大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by a volunteer from CVS / 大象传媒 Radio Nottingham on behalf of May Walker and Brenda Witton and has been added to the site with their permission. May and Brenda fully understand the site's terms and conditions.

The official food supplied during the war was so meagre that we always found ways to get around it. Pigeons were easily available. We made pigeon pie with wild pigeons. The meat was fairly indigestible, so we mixed it with stewing beef. My brother in law worked at an abattoir and got big lumps of meat for us. It was later that he told us it was horse meat! It tasted much finer than beef!
We had dried milk and dried potatoes. Cakes were baked using milk or dried eggs instead of fresh eggs.
There were coupons for clothes. We never threw anything away. Clothes were cut back and altered to make something else.
Brenda got married during the war on June 2nd 1941 at Holy Trinity church in Southwell, Notts. Her wedding cake was from the Co-op and was iced with chocolate. There were no special allowances for a wartime wedding. They had sandwiches and cakes.
May remembers the tea party to celebrate the end of the war. She lived in Birmingham then. They put out the trestle tables and all the people in the street gathered together. They ate egg sandwiches and spam sandwiches. She still has a photo of the celebration party.

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