大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Pam Riding of Kirklees Libraries on behalf of Mrs Taylor and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.
Talk about a war had been going round for weeks amongst the grown-ups but it meant little to me. It was 1939 and I was nine years old and far too involved with my own life with my friends to bother much about adults鈥� conversation. But then came the day of 鈥楾he Broadcast鈥�. Mam and Dad had taken seats close to our sunray fronted radio and we children were all hushed into silence. Neville Chamberlain鈥檚 voice droned on, his words not registering for me. What did register though was that my parents鈥� faces were becoming more and more concerned as the speech went on. Mam particularly looked most anxious and unhappy. Dad spoke first. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 it then. We鈥檙e at war!鈥� he said and turned off the radio. A gloomy silence fell over us all as we realised that our country England was going to be fighting Germany, a country Mam鈥檚 brother had fought in the First World War. He had been killed.

It wasn鈥檛 too long before gas masks were issued to us all. Gas had been used by the Germans in the First World War and precautions had to be taken. I remember the awkwardness of fitting mine on and the smell of new rubber. It was claustrophobic within and the celluloid 鈥榲isor鈥� soon steamed up. We were told that we must get used to wearing it and keep practicing putting it on and this we did dutifully for a few days until the novelty wore off. We were also told that we must carry them with us if we were going out. A cardboard box with a long string was provided for the purpose. Babies had a special gas mask which covered the infant apart from the legs. My baby brother, Jeffrey, hated being inside his so much that he would go purple in the face with temper and Man would have to release him from his prison. She said that she didn鈥檛 know what on earth she would do with him if we did have a gas attack. She was sure he would have a fit to say the least.

Because Dad and my eldest brother, Len, were in the Territorials they were immediately called up for duty. This meant that the only two wage earners in the house were lost to Mam. There were five of us children left at home and another one was expected. The army pay was slow in coming through and as we were a poor family to start with, Mam suffered a lot of hardship and items were sold in order to buy food for us at this time.

Perhaps I should explain the Territorial Army and its role in Dad鈥檚 life. Dad liked Army life. He鈥檇 been in the First World War from 1914 having lied about his age to get in it. Belle Vue Barracks on Manningham Lane trained territorials in readiness to defend the country in times of war. They were called by some 鈥楽aturday Night Soldiers鈥� because that was when they trained after work. I believe there was a bar there for relaxation afterwards, or maybe they went to the nearby Belle Vue pub. They were also paid, and the combination appealed to Dad. He encouraged my brother to join and they鈥檇 go along to the barracks together. There was, however, a price to pay, as they both knew on joining. That price was that in the event of a war they would immediately be called to serve their country. Had Dad not been a Territorial he would not have been called up as he was thirty-nine. Neither would he have suffered with Mam when Len was at Dunkirk and could easily have been killed awaiting evacuation. I can remember Mam saying to Dad when he was on leave 鈥淚f anything happens to that lad, I鈥檒l never forgive you.鈥�

But going back to the early days of the war, we were soon being encouraged to evacuate; to leave Bradford (because being a big town it could face bombing), and moving into safer areas in the countryside. Mam had to face the dilemma of leaving her home and moving with her young children (because mothers with young children were evacuated) or staying and risking us all being killed in an air-raid. She decided it was better to be safe than sorry.

The children to be evacuated were assembled in the local school (Frizinghall), Mam with two under five children was to travel separately. I remember that Mam came to the classroom door to say 鈥榞oodbye鈥� and my seven year old brother, John, going over to kiss her. She waited for me but I felt embarrassed about this and stayed in my seat. We waved our goodbyes instead. Then we all boarded the bus to take us to Simonstone near Burnley in Lancashire. The bus was pretty full.

Arriving at the village we were all given a bar of Aero chocolate, a can of Carnation evaporated milk and a bar of Lux toilet soap. These, I imagine had been given by manufacturers and I was quite thrilled at having possessions of my own. I still had the milk and soap when I went back home, but the chocolate I was unable to resist eating. We were then all ushered into a hall of some kind where we were to be selected by our foster parents.

