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Memories of the Second War

I was born in 1933, and was therefore six when Britain entered the war. We lived at the time on Poole Road, Branksome, West of Bournemouth. I have a dim picture of one or both parents listening to the wireless and hearing Chamberlain’s announcement, but I’m not sure whether this is a true memory or something I was told about later. We moved house two or three times during those years, having recently come from Birmingham. We stayed briefly with friends in Lower Parkstone, and I must have been aware of the ongoing war because I remember being told that the friends’ son (or sons) had been killed when an aircraft carrier was sunk.

Afterwards my parents rented a small house on Albert Road in Upper Parkstone, between Bournemouth and Poole. My father, a musician touring with the recently formed Wessex Orchestra, was away much of the time, so my mother was left to fend for us three children—myself, and a younger sister and brother. The house had a longish garden, in which we were lucky to have four apple trees—-apples became an important part of our wartime diet. My father was no gardener, and even if he had been at home we would probably have needed the help we got from neighbours to do some ‘digging for victory’ and planting potatoes. My mother must have somehow managed to keep us going on the rationed food available in the shops. There was very little meat, hardly any butter (we scraped margarine on our bread) and a marked absence of rich foods such as cakes. But I don’t remember any particular suffering on this account; we always seemed to have enough to stave off hunger pangs—-and no doubt the apples helped a lot. Another way we were luckier than most was in having relatives in South Africa, who at rare intervals sent us food parcels. I particularly remember the delicious tinned pineapple. It seems surprising that the postal service was still able to deliver these parcels. Sweets and chocolate were in short supply, but by no means completely absent. I especially remember small bars of dark chocolate filled with vanilla cream. At least one fish-and-chip shop kept going. Whether they were able to get fish I don’t remember, but their chips were sublime, and well worth the 40 minutes’ walk there and back to get some.

Like most houses ours was heated by coal fires, and I suppose we usually managed to scrounge enough fuel to keep at least one room warm. The kitchen gas stove would also have added some heat. Chimneys were cleaned in the traditional way by a sweep, who came with a large black sack and bunch of rods that screwed together and pushed the circular brush up the chimney. We children were very excited to wait outside and see the brush poke through at the top. One very bad winter (probably that of 1941) I remember lying in bed and suddenly seeing water dripping through the ceiling-—a tank had frozen and burst.

My brother was not yet of school age, but my sister and I went to what I think was called Martin Road Council School, on the site of the later Heatherlands First School. The school’s construction was of corrugated iron, and I later found out that it had originally served some purpose in the First War. The dividing wall between the middle two classrooms could be removed to make one large room when necessary. It seemed to be no more than thick cardboard, with small holes here and there no doubt dug out by exploratory sharp pencils.

A common local name for the school was ‘the cowsheds’. However, what it lacked in amenities was to some extent made up for by the quality of the staff. I was old enough to go straight into the third level, with Miss Hatcher. We learned our arithmetic tables by rote up to 12x12 (as a result I still know them perfectly). We learned to write with pen and ink-—thin penholders with metal nibs, and a small inkwell sunk into each desk. Our introduction to literature consisted of various poems-—Alfred Noyes’s The Highwayman is one that made an impression. We also read (or had read to us) a probably shortened version of Lorna Doone, and Black Beauty. In addition we sang many traditional songs—-Gossip Joan, The Lass of Richmond Hill, Clementine, among others, and a round about rowing that I have never been able to trace (it was not the well known one that begins ‘Row, row, row your boat...’). On one day each week the class was split, girls taking sewing and similar crafts, while boys had drawing and painting. (That’s the way it was in those days).

The school was situated on a small common, partly heather-covered. A short passage between houses led to some public recreation grounds, which we called ‘the rec’. This was little more than a small, grass-covered field, with some swings in one corner. I remember once seeing a group of the girls there making daisy chains, an art which may have completely disappeared in this era of high-rise flats. The school common also contained our air raid shelters-—square, windowless blocks built of brick. We were regularly marched to these for practice and, I suppose, during air raid warnings. The wail of the sirens and of the ‘all clear’ were as familiar to us as the sounds of ambulances and police cars are to today’s children. Seated on benches in the shelters we sang songs, including the popular ‘Quartermaster’s Stores’, improvising new verses as we went:
‘There were ants, ants,
Wearing rubber pants
In the stores...
In the stores...
One exciting day the school was visited by some army personnel, with mock-ups of various kinds of shell and unexploded bomb, to warn us not to touch them if we discovered any, which we naturally longed to do.

