大象传媒

"This story was submitted to the People's War site by CSV/大象传媒 Radio Nottingham on behalf of Edna Buckley with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions."

I can honestly say I am a lot happier now than when I was younger. I was a miserable little sod, always sulking if I couldn't have my own way and my mam used to sometimes give in to me. That is if I wanted money which I didn't get because she'd got none. I used to go running in for some rags when the rag and bone man came and of course we hadn't got any only what we were wearing. Best of it was you only got a balloon. I used to hate school and I dreaded going. I was always wishing I was 14 so I could leave school. My mam used to say "stop wishing your life away, it will come soon enough. And sure it did. All the girls in our street started work at the C.W.S. and that was someting else I hated, but we had to go, but I was happier than when I was a kid because we all had a bike and we used to go cycling when we came home from work. Then when I was 22 my dad died and then I started thinking what if my mam died and I used to worry about that. I never thought about myself getting older. You start thinking about that as you get older and all your family have gone. By the time mam died and I was 33 and married so at least I'd got my husband. As I got older and I was left on my own again I never thought about my age. I am quite happy now , I can do what I want, go out when I want and come back when I want and when I get aches and pains and I start moaning I tell myself to stop moaning there's plenty of people worse off than you. I used to know one old lady who was in her ninties and she was so miserable and always saying "I wish the good lord would take me." Different to our dear Edna, she's always smiling bless her. I make the most of everday and I think you are as old as you feel.

By then the War had started. We used to have to walk over Rolley Bottoms with our Gas mask slung over our shoulders and a few sandwiches usually spam or dripping for our dinners which we had in the canteen. We started work at eight and we didn't finish until six and thats all I had to eat until I got home at night and then we didn't get much. Of course evrything was rationed. We didn't get much butter but our mam used to let me have it all and the other two got margarine. They didn't know of course and she told me not to tell them. We didn't get many sweets but this lady who worked near me used to get her rations and give them to me because she'd got diabetes.
Every saturday morning we used to walk from Teversal to Sutton to Sheppersons who'd got a swet shop in King Street and we had to queue up about 2 hours and we got a free lucky bag. Every so often we had an air raid practice at the factory. We had to go down the fire escape, "not forgetting our gas masks" and go right down to the basement and stay there for about half an hour. of course we didn't get paid because we were on our own time and that meant we only got what we earned. Air raid wardens used to come round and if they saw a chink in the curtains it was "put that light out".
We had some evacuees in our street but we couldn't have any because we were overcrowded as it was. My aunty who lived two doors away had two. A brother and a sister and my aunty had two of her own. My two cousins were very cruel they used to do things and blame the evacuees. As the War went on we had to make Long Johns for the Army. The khaki material was terrible to do. It was so thick we were always breaking needles and the boss used to tell us off and say "the next one of you to break you'll pay for it", but we never did.
We had to work longer hours too. It was 8 till 8. Then it was bedtime but we never grumbled. We were thinking about those poor soldiers. Every so often we used to get some entertainment in the canteen and that cheered us up. We were very lucky, we never got bombed where we lived a Teversal. The nearest one was at Hardwick. I don't know what it was like there but it sounded as if it was in our back garden. God help the people in London. It must have been hell. My middle sister got called up and she went to work at Newark, a munitions factory and that got bombed but as luck would have it she was on nights and this happened in the day. My eldest sister didn't pass. I was too young to be called up but if I had been I would have gone in the Land Army. Can you just imagine me riding on a tractor and milking the cows it would have been great. Never mind I made the soldiers some Long Johns to keep there bums warm.

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