大象传媒

I was born on the fifth of June in 1940 during WWII, as was my twin brother David, with Robin two years our senior. Father was in the Royal Navy as a gunner, he patrolled the Atlantic Ocean whilst granddad was in the home guard and mother looked after us three children as well as my grandmother who was bedridden.
My siblings and I would often watch the army tanks go by our house with their caterpillar wheels, we would stand on the path and the tanks would shake the ground below us, leaving cracks everywhere it had been.
When the flying bombs were overhead, if ever we were too late to get to the dug out/air raid shelter we would hide under the large wooden table.

When dad came home in his leave, I tried on his white buckle belt, I鈥檇 hold my breath and pull it as tight as I could, so much so that dad would have to lie me on the floor to release it.
Our fresh food was kept in the pantry on a cold marble slab and consequently we would have to set mouse traps each night for the cheese etc which was under a large topped dish. Tins of spam were made to go around by mother coating slices into a batter mixture before frying, and we were lucky to have a large garden in which a few chickens were kept. We were also lucky to have an allotment in which we had vegetables and fruit that included gooseberry, raspberry and redcurrant bushes, which meant we often had a nice pie.
We had to eat lots of filling foods, cheap fatty suet puddings were often made with jam (homemade), some dried fruit or made plain then a chunk would be cut for your meal to have with gravy. We would also pour milk over the plain chunks with a little sugar which would happen when we were poorly.

Over the other side of the road was Turks/Gurkh谩s stationed in prefabs/Nissen Huts, they wore turbans and had big knifes and swords and they always looked stern and we were afraid of them, but we still stood at their doorstep and they were kind enough to give us tins of food, mostly tinned EUP and milk every other day.

Our fuel was delivered by horse and cart, we were always told to keep an eye out for horse manure and we would rush out to see if we could get any to put in our garden.
Granny kept her sixpences in a large black handbag, on special occasions we were given one each, other wise we were given a couple of half pennies, one penny pieces or even farthings a week, we would take our pocket money to a sweet shop which would buy us a chocolate bar or some sweets. Sometimes we would put washed silver sixpences into our Christmas pudding before cooking.
Mother would have to do washing in old boiling copper with a fire underneath it, so we would have to boil water first, then the whites would be washed followed by colours and the really dirty clothes last.
Women had to do hard work, with the men at war they would have to do a man鈥檚 job, plus keeping a home going.

Children of some families would have to go without shoes but lots of clothes were taken to a point at the council hall to be swapped for different sizes etc. we were made to wear cast offs bur we never really minded as in the war years we didn鈥檛 know any different. Most families lived with their relations, and houses were often over-crowded but people seemed to be happy with their lot.
At school we were packed so tightly together that we would get nits regularly (30 children to each class).

We all wore hand knitted hats, boys wore a helmet or balaclava whilst the girls had bobble or Tammy hats, wool was reused over and over again, larger items were unpicked and smaller ones were made, often using different colours to make one garment.
We would use condensed milk from a tin as it lasted longer, and we never had a fridge in them days, in order to keep a jug of milk fresh we would have to stand it in a bowl of cold water. We would have to wear dark colours as we couldn鈥檛 wash them that often, and we were only able to have a bath each a week in an old tin galvanised bath where we would have to take turns. Most of our time was spent in the kitchen as we would only have one fire lit, and the front room was only used at Christmas or on special occasions.
At Christmas we would have one day only, boys would be given a boat, car or marbles whilst the girls would be given dolls, prams or hula hoops which were great thing to roll along the ground. We would also play with hard rubber balls and old rope made a great skipping rope, and if we were lucky we also got an orange and some sweets. A large toy would be a three wheel tricycle, with boys getting a peddle car and we would play hop scotch as well as around and round the mulberry bush.

We had to have a black out with blinds up all the windows to prevent any light being seen by the enemy and we used candles in candle stick holders which we took to bed a night to light the way upstairs and we would blow it out once we were upstairs in bed. I once tried to eat a candle as I was so hungry.
The lavatory was outside but we were lucky enough to be modernised, by 1945, with a new toilet and shed that connected onto our house.

When I look back at old photos, I have to laugh, when aged two years old I had my twin brothers trouser, coat, and shoes on, he had the girls coat, sandals and even my hair ribbon slide on, mother really had her hands full during the war!

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