大象传媒

My tracheitis illness kept me from school for about a month. By the time I was in shape to walk around, the three week Easter holiday had begun so I was shipped off North to my mother鈥檚 parents, my Gardner grandparents who lived in the small village of Humshaugh (pronounced 鈥渉umshalf鈥�) on the North Tyne River in Northumberland. I had last been there several years earlier and before the war. It was a new world to me and I wandered about exploring the countryside. The house was the first of a row of six of a terrace built at right angles to the road. Toilets were of the 鈥榙ry鈥� variety built of huge limestone blocks in a row parallel to the houses. These toilets had to be mucked out periodically. The only water for the whole row consisted of a tap just outside my grandparents鈥� back door.

A washhouse next to the tap was available for the tenants each of whom had a set time on a set day each week. Washing on Sundays was not allowed. On her allotted washday, my grandmother would have filled the copper boiler the night before with cold water drawn from the tap and laid the coal fire ready for the morning.

On washday itself, she would be up at five to get the fire started so the water would be boiling after breakfast. Clothes would be washed on a scrubbing board then wrung out through a great mangle, or wringer, which I would turn when I was there. Groceries would be bought at the village shop and then lugged up the hill to the house in a basket. All cooking was done on the coal range in the kitchen that had to be lit every morning before we had breakfast or could even have a cup of tea.
A great holly tree grew between the end of the houses and the road. All the men from the 鈥渢errace鈥� would pause by it to urinate. Such was the peaceful village life my grandparents chose to retire to. To me it was a great adventure but to them it must have become a progressively worse imposition.

My grandfather passed the time hauling coal, splitting and stacking wood (a task he delegated to me whenever I arrived) and tending a great patch of raspberries. He also helped with the dishes. For the rest of the time he sat by the fire smoking his pipe and listening to the radio. He was exceedingly deaf by this time but refused to even try any form of the rudimentary hearing aids that were just coming into use. The only way he could hear the news was with the radio turned to top volume that deafened everyone else in the room. I used to go to the adjoining sitting room (which my grandmother always referred to as 鈥榯he room鈥�) where I would sit in the cold listening for the end of the news programme.

Each of the three bedrooms upstairs was equipped with a washstand where we washed each morning. The clean water had to be carried upstairs of course and the dirty water, along with the contents of the chamber pots, carried down.

My grandparents slept on a feather mattress that had to be turned and pounded every morning. My grandfather believed 鈥渘ight air is not good for you鈥� so the window in his room was never opened. The subtle blend of stale sweat, urine and lavender was quite memorable but the old folks did not seem to notice.

I spent quite a bit of time up at Greens鈥� Farm that was worked by brothers Willie and Jimmy Green. Their old father was in the early stages of senility. My grandmother鈥檚 friend, Miss Landers, looked after these three men.. Although she was always referred to as their housekeeper, she actually lived with Jimmy. In those days, this sort of arrangement was not talked about. The old father was supposed not to know and it was not until years later that I learned the true nature of the relationship.

Old Mr. Green was quite a handful as he insisted on touring the farm in a horse and trap with the boys every evening after tea. He was adamant that no motor vehicle be used on the farm and thought the boys worked the place entirely with horses in the time-honoured manner. Each afternoon before the sons came in for tea, the tractor was carefully hidden behind the cowshed away from the old man鈥檚 view. Both boys were very kind and let me sit for hours on the tractor while they did their spring ploughing.

The Green boys recounted some great run-ins with the local advisers of the County War Agricultural Executive Committee who had tried to advise the brothers on improved farming practices. One such exchange reached the point where Willie informed his adviser that after the war he, Willie, 鈥渨ould still be on the farm doing things his way while the adviser would be back where he was before the war鈥�. 鈥淎nd where was that?鈥� the adviser asked. 鈥淲hy, back on Grangers Street (the main thoroughfare in Newcastle) shovelling up the horse shit鈥� responded Willie. The story caused great merriment and went through the village like wildfire.

