大象传媒

52a - John Edkins was born in in Birmingham in 1924:
When the war started we lived in Wilmcote. I would rather like to go back to 1938 when for a short time my folks lived in Studley, and the time I left school, and I started work in Redditch. I went to a little company called Edward White and Sons, they were very old established engineers and I went there in August 1938 and I stayed there about two months, 鈥榗os I went there on trial to be an apprentice. But I鈥檒l just go for a month, but at the end of the month my parents were considering coming back to Wilmcote again, so I stayed another month really and I stayed there two months without any pay, but it鈥檚 interesting because at that time the war was looming, at that time it was looming. You mentioned 鈥�, that would be about the year of your birth wouldn鈥檛 it?

Neville Usher: Yes, 鈥�38.

John Edkins: Edward White and Sons, there was the old founder, Edward White, and his son George White and his grandson Young Edward White. Edward White was a white bearded man, you know, a typical old engineer, and George White he was a practical man on the shop floor. He did the office work, but when he finished his office work he would go in on the shop floor and do some work on a machine or something. Young Edward White was a real tearaway, he was amongst the jet set at the time. One or two things that are very interesting: one was, George White the second one was very much in the local war preparations you know, A.R.P. and that sort of thing, and they were starting to deliver the gas masks. And the gas masks were delivered in 3 pieces; there was a container, the face piece, and a rubber band that went round the centre. Well it was a job to get those masks over this container, and Whites being inventive type people, I know they made a little machine, it was a sort of number of fingers, vertical with a lever, and you put the mask on and pushed the lever down, and all the fingers opened up, and you dropped the container in, and then loosed it off, and pulled down with the container on, and we put the elastic band round.
And of course Whites made machinery, principally for the wire working, for needles, pins, fish hooks, and wire processes generally; if somebody wanted, you know, a million hooks they would make a machine to make them and so on. But one of the machines they did was a wire crimping machine, that鈥檚 bending wire and from that crimped wire (they didn鈥檛, but other people), made just thousands and thousands of stretchers with crimped wire bases 鈥榗os timber and that was difficult.
We moved to Wilmcote and then I got a job at Josephs. They were just starting up a section for aircraft component production, so I went there and at Josephs they weren鈥檛 ready for these boys to into this aircraft department, so they gave me a job on the hollowware section making teapot strainers, and these teapot strainers, to make them, there was 4陆d. per gross; there were 3 operations, you had got three halfpence per gross (on flypresses) but by working carefully during the week I could make about 17/6d. a week which was a fantastic wage for a boy of 14 at that time. And I only did it for a few weeks, and at the same time they were in there, they were making tails for incendiary bombs, they were making these mess tins for the army, and all sorts of things at that time, you know all war preparations.

And I went into the aircraft section for the last few weeks I was there, and I was with a sheet metal worker, they were making the aircraft cowls for a fighter, I think it was a Gloucester fighter but I won鈥檛 be sure. One side was a smooth side, and the other side had got a chute in for a machine gun which fired through the propellers. I just held the end of this metal while the skilled sheet metal worker riveted and so on. Well I was bored to tears with that, it wasn鈥檛 my scene.
Well my mother at Wilmcote had a friend, a certain Mrs. Palmer. She must have told Mrs. Palmer I wasn鈥檛 very happy there, it wasn鈥檛 creative enough for me, she said I will have a word with my cousin who happened to be a Mr. Palmer who was the Chairman and Managing Director of Eagle Engineering in Warwick. He wrote to Mrs. Palmer and said they hadn鈥檛 got anything in the drawing office which is what I wanted to do, but if I went and saw the works manager he may fix me up with something. I went and saw the Works Manager a certain Mr. Collier, and he gave me (and afterwards I was very surprised), because about 3 weeks before they had dismissed a lot of boys, you know they hadn鈥檛 got work for them, and I went and worked in Mr. Collier鈥檚 office, the works manager.
And I did very well there, I worked there for 30 years. I did all sorts of things, always had a roving commission there right from a boy really. All sorts of things. But of course I was there all through the war.

Neville Usher: Because presumably they were on essential war work?

John Edkins: Yes. They were building trailers, and they had the first order for trailers from the Air Ministry in May in May 1939. Incidentally I started there in March 1939 which was just exactly six months before the war started.

