´óÏó´«Ã½

Q. Before you went into the armoured corps, when you were in Alloa, the Wee County itself, did yourself and your wife witness rationing? Was it the same or different?

A. Oh yes, there was rationing all right. Butter was rationed, eggs were rationed, we went on that powered egg, you know, and spam, tins of spam. We had a big family and my mother was a clever woman.

Q. You being a gardener, you would have been able to grow your vegetables?

A. Yes, but at that time I was only an apprentice gardener. I did go into the gardens right enough at the pit but I only grew one or two vegetables. Down at the Duke of Wellington’s Estate, there were masses of vegetables there. They were poorly paid, gardeners, it was a good job but even for all the rich people you got tatties and you got vegetables but not much money. Gardeners were never overpaid.

Q. Did you have a tied house?

A. Yes, I’ve always had a house near my job. My father used to say to me ‘you’ve got a job near your work’ he was kidding me on. He meant there was a tied house with my job. Maybe that’s why I’m nearly 88.

Q. Are you 88?

A. Almost. In two months, I’ll be 88.

Q. And you are a widower now?

A. Oh yes. She died twelve years ago. But I have a son, a great golfer — he played for Scotland and Great Britain and his son, who’s seven, he was the same, he played at Tulliallan. And my daughter, in Zambia, could never play golf. She went to Zambia and that’s all she did. She played for Zambia. I played a wee bit of golf but Davie played a lot more.

Q. Did you have three children?

A. Yes, two girls and a boy.

Q. Did you go out in Alloa with your wife?

A. Oh yes. My sister was the cashier in the picture house so, when we went to the picture house, we got in for nothing. And later, when we were having a row, she used to say ‘the only reason I married you was that I got into the pictures for nothing!’.

Q. When you were in the war, did your wife work?

A. Oh, yes. She worked in a blanket factory down in Kincardine and then she went to Stirling. It was another blanket factory in Stirling. She fell off the lorry and came down to see me. I said ‘what are you down to see me for?’ and she said ‘I fell off of the lorry’ and I said ‘that’s how I found you, when you had fallen off a lorry!’. She was a lovely person, my late wife — always smiling.

Q. Did you go dancing in Alloa?

A. Yes, I was a great dancer. Oh, the parties! I just to go to the bowling green and have a good drink or two and I said to the boys ‘just watch my feet now, watch my feet’. I knew all the moves. We loved dancing. Actually, that was the first time I met her was at a dance. It was in Alloa, at the Girls’ Club. We also danced at the Mayfair and at Patons and at Sauchie. We did a lot of dancing. We went to the pictures to the Gomont and the Pavillion. The Pavillion had the first talkie, it was either Laurel and Hardie or Sunny Boy, with Al Johnson. It was either one of those two, we got the bus to Alloa to the Pavillion. We were just about 15 or 16 at the time.

Q. Can you remember any of the films you saw during the war?

A. No, I can’t remember any of them. We were usually busy with the women then!

Q. Tell me where you were at VE Day?

A. I was in Alloa. I got leave and I was in Alloa and we went to the dancing that night. It was at the Mayfair. Now, who was playing? It was a great band from across the border. I can’t remember, my memory goes now and again. I’m glad this has happened because this has been going through my head for years and years and I just want to close it like that (claps his hands) now. I want it to be finished. Maybe the first twenty years I kept away from it but then it started to come back. I just want it to be a closed book now.

Why do you march old man,
With medals on your chest,
Why do you grieve old man,
For those men you laid to rest,
Why do your eyes gleam old man,
When you hear the pupils blow,
Why do you cry old man,
For those days so long ago,
In misty fields of gossamer song,
In visions of distant times,
When young boys of tender age,
Marched for the distant lines,
We buried them in a blanket shroud,
Their feet all squashed in bracken,
In a gouged out grave,
In green grass of bracken,
I’ll tell you why,
Because if it hadn’t been for those apple blossomed youth,
You would never have no freedom at all.

It’s true — I did a lot of research after I buried that man. I can remember going in the morning and we used to get up about 5.00 a.m. You were doing something — if you were out of action they would give you something to do.

Q. Seem to me there had to be a lot of sacrifices made in those days?

A. Oh yes. The easy bit for me was we joined the Desert Rats but we didn’t know any of them. So, if any of them got killed it was not as bad as if they had been in the Aryglls or something — like you had grown up with them. That was one wee good bit, well it wasn’t good, but it made it easier for you. They were strangers to me.

Q. Did you have a big party when you were finished?

A. Yes, Alloa was jumping that night. I had a good drink that night.

Q. Tell me about your family.

A. This older brother was made a quarter master before he joined the army. He was in the territorials and my brother was a clerk and the boy that was the sergeant major with the territorials he said to him ‘if you join the territorials I’ll make you the quarter master sergeant’ so he was made a court marshall sergeant and maybe just a fortnight later he went away down to Aldershot. They knew the war was going to start and he knew he would need a quarter marshall sergeant.

Q. Was he in the Argylls?

A. Yes, he was in the Argylls. He was captured at St. Hillary and my next brother, he got out at Dunkirk. He got away in the boat. He was a sergeant in the engineers.

Q. So, did they get back to Alloa to tell you all about this?

A. Frank did come down when I was wounded, he came down to Hereford to see me, but the two brothers met and the elder didn’t know that the other was in the army. With him being in the territorials they were first over, you see. And, this other brother that was the engineer, and one was on one side of the railway and the other was on the other side, but they did wave to each other across the railway.

Q. Are you the only one left out of your brothers and sisters?

A. I have one young sister left. All the rest are dead. I was the weirdy of the family, the runt of the family. I’ve got older than all of the rest of them. They all got to over 70 but I’ve beaten the lot of them.

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.