When the Greens killed a pig, Miss Landers showed up with a gift of the various sausages she had made from the offal and blood. These products were all new to me and I enjoyed them very much. These were the days before anybody had heard of cholesterol and we feasted on blood sausage and bacon with lots of drippings (fat) without a thought for our health. It all tasted good. Our diet generally was low in fat.

The village butcher killed animals to supply meat for local consumption. He would starve the beasts for several days beforehand and we would hear them crying out and bellowing by the hour. Once the noise stopped, we knew there would be fresh meat in the shop.

A single woman called Harriet Wragg lived a few doors away. Once a week she would bake bread for whoever of the neighbours wanted it. I would go down to help stir the dough in her kitchen. I would bring home bread for the week and a teacake stuffed with sultanas in, which I took particular delight, especially when spread with the white butter Miss Launders used to make. My mouth waters at the thought even now.
Each day, two trains, each consisting of two carriages, steamed each way through the station a mile and a half away but carried few passengers because the buses charged half the train fare and traveled the same route.

Great aunt Mary, who was my grandfather鈥檚 sister, was a prim, retired schoolteacher who always maintained buses made her ill. She would always arrive by train in solitary splendour. We were honour bound to walk to and from the train for each visit both to meet her and see her off on her return. Aunt Mary delighted in giving everyone jobs. Mine was to remember to remind her not to forget her umbrella.

Two bus lines served the village - Moffats (blue) bus, which went to Hexham, the market town, and Foster鈥檚 (orange) bus, which went to Newcastle. Arrivals of these buses were often the most important event of the day for most villagers. Everyone liked to know who had arrived and left on the bus. Apart from these, there was not a great deal of movement.
We arrived by train on the few occasions we travelled by that means from London to Newcastle because the onward journey to Humshaugh was at virtually no extra cost. Our luggage would be brought by handcart the mile and a half to the house by Willie Herdman the local odd-job man.
Willie also cleaned out the 鈥渘ight soil鈥� from the outside toilet (using the same hand cart) when the need arose and fired his shotgun up the chimney of my grandparent鈥檚 sitting room each spring to get rid of the nesting jackdaws that interrupted the flow of the smoke from the fireplace on the rare occasion that it was lit.

Willie was my idol. He would reach into the dry stonewalls surrounding the fields and bring out a live rabbit which he would then kill with a blow to the neck. He would then teach me how to gut the animal, using my penknife, before sending me home to deliver the meat to my grandmother. When it came to killing and cleaning the rabbits I kept in our back garden later in the war, I knew how to conduct the tasks from watching Willie.
At that time the whole countryside was overrun with rabbits. When out walking with my grandfather, he would stop at a field gate and clap his hands loudly just so we could watch the rabbits run to their burrows. At harvest time the men of the village would turn out with sticks to kill the rabbits as they fled from the ever diminishing island of standing wheat left ahead of the reaper as it spiralled around just before harvesting the field was complete. All these practises, and the role of rabbit in people鈥檚 diet, ceased in the early fifties when South American disease of myxomatosis was introduced with fatal effect on the rabbit population. By then, I would have left the country.

Great interest was aroused one day in the village when a long line of soldiers came through on what was evidently a gruelling route march. It was all some of them could do to put one foot in front of the other. When they stopped for a rest outside the 鈥淭errace鈥�, the women took out tea but it was not long before the sergeants were running along the line blowing whistles to alert the men to fall back into line. Nobody seemed to know where the soldiers came from or where they were going. To ask would have been inappropriate. We were continuously being cautioned about the importance of security by advertisements such as 鈥淏e like Dad, keep Mum鈥� so it was considered patriotic not to be inquisitive.
I would accompany my grandmother to church on Sundays. She would give me a small, silver three-penny piece for the collection and slip peppermints to me during the sermon. A retired colonel who was said to be much more generous to the church than we were, sang both loudly and out of tune at every service. His generosity was such that the vicar agreed with his request that every service should end with the congregation singing 鈥淕od save the King鈥�. Our colonel rendered this with great patriotic gusto in tones just as bad as he used for hymns.