And so I was there all through the war. I travelled from Wilmcote to Warwick on the train, the first train went out of Stratford at 7 o鈥檆lock, and at Wilmcote at 7.06, and of course in those days we worked five and a half days a week. It was rather interesting when I started there, I started there for 10/- a week, my fare on the train was 10 1/2d. a day so that I paid 5/3d. per week in train fares, so I had 4/9d. left, so my mother didn鈥檛 get very fat out of me. By the time she gave me a bit of pocket money out of what was left鈥�

Neville Usher: How many people worked there during the war?

John Edkins: I would say that all up, there would be 250, yes about that size, probably a staff of 40 and the rest would be shop floor workers. Some of our skilled men went, of a suitable age, and of course there was a big influx of people from round the Warwick area, they came you know out from Moreton Morrell, out that area, a lot of them had been estate workers, you know, grooms and so on, but we were on trailers and we got them in fairly big quantities, I mean we would get orders for trailers 500 at a time, well you broke it down to quite a simple assembly job, and we could get unskilled labour to do that.

I personally, when I was about 16, I dealt with all the military or government spares, supplying spares, we supplied a lot of spares, an awful lot of spares that I dealt with. And the day I was 17, the day I was 17, I went up to Northgate Street, Warwick to a taxation office and got a driving licence, and back to the works - I had to wait till 9 o鈥檆lock till the taxation office opened, and got a driving licence, back to the works, I jumped in a little Ford truck they鈥檇 got, and I drove on my own to Stafford!

Neville Usher: With no driving test in those days?

John Edkins: No driving test or anything. I mean I worked amongst vehicles all the time, and no driving test, I went to Stafford because a lot of spares had gone there and they鈥檇 got them stuck. And I had to see a sergeant there, he turned out to be a big black man about six foot six inches tall, he was a huge man.

Neville Usher: Very unusual in those days, a black man in England.

John Edkins: Oh yes, that鈥檚 one of the things, I was surprised. I think he must have been you know from one of the Commonwealth countries like. And I told him what these spares were, he was most difficult, what proof had I got that this was this; I was so familiar with all these. The studs had got left hand threads on a right hand thread, and so that鈥檚 part of the so and so. What鈥檚 the difference? I said one鈥檚 got a left hand thread and one鈥檚 got a right. How do you know? Well hold it up and look which way the thread goes you know. Oh he was most difficult, but anyway he accepted, 鈥榗os I took nothing with me, no drawings or 鈥� And so that was rather interesting.

And oh, of course you mentioned about secret things and that. Of course we built special trailers at times for all sorts of purposes, for sometimes only a prototype and of course they were dealt with by the 鈥渨heeled vehicle experimental establishment鈥� which was a government department down by Farnborough somewhere, I just don鈥檛 know, Chobham probably. And I remember one brand new Bedford lorry coming to the works on solid tyres and wooden wheels and spring spokes, so it had only got a very small amount of rubber on as a tread, 鈥榗os rubber was at a terrific premium during the war, it was an experiment, and the vehicle was also running entirely on vegetable oil.

Neville Usher: And now we鈥檙e trying to make things run on vegetable oil, 80 years afterwards.

John Edkins: Yes. It was quite interesting, and as I say I always had a roving sort of job, nobody to nail me down to ...

Neville Usher: To a job specification?

John Edkins: Exactly, I did all sorts of things. Including, I did a lot of work on some trailers that made the crossing of the Rhine possible for launching the pontoons and recovering the pontoons. But that was the work aspect, when I got home I was in the local Home Guard, at Wilmcote, and we used to do our training round the district and we used to have to do some guard duty which in case of Wilmcote, we did on Borden Hill. Up on the top of Borden Hill was an old living van you know, the sort you would often pull behind a steam roller, so we had got a stove in there, and of course there was lots and lots of fun, as well as 鈥�, because we had got one fellow who was an absolute 鈥�, two or three of them were good at getting rabbits and when they got up there, they鈥檇 set a lot of wires and catch some rabbits, all sorts of things.

Neville Usher: And as well as you in a job, there must have been a lot of old men in there as well?

John Edkins: Oh yes, well it was the older men that were skilled at getting the rabbits.

