and I'm
tired. Please let me stay in bed. Nothing will happen". But my mother was
relentless, and conscientious about Air Raid Precautions. Always we took
our gas-masks in their plastic boxes into the shelter with us. A friend
with a young baby showed me the large gas-mask meant for babies. The baby
had to placed completely inside it. "I don't know how I would manage it,"
she said. We preferred not to try on our gas-masks. Once or twice at school
we were made to practice wearing them for sixty seconds or so. Though we
heard so many sounds during air raid alerts and rarely went to sleep during
the night, there was no damage in our street, May Street, or in nearby West
London streets.
Joseph, Jessie and Ruth, still lived two doors away, and the retired
couple, Mrs and Mr Castle still lived next door. There had been an addition
to the largest family in our street, a baby called Faith, who soon stood
next to Ruth. And I remarked "How Ruth has grown". I had not seen her for a
year. "Remember to have faith," my religious friend Lois urged me. But I
missed Fay Nicholls, and other friends from the primary school. None of
these appeared to have stayed in West London.
My mother and I took more notice of the siren when it sounded at dusk,
or an hour or two later in the evening. Usually I went to bed between 8.30
and 9 pm, and my parents followed at 10 pm. My father had to rise at 6 am
for work, which was the reason for these early bed-times. Normally I got up
at 7.30 am, after my father had departed for work. But after September 7th
1940, the siren sounded every evening, often after I had been in bed for an
hour but was not yet asleep. My mother never once let me stay in bed. With
my cardigan and winter coat over my nightdress, I spent every night without
fail in the Anderson shelter. I am not sure why my mother let me go to bed
indoors at all; she thought perhaps an hour's rest was better than none at
all, or perhaps she wanted me out of the way, while she made preparations
for the night and following morning. Sometimes my father was at home with
us; but often he was out with the fire-watchers, or Home Guard, "Dad's
Army" as they called it.
[Dad joins the army and we go to Gordona]
One night Dad was with us in the shelter though the Wiltshires were
absent. He was shaking and nervous, and saying a few prayers aloud. "Why
are you so afraid?" I asked. "Mum and I are not afraid." We had given up
showing any signs of fear and accepted loud bangs going on all night, and
hardly any sleep as normal. I think that I was too tired to care, and
retained some kind of faith that bombs were not meant for our street.
However illogical this was, I was too tired to think further than this. I
also thought that adults should be more courageous than children, that was
why I was so concerned about my father's shaking with terror. "Oh shut up,
shut up," Dad said and swore a little. "Don't swear Jack. I don't like you
swearing," said Mum.
Next day I did not go to school. I had told Mum how I spent most of the
day in the school shelter, even when it was quiet, because it was a school
rule to go to the shelter whenever the alert sounded and not to emerge
until the all clear. Most people didn't do this. They waited until they
could hear some sound of gun-fire or bombs, at least where daytime alerts
were concerned. That dreary day we spent most of the time indoors, drinking
tea. Dad went out for a walk. He did not go to work. Until then he had
continued working for Harrod's but work was probably running down. People
living in the suburbs during the "phony war" had continued having their
houses decorated, but now, it was just a case of finishing old contracts.
Soon there would be no work; the younger men had all gone into the army.
When Dad came back, he told us that a house half way between our house
and St. Andrew's Church had been hit. It was empty. No-one had been killed.
The occupants had gone away earlier in the year. Mr and Mrs Castle, the
retired couple next door had a few slates missing from their roof.
Otherwise there was little damage and our house remained unscathed. "You'll
have to go", He told my mother. "pack the bags". He had that habit of
ordering my mother what to do. She did not like it, but on this occasion
she agreed with him without demur. "I'm going to volunteer for the Army,"
Dad said "It's no use staying here."
That day we packed a few things, pots and pans and clothes - no books,
games or toys, except for the game of "Monopoly", the newest game. "It will
cheer us to play with this," said Mum. "They had a new game in the shops
"Totopoly". It was about horse-racing," Dad said. "Well we can't afford
that", said Mum. We caught the train easily. There was no longer any panic
rush out of London, because those who had firmly decided to leave, had left
earlier. We went to stay with Nana at Gordona for a few days, while my
mother looked for separate accommodation in the village, with space for my
father to stay when he came on leave.
Dad stayed a few days in London, and came down to Gordona with 8 rolls
of expensive wallpaper, and about a dozen oil-paintings and watercolours.
These had mostly been painted by Uncle Len, Aunt Violet's deceased husband.
At that time Aunt Violet had gone into hospital and her flat was vacant.
Therefore Dad was concerned to save these pictures from bombing or loss. He
also brought an old manual typewriter one of his customers had given him.
My grandmother let him store these things in her empty garage. This garage
had never contained a car, only unused junk. He did not bring any valuables
from our house, and we heard that the Wiltshire family had taken over the
whole house including all our furniture shortly after we left.
Dad said good-bye. The upper age limit for
conscription
of men into the
Armed Services was 41 and my father was then 43. His first applications as
a volunteer were rejected. So he stayed for a few months longer in London
doing what work Harrod's made available to him. He no longer went out for
social drinking in the evenings, and my mother said he was sending us
enough money to pay the rent at Branksmere for the time being. He applied
to the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers but was turned down. He
was very disappointed about this, because this was his favourite regiment,
giving opportunities for the trades which interested him. But after we had
been in Manningtree for a few months we heard was that he was doing his
army training and was stationed somewhere near Chilwell, near Nottingham.
He had been accepted for the Royal Army Ordnance Corps.