If a group of us children was suddenly transposed to the present, we would be immediately noticeable on account of our clothing. Boys universally wore short trousers, a little above knee-length, a tucked-in shirt, and in cooler weather a pullover or jersey. Some boys wore ankle-length leather boots, but in my case it was always black shoes. Socks were kept up with the help of elastic bands called garters. We cleaned shoes ourselves with blacking and brushes. Girls invariably wore frocks (not ‘dresses’) or skirts, with ankle socks or, in cold weather brown stockings. Trousers or shorts for girls were unknown. A popular summer activity for the girls was performing handstands against the school walls. If boys were present, skirts would be modestly tucked under the elastic of their knickers. In winter, both sexes wore belted gaberdine raincoats, usually navy blue or some other dark colour. Popular headgear for boys was a woolen balaclava helmet. In summer, leather shoes would often be replaced by crepe-soled sandals, or more often ‘pumps’ (thin-soled gym shoes).

The war was a normal part of life for us and, since we were lucky enough not to be in a zone of heavy bombing, it was mostly, from a child’s point of view, fun. During my father’s brief returns from touring, he walked up and down the local streets ‘fire-watching’ (looking out for incendiary bombs that might need putting out). We must have had the obligatory blackout arrangments, though I don’t remember the details. I think we also had the popular brown paper strips across the windows, to prevent flying glass if there were bomb blasts. Fortunately however our nearest bomb was about half a mile away. During air-raids at night, Mom took us into the ‘cubby-hole’ under the stairs where we lay in candle light waiting for the ‘all clear’. We often heard the drone of bombers overhead, on their way to bomb one of the cities farther North. Later in the war we had a Morrison shelter-—a sort of iron cage with sheet metal over the top, big enough for the family to sleep in. These were supposed to be strong enough to hold any rubble that might fall on them if the house was bombed. I remember hearing tales about bomb blasts carrying these shelters intact and lodging them in trees, and wondered if I would wake up one morning and find ourselves in one of the apple trees.

Aircraft were an important part of any boy’s life (and possibly of some girls’). We all regarded ourselves as experts in aircraft recognition. I remember seeing from our garden fleets of (probably) Whitley bombers towing gliders. This must have been early in the war, for by ‘D-Day’ we were back in Birmingham. Spitfires, Hurricanes, and later Mosquitos, were often sighted, as well as more exotic items such as the Lysanders that were used by the army, and an occasional autogyro. One incident that caused me some jealousy was arriving home from school and being told that Mom and my brother had seen an aircraft going overhead in flames. Barrage balloons were
fascinating, and when it got dark early in the winter months we could go outside and see searchlights weaving back and forth on the horizon. One evening when it was still daylight I was on the common near the school and saw an aircraft crash about half a mile away beyond the rec—-or at least, I saw the cone of rubble that was shot into the air. Next day in school, some boys were proudly showing pieces of shrapnel they had scavenged from the wreck.

I do not remember ever being bored during those years, in spite of there being perhaps a fraction of one percent of the vast array of toys available today. There was always something to do. In summer you could pick the long stems of a species of plantain, loop the stem over, then pull it back and ‘fire’ the seed-head several feet. The most common hedge was the privet, and a privet leaf is ideal for folding in half and blowing down to make a reedy sort of whistle. Wall barley was also common, and the flower heads were useful for throwing as darts to stick in girls’ hair. Most children carried handkerchiefs (or ‘hankies’)-—paper tissues had not been invented-—and if you found a suitable stone and tied it with string to the four corners, rolled it up and threw it in the air, it made an effective parachute.

