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My dad Ernest owned a cobbler’s shop,101 Saltwell Road, and when the war broke out his was a reserved occupation. I was born in 1940 but by 1941 Dad had decided join up. A conscientious objector lived near us and Dad was aware of the unpopular feelings the local people had toward him, and as he didn’t want to be thought an objector too, he joined up in 1941,one year after I was born.
To keep the business going dad had employed a retired cobbler but my Mam,
Helen, had to work to keep the business going. Mr Drummond did the repairs while Mam finished off the shoes -colouring and polishing the leather. A skill she had to learn when Dad went away.
The family home was in Lobley Hill so it meant Mam had to push me in my pram from Lobley Hill to Saltwell Road every morning to take me to work with her. Mam made the journey many times- she wore out 3 sets of wheels on the pram!! Of course caring for a baby in those circumstances was frowned upon by the Welfare Officer who often visited Mam to try to persuade her to have me evacuated- but Mam refused to let me go, and would put me to sleep under the counter among the leather, or arranged for my cousins to push me into the park when a visit from the Welfare Officer was imminent. When I was a toddler the family who ran Saltwell Club would take me out of the shop to the club to keep me ‘safe.’ I often came home with the pocket of my dungarees weighted down with the coppers from the club’s customers.
Dad returned from the desert in 1944. He hadn’t seen me since I was a few months old. I was a very blonde child, and I was playing out in the street when Dad arrived home and he walked passed me as he didn’t recognise his own baby girl.

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