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Late 1930’s — 1950s

Life in St Helens was much the same as life in South Wales, most of the men and boys went to work in the mines or the other industries in the area. In St Helens it was mines or the glass works. All men, boys, girls and young married couples had to work, mothers with young children would look after the home. Mothers went shopping every day, food had to be bought fresh and the milkman come on a horse and cart called a float, with large cans full of milk. The ladies would stand and wait for him to fill a jug for them. Mothers in the 30’s and 40’s had to work very hard as did all the families. Washing was all done by hand with a scrubbing board and a tin tub.

Life for children was good, school days started at 9am and finished at 4pm then it was home for tea. All our free time was spent out of doors, in Spring and Summer we went fishing, walking, we build camps and rafts to sail on the canal across the road from our house. Summers always seemed hot and winters cold. For adults it wasn’t so good and in 1939 the year I was born they faced the threat of war and because they had lived through the First World War they had a good idea what to expect. But not the Children.

Christmas was not like it is today, I can remember my brother and I didn’t get much, some nuts in the toe of the stocking and some sheets of cardboard with pictures of uniforms on them to be cut out and put on cardboard men. Once we both got airplanes . A man dad knew made them out of babies milk tins, we thought they were great.

Rationing started in 1940 and lasted until 1953. It was very hard trying to feed everyone; I had never seen a banana until I was about eight years old. When the Queen got married all the countries of the commonwealth and many more sent ships loaded with tinned food, the palace gave all the widowed mothers with dependant children a food hamper it was wonderful to see all this exotic food

I left school when I was 15 and had to start work I worked for the next three years until it was time to go into the armed forces, this was called national service. I signed on as a volunteer, but that is another story.

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