Neville Usher: Did you ever have to do any 鈥�, put any fires out or get involved?

John Edkins: No, no, I don鈥檛 know that we ever had any incidents, no not an incident. But wonderful comradeship amongst them all in the district, and I think we got quite professional after a while, doing what soldiers have to do, although we must have looked a motley lot at the start.
And also in those days I went to night school in Stratford here, which is next to the Library.

Neville Usher: And what were you studying?

John Edkins: I was studying engineering. And Mr. Robert Hudd was the principal, and the instructors or teachers, whatever you like, were well known local people. There was John Leeson, I don鈥檛 know whether you have heard of him, he eventually acquired Glovers, or rather Archers the one on the corner of Arden Street, but prior to that he had been a craft teacher, he used to teach woodwork at the Grammar School and many other schools in the district, he taught me woodwork when I was at school. And there was a follow named Stein from Aston Cantlow, he was a very good engineer, you know training. We also had an admiralty inspector, and admiralty inspectors were wonderful people, so Stratford here had some wonderful instructors.

Neville Usher: How did the Admiralty inspector come to be in Stratford I wonder?

John Edkins: Well I would say that he was working probably in the Midlands, and lived somewhere 鈥�, I don鈥檛 know whether he lived in Stratford but he was working in the Midlands. I got to know some of the Admiralty inspectors, because they came to Eagle to inspect vehicles we were making for the Admiralty.

But going back on this, I have got some rather amusing things that I have jotted down, and I go back to when I started at Edward White and Sons, and one of the jobs 鈥�, I mention here, I鈥檒l read it just as I鈥檝e got it down:-
鈥淎fter I started in Redditch, the scene in Europe was ugly, and war was looming. Preparations were being made. I joined N. C. Joseph (I have over-run my story a bit here, I am getting confused).
After leaving school I returned home to Studley and obtained a place with Edward White and Sons of Windsor Street Redditch. Spent about 2 months there on trial without pay, prior to becoming an apprentice. Parents decided to return to Wilmcote, and I went with them although I had been accepted by Whites for apprenticeship.
Whilst my time at Whites was only a few weeks, there is no doubt that I obtained the basis of practical engineering. The men were very helpful, and ever ready to show and explain the various operations. I learnt how to do elementary machining tests, including drilling and tapping, shaping, marking out, and of course much more to assisting skilled machinists and fitters.
On arriving, and on a lighter note, I remember one of my daily jobs was to make the tea. This meant making a fire on the blacksmith鈥檚 hearth, then going round the shop and collecting the men鈥檚 cans and tea and sugar and so on. The cans varied from proper enamel billy cans with lids, tea pots, or just cocoa tins with a wire handle. The cans had to be washed out and filled with water, then placed on the fire. As the cans boiled the tea was put in, this was sometimes just leaf tea or a mixture of tea and sugar; sometimes tea and sugar and evaporated milk in newspaper, which had to be scraped off into the cans which you did with your rule! It was a job to remember which tea went into which can, and woe betide you if you made a mistake. One day, early in my tea making, Old George Finch, 鈥渙ld鈥� because he also had a son there who was Young George Finch, told me to bank up the fire as he wanted to use it later. He placed a large pot on the fire which contained a white substance which went on heating whilst he threaded a number of parts on wires and suspended them in the pot, the contents of which had now become a liquid state. From time to time he took the items out, and immersed them in water, other items were heated in the fire and quenched in oil and sometimes in an air blast. Being curious, I enquired what he was doing, he told me that he was heat treating and the solution in the pot was cyanide! The parts that were being heated in cyanide were being case hardened, whilst those parts which were being heated and immersed in oil were being tempered. Next day when I went to make the tea, fire, I noticed the whole of the interior of the canopy over the fire was covered in white dust. I mentioned this to one of the workmen who said oh, it鈥檚 all right; needless to say that after that in view of the amount of dust that was falling into the cans, I did not have another cup of tea and drank water only, until I left! The cyanide which was dropping into the tea cans, nobody seemed to worry about.

Neville Usher: They weren鈥檛 dying like flies?

John Edkins: No they weren鈥檛 no, they were old men they had done it all their lives.

(concluded in Part Two)

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