Mum said what a pity it was to lose her all-electric kitchen, but
nothing much could be done. The Wiltshires did not seem to mind staying on
in London. Sometimes I wondered whether we should have done the same,
especially as shortly after we arrived in Lawford, three land mines were
dropped nearby, damaging but not destroying the Edme factory, which
produced malt. It is still there in 1992, producing bottles of Edme malt, a
small, select trade. When these land mines dropped without any air raid
alert, I was in bed. I woke up and asked Mum "Was that a door banging?".
She laughed about it later on. That was the only record I have of free fall
high explosives dropping near Manningtree. Later on there were a few V1
rockets. Compared with London the place was very quiet and we felt no need
to worry about being killed in air-raids. More mundane worries continued.
When Mum and I arrived in Lawford, Nana was pleased to see us - but,
mutually, it was agreed that it would be best if we found separate
accommodation quite soon. Mum and I wanted to be on our own, and my
grandmother had to keep rooms vacant in case relations wished to stay.
Something I did not know was that the house belonged to Uncle Geoff,
mother's eldest brother.
Uncle Geoff visited very rarely, but in the past often sent his
children to stay. Billy, his eldest son had been staying there on and off
during 1940. And
Uncle Bob, mother's youngest brother was now a permanent
resident at Gordona, so there was little room. Uncle Bob continued to work
assiduously in the garden. When indoors he spoke very little. He had no
children, and his wife was constantly ill, and declared that she could not
bear the strain of married life. She retired to live with her parents. This
was enough to make Bob morose. My father, when visiting Lawford, liked to
be sociable and would take Uncle Bill, mother's middle brother, and Uncle
Fred, Aunt Kath's husband to the public house in the evenings for beer and
a chat. Once Uncle Fred and my father came home drunk at Christmastime when
the house was brimming full. Fred went to sleep in the chair, but the drink
always made my father voluble, and he would babble on some boring remarks
about the gauge of the Russian railways being different to those in Europe.
Until people said "Shut up about the Russian railways".
Bob did not drink. My father visited him once at his place of work, and
warned him about lead poisoning. It appeared that Bob was uncaring about
safety precautions while at his printing works. My father while he was a
house-painter always washed his hands before eating his sandwiches and
never licked his paint-brush. He had seen workmates using
lead paints
develop a thin blue line in their lips. Such workmen died young, and it was
usually the case that they had licked their brushes to give them a point
when doing fine work.
Though Uncle Bob was eventually promoted from compositor to
proof-reader, he probably had a measure of
lead poisoning caused by his
work practices. In later years he became blind and had some mental
dementia. Fortunately, not before he had a successful second marriage after
Edna died, and a son, Robert, now living in Australia.
Soon after we arrived in Lawford, my mother was offered a small
semi-detached cottage to rent, called No; 2 Branksmere, situated in
Colchester Road near Aunt Kate's council house, and not far from the
secondary modern school. For me, back at this school in late October 1940,
life was bleak. I was placed bottom of the class in the second year, as I
had not taken last year's end-of-term examination.
Secondary modern schools were streamed in those days, and though
sitting in a place given to those at the bottom of the class, at least I
was in the top stream. The girls recognised me from the previous year and
some of them were friendly and I got on well in the playground.
However, I came home one day to tell my mother that I had got a
terrible illness. The girls at school had told me that everyone got very
ill when they became thirteen. I had just had my thirteenth birthday in
February 1941. "Nonsense," I had answered the girls at school. "I feel very
well. I'm sure I won't get ill. It won't happen to me". So when signs of
this "illness" came just 2 weeks after my 13th birthday, I was terrified
and thought that I might die. The thought of death often crossed my mind,
but it was usually irrationally connected with actuality. I had not been
frightened of being killed by a bomb in London. But I was frightened of
getting lockjaw, when playing in the fields with other children. The
country children had told me that a cut between thumb and first finger
caused lockjaw. Consequently, I had been frightened by a tiny scratch I had
obtained there. Much bigger cuts and grazes in other places were ignored.
We had not been told that lockjaw or tetanus was caused by bacteria, and
that all deep cuts were dangerous, especially if contaminated with earth
from fields in which cows or horses grazed. Instead of plain speaking "old
wives tales" were passed around.
Aunt Maud the young neighbour and friend of my grandmother was no help
in this respect. She said she had nearly died from lockjaw when very young.
Apparently her large protruding teeth had saved her, leaving a gap for her
to take drinks. But she let us think that it was caused by cuts between
thumb and finger! No good medical information which ordinary people could
understand was available from radio or popular magazines.
"The Radio Doctor" had started giving advice in short talks, but
this was not
available until just after the war. The rules which prevented doctors
giving advice to a general audience in public were very strict; in those
days this was considered to be advertising.
To get back to the "illness" which started when I was 13, I was
relieved when my mother told me that this was not an illness but the start
of monthly periods. I was growing up. My mother told me to refer to my
periods in public as being "unwell". So I started to say "I am unwell
today" if necessary, but usually did not talk about it. Girls, when having
periods usually asked to be excused from P.T. and Games; but I never made
any excuses; just moved more sluggishly.
It was while I was living at No: 2 Branksmere Cottages that my father
thought that I should have some religious instruction. I was twelve years
old and did not take kindly to it. At that time he had not yet been
accepted for the army but was still working in London, but stayed for the
week-end at Branksmere whenever he could. The war had awakened in him an
enthusiasm for attending Mass, and he took me to the church at Brantham.
There were no buses on Sunday, and the church was three miles away. The
walk took us approximately one hour. By that time I had got used to fairly
long country walks, but this walk along the roads was less interesting than
most and I arrived at the church tired.
