大象传媒

This story was submitted to the 大象传媒 People鈥檚 War site by ^{About links} on behalf of Jean Stovold and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

I remember rationing well. There were many recipes printed and cookery demonstrations showing you how to make the most of your meagre rations. I found these very helpful and it did help me to make the short supply you were given 鈥榞o a little further鈥�. Uncle Archie, the butcher (as my daughters called him) always put in a little extra meat for luck when I collected my rations. Bones he would let us have cheaply and all this was gratefully received. In fact, to get a larger variety of food, I registered my younger daughter as a vegetarian in order that her supply of meat was nil and the cheese supply for the family larger. Even then the cheese ration was small. A friend of mine, when getting his weekly ration of cheese, would tell the assistant serving him not to bother to wrap it as he 鈥淲ould eat it there and then鈥�, which he did. We also swapped food with neighbours.
In 1943 I moved to Wembley in outer London and there kept chickens on a battery system. The chickens were called Henrietta, Rosie and Lucy. This enabled us to obtain extra eggs and meat. We fed these chickens on scraps from our plates and neighbours scraps. I cannot remember where we got the corn from but I do remember we kept it in a tin to stop the mice eating the food.
When either of my brothers came home on leave from the forces they would bring ration papers with them.
One of my neighbours at this time became friendly with the manager of a grocer鈥檚 shop and the manager asked him if he would like a little extra rations. You can imagine my neighbour鈥檚 surprise when he was at work one day to receive a message from the gatekeeper at his works telling him to come to the gate as soon as possible because there was a large parcel. Instead of an extra pound of cheese, there was a tea-chest of tea. He was terrified he would be prosecuted and all the neighbours were given quantities of tea.
In spite of food not being plentiful, I never worried about not having enough food. If you had money you could always go out for a meal and this was not rationed.

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