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This story is by Joyce Gibson, and has been added to the site with their permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions. The story was collected by Joyce Gibson, transcribed by Elizabeth Lamont and added to the site by Bruce Logan.
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During the war we were desperately short of clothes. Absolutely every garment had to be recycled probably several times and my mother was frequently forced to display her extraordinary talent for making use of every last rag. During one bitterly cold and frosty winter, (winters seemed much, much cooler in those days — no doubt owing to the shortage of both food and fuel), my father’s worn-out old socks were incorporated into a pair of fur-backed gloves for me to wear on my way to school. The fur backing came from one of my mother’s fox collars which, in the 1930’s were all the rage. Tragically for me, I dropped one at the very first wearing. I realised, turned round to pick it up but it had gone. I wonder what the thief did with one glove made from a pair of old socks?

A bright red summer dress patterned with large yellow roses also comes to mind. As it was my only dress and the weather turned suddenly very warm, it was a major tragedy when I found it impossible to get over my hips. My mother, ever resourceful, found in the back of a drawer a piece of pale blue rayon cloth originally intended for making a petticoat and inserted it in bands at intervals into the skirt of the dress. I’ll never forget the unkind remarks made by my schoolmates when I turned up next day. I never wore the dress again and was condemned to wear my winter skirt for the rest of the heat wave. The quips were equally cutting when I went to stay for a night or two with my wealthy (by our standards) aunt and her daughter. Their faces were a picture as I unpacked my pyjamas which had been so patched with flour bags, obtainable for a shilling each from the butcher at the top of the road, that there was very little of the original garment left. However, they didn’t give me another pair, even for Christmas.

In 1944 my father, who was serving in the Royal marines, was posted to Iceland and issued with underwear suitable for cold northern climes. After the posting was unexpectedly cancelled, he was still in possession of a pair of thick grey woollen long johns, which, had he ever had to wear them, would probably have brought him out in a nasty rash. My mother, true to type, unravelled them and, with the help of my grandmother, produced a cardigan knitted for added thickness in raspberry stitch, executed by wrapping the wool several times round the needle to produce a large thick bobble. This was just too much. The jacket, stiff as a board, was completely unwearable. From then on it was taken out of mothballs every time illness confined a family member to bed when, to save on heating costs, the donning of the raspberry stitch bed jacket was obligatory.

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