The Mass was entirely in Latin, for these were the days long before the
Second Vatican
Council, when the congregation took little part in the Mass;
reading silently an English translation from their Missals.
I did not have a Missal, neither did my father, but at least he had had
religious instruction as a boy, and knew what the service was about. To me
it was entirely incomprehensible, and I told him how bored I had been by
it. It was far more boring than going with Nana to the Church of England,
where there were often interesting diversions like the Harvest Festival.
"You are supposed to be a Roman Catholic," he said.
I said, "I did not know anything about it".
The next thing that happened was that my father arranged for me to take
a series of lessons from the Roman Catholic Catechism on Saturday
afternoons with Mrs Christian, an appropriately named local woman. He went
back to London; and I started the instructions. To begin with the lessons
were fairly interesting. I had a copy of the Adult Catechism given to me by
my father and I started learning a few questions and answers from this.
The first of the questions being, "Why did God make you", and the
answer being "God made me to know him to love him and to serve him in this
world and to be happy with him for ever in the next," was something I could
agree with.
However Mrs Christian produced a booklet called "Catechism answers for
5 to 7 year olds" and I had to take this home and learn questions and
answers from it.
It was the fact that it was labelled for 7 seven years olds, and I was
at the time 12 years old that turned me against it. "I don't want to learn
babyish stuff," I thought. I was very sensitive about this.
By this time I had formed some ideas about God for myself. I had always
thought of God being very much present in the works of creation, like the
fruits of the fields and the wild creatures. This I had absorbed from my
grandmother, with her words "Fruits of the Earth," as she said while lying
ill in bed one day, and being brought a peach. I had also liked very much
the framed text of the beatitudes. Though i felt very guilty about it, I
told my mother that I did not want to attend the religious instruction and
I also did not want to travel in the car with Justine, who I was told "Had
made her first communion, though she is three years younger than you". I
was feeling too nervous and somewhat humiliated by these strange people. My
father was not there to go to church with me, and in London I had never
seen him go, and my mother was not a Catholic.
"Oh, don't make her go, Jack", she said to my father, " if she does not
want to". "Have you learnt anything?" he said. "Who is the head of
Catholic Church" he asked "The Pope, "I answered. "That's where you are
wrong," he said. "Well it seems like the right answer", said my mother
"Why is it wrong?" "No the correct answer is "Jesus Christ is the Head of
the Catholic Church", he said. We checked this up in the Catechism "Oh!"
said my mother."I suppose that's right. Still, I think there's too much
bowing and scraping in the Catholic Church"
It was agreed that I would not have to continue religious instruction
at the present time. My parents were also trying to consider my general
education; as I was learning very little at the secondary modern school,
and were making enquiries at the Girls' High School in Colchester to try to
arrange a transfer. But first, Christmas intervened. It was an easy walk
from Branksmere to Nana's house where we spent Christmas. It was my second
Christmas with the extended family. Christmas 1940 seemed better and
glossier than Christmas 1939.
Aunt Kate and Annie, my parents and I were the daytime visitors. My
grandmother and Uncle Bob were the residents. Aunt Edna, Bob's wife, and
Aunt Betty with John were the guests. I spent most of the Christmas
holidays walking the country lanes with John, looking for holly from the
hedgerows or just playing. We also had a Christmas tree. There was a copse
of fir trees nearby. John climbed one of these trees and cut off the top,
which was how we got our tree. Back at Gordona we planted it in a pot
covered with Christmas wrapping paper and filled with earth.
We spent hours making small presents to hang on the tree, as well as
covering it with silver foil and coloured balls. We attached small candles
to the branches. This may sound dangerous but John and I were very careful
to keep the tops of the candles well away from the paper. We bought two
pounds of boiled sweets and divided these between a dozen small bags which
I had made from scraps of material on Aunt May's
sewing machine. My mother
had taught me to use this machine which was stored at Gordona and I found
it much more fun than hand sewing, though I was still unable to to thread
the machine's needle.
Nana had a large boxful of old Christmas cards. There must have been at
least 200. The back room was kept as the "best room" and the front room
used for meals. We used the best room for the Christmas tree, and decorated
it extensively. There was a picture-rail running all round the room about
eighteen inches from the ceiling. With the help of a step-ladder John and I
arranged all the Christmas cards on the ledge formed by the picture-rail.
Then we put up the Christmas decorations which had been carefully saved
from one year to the next. These were not like the the paper chains I used
in London, but were commercially made, long chains of different patterns,
and a few paper bells, normally folded flat for storage, but now opened up
to display their full glory.
John and I were ambitious, and tried to add to the decorations by
making our own with coloured paper, cut to the same shape as the commercial
ones. But our patience soon ran out with the work of carefully glueing one
cut-out piece to the next. After two hours work had only produced one chain
about eighteen inches long, we gave up and concentrated on learning our
poetry for the Christmas afternoon family entertainment. At this time the
children put on an entertainment for the grown-ups. I had a birthday book
containing 365 verses from Tennyson's poetry, so I chose to learn a verse
beginning "Ring out wild bells to the wild sky." John learnt the second
verse in the same poem. Thinking back, I suspect that people were bored
with this, but everyone clapped and listened politely.
Afterwards we played charades, John and I usually enlisting the help of
one adult. We made up three scenes to illustrate a three- syllable word.
The audience had to guess the word, with the help of a fourth scene
containing the whole word. The words had to be carefully chosen so that
they could be broken down. For example "Mantelpiece", and we had, in the
last scene to avoid giving guilty emphasis to the word.
