´óÏó´«Ã½

This story is contributed by Marjorie Morgan and is added to the site with her consent.

I was still in school because I was about 14 when war broke out. On the day I was with my grandparents over the border in Gloucestershire I remember the air raid wardens coming round and getting my grandmother to cover up the windows because there wasn’t to be any showing. We didn’t know what to expect, but my parents were very worried because they had lived through the experiences of the first world war and were horrified at the thought of another war which you could understand. I was living in Llandewi my mother and father were farmers just up the road and I travelled into Abergavenny every day to go to school. The war meant that you couldn’t really go to college, there weren’t the opportunities then of course. And schooling was limited because we had a school evacuated from Wallasey in Cheshire and they used to have the school for lessons in the afternoon, which meant we went to school early in the morning at eight o’clock, but living out here we couldn’t get there till nine o’clock because there were only three buses a day. But still, we coped.

When I left school I practically went straight into the Food Office as a junior clerk. It was where ration books were issued once a year and everyone who needed coupons if they were going away to relatives had to come in and you’d give them temporary emergency coupons so they could buy rations where they went. You had to register with a butcher or grocer and buy all your food there. You couldn’t go somewhere else and get it. Now you can go anywhere, but during rationing you had to buy it where you were registered. Prices were regulated so they’d be the same everywhere. Bread was rationed, but you could — you had bread units, they used to call them, and you spent them as you went, you could buy bread anywhere provided you had the units. The amounts you could buy were registered…there was a couple of ounces of butter, about half a pound of sugar, a couple of ounces of bacon and some money’s worth of meat, it wasn’t in ounces. I never bought milk so I don’t know. We would also issue permits for the butchers and the grocers and the cafes and hotels to buy their food, you see, because however many meals, or how much food they sold they had coupons for it and could exchange it for permits to get their food.

People had to come in once a year to collect their ration book….and people in certain occupations like roadmen and railwaymen…people who had to take sandwiches to work were allocated extra cheese, I think it was about three quarters of a pound a week, which was a lot, but they had to have a form filled by their employers to claim that. So they’d come in and you’d give them a special coupon that they could buy that.

All the public had to come in at sometime and we used to sell baby food…powdered milk for babies and cod liver oil and orange juice for the little ones and vitamin tablets for the expectant mums. It was quite a system.

People tried to cheat the system….people lost their books you see….and certain people would come in with a book that the water had fallen all over them and you couldn’t read and they’d written their name…the book was damaged and they had to write their name. Something like that, but you always knew. But there was one woman who would regularly do it. She’d erase the person’s name….and put her name on it. People used to lose them quite often, and then they’d have to come in and sign a form to say they had lost it, and they’d have another one. We also had to issue identity cards…aswell that was quite a business. You had a record in boxes of everybody over 18…the card had their name and Christian name and insurance number on it. Our office covered Abergavenny borough and rural….so I knew everybody….they used to say I knew everybody. I could name anybody who lived in Abergavenny and district.

I think there was a black market in food…killing pigs and that sort of thing. You were allowed to kill two in 12 months, and we had to give a permit. But I know there were more than two killed with some people. It wasn’t only farmers with pigs, there were cottagers too. It did go on I know.

Everyone was allowed to keep chickens, but you had to have a permit to buy food…you had to have coupons to buy that …a lot of people just fed them housescraps and things like that. They could buy small amounts of chicken food if they had a permit.

We were lucky living on a farm we had our own milk and eggs and butter and bacon, meat if we wanted to kill a chicken or something. So we didn’t know what city people knew about that side of it. I think we were very lucky.

I think we had lots of fun in simple ways. There wasn’t the petrol to go scorching round so we rode our bikes a lot. We used to go to the dances around in the village halls. You weren’t allowed to use cars because you weren’t allowed to use the petrol for that. I belonged to the Young Farmers Club and if we wanted to hold a dance we’d always have a quiz or a lecture beforehand and then we could drive the cars there and stay on for the dance afterwards. So if we were home late we’d been to the quiz or the lecture or something educational we could take the car then.

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