大象传媒

Part 1

Well before my tenth birthday in April 1939 I was sufficiently well aware of current affairs to know a war was expected, so I was not surprised when one was actually declared on September 3rd of that year. To a small boy, the concept was very exciting. It would be a glorious success in which we, the British, would of course show Hitler the error of his ways in a very short time. After all, had we not won the previous war with Germany only 21 years previously?

Looking back, I suppose my main source of information was the newsreels that were shown as part of every cinema show I went to see. Television was in its infancy in Britain and was still nothing more than an experimental novelty enjoyed by the wealthy, and my friend across the street, Hugh Metcalfe, whose home was equipped with a set made by the firm his father worked for as an electrical engineer. Over the years of our childhood attendance at cinemas my friends and I sat transfixed at the newsreels as we watched the Germans under Hitler invading first Austria then Czechoslovakia and finally, Poland. Interspersed with these were newsreels of the Italians under Mussolini invading Ethiopia and Albania and, a year or so earlier, shots of the Spanish civil war. There were also confusing newsreels of Japanese attacking Chinese. We did not always know which side to cheer for but we thought we knew what to expect when war came upon us, especially from the air.
In those uncertain times, my parents listened regularly to a lot of news programmes on the radio. The contents of these radio reports also did not evade me and were the subject of regular discussion. I could relate particularly to Ethiopia because one of the emperor Haile Selasie鈥檚 daughters was my nurse when I had my tonsils taken out at Great Ormand Street Hospital for Children in London in 1936. The other countries were nothing more to me than places on a map that produced stamps for my collection. We encountered few foreigners in England at that time. To hear someone speaking a foreign language was most unusual.
I also remember hearing the broadcast of the announcement describing the treatment of Jews in concentration camps in Germany. That must have been about 1938. There was a
general air of shock that re-enforced everyone鈥檚 feeling that the war was not far off. When it arrived, we would right all these wrongs; and of course, we would win.

My friends and I were very conscious of being British, the upholders of fair play, winners of the previous war, the hub of the British Empire, on which the sun never set. These were the days when Empire Day was celebrated each year to remind everyone what it was all about. Those children belonging to Guides, Brownies, Scouts or Cubs would wear their uniforms to school, and we would spend the afternoon in the school hall singing the patriotic songs we had been practicing for weeks 鈥� 鈥淟and of Hope and Glory鈥�, 鈥淭he British Grenadiers鈥�, 鈥淛erusalem鈥� with its 鈥淎nd did those feet in ancient times鈥︹�� and such. (It has always amused me that the tune of 鈥淟and of Hope and Glory鈥� should have been chosen to be played at graduation ceremonies throughout the U.S.A. while the words never heard in that country, would constitute a much better national anthem for the British than 鈥淕od Save the Queen鈥�.) Our headmaster, Tom Wilkinson, sometimes accompanied by the vicar, would stand beside the lectern on the stage beating time vigorously with both arms in a paroxysm of patriotic fervour. Our teachers, except for the one pounding the piano, stood facing inward along one side of the hall, ready to rush down a line of singers to thump over the head with a hymnbook any backslider who had the temerity to display lack of patriotic spirit such as pulling the pigtails of a girl in the row in front.
These were also the days when Armistice Day, November 11th, was observed with great dignity. Again, everybody who owned a uniform would wear it to school. This was the day on which the previous war had stopped 鈥� the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. Wreathes were laid on war memorials in villages throughout the country and there were parades at which the old soldiers would wear their medals. Everyone wore a red poppy cut from canvas mounted on a piece of green wire. They were supposed to resemble the poppies that grow wild in Flanders where much of the fighting took place in World War 1 and millions of British soldiers lie buried along with others.
The whole poppy scheme had been dreamt up and organized by a General Haig (of the whiskey distilling family fame) who had planned a good number of the mass slaughters which had gone, during the war under the misnomer of 鈥渂attles鈥�. Volunteers sold the poppies everywhere during the weeks before on behalf of the British Legion, an organization of old soldiers founded by Haig. For the rest of the year the British Legion was a social club for old soldiers devoted to giving them a place to drink beer and chat, and to looking after the welfare of the down and out amongst them. We bought our poppies from ladies who came to the school. These were depression times so nobody had much money. The usual poppy cost a penny but there were more elaborate ones for the larger givers, like for six pence, and there were even arrangements which the affluent could mount on top of the radiators of their motor cars which in those days had chromium plated filler caps at the front end of the hood, or bonnet. Income from sales went to the support of the blind and wounded ex-servicemen who manufactured the poppies.
At eleven o鈥檆lock, at the precise time the Armistice was signed, everyone stopped for a minute鈥檚 silence. A service at school was timed to incorporate the moment. We would hear the field guns boom from their site in Hyde Park in the centre of London about fourteen miles away. My mother would stop housework, women would stop in the streets, and there was a general cessation of all activity, even of traffic. 1939 was the last year of such devout observation.