When everyone was tired of this we handed out the presents from the
tree. Not many people cared to eat the boiled sweets on top of Christmas
dinner, but they admired our handiwork on the wrappings.
After this the main presents were drawn out of a sack, which John and I
had prepared beforehand, with John wearing a home-made, amateurish-looking
"Father Christmas" outfit. Everyone was supposed to give a present to
everyone else, and the sack had been filled gradually during the week
before Christmas.
I had worked hard on my presents, making home-made sponge bags for most
people. These were properly lined with plastic given to me by Freddie or
"Uncle Fred" as I called him, who worked at the plastics factory and
obtained many offcuts. They were machine stitched with Aunt May's machine.
I cannot imagine either children or adults putting in so much work for
Christmas in these days of almost universal television ownership. We did
not even resort to a board game or a card-game on Christmas Day itself,
though these may have been played on Boxing Day.
There was a flourishing amateur dramatic society in the local village,
of which Aunt Maud was a member. John was also very interested in amateur
dramatics, so though I was without much practice, I was encouraged by these
people.
Aunt Maud was not invited on Christmas Day - our house was already very
full with family - but she was a frequent visitor to tea. Likewise I often
called at her house where I became acquainted with Freddie her husband, the
hard-working British Plastics factory worker.
My grandmother did the cooking with help from my mother. We had a very
large chicken, never a turkey. In these days all chickens were "free-range"
and they were considered a real treat not for consumption except at
festival time. The chicken was garnished with bacon, sausages, and served
with Brussels sprouts, roast potatoes and Yorkshire pudding. Aunt Kate
followed the tradition of serving Yorkshire pudding separately, but my
mother had never done this. Everything was on one huge plate.
This was followed by Christmas pudding. A small amount of brandy was
pored over this and ignited. It burnt with a blue flame which died in an
instant. It was fun, and we thought it made the pudding taste even better.
Beer had been used in the mixture, so this was a real alcoholic pudding. I
had helped to stir these puddings three weeks beforehand.
Colchester County High School for Girls (opened 1909) was divided from
about 1926 to 1957 between two buildings: Greyfriars for junior pupils and
the senior school. Joan calls it the grammar school.
|
After Christmas [1940] I
went back to the secondary modern school, but my mother had been to the
grammar school, and they had agreed to accept me for the Easter term,
starting in April 1941, provided I had lessons in French and mathematics,
to cover some of the lost ground.
I went to French lessons with Doreen, about 18 years old and still in
the sixth form of the Colchester girls' grammar school. Soon I was learning
lists of verbs in present and past tenses and composing simple sentences in
French. Previously I had thought foreign languages were mysterious and very
difficult, and that learning foreign languages was what made grammar
schools different to ordinary schools. I made rapid progress in my French
lessons, and after three months felt that I was well prepared for the
grammar school, though I had not been taught to speak very much French. The
written language was considered the most important.
The mathematics was also interesting, and I became very fond of Rachel,
the invalid young woman who taught me. She spent all her time in bed in the
downstairs front room in the large house next to Lawford Place, a hall used
for village meetings. Rachel was the daughter of the headmaster of the
Manningtree secondary modern school.
I was told later by Miss King, the headmistress of the Colchester
grammar school that these girls were very good to teach me; she said they
would do anything to help their old school. Certainly I found them very
friendly and attractive. Privately I had nicknames for them. Doreen I named
"Frizzy Hair". She had naturally curly hair like my mother's.
Rachel was named "Protractors in the Bed". Before I went to her for
lessons, I already knew how to use a protractor to measure an angle, but
she gave me further lessons in geometrical drawing. The geometrical drawing
instruments she provided for me to use were always getting lost in her bed.
She would dive beneath the sheets to retrieve them. She was very lively and
intelligent, so I was very sorry indeed that she had to lead this secluded
life, but I did not know the nature of her illness. She also taught me
elementary algebra, such as the use of x and y in equations and some simple
geometry theorems.
Neither of these young women asked for any payment from us. My mother
could not have afforded it, and the school probably had no spare funds for
such payments, so this was entirely voluntary work on the part of these
women.
They both liked me and were pleased to see that I made such rapid
progress. At that time I had almost lost all interest in education, and
became rather afraid that I should have to leave school at fourteen and
wondered what I should do then. Aunt Kate had remarked that I was not
practical, and she wondered how I was going to earn my living. I was
disappointed when she said that; it seemed that she did not notice the
things that I could do and was made to do, such as gardening, shopping and
cleaning all my grandmother's brass ornaments, as well as the knives and
forks. Additionally, when my father went into the army, he gave me the
button stick and Brasso when he came on leave and made me clean his brass
buttons. Surely, I thought, these things were practical.
Aunt Kate meant that I had made no progress in sewing and very little
in cooking. Throughout my life I have never made any progress in sewing and
it has never worried me, as it not an essential skill in the modern world.
With cooking, I remedied this matter as soon as I had to live in rooms on
my own.
But for the time being it was far more important for me to concentrate
on school work, as I had learnt very little academically for nearly three
years, and I was now thirteen, a peak time in most people's education. I
had to make up for lost time. At the end of that term I came top in the
examination and Derek Page came top in the Boys Department. He was
transferred to technical school in Colchester, and I started attending the
Girls' High School in Colchester, so I did not see so many of the local
children during term-time.
I liked the house we were living in, Branksmere. There was plenty of
room and we had access to a garden.. We stayed there five months.
"Can't manage the rent any longer" said Mum.
Dad was no longer working in London, but was now doing army training in
the North of England, and he started as a private.
"How are we managing now?" I asked.
"There is an official army allowance. It is small, but at least it is
regular", sighed my mother. "I know exactly what I am going to get each
week".