One by one the children with us went off into the evening. Quite a few people had wanted my brother to take home, but nobody wanted me. We stood there like a pair of orphans from the storm, except that we had gas masks slung around our necks and a big label pinned to our coats for identification. Finally, a couple of women stood before us and looked us up and down. There was an 鈥榦fficial鈥� with them. 鈥淭hey are brother and sister, and we don鈥檛 want to separate them,鈥� she said, on hearing that both women wanted a boy to be company for their sons. They each had an only child. The two women gazed at us further while John and I tried to work out what was happening to us. No one had told us anything and Mam was nowhere to be seen. She, with other mothers, had been taken elsewhere, I believe. Finally one of the women, a Mrs Rockley, said to her friend, 鈥淕o on then, I鈥檒l have the girl and you can have the boy鈥�. Soon after we were both with the women in their homes. They were neighbours living in a row of small cottages, three doors from one another.

Although I felt strange as I had little confidence in those days, so asked no questions, I loved being with Mrs Rockley. She was a kind and friendly lady and treated me very well. I also had a room of my own (something I鈥檇 never had before), and it was very well furnished compared with what I鈥檇 been used to. Unlike home, where food was wholesome but limited, here there were the luxuries of cakes and tinned fruit and salmon. Mrs Rockley had obviously had the money to be able to stock up when war was imminent and had a cupboard full of tinned goods, such as I had never seen before. Mrs Rockley also used linen tablecloths whereas at home I had been used to only 鈥楢merican cloth鈥�, which could be wiped over after use.

Mrs Rockley鈥檚 son however wasn鈥檛 keen on me, but didn鈥檛 say so. When he got the chance he was out with his friends (at my brother鈥檚 billet). He was about my age and I remember his father encouraging him to play a board game with me, but that was really the only contact I had with him. But my brother was nearby and although he usually was with local lads, they let me tag on. I don鈥檛 remember any girls on that row and though I was a bit lonely in the main I was happy with the arrangement.

The only thing I didn鈥檛 care for at the time was the toilet arrangements. Back home we had an outside toilet and it was the same here but this one was without water for flushing. The lavatory building was at the bottom of the yard. Inside was a wooden seat that stretched from wall to wall. In the seat were two holes to sit over (probably a good arrangement if you had children) and on looking down either there could be seen previous deposits. I wondered what happened to these and found out one day when men with a vehicle came and cleaned them out. I bet there were no queues for that job!

But everything else about Simonstone I liked, even the small school where I felt like a foreigner when the village kids stared at me. As my brother was at the same school I knew we could be together at playtimes and then I wouldn鈥檛 care about them. And of course I loved being in the country. When we weren鈥檛 at school we could play out freely in the lanes. It must have been Autumn because I remember kicking piles of tinted leaves as we walked along, and of course, throwing them at each other. Here too, I also saw my first red squirrel quite closely, as it sat on a wall eating an acorn. That really did delight me as did the farm close by with its dairy herd. It could have been from this farm that a young man treated us to rides to school in his van. He was a bit of a mad man and enjoyed driving along with his hands off the wheel to scare us. He would wait until the last moment before replacing them as we approached a bend and only then, when he had made us scream.

Petrol could have been rationed as early as then because there were very few cars on the road. Back in Frizinghall we often played on the road without fear. The main Bradford/Keighley road was different, of course but still not too busy to cross by ourselves. In those days I didn鈥檛 know of one person living near that owned a car. I did see a convoy of Army vehicles on the main road now and again with soldiers waving to us as they passed by.

Simonstone village was very quiet though, being well off the beaten track, I suppose. Most evenings John and I would walk down the lane to visit Mam and sister Audrey and brother Maurice. They too were billeted in a cottage, but with an elderly couple. This couple had probably agreed to take evacuees for the money it would give them. They certainly didn鈥檛 seem to like children when we visited. We were not allowed to walk on their carpet and had to go round to their back door, and I can鈥檛 remember either of them saying much to us. Mam wasn鈥檛 happy with them and said she felt she wasn鈥檛 really wanted. It could have been that the couple hadn鈥檛 wanted young children. Or maybe they had just wanted the money it would bring them. I don鈥檛 know, but anyway, they were not to have Mam and her youngsters to put up with for long as it happened.