Our entertainment at home was necessarily simple and revolved around the cinema and the radio. Both ran news programmes that we listened to eagerly despite the obvious propaganda. At the cinema the operator would flash a message on the screen when the air raid sirens sounded but nobody took any notice. We had adjusted to air raids. The radio broadcast a whole range of programmes which none of us missed. They provided all the humour in our lives. One widely popular show was on Thursday nights and called ITMA - standing for 鈥淚t鈥檚 That Man Again鈥�.

I honestly believe the British war effort stopped every Thursday evening for the half hour the show occupied. The writer and star was a Tommy Handley. There was no plot, just a series of skits with characters each having a stock phrase - Mrs. Mopp the cleaning lady with her 鈥渃an I do you now sir?鈥�, a deep lugubrious voice which came up with 鈥渄on鈥檛 forget the diver鈥�, the alcoholic Colonel Chinstrap who turned every phrase into an acceptance of a drink with his 鈥淚 don鈥檛 mind if I do鈥� became stock phrases on everyone鈥檚 lips and part of the language of a whole generation. George Gorge would pop up with 鈥渓ovely grub鈥� which in those austere times caught many an imagination. Shortly after the end of the war, Handley died suddenly of a heart attack between shows and ITMA ended. It seems he did most of it himself.

The plays broadcast every Saturday night were a source of pleasure. Also there was 鈥淪aturday Music Hall鈥� with comp猫re Jack Warner whose common role, both on radio and on film was that of a policeman. He would supposedly wheel his bicycle through the audience admonishing them to 鈥渕ind my bike鈥�, another phrase that was widely used. Another expression of his that popular was 鈥渆vening all鈥�.

Each morning my father would turn the radio on at 6:30 in the back room where I slept with my parents. He would get up and make my mother a cup of tea. Until that arrived my mother and I would lie in our respective beds listening to 鈥渢he Morning Exercises鈥� which were broadcast every morning by two very enthusiastic people. Neither of us ever stirred. At the end of that, her tea finished, my mother would get up to use the bathroom while I would lie in bed listening to the news in Norwegian which occupied the remaining fifteen minute until the English news at seven. This news was preceded each day by a remarkable piece of music played part of the time with drum sticks on a base fiddle and a singer who sang 鈥淭he big noise blew in from Winetka and he blew right out again鈥�. None of us knew where Winetka could be but assumed rightly that it was somewhere in the United States. When the tune finished, it was my time to get up. My father and I would listen to the news and then the bathroom would be free for me. Both parents would be out of the house by eight and I would leave half an hour later after feeding my rabbits and doing the dishes.

In December 1942, the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbour brought the U.S. into the war. On the Home Front as it was called, the first noticeable effect was an improvement in the quality of food that I presume resulted from greater numbers of ships available to defend the shipping convoys. Things generally began to improve early in 1943. Even if the food was strange, at least we got it. The Germans had started a disastrous campaign in the Russian winter ignoring the experience of Napoleon who tried the same thing. The British efforts in the Western Desert of North Africa were beginning to show progress.

Perhaps the greatest reason for this improvement in successes, which we were not to learn for several decades after the war, was that the Allies had managed to solve both Japanese and German coded messages.
The streets of London became crowded with soldiers from all over the world. Observing Americans became a pass time we all indulged in. They were different from the other foreigners we had become accustomed to as they spoke English and there were so many of them. On a rare trip to London I encountered a group of airmen from Brazil. We did not even know that country had declared war.

All the boys I knew had their collection of bits of shrapnel, be they from anti-aircraft guns or enemy bombs, bits of parachute and aeroplane fragments and such. The most sought after were cartridge cases from machine guns, and, best of all, live ones. These ultimate of prizes could only be obtained by crawling under the fence of the firing range at an aerodrome. The British cartridges measured only 0.303 inches in diameter while the U.S. ones were a full half-inch. These were the more desirable as they were big enough to be made into cigarette lighters by the commercially inclined.
You could always convert a live cartridge into an empty case by firing the bullet. All you had to do was cinch the cartridge in a vice and hit the detonator using a nail and hammer. This was a risky method as your fingers tended to get in the way of flying objects as one or two classmates found to their detriment. The missing joints on their fingers were admired in the same way I suppose duelling scars were admired by German students of a bygone age.

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