In addition my mother had applied for my scholarship grant, an
allowance of three pounds per term meant to be spent on school uniform.
This had just come through and it meant a visit to Colchester.
Unfortunately we had to go the official suppliers' of school uniform, and
their prices were high. For summer we bought the official school blazer
complete with a large badge with a motto in French, "Dieu et mon droit". I
did not like large and conspicuous badges, but had to get used to it. We
also had to wear hats, both in summer and winter with a smaller edition of
the badge on the hat- band. For summer we bought a Panama hat, the official
wear.
Material in the school colours was supplied for making summer dresses.
My mother could afford only enough material for one dress for this coming
summer. I wore this for a complete week and each week-end, while I was in
old clothes, she washed it. Unfortunately the first few girls I met at the
new school noticed this and unkindly said, "Are both your dresses of the
same pattern , Joan". I did not answer but was very sensitive about such
remarks.
The first summer term in these new surroundings was the worst. I felt
something like a foreigner. I was from London, had not much money, and knew
that I was "different" from the average grammar school girl. As a soldier's
daughter I was granted free bus fares and free school meals. On the bus
this was not noticed, but in the school refectory, someone called out "Will
girls with free meal tickets stand in this line here", so everyone knew who
we were. The others with free tickets were mainly Colchester town girls,
No-one who took the country bus to Manningtree had a free meal ticket, and
it was these girls who noticed me in school, as they had previously seen me
on the school bus. It was a mortifying system. I did well in school work,
but very badly in social life; the girls were not friendly and did not
treat me as an equal as they had done in the London primary school. So I
missed all my old friends very badly.
We had to move into one room. We found a large front room in Long Road,
not far from my grandmother's house and next door to Cookson's the grocer
from whom we obtained our week's rations. A married couple sublet this room
to us. They were young and had one small child. For the next six months my
mother and I were settled down, and we did not see anything of my father,
who was stationed in the North of England.
ONE ROOM IN HEART'S DELIGHT
MOTHER WORKING AT THE APPLE FARM.
I had just started Colchester County High School for Girls when we
moved away from Branksmere Cottages to one room in the house called
"Heart's Delight". It was not our Heart's Delight but we made it do. Being
cooped up in one room did not worry me very much because I spent most of my
day in Colchester, catching the 8.30 am bus in the morning and not
returning until 5 o'clock in the evening.
This gave my mother enough time to take a job. At first she did casual
work in the fields, starting in June with pea-picking, going on to
strawberry picking, then finally blackcurrants. Sometimes she picked up
potatoes. This was harder work and not so popular. At the end of the soft
fruit season, she went on to apple picking. She found that she could take
regular work at the apple farm, paid at an hourly rate in the autumn. The
money was not so good as that earned in the currant fields where a good
worker could earn £1 per day.
Children were given permission to stay away from school for two weeks
in July to work in the currant fields, after school exams were over. I did
this in 1941 and earned ten shillings one day. I had never had so much
money in my pocket before. When I returned to school, I was able to go to
the chip shop and buy twopenn'th of chips while waiting for the evening bus
home. Many of the girls bought chips. Officially we were not allowed to eat
in the street or to take our hats off. Both these rules were ignored, once
out of sight of the school. However, I saved most of my currant-picking
money.
My mother went on working at the apple farm until Christmas. This was
indoor work, grading the apples according to size and condition, and
packing them in boxes ready for the shops. My mother enjoyed this work and
the company of the other workers. She had not worked outside the home
before, not ever having any opportunity. By the end of the year she had
saved £100 in her post office bank account. I also had a post office
bank
account, in which was deposited the money for my school clothes. I was
receiving a grant from "London County Council" on condition that I went
back to London at the end of the war. My mother gladly signed and agreed to
this condition. However, we knew that we could not predict what we would do
after the war.
These were dark days according the news reports, for neither the USSR
or the USA had yet entered the war against Hitler. "We will win the war,
because we have right on our side " I thought. At the High School the rules
about gas-masks were strict. We had to carry them every day. I had quite
neglected to do this while at the Secondary Modern School in Manningtree,
where nobody seemed to bother. "They won't use gas, now" They would have
done it before now if they were going to," people said. However in the
garage where John and I played we found some leaflets, warning us about the
smells of the different poison gases. "If you smell pear-drops and do
nothing about it you'll be dead in a few minutes", the leaflet said,
putting the wind up John and myself. For a few days we walked about
imagining we could smell pear-drops. My gas-mask was contained in a brown
plastic case with a shoulder-strap. Every day I also carried a smart blue
attach‚ case, containing school books. It was marked with my name, and was
my last pre-war Christmas present from Aunt May.
Annemarie Ilse Nossen, born Berlin, Germany 31.1.1897 (mother born Betty
Landsberger) was a probationary teacher on 4.7.1933 when she sailed third
class from Breman to Southampton. She graduated BA General from London
University in 1935. In 1939 (when she went to a trip to the USA) she was a
German citizen resident in England and working as a schoolmistress at
Colchester High School for Girls. As an Assistant School Mistress living at
6, Honywood Road, Colchester, Essex, took the oath of allegiance on
26.3.1940, making her a naturalised citizen of the United Kingdom. She died
in Colchester on 22.11.1980
|
One of the first people I met at the High School was the Lower Fourth
Form Teacher, Miss Nossen. She was German. Immediately in my mind I
excepted her from the Germans who lived in Germany, who wanted to drop
bombs on us. She no longer is a real German, I thought. She must have lived
here all her life. I had never met any Jews and did not think whether she
might be Jewish. In any case, I had no knowledge that the Nazis hated Jews.
