大象传媒

This story has been submitted by Alison Tebbutt, Derby CSV Action Desk on behalf of Eleanor Mary Whyman. The author has given her permission and fully understands the site's terms and conditions

On November 17th 1944 my husband arrived home for a long awaited weekend leave. He was serving with 410 Battery Search Light. In the evening we went to the cinema (a real treat.) In the early hours of the next morning I awoke to find myself in the early stages of premature labour, as I was eight months pregnant. My husband went on his bike to alert the nurse, who on arrival realised we had no fuel of any kind to heat the room. She went straight to her home for some of her own coal and then set about preparing the bed, ready for the birth.

We were all in for a shock as I was carrying not one baby but two. I had a girl, at 3lbs 4ozs. A boy followed, who was 3lbs 12ozs. Our little boy was very weak and the Doctor said he had a congenital heart. We had to have both babies baptised. He only lived for one hour after the service. He was three days old. My husband then had to get a wooden box, line it all with cotton wool and place our little son鈥檚 body inside. After securing the lid he took this precious little bundle and left it at the gatekeepers lodge at the cemetery in Stapenhill, Burton on Trent.

By a miracle, our daughter survived. We had a cot loaned to us by the Town Hall staff. It was white enamel and had an electric heated pad as a mattress. This was switched on all the time. Hung on the outside of the cot were six hot water bottles which I had to change every hour. The baby was wrapped in cotton wool and had to be covered in oil. As no olive oil was available, I had to use cod liver oil (can you imagine the smell?) I breast fed her for ten to eleven months and she was fed every three hours. It took ages to feed her as she was nearly always asleep. It was a hard time as we had another little girl aged seventeen months and no-one to help as my family all lived in County Durham. I just wish our little son had lived, I would have coped. Eventually the Army granted my husband three months compassionate leave as I couldn鈥檛 take the premature baby out until she was five months old.

She is a lovely daughter to us, and will be sixty-one years of age on the 18th November 2005. Her name is Kathleen Greenwell and she is a mother to three children and a grandmother to four.

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