大象传媒

SCHOOLDAYS

Every day we had to carry our gas masks to school in a case which we hung over our shoulder but we didn鈥檛 realise the significance of this, everything we did seemed quite normal to us. In the playground there were long brick shelters with slatted benches inside. The shelters smelled slightly damp. If the air raid siren sounded when we were in school, we all filed into the shelters until the all clear sounded. Children who lived very near to the school were allowed to run home. Once a week the teachers assembled the whole school in the hall for singing lessons and taught us many songs. These we sang in the shelter with great enthusiasm and, far from being an ordeal, it all seemed great fun. We had approximately eight evacuees from London in our school, they lived with local families, and we were fascinated by their accents.

FAMILIES

Many of us lived in one-parent families because our Fathers were away on active service. I can鈥檛 remember my Father being at home before the war so nothing seemed strange. My sister and I together with our friends had plenty of freedom to play in the road (there was very little traffic) or in the fields. We just knew that if the siren sounded we should run home to the shelters in our gardens. I can鈥檛 ever remember feeling afraid although in retrospect I realise that our Mothers must have been terrified and anxious for the safety of their husbands. Stuck on the windows of every house were strips of paper in a design rather like the union flag. This was to stop the glass shattering if a bomb fell. In the village there were two big round metal water tanks which we called sumps. They were open at the top, not really very high, and we could haul ourselves up to peep over the top at the water. We just thought of them as ponds but of course they were there in case of fire. No one bothered to lock the doors of their houses. My Nanna had a mortice key permanently in the lock on the outside of her door so that anyone could come in.

HOLIDAYS AT HOME

None of us went away on holiday but in Rumney during the school holidays in the summer, we had two weeks of events organised by the local committee. Most of the events took place on the school field, in the school hall and the church hall. There were Parties, Fancy Dress Parades, a Horticultural Show and an Eisteddfod which attracted Choirs, Soloists, Elocutionists - "The Highwayman" was quite dramatic! It was great entertainment for us all. All this must have entailed a tremendous amount of work for the organisers, but as children we just took it all for granted. We used to go to the County Cinema with my Mother and when we walked home it was absolutely pitch black. No street lights, no traffic lights, nothing except a very small torch, which we carried to shine a tiny circle at our feet.

FOOD

When we look at the Supermarkets of today it鈥檚 hard to imagine that there was ever a shortage of food. Every person had a Ration Book containing coupons, which were cut out by the shopkeeper when buying food. My Mother says that we were allowed 2oz butter, 2oz tea, 2oz Sugar, 2oz Sweets and 1 egg each per week.( Our sweet ration was augmented by the American soldiers who used to drive in their jeeps up the village, and throw out a handful of packets of chewing gum. ) I clearly remember a shopkeeper giving me something wrapped in newspaper to give to my Mother, and the excitement when the parcel was opened, it contained a bottle of tomato sauce! We regularly queued at the shops for bread and potatoes, although we grew some vegetables in our gardens. My Aunty was in the Land Army working on a farm where they grew fields of vegetables. We used to like dried egg, it was mixed with water and used for omelettes or scrambled egg. None of us felt deprived of anything, and there was always a meal on the table. My Mother had a recipe for a fatless sponge - it was lovely. There was a shortage of meat, and I remember eating a lot of stew and lentil soup. There was absolutely no assortment of anything much. My Grampy kept chickens and every Christmas he killed one for us, and that is truly the only chicken that we tasted in the whole year. Even now I feel chicken is a bit of a luxury!
Food was still rationed after the war was over and it was a few years before gradually everything became available. The first time the greengrocer had a supply of bananas there was a very long queue and we were allowed just two each. None of us had ever seen or tasted a banana, it is just impossible to convey how thrilled we were. It really makes our generation appreciate the wealth of assorted food in a Supermarket today.

CLOTHES

Clothes were rationed in the same way as food and were mostly recycled from the older children to their younger siblings. In fairness, this didn鈥檛 apply to shoes, which we bought in the Co-op only when we had grown out of our old ones. My sister and I were lucky that my Gran was a dressmaker. Among other things, she made us blouses from parachute silk, which were great. I remember someone coming to our school to measure every child鈥檚 feet to see if we were eligible for extra coupons. Also at school, we had a delivery of sweetened cocoa powder sent from Canada and everyone had a paper bag full to take home.

STREET PARTIES

When the war ended, my Gran quickly made a long string of brightly coloured triangular bunting flags and we draped them all over the front of our house. Everyone decorated their houses in some way, it was lovely. Street parties were held literally in the street, with races and fancy dress.

HOMECOMING

During the war, my Father had been allowed home on leave a few times which was very exciting when he came and very upsetting when he went back. When he eventually came home to stay, he had been issued with a navy blue pin-stripe suit and a green trilby hat, which was a smart outfit. He also brought his knife, fork and spoon with his service number stamped on them.

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