All I knew was that they hated Czechs and Poles and now they hated us. If
not, why did they want to invade, and drop bombs on us? Thinking and
forming answers was simple for a thirteen year old. We had no access to any
complicated information. These were the days before TV, and when we turned
on the wireless, it was for short periods only that we listened intently to
the censored wartime news. Our culture did not include portable radios and
listening casually and obtaining snippets of opinion and specialised
information in the way that people do to-day.
But I was surprised to meet Miss Nossen, the German. German was taught
in the school as well as French and Latin. But in the Lower Fourth, the
first year for those who had passed the "eleven-plus", we did French only.
French was also taught by Miss Nossen. But there formed in my mind because
of this German association, that there was another aspect to Germany
somewhere, besides the unpleasant one we were now experiencing. It was the
germ of an idea that Germans were not all "Nazis", because some Germans
lived here, and like Miss Nossen, were not interned but lived amongst us,
and carried on their normal work, and regarded England as their country.
Shortly afterwards I was to meet Miss Kahn who taught science., and I
wondered "Was she also German?". She was an awkward person, absolutely no
good on the sports field, when she took part in the Staff against Pupils
end of term rounders match, so I empathised with her. We were both
outsiders in the school and both no good on the sports field.
She seemed much more of an outsider than Miss Nossen, though she had no
trace of a foreign accent. She was almost certainly Jewish, but I had not
heard of Jews. I knew something about left-wing politics. I had heard of
Lenin though not of Karl Marx. How odd, a person brought up in the sixties
must think this was? But I had not heard about Nazis being against the
Jews. It was not until after the war that I heard about this. In the
meantime most of the girls laughed at Miss Kahn when she taught science,
which made me cross, because my cousin John had encouraged me to take an
interest in this subject. It came easily to me whose favourite subject was
mathematics. But when I went into Miss Kahn's classroom, there was no
equipment. We spent most of our time taking down notes from the blackboard
and did few experiments. The one thing we managed to do was to grow a large
blue crystal of "copper sulphate". So at the end of the term when we were
asked if we would like to drop science and take up German which was the
alternative subject, I put up my hands with the rest. Fortunately my
preference was ignored, because all the girls who did well in examinations
were arbitrarily assigned to take science. The second stream did German;
and the third and fourth stream did science. At this stage we had no
freedom of choice. I was quite glad about this in later years, because, as
I had had only three months education in the High School, I had no idea of
the relative importance of these two subjects. Today I would not feel happy
about young people exclusively studying languages, or exclusively studying
science. But it was wrong to exclude second stream from science. They also
did French, and one foreign language was quite enough for us to cope with.
Most of us had never travelled abroad.
I never felt very comfortable in class during that first term. I was
thirteen years old and taller than all the others who were eleven or twelve
years of age. I tried to hide behind them because I did not want to look
conspicuous and developed a crouch. This was noticed by the physical
education teacher who said I needed special exercises. So when other
children were having their mid-morning break, I had to attend a private
instruction from the gym teacher. There were special bending and stretching
exercises and I was made to hang from the rib-stalls which lined the main
hall, also used as gymnasium. All of this I hated, especially as I was
given a set of exercises to do every night before going to bed, to be
supervised by my mother. When John came to stay I told him about these
exercises and talked through the wall at him while I was doing them. He
used to lie in bed in the front bedroom while I was in the back room at
Gordona, during school holidays, when I stayed at the my grandmother's big
house to give my mother a little space in the one room she occupied, and to
allow my father to come home for 48 hours' leave. I believe once a year he
got a week at home, and this was probably in the summer. My father's work
as storeman and medical orderly in Chilwell was important, but he could be
spared for a week. When I told the other girls, rather proudly that my
father was in the army they did not have a very high opinion of this, to my
surprise. I learned that most of their fathers were at home, in "essential
occupations" and were not eligible for call-up, or were over-age and unlike
my father did not volunteer. They were all well-established in Colchester
or the surrounding community, unlike the few of us who had arrived from
London. Essex was not an official evacuation area, so I only met about two
other girls from London during my career at the Colchester High School.
My other recollections of the school included running round the
playground with children much younger than myself, but not being very
interested in their boisterous play, and admiring the magnificent peonies
in a bed guarded by a wire fence, which was the province of our gardener.
In wartime we had to dig for victory, but that did not stop us from growing
flowers .
In my first term starting April 1941, I had to do half an hour's
homework every evening. I had never done homework before, except for one
short burst of holiday work, when long, long ago in London , I had prepared
for the "eleven-plus"., and I used to worry about getting it all done, as
it usually took longer than the official half-hour. I was glad when at the
end of the term, I found that I had done very well in the examinations, so
that I was promoted from a middle-of- the- road class to the top stream
class for the following year.
During the summer holidays John arrived to stay with grandmother and I
forgot all about school for the month of August. There was still some fruit
picking to be done including some very late black currants and John went
with my mother and myself for one week's work in the fields. We enjoyed
this work in the hot sunshine. We forgot to eat any currants and soon
learnt the correct technique for stripping the bushes clean from my mother.
" Pick one branch at a time and move on gradually to the next. That is the
way to fill the basket," she said. I used a small green camp-stool to sit
on beneath the bush as I worked.
John had arrived on his bike, and this summer he taught me to ride it.