We felt especially important when we wore our cub uniforms to school because our troop was sponsored by Field Marshal Lord Milne whose name appeared beneath the number of our troop on our shoulder patches (鈥�1st Ruislip Cub Troop, Lord Milne鈥檚 Own鈥�). None of us had the slightest idea who he was or what he had done but he must obviously have been a war hero of some kind. When he came to inspect us one day we were very deflated. We had expected him to arrive in military uniform resplendent in the red tabs of staff rank and mounted on a horse but here was a short, stooped man wearing a bowler hat and overcoat. It was a cold afternoon and he hurried away to his chauffeur and car without addressing us. Years later I looked the gentleman up in a reference book. It seems he conducted himself quite well in the Balkans campaign. In peacetime he rose to become chief of the imperial general staff so must have had some merit. At least he did not organize any of the mass slaughters. I was always puzzled as to how our troop had become 鈥渉is own鈥�. Many years later, it turned out that when Milne was campaigning in the Balkans, he met and became friendly with a young medical officer called Max Wilson who, in the course of time, moved to Ruislip and became involved with scouts. Wilson simply asked Milne, who agreed.

Another celebration that was held for the last time was Ruislip Day. This festivity was organized by the local residents鈥� association, of which my father was a keen member. A huge crowd would assemble at the Manor Farm situated at the end of the High Street, which was bought about 1936 from owners and changed to public use. The old tythe barn was made over very artfully into a library, a bowling green made where there had been a rick-yard, and the orchards set aside, as far as us boys were concerned, to be plundered at will by the youth of the town. On Ruislip Day there would be races, competitions, talent shows, Morris dancing, bowling for pigs, and, to our great amusement, a demonstration by the ladies of the League of Health and Beauty who would perform a series of graceful callisthenics to music while dressed out in white blouses and navy blue knickers. Such activity was regarded as rather avante garde as adults were not thought to need to take any more exercise than they encountered in their daily toil. The sight of grown women running around in dark blue knickers was not a common sight. My peers and I found the whole performance very amusing.
My mother rather admired the women of the 鈥淟eague鈥� under the direction of their leader Daisy Dormer, but would never have considered joining. She stuck to voluntary work for the infant welfare programme. For years every Thursday afternoon she would join her friend and near neighbour, Mrs. Wilfred Wilson, and walk to the church hall on Bury Street where they would register mothers who brought their babes in to see the doctor or nurse under this government-sponsored programme.
My job was always to deliver the programmes for Ruislip Day on our street before the event. The principal and owner of one of the many private schools that flourished at the time (and put out of business by the 1946 Education Act) was a leading Scout leader and related to a comedian of the time called Gillie Potter who was usually prevailed upon to perform. His line was 鈥済ood afternoon England鈥� as he introduced his patter dressed in a dark blue blazer with the broad red arrow of a convict on the pocket. None of this was to come back in pre-war form although the Ruislip Days were continued after the war.

