大象传媒

When the war broke out I was 12 years of age. I started at the shipyard in early August 1941, when I left school. Just previous to me starting they built 2 corvettes for the Royal Navy. Through the war it was all naval stuff. They call them military class trawlers. They went on as minesweepers and layers and various functions for the Royal Navy but they were built as trawlers so they could be converted back after the war was over. Just previous to D-day we built 2 large tank landing craft but that threw things into disarray because we were used to producing trawlers.

It was all hand stuff during the war. There was only one hand crane on the jetty side and all the steel work was lifted up with pole derricks and hand windlasses. It took maybe 2 or more men on a hand windlass and 2 on a hand crane.

It was good to watch when they pulled the frames out of the furnaces, 鈥榗os it was like the royal naval gun team on the Tattoo when they were all racing about doing different things. This was just the same, they pulled this red hot bar out and every man knew his function and they dragged it round and pinned it down and eventually it ended up to the right shape of the set.

Up to me starting, when there was an air raid there were big shelters at the shipyard, but as I started nobody bothered. There were alarm bells with a light on and if they started then you were supposed to try and take cover, but generally if you were working on a ship you thought, well where can I get?

There were accidents, somebody would lose a leg or an eye. We didn鈥檛 have protective clothing and the sound was deafening. All they did was put a bit of cotton wool in your ears. There were people who used the oxyacetylene burners who wore goggles, and the welders had a mask but generally you didn鈥檛 have anything like that.

There wasn鈥檛 really much bombing activity on the shipyard. It was camouflaged, there was a chimney that was camouflaged, and all the buildings and vehicles were painted in various shapes in green and black. But of course Beverley didn鈥檛 get much trouble. There was a bit of machine-gunning by aircraft, I think they were attacking Leconfield and just thought they鈥檇 shoot Beverley up a bit on their way out.

When I was 14 I was a firewatcher and you just got an armband with FW on, but later on when you joined Civil Defence you got a blue battledress and tin hat and so. When the siren went you had to stand by at your post until the all clear went. If there had been bombing I would have just had to do as instructed.

Up to my brother going into the air force he was a spotter, and he and the foreman joiner would go into a spotting tower above the admiralty stores, near what鈥檚 left of the general office. When the alarm went they went up there with their binoculars and if there was anything that looked a bit dodgy they switched the alarm on and everybody knew. I remember the men saying just before I started when the Germans bombed Driffield they could see the activity off the ships. They were that high up they could see the planes.

I can remember working odd times at nights. There was a ship came into Hull and it had hit a mine and they had to shape some frames in a rush, so we worked all weekend to get that ready. But there wasn鈥檛 the lighting, you couldn鈥檛 have lights outside, although maybe in the summer when it was lighter the men worked after tea and such. But in winter, the riveters had to douse the hotting fires they used for heating the rivets before the blackout.

My father wasn鈥檛 much of a vegetable-grower. A lot of people did, a lot kept a pig where they had the facilities to do it. Fruit and such as that, like bananas and oranges we didn鈥檛 see them until after the war was over. Fish and chips was a staple thing, there was no shortage. At the beginning of the war there was a bit of a lull but after that they carried on going out and fetching fish in just the same.

The cinemas were open all the time. Then there were some quite good shows, concerts at the Regal in Beverley. They got national figures, dance bands and that type of thing. I went to night school for shipbuilding in Hull 鈥� we had a pass so we鈥檇 maybe go to the cinema or there was the Tivoli Theatre and we鈥檇 go to the music hall there in those days. We started smoking and going for a pint to be like the men.

The troops from other countries were welcomed mainly. There was lots of different regiments, Manchester Regiment, Cameron Highlanders, Parachute Regiment, Canadians, Polish forces, Free French just prior to D-Day, General Leclerc鈥檚 division. There was an influx of young men and it was quite lively. When the Cameron Highlanders were here it was good in St Nicholas Church Hall there was highland dancing and it was a good night in there. They used to invite local people.

Another thing that is relevant to today is identity cards which you had to carry everywhere with you. 鈥� We never really thought it an infringement of civil liberties, it was just one of those things. But in those days people were more inclined to toe the line, nowadays you question everything.

I joined the Civil Defence as a messenger boy, some lads went into the Air Training Corps, some went into army cadets, but you had to do something.

Whenever the siren went I had to turn out and report to the warden鈥檚 post that you鈥檇 been allocated to. Mine was at the corner of Swinemoor Lane and Grovehill Road. There were several wardens, male and female, a head warden and one or two messengers, boys or girls with a bicycle at the ready in case you were needed.

The only time I really had to do anything like that it wasn鈥檛 an emergency it was a really big exercise in Beverley where all the troops and everything that was stationed there took part. I remember I had to cycle from down there with this message to St Mary鈥檚 Manor which was the headquarters for this sort of a do. There was one or two of the top brasses with their red flashes, and I can鈥檛 have been shot 鈥檆os I got away all right and nobody said lay down or anything.

When there was machine-gunning, my brother was aeroplane mad and he went down the street to see what they were and he鈥檇 shout 鈥淭hey鈥檙e Heinkel 111s鈥� and I remember this warden running and holding his tin hat on shouting 鈥淭ake Cover!鈥�. I suppose it was sound sense like. But to lads really it was sort of an adventure and you didn鈥檛 see the serious side until people you knew started getting killed. Both my brothers didn鈥檛 survive the war, one went in 鈥�43 and one went in 鈥�44, but up to that it was a bit adventurous.

We got issued with gas masks at school early on in the war, and rotten things they were. You got them in a cardboard box and had to put them on at various times, but whether they would have been any good I don鈥檛 know really. Eventually you started to get little cases for them, mine was a round tin, and you had to carry them everywhere with you, but when I went in the Civil Defence I got a better one, a bit more substantial.

I didn鈥檛 really choose to go in the shipyard. 鈥� We had a tradition of seagoing in my family 鈥� but my father wouldn鈥檛 sign for me to go to nautical school 鈥� he鈥檇 lost his father and brother in the first world war trawling. 鈥� I went in and said to my father I鈥檝e got a job as an electrician, and he said 鈥渘o you haven鈥檛 you鈥檙e going to the shipyard鈥�, and that was that.

I was never called up. Some of the apprentices were called up as they finished their time 鈥� but when I went to sign up for the Navy they found I was deferred and wouldn鈥檛 take me. At deferment time the apprentices had to go in the office and sign, but some of us wouldn鈥檛, so the manager says 鈥渋f you don鈥檛 sign I will personally see you go in the infantry鈥�, so we signed. But as I got older I realised that I鈥檇 lost 2 brothers in 6 months, and I think he thought my mother had been through enough and he was just warning me off. I regret that in a way, I鈥檝e heard people say that once you鈥檝e joined up its like being in a big club.

The landing craft were just like a floating box to look at. We were used to trawler type vessels, which just sat on a keel, but these were like a platform of wood to build on 鈥� it was a totally different type of thing to build and it did slow things down a lot. They built a few tugs towards the end of the war, but during war they were just military class trawlers. There were some variations, may be a different gun platform but by and large they were the same sort of thing.

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