大象传媒

This story was entered onto the peoples war website by John Warner on behalf of Bert Vickery, the author who fully understands and accepts the sites terms and conditions.

Now having told you of how those two old spinsters treated us, that鈥檚 my Mum, myself, and my sister. Soon after we arrived in Market Harborough, my stepsister Flo and her two sons, Lenny and Billy, were billeted at a large house just outside Market Harborough; I think the place was called Lubbenham, and that was the area and it was called Lubbenham Hall. Also sharing the big house was three sisters and the mother from Oxton. Now we know a bit about people from Oxton, you get good and bad wherever you go, but this was the bad lot. Sadly Flo had to share the kitchen with the other family, and if we thought our lives were made unbearable with the Freshwaters, then the Grants, that was the surname of this family, almost drove my stepsister to suicide. Now I think, looking back, that the three sisters were ladies of the night, and me at sixteen was proper cissied by them, and I told them where to go. But what I saw of them in the town they were dolled up like gangster鈥檚 molls, and the mother had a mouth like Blackpool Tower. After a month or so, dear old Bill, my brother-in-law came to see Flo and the children, he went to the local evacuee officer on the council and he managed to get dear old Flo and the two boys in an annex over a private cottage in a village called Kidworth. I think that was the name. That was just outside Market Harborough. I lost touch with Flo and the boys after I joined the Merchant Navy, a part of my life I will reveal later on.

At this stage of my experience it was a critical meeting that changed my life for ever, and my poor old Mum Flo said to me鈥� I should like for you to bring your young lady for tea on Sunday.鈥�

The day has to be either September or October 1942. My dear old Mum Flo had saved some of her rations for the big occasion for tea with my Cornish girl friend, Mum, and I. Everything went well till in all our innocence Mum, God Bless her, not knowing that that I鈥檇 told Mary that I was eighteen, instead of sixteen, said, 鈥淏y the way boy, I got your orange juice on your under-16 ration book.鈥� Well the look on Mary鈥檚鈥� face, and the look she gave me, was to know that my secret was out in the open. Mary got up from her chair, went through the front door almost breaking the glass by slamming the door. Next day I called at her digs only to be told that she鈥檇 gone back to Cornwall broken hearted. And so I was broken hearted I can tell you..

Well having tried to join the Royal Navy, and failed because I was only sixteen, I applied through the Labour Exchange to join the Merchant Navy. I was accepted and was to join the training ship Vindicatrix, or the Sharpness, Gloucestershire, on the 16th. November 1942. In the meantime I had that important letter that Mary said she had for me, which she got from Cornwall, asking me to be at Market Harborough Station to meet her train as she had a very important message for me. Low and behold I was there looking bewildered when Mary stepped off onto the platform and took one look at her blond and saucy sixteen year old Cockney and she kissed me like she鈥檚 never done again in the following sixty two years. The important message for me, and that was whilst in Cornwall, she got engaged to a matelot, a sailor, by the name of Ivor Drew. Now having seen me, and made such a fuss of me, it goes as to me that she loved; consequently she had to send dear old Ivor Drew鈥檚 ring back, and then I passed on the news I was off to the Navy training ship in November. This didn鈥檛 go very down very well with Mary, but we had to accept it. But we loved each other so much in those couple of months, since my poor Mum Flo blamed herself for the temporary break-up of Mary and myself. More was to come because at the factory we had an old labourer who took a liking to both of us, when he saw me one Saturday morning only to tell me that he had seen Mary with the biggest Coldstream Guard he had ever seen. He said to me, 鈥淕o indoors and don鈥檛 go anywhere near her or he鈥檒l knock your block off!鈥� Well I did but there was a ring on the bell at the Barrettes鈥� home. I opened the door and there stood this massive Coldstream Guard and Mary, and she said, 鈥淢um, I鈥檇 like you to meet my brother Frank, the reason he鈥檚 come to see us is that he鈥檚 got a girl in the family way and he wants to borrow some money.鈥�
Well I don鈥檛 think we had more than a fiver between us, but we gave him what we had, and off went Frank and we did hear that he got married. The date we鈥檙e not sure of.

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