History tells how Britain was grossly unprepared to fight a war but to me at the time we had everything ready. My father took me to an Air Display at the nearby Northolt airport in 1938 where we were in the crowd when a Hawker Hurricane fighter swept overhead at the astonishing speed of 400 miles per hour. How could the Germans stand up to this? The fact that Britain had only about twelve of these planes at the time escaped me, as I suspect it did many others. This was 1938 and the rest of the planes were biplanes with fixed undercarriages that gave demonstrations of aerobatics. They belonged to an era that had already passed. Wilkinson, our school headmaster, was like all the males of his generation, a veteran of the previous war. He had been lucky and survived it without any evident wounds. He lived just a few doors from my home, as did the school caretaker, Mr. Emery. Each would walk to the same pub each evening but on different sides of the street and then sit in different bars. I don鈥檛 think they ever spoke outside the school. Awareness of class distinctions such as this example was part of the way of life.
Millions of other men who had avoided death in the war, were not so fortunate and carried evidence of wounds in the form of facial scars, limps, an eye covered with a patch or replaced with a glass one, and lost limbs, while others coughed their lives away as the result of breathing poisonous gas. These men were all between 38 and 55 in 1939. Many were fathers of school friends. My recollections of childhood trips to London include that of the groups of be-medalled old soldiers, often including some maimed or blind, walking in lines along the gutters displaying their medals and playing musical instruments rather badly as they begged for money. My mother always gave me a penny to hand them. Theirs, they had been promised, was the war to end all wars. Britain would be made into 鈥渁 country fit for heroes鈥�. How badly they were led and misled! A German general is credited with saying of the British army that it was a group of lions led by donkeys. Now we were approaching another war. Some of the unfortunates from the previous war carried mental wounds of one kind or another 鈥� generally lumped together as 鈥渟hell shock鈥�. One of this number, who had also lost a leg, rode down our street every day on his bicycle which had been modified by the removal of the free wheel capability and removal of the pedal on the side where the artificial leg hung stiffly down. He was a watchmaker at a shop on Ruislip鈥檚 High Street and would ride by shouting remarks such as 鈥渢ake your damned watches to Jericho鈥� at nobody in particular as he pumped away with his remaining leg.
Not only had the previous war taken the lives of millions of young men, but the ensuing influenza epidemic had taken even more of both sexes. So many deaths reduced the number of men available for marriage that many young women were left without hope of ever finding a partner. These ladies had to support themselves and provided not only the many unmarried women teachers we had in the schools but a substantial portion of the work force in general. It was not unusual find they had no remaining relatives. We had a substantial number of these ladies and war widows living around us. One or two had private incomes in the form of pensions but the rest worked. One lady, a Miss Kershaw with modestly independent means had not a relative in the world, spent much of her time walking her dog. She carried a large whip that she would use to drive off any other dog that got within reach. In her sober moments she was pleasant enough but she succumbed to alcoholism during the war and finally suffocated in a fire started by a cigarette she was smoking dropped on the furniture when she dropped off to sleep. A sad tale, but unfortunately not unique.

Anticipation of the coming war had been widespread for some time. As part of the air raid precautions (ARP), we were all fitted and issued with gas masks before hostilities began. Millions of these had been manufactured. Apart from the standard version, there was a coloured Mickey Mouse version for small children and a big bag version to accommodate babies. There was a general agreement that it was only a matter of time before the Germans would use this weapon on civilians much as both sides had used it on each other鈥檚 armies during the previous war. This time, we were convinced, poisonous gas would come in bombs dropped from planes. We all had our gas masks fitted in neat cardboard boxes that, we were told, would have to be carried by everyone once hostilities began. A great mistake was made in the design of the gas masks of the type issued to our family and we all had to return to the distribution centre to have an extra filter taped on! I have often wondered what it was that had been overlooked. Manufacturers made a small killing by marketing tin tubes in which to store and carry the gas masks as the card board boxes would not have lasted more than a short while. It was an offence not to carry your gas mask on the street.Scouts and cubs from the Ruislip area put on a great demonstration of air raid precautions drill during the summer of 1938. My part in this was as a member of a class of children. After what seemed like months of practice the great day arrived. With other cubs I was seated in an assortment of school furniture in the middle of a field where we stood at the appropriate moment to sing a song. When the signal came we all ducked under our desks while a plane flew over at low level simulating a bombing attack. Scouts, acting the roles of firemen, messengers, etc. rushed about. If someone had told me then that it would be six years before I would be required to duck under a school desk, in all seriousness, I would never have believed it.When the war came we were sure it would be short. The same misconception had been held in the previous war when, on its declaration on August 4th, 1914, everyone was convinced it would be over by Christmas. In this war, the enemy missed the chance to invade Britain in the late summer of 1940 when the country was virtually unprotected following the fall of France. If Hitler has taken the advice of his generals to invade right away, the war really would have been over by Christmas 1940.

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