大象传媒

SOME WARTIME MEMORIES BY A COUNTRY GIRL

Kathleen Watson

My childhood was spent first at Cullion and then Donemana Stations on the Donegal railway Line which ran from the Waterside end of the Bridge in Londonderry to Strabane and then into Donegal.

On September 3 鈥� 1939 I was sitting in church with my sisters after attending Sunday School, when my Father came in and told us that our country was at war with Germany. I was a bit scared but did not realise what it all meant and the changes it would bring to our lives. I was almost 13 years old at this time and up till then we had a happy childhood, going to school, playing with our friends, doing our chores at home and generally enjoying ourselves. I had one older sister, four younger and one brother.

My older sister, Jean and I attended Londonderry High School and travelled by train into the Waterside and then by bus to Crawford Square where the school was then. The first thing I remember about the war was gas masks and we had drill using them once a week at school. I hated them because I couldn鈥檛 breathe and thought I was going to smother.

Then there was the 鈥渂lack out鈥� when all the street lights were dimmed in the towns and people had to have black curtains at their windows. We were used to walking in the dark in the country but it was scary in the town with all the people about whom you didn鈥檛 know.

Through time we got to know quite a few soldiers and airmen who travelled on our wee train to attend the technical College in Derry to learn engineering and mechanics. As the G.N.R. line ran through the 鈥淔ree State鈥� which was neutral country, service men couldn鈥檛 travel on it so our week Donegal railway was quite important to the war effort.

I remember the 鈥渆vacuees鈥� coming to our district from Belfast. To us it was like the aliens had landed because they had a different accent from us and sometimes we didn鈥檛 know what they were saying. Some of them only stayed a short time and then went back home but quite a few stayed until the war ended and some actually settled down and married locally. We felt sorry for the children who came without their parents for they were lonely at first but most of them were sent to good homes and soon made friends. When rationing came in it did not affect us so much as the people n the towns. We had ducks and hens so always had plenty of eggs. At one time we even had a pit. My Father, with our help, grew all our own vegetables and potatoes, and we could get extra butter from the farms. The only things we missed out on were sweets, sugar and butcher meat, but we had plenty of chickens, ducks and even the odd rabbit which was lovely made in a pie. Smuggling was rife at that time when people went across 鈥渢he border鈥� to buy things that they couldn鈥檛 get here. The farmers even smuggled cattle by swimming them across the Foyle at Dunnalong.

All through our summer holidays my sister and I worked on the farms, gathering potatoes, tying corn, pulling and spreading lint to dry and thinning turnips all for 12/6 per day. Hard work but very healthy. We were unofficial land girls.

When I was sixteen I left school. Jean was already in the civil service and working at Stormont, in the office that issued coupons for petrol, which was also rationed. A friend of ours worked in Short and Harlands aircraft factory where they made Sunderland flying boats and Stirling bombers. She got me a job there and so I was dispatched to Belfast as company for my sister. I worked in No.1 Finished Parts Store where my job was to order in parts of machinery which had been dispersed to outlying stores around the country for safety. My first week鈥檚 pay was 17/10 halfpenny. At first we lived in Victoria Gardens off the Cavehill Road with friends of my Mother but after some time Jean was transferred back to Londonderry to work with people who had been evacuated here from Malta and Gibraltar so I moved and went to stay with Mrs. Davis and her daughter Isabel in a wee street off the Newtownards Road which was much nearer to my work so I was able to walk there and save bus fares.

I absolutely hated being in Belfast but while I was there 鈥� although the sirens went off sometimes, there were no raids, but on moonlight nights you could see folk from those wee houses pushing prams and buggies laden with their belongings heading off out of town to somewhere safe. They had been through so much and were still scared.

My abiding memory of Belfast is cheese. Manual workers were given an extra ration of cheese so you had for packed lunch, sliced, grated, toasted and every other way imaginable till you were absolutely sick of it.

Beauty products were very hard to come by in those days so we had to use anything we could find. We used gravy browning to tan our legs as stockings were scarce. Isabel worked in her Uncle鈥檚 grocery shop and she and the girl in the chemist鈥檚 across the street had a swapping arrangement going about sweets and make-up and so on. One day she came home with two hair dyes, one for blonde hair and one for auburn, so she and I had a great night beautifying ourselves with the dyes. Next morning, her hair was green so she had to stay at home to wash and wash till she got it all out. Mine turned out lovely till I was coming home in the evening. It was pouring with rain and my face was red and white striped. I couldn鈥檛 get home quick enough to get it all washed out, so that was a lesson for us to be careful in future.

It wasn鈥檛 all bad in Belfast: I had some good times but was really glad to get home when the war was over.

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