Compared to today, the streets were almost devoid of traffic. In summer or at weekends we would wander all over the place, sometimes for miles. Although the extensive Bournemouth beaches were only a few miles away, we could not make use of them. This was the early part of the war when invasion was thought to be imminent, and beaches were fenced off with barbed wire. But standing on the cliffs you could look out and see black dots on the water, which were mines. It was a big thrill on one occasion when I was walking on Ashley Road (the main road between Bournemouth and Poole) to see a fleet of heavy tanks go by, leaving deep indentations in the tarmac. Another favourite spot of mine was farther West at a place called Constitution Hill. From there you could see Sunderland flying-boats low overhead, coming in to land in Poole Harbour. In those days, Upper Parkstone was more or less on the edges of civilisation, as it were. Houses were sparse, and a short walk took you to empty moorland. We would sometimes go there with some older boys from across the street to collect dandelion leaves to feed their rabbits. Large green dragonflies would occasionally zoom past. The insect world in general was of great interest to us, occupying attention that would today be focused on television or computer games. We were absorbed by bees, wasps, ants, various kinds of beetle, earwigs, and (mostly cabbage white) butterflies. Snails were also plentiful, and when you went out of the house in the summer mornings you would find their glistening tracks all over the place.

At about eight years old I was lucky enough to acquire a small black bicycle, which at first I couldn’t ride. I vividly remember the day when, practising in the side-road by the house, I suddenly discovered the knack. Later I went for long rides, quite alone. Once, as far away as Boscombe (the other side of Bournemouth) I was stopped by a policeman because I hadn’t noticed I was going the wrong way in a one-way street. Another time, I had somehow discovered a large discarded motor tyre, and had tremendous fun wheeling it along with a stick, like a hoop. I think somebody remarked that it ought to be given in for salvage, as any spare scrap of metal, rubber or paper was needed for the war effort.

In winter, or during bad weather, we had many indoor activities, the most important one being reading. One Christmas or birthday I was given a copy of 'Alice in Wonderland', and still remember laughing uncontrollably at ‘A Mad Tea Party’. We didn’t have many books in the house, but made frequent trips to the local public library, which apparently some time after the war was burned down. I made acquaintance with the ‘William’ books of Richmal Crompton, and read them avidly. I also borrowed various boys’ adventure books, including several by T.C.Bridges, one of whose titles, 'Tons of Gold', has stuck in the memory. (Many years later I came across a book by that author, and found it atrocious!). I was given a book of stories called The Pearl Fishers, and at some time we possessed a book of 'Popeye the Sailor' cartoons, as well one about some characters call ‘Pip, Squeak, and Wilfred’. Other favourites were the ‘Mary Plain’ books by Gwynedd Rae. Dad had an early set (10 volumes) of the Chambers Encyclopaedia, and we children were allowed, with carefully washed hands, to look though them at the illustrations. Another book that we read over and over again was 'Number One Joy Street'. An interest in evolution and biology in general was sparked off by The Miracle of Life. I pored for hours over the black and white pictures of dinosaurs and other extinct animals.

We sometimes played a simple game of patience with cards (I think the one called ‘Demon’), and did jigsaw puzzles. Of these I remember ‘The Royal Scot’ steam locomotive, ‘The Boyhood of Raleigh’, and a wooden puzzle of an Italian scene, possibly of Naples, lent by the boys across the road. A very important item in the house was the wireless set (nobody talked of ‘radios’ then). I must have heard a lot of ´óÏó´«Ã½ war news on it, though at that age didn’t pay much attention. Most of all, we loved the comedy half hour—-ITMA (‘It’s That Man Again’) starring Tommy Handley, with supporting characters such as Mrs. Mopp (‘Can I do you now, Sir?’) and a seedy foreign pedlar (‘You buy nice medicine? Good for tummy, Oh Lummy!’). On rare occasions we went to the pictures, and I remember seeing a film of Tommy Handley in which he opened a violin case and took out an umbrella; ‘My Auntie told me I should always carry an umbrella in case’. At Christmas, in spite of paper shortage, we made chains with paper strips, and small folding paper bells must still have been available—unless Mom had saved them.

After my last year at Martin Road school we returned to live with my grandmother in Birmingham—one of the blitzed cities. Although the war was still going on, I’ve a feeling that by then most children who hadn’t been evacuated, injured, or killed were fairly bored with it. My main memory from the end of the war is of the celebrations with huge bonfires in the streets when it at last came to an end.

M.J.Whalley
Howick, Quebec. December 2005

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