大象传媒

1945
The Japanese surrendered on August 14th, and the news was broadcast by Mr Atlee at midnight on 13th. Bonfires were to be lit all over the U.K. This time mother and I did catch the train to London and walked or perhaps shuffled is a better word, down the Mall, singing with the rest of the crowd. We heard a great cheer, and the King and Queen, with Princess Margaret and Princess Margaret drove in an open carriage, past us. Although we were cheering because the war was at last over, I think people were also trying to show the Royal Family, how much we had admired the example they had given us, when they had stayed in London during the bombing, even though the Palace had been hit twice. As the Queen had said when this had happened, by staying, she could look the Londoners in the face.
Of course, there was also another side to the story, because the Lease Lend agreement with America came to an end, the imports of food, cotton and petrol would have to be cut, and rationing continued. It would still be years before we could get back to normality, there would be many families who would never be the same, especially those of the estimated 55 million who had been killed. (August 1945)
The last year of the war also saw the deterioration of the relationship between the Allies and Russia, as the latter country pursued it鈥檚 own policies in the countries they had liberated.
Britain had sold over 拢1,100 million of overseas investments, and run up debts of nearly 拢3,000 million to finance the war, and we negotiated a loan of a further 拢1,000 million from the U.S.A., which had to be repaid with interest. The only way we could repay this was by a huge rise in exports, which was helped, as Germany and Japan, were not in any position to compete. The aim was to
improve our exports and minimise our imports, which meant that everything had to continue to be rationed. Food, petrol and clothing. In fact bread was rationed for the first time, and whale steaks were added to our menu. These were, in fact, very unpalatable. The rations for one week, was 13 ounces of meat, one and a half of cheese, six of butter or margarine, one of cooking fat, eight of sugar, two pints of milk and one egg. One even had to queue for potatoes and fruit. (1946)
There had always been a black market, during the war, where extra rations could be obtained at a price, but one expected that this would go, but of course the reverse happened, and if you had money, there was always people who had something to sell. Pubs, markets were the usual places.
The lack of coal and materials were limiting our exports, just at the time when it was very important that our production needed to increase.
When Eric was eventually discharged from the Army in 1946, we came to live in Warrington, and Eric resumed working for the local Guardian. We lived with his parents, but it was only a small house, so we went to live with his sister and his family.
About this time, because there was a shortage of teachers, there was a scheme to increase the number of teachers, by allowing people to take a crash course at Padgate Training College for a year, and become qualified. It was really a stopgap measure. I attended for interview, and was told that until there was a vacancy for an infants鈥� teacher at one of the local schools and I could go there until a vacancy arose at the college.
I was terrified, as I had never stood in front of a class before. I was given a timetable and went to see the head mistress to discuss in outline, what I was expected to teach. On the first day of term, I arrived to find over forty children running round, and I tried to make friends with them. I decided that I would teach them about manners, politeness etc. then I could at least have some sort of order. It seemed to work, and we began to learn to read and write and do simple sums. I began to enjoy this. Two things happened very quickly, the first the confirmation that I was pregnant, and then the offer of a course at the College. I was very upset, as I loved the children and the advent of my son wasn鈥檛 planned. I declined the offer to train, but continued to teach. I went to the Education Office, and gave in my resignation for the end of October, but they persuaded me to stay until the end of November. The same thing happened in November, and I agreed to stay until the end of December, as they were still short of teachers. The school nurse was rather apprehensive, as I was still running round the playground and did the P.E.exercises draped over a box, as I could not lay flat on my stomach. She issued dire warnings about having a greyhound and not a child.
Christmas was a lovely time to leave, as I told the children that God was giving me a baby, the same as God had given to Mary.
This gave rise to a rather funny incident, when we were shopping in the local covered market. A small girl was jumping up in great excitement, calling in a very loud voice, 鈥淗allo Mrs. Haslam, have you got your baby Jesus yet鈥� Everyone thought it was very funny, but we were rather embarrassed.
1947 was a very difficult winter, as it was one of the worst winters of the century, snow stopped production, frost destroyed winter wheat, and animals died of cold. This meant that the recovery of the country was slowed down. This was followed by a rainless summer, which led to water shortages. The elements were not on our side.
The emergence of the 鈥淐old War鈥� factor, which was brought about by the Marshall plan from the U.S.A. which in effect, was to provide money to countries to re-construct shattered Europe. This was refused by Russia, who were continuing to dominate various countries, and therefore the American Dollar was in fact fighting
the communist bloc of Russia. The division of Berlin led to the setting up of the Berlin Wall, and the division of the German Nation into the Russian Zone and the Federal Republic of Germany consisting of the French, British and American Zones.

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