大象传媒

This story has been submitted to the Peoples鈥� War site by Morwenna Nadar of CSV/LONDON on receipt of the following letter from Miss Shelagh Edge who fully understands the terms and conditions of the site.
鈥淚 telephoned the BC to ask if I might submit the story of my friend, Cecily Manktelow, who, sadly, died suddenly on June 1st at the age of 82.
She taught for 43 years at Parliament Hill School in Highgate, and ended as Deputy Head. I took the enclosed account from the speech she gave at her retirement party. I remember hearing it with interest, as I was not in London during the war. I found the speech when clearing up her flat.
Although she was a very self-effacing person who would not have thought it would be of interest to those outside the school environment, I think it would be, and hope you include it.鈥�
(The speech was given around 1983/4).

I started teaching at Parliament Hill School in North London. As we were in the middle of the war in 1943, as soon as I arrived at the school, recently returned from evacuation in St. Albans, I joined the rota of fire-watchers. 3 were on duty very night of the week. We slept in what is now Room H which was used as the secretary鈥檚 office. When the siren went, we proceeded to Room B, reinforced with brick walls as the fire-watching room, having first donned our tin hats, gone round and unlocked all the doors, and searched for incendiary bombs. I was frozen with fear of course 鈥� but when the all-clear went, we tramped round and locked all the doors gain. We cooked our breakfast in Room D which was one of the Housecraft rooms with cookers and a sink in it. The other Housecraft rooms were upstairs in Rooms U and V. One night 700 windows were lost in the building, due to a bomb nearby 鈥� fortunately I wasn鈥檛 there!

There was a great spirit of camaraderie 鈥� it had to be so. Sometimes, when the siren went off, we had to evacuate the building and have lessons in the air raid shelters just below the loggia. I remember once the 鈥楢鈥� level examinations were conduced in the present Drama space which was then a cloakroom, the examination desks being set up between the lines of coat pegs. Unfortunately, we had a burst pipe and so a number of us had to creep about between the desks, mopping up the water which began to flow round the candidates鈥� feet. All this time I was travelling up daily from East Croydon, having slept all night in the air raid shelter in the garden. On several occasions I arrived at the station to hear the announcement, 鈥淓nemy aircraft overhead 鈥� take cover.鈥� At the time, Croydon was known as 鈥淏omb Alley鈥�, so one never knew whether to rush for the shelter or take a chance and get on the train 鈥� of course, carrying one鈥檚 gas mask all the time! Somehow I arrived at school at ten past eight daily, despite all this.

While trying to clear up 43 years鈥� worth of books and papers, I was continually held up by finding of the past, as when I found one of the plastic boards that staff and pupils used. Because of the shortage of paper, we each used a slate with a big blue pencil and a duster, instead of a rough notebook. After such training, I can never throw away paper with one clean side without feeling guilty. Text books were kept until they were falling apart and then they were sent to be rebound (and made smaller in the process), rather than spend money on new ones. There were lists in the staff room on which we wrote the name of those girls in our forms who had been bombed the night before, so that all who taught should know to treat gently any deficiencies in their homework. One morning a flying bomb zoomed and rattked oer the road just as half the school was in and half arriving at 9 o鈥� clock, but fortunately for us, it did not stop. Those were nerve-wracking days. With rockets it was different. There was no warning, no trooping down to the cloakrooms and shelters. The crash came every few hours, in a lesson, perhaps, and in the rumble that followed there was a second鈥檚 tension, a half smile of relief, a flicker in the eye at the thought of families all over London 鈥� then the suspended sentence would be finished. One morning a loud crash came when the whole school was in the middle of Lord鈥檚 Prayer at Assembly, and that time there was no suspension, not the slightest movement, not a tremor in the voices.

So when Peace in Europe came, it not only meant for the end of destruction and the beginning of rebuilding. It also meant the relief from tension and the prospect of quiet nights and quiet days, and not having to sleep in the Underground as many of our pupils did. I shall never forget the happiness of those V.E. days. As a peace treat, St. Pancras gave all the children and staff free tickets for the Zoo, with free tickets for elephant and llama rides, visits to the aquarium, free drinks and buns. The whole school went, and instead of meeting at the school, we met for registers at the Zoo gates. Once inside, all went our several ways. Later in the morning, Miss Edmed, the Headmistress, arrived in an ambulance (presumably the only transport available) full of food! The forms had been told their feeding times, queues quickly formed and went, so that in about 20 minutes nothing but empty baskets remained. All staff had to be on duty for 2 hours in rotation and then we were allowed to go or stay as we wished.

In 1945, when the war ended, there were several coach parties arranged for staff and friends. We met after dark and were taken round London to see the flood-lights and the decorations 鈥� a great treat after 6 years of being in the blackout. In August 1946 a goodwill tour of Belgium was organised for London schools. About 700 pupils and staff from various schools accepted the invitation. 5 of our staff went, including me. One abiding memory of Bruges is that of sleeping in dormitories in paper sheets which had been left by the Germans when the town was under occupation. We slept in curtained cubicles, and the continuous rustling like the waves of the sea or the wails of despair as one or limb was poked through a sheet was very distracting for light sleepers. We visited the Cathedral, the lace-makers, had trips on the canals and buggy rides in the town and visited Knocke by the sea and Ghent. The highlight of the tour was the reception in the Hotel de Ville given by the member of the Belgian Ministry of Education who gave a moving speech in English, expressing his country鈥檚 gratitude for their liberation. Our Miss Williams, who died last year and was head of French, replied in French, and we were very proud of her. After 5 days we moved on to Brussels and were received in the Senate House where we sat in the members鈥� desks. Here we received an official welcome, and afterwards we assembled in the courtyard and marched to another part of the town, where we sat on benches in the rain to see a carnival procession. The elegant hat I was wearing was a soggy mess at the end of the day!

Another highlight was when the school had the honour of receiving, on a visit, representatives of all the allied governments.

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