大象传媒

I joined the army, the ATS on 9th August1940. I was in Edinburgh for six weeks and then I was posted back to Stirling. I went in as a Cook. I remember my mother was on holiday when I went in, so she didn't know I joined up.

At the time, I was going with a fella, Dan, who was a lovely man, but he got killed in the war. If his mother had only let him get married when we wanted to, she would still have had him. She wouldn't let him get married, even though we had been going out for three years and we were engaged. He was a lovely laddie who stayed in Cowane Street. I joined the army to see the world, but I never saw much of the world. Dan's mother told me to join up to get me out the road. She thought I was going to take him away, but I ended up based in Stirling. We were to get married and I used to write to him every day. I had a cardboard box that you got biscuits in, in my room, at my mother's house.

One night Dan came down and he stole it. He brought a patchy bag down one night and put all the letters in it when he was going away. He always drank milk and we had our supper with my mother and then I had to go back to the Hotel where I was stationed. I was to be up early next morning and he was blaming me. He started to walk me up the road and then said 'wait a minute'; he ran back to my mother's, she lived in Drip Road, and he went up to my bedroom and stole my letters that he had sent me. He was worried in case I took him from breach of promise. And then he was killed in the war. If his mother had let us marry, he would still have been here; they don't let married men volunteer for minesweeping.

He had a brother, Jim who was married to Lizzie down Burns Street and Andre who worked in the Grampian at the time, but he was young and he wasn't married. He is married now and stays in Falkirk. Jim was up in the Highlands, but he died.

I was about 17, 19 when I joined the army and my husband was in the airforce. When I met my husband, I smoked at the time. I used to get cigarettes off my brother-in-law in Denny. Alexander's bus station was in the Main Street, Stirling, just a small office. I was standing there waiting for a bus to get cigarettes when along came these two fellas, one was in uniform, his pal wasn't in the army, and he just died recently. Jimmy was in th RAF. They were heading towards the Post Office. He winked at me and I winked right back. They just turned at the Post Office and came back and I went to him. I saw him every night after that. He was a Honey. He came from Cowie and in Cowie everyone knew each other. My Granny came from Cowie and went to see his mother and she said to his mother 'Bell, that's a braw laddie, maybe one day he'll marry my grand daughter.'

We did get married, we got married on 1st August 1941. It was a real love story, ours. We met on 10th April which was my birthday, we made a date for the next month. That was the start of the love story, we went together for five months. I got married in my uniform and Crow and Rodgers in the Allanpark took the photographs. I no longer have any photos; the kids have taken them away. I had a wedding cake that was one tier. We went to Pitlochry for our honeymoon. Aye, he was a Honey and the bees didn't know it, I miss him. My mother called him Gentleman Jim.

He was in Stranraer and he got posted to Northern Ireland. I was a little worried about him but he wrote every day and I wrote him. I wasn't away anywhere during the war. I just got sent on courses to Edinburgh. I was a Cook stationed at Gill's Hotel in King Street. When Jimmy came home on leave, he used to stand on the corner of King Street and wait for me and one of the other lassies, one from the Highlands, would shout at him from the window 'Glamour Boy' and 'Brylcream Boy'. There was a crowd of lassies stationed together in King Street, it was good fun. One night, though, there was an air raid and we all congregated in the hall of the hotel. That was the night they hit the bridge going into Fallin. Three wee cottages in Fallin got hit.

The fellas came home from Dunkirk and they were stationed up in St.Mary's School, Irvine Place. We cooked up in St'Mary's for the ROAC; it was a great life. You got nine shillings, but I got mine made up to twenty-eight shillings, because I got an increment. I was always passing courses for first class cook. I still have my pay book but it's awfully worn.I cooked porridge in the morning for the men, but up in St'Mary's there was a problem with either mice or rat's droppings. It was horrible. The poor soldiers didn't know what they were eating. They liked sugar or jam on their porridge. We didn't eat the porridge ourselves and they never knew about the rat's droppings, we tried to pick out as much as we could. We would have millet for lunch and maybe a cup of tea. It was great fun. I still see one of the guys, Jimmy Johnstone from Bannockburn.

There wasn't much to spend your money on during the war. I used to spend my pay on cigarettes. I got my husband's pay on a Thursday and my own pay on a Friday. I used to give my mother four and six, but was always broke by the Monday and used to go back to her and ask for it back.

I came out of the army in December 1942, I remember the snow that year, and I was released for family reasons, I was expecting my first baby. I remember VE day but was out of the army by that time. Agnes our sergeant stays up in Clarendon Place still and every month we all meet up in the Terraces Hotel for lunch and a get together.

I have five lassies and two boys in my family. The boys, Jim is in Inverness and David is in South Africa.

My poor man, he died when he was 52. He took Hepatitis. He had been a gardener before the war and the Brew wouldn't give him anything else but a gardener's pay. He got six pounds a fortnight. That's what she paid him. She had a house down on the hill. Thirteen rooms it had. I cleaned for her for one pound a week! That's all she paid me. I was expecting Jim at the time. My sister Annie did the housework when I couldn't do it anymore and one day she was wrongly accused of stealing 拢40.00. My man handed in his notice after that and got another gardening job down near Arnprior but didn't like that one. We eventually went back to Stirling and he got a job working in the railway as a signalman. He was a clever man but it was only four pounds a week though. Aye, I still miss him.

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