In spite of the fact, that I always wore skirts (jeans or slacks were
neither in fashion or obtainable for girls because of clothes shortages) I
put my legs over his boy's bike, and in time-honoured fashion, rode along
with John's hand on the back of the saddle. I careered about wildly in the
middle of the road; this was not dangerous as the only traffic I was likely
to meet was the horse-drawn milk-cart, along this road which connected my
grandmother's house and my great-aunt's house. For several days I
practised, until at the end of the week, John told me I was able to ride
the bike, because he had no longer been holding on. It was still a day or
two before I became really confident and steady; then I decided to ride to
my Aunt Kate's house. When Aunt Kate saw me she said "you should have a
bike of your own". Next door to Aunt Kate lived Mrs Chapman and her
daughter Beryl. Beryl had decided to get a new bike, so Aunt Kate asked if
they would sell the old one. She offered it to me for £3. At the end
of
August, my father had completed 8 weeks physical training as initiation
into the Army and arrived home on 48 hours leave. He agreed to buy the
bike, which was very old, but could be made serviceable if repaired. He
examined the bike and listed the missing parts; three spokes for the
wheels, two new inner tubes, a bell for the handle-bars and told me to go
to the cycle shop in Manningtree and buy them. I had no difficulty in
obtaining these spare parts, for in those days everybody believed in "Make
do and mend", and my father kindly fitted them on and my bike was as good
as new. This gave me immense pleasure. I was able to visit Aunt Kate as
often as I liked, and she was always pleased to see me. I also rode round
the country lanes near the Apple Farm .
But most of the time John and I liked to walk. We liked to scramble
over the fields and climb straw stacks. There was no straw burning. The
straw was gathered into stacks, and the stubble dug in. Some fields
contained horses which were still much in use for drawing carts. I was
always afraid of fields containing cows, in case there might be a bull with
them, however much I was re-assured that this was not the case., and would
not walk through these fields. But I considered those fields containing
sheep or horses as safe. One day I was blackberrying on my own in a field
containing three horses, quite oblivious to everything that was happening
around me. When I turned round, I found that the three horses had walked
over to see what I was doing and had surrounded me. I did not know what to
do. As I had a basket full of blackberries, I decided to feed them to the
horses, so that they would be friendly towards me. I was quite frightened,
but the horses took the blackberries, and I walked away from them quite
peacefully, but disappointed that I had very few blackberries left in my
basket to carry home.
Sometimes John and I were content to lay down for a time amidst the
long grass which concealed us completely and watch the antics of insects.
Never before had I examined ant-hills so closely, delighting to disturb
them and watch the ants scurrying about, or simply to lie on my back and
listen to the buzz of the grass-hoppers; these insects making a constant
clicking sound amidst the long grass warmed by the heat of the summer
sunshine. We spent long hours like this, or when not so exhausted would
search for new varieties of wild flowers, or catch the white cabbage
butterflies, kill then and put them in a jar. There was a rumour that
someone would pay us for a jar of dead cabbage-whites (or for the tails of
three dead grey squirrels) but we never found out where to go. I don't
think John or I would have liked to kill the squirrels, though in those
Essex fields, we never saw any.
Back at school for the Autumn term, I was still in the building called
"Greyfriars", but was now in the Upper Fourth. The classes I passed through
in the four and half years I attended were labelled Lower and Upper Fourth,
and Lower, Middle and Upper Fifth. Forms One, Two , Lower Third and Upper
Third formed the Preparatory School attended by fee- paying juniors, which
was located in part of the Greyfriars building, so that at break-times, the
playground was filled with many younger children. I was not very keen on
playing with these younger ones, but I had formed a friendship with Irene
Kekwick, who had been a fee-paying pupil and liked to associate with these
younger ones. Irene seemed to like me and gave me little presents, but I
got tired of this very soon, and left her behind in a different class. I
was placed in Upper Four D. The Upper Fourth was divided into A, B, C, and
D. We soon discovered that everyone who had done very well in last year's
examinations was placed in Upper 4 D. The lettering was designed to prevent
us thinking too much of ourselves. Upper 4 A was filled with the second
best . The poorest achievers were placed in Upper 4 C.
I was one year older than nearly everyone else in Upper 4 D, and was
not allowed to catch up the year, in spite of the fact that I often came
top in many subjects at examination time. There was another girl who was a
year older than the rest and did exceedingly well. Unfortunately her
parents decided to withdraw her from school at the age of 14. This happened
to various pupils throughout the school. Either the girls were not
interested in school or their parents felt unable to enable them to stay on
to complete the course until School Certificate at 16, because they lacked
money, and the girls had to go to work, often in low-paid jobs like
hairdressing or as shop assistants. In spite of the fact that I was one of
the less-well off, my parents were very anxious for me to complete the
course.
The first term in the Upper 4 d was very pleasant. The form mistress
was called Miss Heriot, a French name but she did not appear to be French.
She was sixty years of age, and quite chatty. She did not tease me as Miss
Nossen, the very large German lady had done. She also taught maths. I did
well in maths and was popular with her, and achieved a good end-of term
result. At Christmas 1941 I thought I had settled down well, and prepared
to enjoy another Christmas at Gordona.
1941 had been a worrying year. There were serious fears
that we might
lose the war. I remember my father saying early on that if Russia and
America both came into the war on our side, we would win. He thought that
eventually this would happen. He had a good grasp of current affairs and
afterwards told me that the had attended interesting lectures while in the
army. But I took little notice of his words and said to people
occasionally, "What will happen if we lose the war and the Germans come and
take over?" This was the unthinkable to all adults and I was told firmly
that it would not happen as we had right on our side. But I kept thinking
about it and worrying. But in 1941 Hitler marched into the Soviet Union and
suddenly the Russians were on our side. We had always known that the
Americans were helping us without declaring war by sending supplies but
before Christmas 1941 Pearl Harbour occurred and the Americans were also in
the war on our side. All this meant that we knew the tide was turning and
Christmas 1941 was more cheerful than Christmas 1940. It was probably the
best Christmas family gathering I had ever experienced, as my grandmother
was still vigorous and in good health, so that she did most of the
Christmas cooking and entertained as many relations as could be packed into
her house. Some relations would visit for a few days over the Christmas
period, coming in relays to keep all the vacant beds full.