One day Mam was hanging out washing when she heard two neighbours talking. They were discussing my brother John who seemingly had wet his bed, and this had upset his foster mother enough for her to complain about it to other villagers. I should write here that at home John, who was seven never wet his bed, and like many (I was to read years later) was traumatised by evacuation and affected in this way.

Although we were poor, Mam did have a lot of pride. She was so put out by neighbours gossiping about John that, there and then, she decided to take us all back home. When Mam told me I was upset too, but for different reasons. I did not want to go back home, much preferring the life I had with the Rockleys. Mam therefore said that I could stay and then, later, whenever I wanted to I could go home by myself on the train. The thought of this horrified me as I was quite frightened of trains with their hissing and thunderous noise. I was also afraid of getting lost on route. What if I went past the station? How would I know which train, if I had to change? Travelling alone, held me in such fear that I said that I wanted to return home with the others. To this day I don鈥檛 know if I made the right decision. If I鈥檇 stayed for the duration of the war I鈥檇 have been fifteen and a very changed person, I鈥檓 sure. Would my own family have been as precious to me or would they have become almost strangers? Many did stay with foster parents for the whole of the war. I鈥檓 sure that they must have emerged as very different people with different ideas and values.

I can鈥檛 remember the arrival back home at all. We lived in Highfield Road, but we were soon to move to Salisbury Road and into a bigger house that Mam rented at ten shillings a week. Brother Frank came back to see us because during the TWO WEEKS we had been evacuated he had been living with an aunt in Dewsbury. This was because he was at Hanson High School and doing well and Mam didn鈥檛 want his education to be interrupted.
I think the school at Frizinghall must have closed when so many children had left for the country. I remember having lessons in my schoolteacher鈥檚 house. Miss Towne lived in one of the big houses on Bradford Road and I thought it was a treat to be somewhere so posh! We were all squashed into one room and seated on the floor. I think that I must have been more interested in the room than the lessons as none of it has stayed with me!

Mam was still suffering from lack of money and although proud, decided to apply for free school meals to make sure we were being properly fed at least once a day. These really were a blessing to us apart from one thing. That was that the teacher humiliated us few who received them by giving out the dinner tickets daily from her desk after calling out, 鈥淔irst the free tickets鈥� so that every one knew of our poverty. I had classmates who were quite well-off and the last thing I wanted was to be thought of as their inferiors, which is what this act did.

There were no meals served at Frizinhall School in those days. We had half a mile walk to Bolton Woods School to obtain our free meal. The conditions were somewhat Dickensian with long trestle tables and benches for seating. After quickly gabbling 鈥楪race鈥� we would scramble over the benches and greedily eat, for usually we were starving. Previously we had queued at the front where the caretaker had sloshed out our meal from a big churn with a ladle. It was often stew (and I did once find a pebble in mine), or if not, something like fish pie or sausages served from big flat dishes. We always knew it would be fish on Fridays because of Catholics not eating meat on that day. But no matter what it was, we ate the lot. I don鈥檛 remember any faddy appetites in those days. We were glad of anything we got! The dessert would be rice pudding or a boiled pudding like treacle, jam or spotted dick (currant), and these I could have eaten forever. As soon as you had cleaned your plate you could go out for seconds if there was food left over. This encouraged fast eating I鈥檓 afraid, and I was usually there not only for seconds but thirds and fourths if it was a favourite of mine. I can remember having thirds of both courses one day. The caretaker in his butcher鈥檚 apron never commented as he kept refilling my plate. Usually after dinner we ran down the road back to school but I think that I walked
that day!

Running back to school was not because we liked school (although I must say that I did) but because of our rivals with their gangs. 鈥楾he Bolly Wooders鈥� (Bolton Wooders) didn鈥檛 care for us invading their territory and they were a rough lot. They would thump us if caught or throw things at us. As there were more of them than us we found it more prudent to run!

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