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Mr. J Purves, born in Selkirk, 5th September, 1937

The earliest memories I have of the War are probably lying in bed, hearing bombers going over to bomb the Forth Bridge and Rosyth and maybe even on their way to Glasgow, though we never had any bombs over Selkirk that I remember. Later on I can remember as a wee boy standing on the corner of Tower Street and watching the troop convoys going south down the A7. Tanks, guns, lorries, Bren gun carriers, soldiers waving to you, that seemed to be quite fun to me. At the same time I remember, because I lived in the High Street in Selkirk, every Sunday morning, when the soldiers were stationed in the Haining, we used to get the Church parade, and we used to see them, sometimes with a band often singing or whistling as they marched along. That was the Polish Troops, and the British Regiments. The one I remember most was the Welsh Fusiliers because they had their goat mascot and they had the black flash on the back of their tunic. But most of all I remember the goat.

Other recollections as a young boy, we used to always be playing soldiers fighting the Germans. There was one day I had gone missing, and Mother was quite worried about where I was. What I had done, I had taken my penny to buy a set of bus time tables, and these were my battle plans. I took these with my tin helmet and my gun up onto Selkirk Hill, and that afternoon I routed the whole German Army! I couldn’t understand why there were still convoys of troops going up and down the road when I had beaten them by myself. My Mother was told that there was a little lad up there fighting the Germans and I was safely rescued and taken home.

Because my Grandparents lived in Galashiels and my Dad was away in the War, Mum used to bring me across to visit them. It was always great going home in the bus about eight o’clock at night, with the troops going back to the Haining and they would always give my Mum a seat, and they would always sit me on their knee and put their hat on my head and I would be a little soldier for the rest of that evening. I often wonder if it was these memories that led me to my 25 year career as a professional soldier.

My grandparents and mother, they sheltered you from things then, they didn’t want you to know that people were getting killed and maimed. I remember my Granny talking in sort of hushed tones about lads from Galashiels that had been killed….maybe trying to protect me because my Dad was away fighting at the time.

Dad always managed to keep in contact with us, letters came back. What I do remember was just along from us there was a lady called Mrs. Lees, and she had a little sweet shop, and I was never without sweets of some kind during the war of some kind. She was a right sweet old lady — excuse the pun! I don’t remember rationing hitting us too hard, but I remember powdered egg, and I enjoyed that, it was good. Maybe because I didn’t know anything different — I was born two years prior to the War, I didn’t know what it was like to have stuff and so rationing and the shortages were the norm. I remember that at school we used to get cocoa sent from Cananda.

I can remember having mince quite a lot, I remember the powdered egg, I think Mum just mixed it with water and fried it, but we couldn’t have lived on that all the time. It was more like an omelette the way it came out. Mum used to get the rations, but being four or five years old, somebody feeds you and that’s it. I remember the good things, like sweets, and there was another place in the market, it was an ice cream shop. But, you didn’t get ice cream in a cornet, you got some kind of jelly. It was made with Semolina jelly, and milk and frozen together. A lady used to send me along to get some in a glass tumbler, she gave me about thruppence, to buy it and other things for her tea. So I went off but on the way home I started to play with one of my mates and about an hour they came looking for me to see what I had done with this ice cream, which was then a sort of milky watery mess in a jar.

The soliders were stationed in the Haining —we didn’t go around while they were there. There were also Italian prisoners of War, they were stationed in what is now Bannerfield. They had British Army battle dress which was died a chocolate brown colour, but they all had big coloured patches on them. They used to wander quite freely through the town, we never had any trouble with them.

When I went to the Infants’ School up the Back Row in Selkirk I was in this little play — we marched round in a circle,singing the words ‘Tommy was a soldier, Tommy was a soldier, Tommy was a soldier, hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!’ and I remember I got the part of the soldier with my tin helmet and my little gun, and another was dressed as an airman and another a fireman. I suppose that was a sort of patriotism, they used to do these kinds of things, then.

I remember going coming to meet my Father at Galashiels Station, when he was coming home. It must’ve been pretty soon after the war ended. I don’t remember celebrations or parties or anything…I don’t remember being hoisted on anyone’s shoulders or waving flags. My Dad spoke very little about the war, I had to get to know him again. I’d be three when he went so I don’t suppose I really knew him too much, but when he came back he used to take me down to the rugby matches at Philiphaugh and sometimes we’d come across to Netherdale. Sometimes we’d go up to Cauldshields Loch for picnics. It wasn’t many years after that that we left Selkirk to go down to Ayton in Berwickshire, but by that time the war was well and truly behind us. Everybody was picking up their lives and didn’t talk much of the War anymore. My father was a baker with Robert Douglas before he went off to the war and when he came back he worked on there, in the Market Square, then he got a little place down in Ayton. From there we moved to England.

Mr grandfather, John Purves, worked in a sawmill up at Buckholm, and he lived just round the corner in St John Street (Galashiels). He served in the First World War and I probably remember him more in my earlier years than my Father because it was my grandparents I used to come and visit. He used to take me to the Scott Park and I would go on the swings, I must only have been five, six years old, but I used to be able to walk the streets of Gala to go and meet him when he came out of work. He was a joiner as well — I remember he made me a little wooden tank and a little wooden aeroplane. I often wonder where these went, because they were the only toys you could get, you know, if somebody made them for you. And I would go over to Gala and there were two toy shops, there was one in Bank Street, almost next to the Salmon Inn, then I would go off down the Street, come down Channel Street and up and where the bathroom shop is now on the corner, that was another toy shop and I would spend ages looking in the windows there. That’s where most of my pocket money was spent.

We didn’t have a shelter — we used to come off Scott’s Close in Selkirk, down a few steps and it was like a shared garden. What I do remember is my Mother’s relations lived in Fife and school holidays used to be spent in Fife because they lived on a big estate there which was well away from everything. I remember my Grandfather on my Mother’s side taking me out to watch, there were two or three spitfires taking out a German bomber, over the Forth Bridge. It was obviously trying to get the naval base at Rosyth, and they shot this bomber down. I remember seeing the smoke and flames, and two men came out on parachutes, and I could actually see the top of the bridge from where we lived. About four or five days later I remember being taken up to Dunfermline to watch the two or three of them that didn’t survive, the Germans, being buried with full military honours. It always stuck in my mind, how good the British were about that, bearing in mind we were told all this, about how ‘bad’ the Germans were. This of course was another thing — how ‘good’ we were — propaganda of course on our side — but on reflection it was amazing the people that turned out. These were the enemy, but people lined the streets, men took their caps off and people bowed their heads — I suppose it was quite moving. So, holidays were spent up in Fife — on the way to Fife, the train used to go out of Waverley, across the Forth Bridge. It used to pass Turnhouse, the aerodrome, and there were always spitfires and things lined up there. I used to stand at that side of the train from the moment it left Waverley, hoping to see these planes.

At home Mum had to carry fresh water up in a pail, up one flight of stairs, that was the fresh water and there was an old bucket that the slops went in, that had to be taken down and emptied somewhere. The loo was outside, there was a cooker, a sink, but no running water, and all the water had to be brought up and boiled. The kitchen was more or less a corner of the living room, then there was another stairway to a second floor where I had a little bedroom and there was a bigger bedroom that was my Mum’s.

Despite the obvious hardships that my parents must have endured, I remember it all as a happy childhood.

(Collected by SMC Museums)

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