For Christmas we had a very large chicken, or possibly two chickens.
Turkeys were almost unknown as far as ordinary families were concerned,
though some people had a goose or a duck. Meat was rationed; however
chickens in the country districts were excluded from the ration, being
obtained from local suppliers. They usually arrived with their feathers on,
and had to be plucked. The insides also had to be removed. Country women of
my grandmother's generation did not turn a hair on being confronted with
such work, which would faze me. I was never involved, and I don't think my
mother could deal with taking the inside from a chicken. We had become town
dwellers and had never kept up with country ways; in time my father learnt
how to get a good vegetable crop from the garden, and I was also involved
with this, but cleaning up chickens fresh from the free range of those days
was beyond us, and we never learnt how to make bread. My grandmother did
not make her own bread at this time, but many of the younger neighbours did
so. Gradually women gave this up as they obtained "war work" replacing men
as Land Army girls or working in munitions factories. It was fortunate for
my mother that she found a fairly light, pleasant, clean job at the apple
orchards.
The Christmas decorations stored for two or three years were taken out
of their boxes by John and myself, and we busied ourselves in a similar way
to the preceding Christmas. Time went all too quickly.
Uncle Bill (William Arthur Nevill Ruthen) is the person from the
Ruthen family picture that we hear the least of in Joan's
biography. He was born (Tendring)
on 24.6,1904. The
Wellcome Physiological Research Laboratories were in Beckenham,
"the southern suburb of London where he lived and worked".
Bill's future wife, Eileen Ivy Emma
Butler (born Camberwell, 12.3.1912), lived with her parents at 35 Bartram
Road, Lewisham in 1936. Her father (Arthur McGuiness Butler born 14.3.1879
in Holloway) was a shipping
clerk (1901/1911). Her mother, Ivy Florence Bradbook, born
born 24.5.1882, married Arthur at St Judes Church, Peckham on 27.8.1910.
35 Bartram
Road had been the family home since the early 1920s. They lived there with
Arthur's sister, Alice Emily Butler (born about 1876. Lived 35 Bartram
Road to 1931).
In the summer of 1939 Bill and Eileen married in Bromley, Kent. On
registration day 1939 Eileen "Ruthern" (housewife) and her mother Ivy F.
[Florence] Butler (born 24.5.1882) were living at 73 Queens Road,
Cuckfield, Sussex.
Daughter Jill S. Ruthen (mother's name Butler) born Bromley, Kent in the
spring of 1944. Son Peter L. Ruthen (mother's name Butler) born Bromley,
Kent in the
spring of 1948.
Ivy Florence Butler died in Bromley on 26.3.1956 and was cremated
in
Southwark on 29.3.1956.
Alice Emily Butler died in Bromley 13.4.1962 and was created in
Southwark on 19.4.1962.
1965: William A. Ruthen, Eileen Ruthen and Jill S. Ruthen (just 21) lived
at 2 Crescent Road, Bromley, Kent.
Arthur McGuiness Butler died, aged 94, on 6.5.1973. His address was
Larches, Mill Lane, Newdigate, Dorking, Surrey and he left £2,464.
Bill died in the Bournemouth area on
23.4.1974 and Eileen died in the same area in 1993. Jill lived at 32,
Wellesley Avenue, Christchurch, BH23 4SX about 2003. Peter lived in
Blackheath, South East London. They were the two
people named Ruthen notified of Joan's funeral in December 2008. Both were
in Joan's address book marked "cousin".
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This year [Christmas 1941] Uncle Bill
came to visit. He was a laboratory technician in charge of the "animal
house" at a well-known drug manufacturers and knew something about science.
When I said that I never ate salt, he remarked that extra sodium chloride
with meals was quite unnecessary, and I was pleased to have his backing, as
my fussy father was always trying to get me to take salt with meals. I was
so glad to chat with people like Uncle Bill, who I did not see often.
Likewise with Aunt Betty and Uncle Fred. One night I shared a bed with Aunt
Betty in grandmother's house and most of the night I spent coughing. "What
should I do to get rid of this cough?" I asked. "You would do better if you
opened the window." she replied. I did not believe her, but we opened the
window, and I was pleased that with the cool air flowing in, my cough
disappeared. Since then I have kept the window open at night in my bedroom,
even in winter; giving this up only when satisfied that the ventilation was
adequate without the window being open a crack.
Aunt Betty was a Christian Scientist. She like my mother had been
brought up in the Church of England, but had been helped by a Christian
Scientist lady when her life had been going badly, and subsequently adopted
this faith. My cousin John was brought up as a Christian Scientist and in
time became a reader in his Church, of which he remained a devoted member.
Unlike my friends in London from the keen Evangelical Protestant background
he did not discuss religion with me, or at least not very often. But we
were amateur philosophers and took a delight in talking about such
questions as "What is infinity?" to which we never found an answer. But we
could talk on this subject for some hours at bedtime. Somehow it was not a
subject for daytime discussion. But we talked through the wall of our
respective rooms and did not stop until we heard the adults coming to bed.
In the daytime we were more practical and talked about our Christmas
preparations or the gardening we often helped with at Gordona.
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Index
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