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The summer of 1943 was a watershed for me. It was a bleak time, deep in the middle of the war, and I knew I could only decide my own future provided I did so before my 18th birthday. For on reaching 18 years the law decreed that all young men were ‘called up’ for military service and all young women were offered a choice. They could join one of the armed forces or be ‘directed’ into factory work, or other work deemed to be essential to the war effort.

My elder sister — though married and in her early twenties — had been directed into a factory as she did not have a family at that time. My second sister, resident at the Sheffield teacher training college, had been caught up in the city’s first air raid on 12 December 1940. I decided my best course would be to leave my studies and choose my own employment before my 18th birthday. It proved to be a very good decision.

I had made a few cautious enquiries in the available labour market before applying for an administrative post with the London and North Eastern Railway Company. Their office address was the Victoria Railway Station in the centre of the city and employment with them complied with the Essential Works Order.

I had to report there for an interview. When I entered the station I was immediately caught up in the usual rush of a busy war-time station; servicemen returning to barracks, carriage doors slamming, guards shrill whistles signaling the departure of their cargo, and everywhere dense clouds of steam as the locos moved away.

I remember being struck by the dirty appearance of the platforms, the cacophony of shrill noises and, above all, the belching steam which filled the station as the locos entered and departed. It was a depressing sight and I doubted that I had made the right decision. That is, until at the end of my interview, I was informed that the whole of the engineering complex had been re-located to Aston Hall, a beautiful manor house in the village of Aston some 8 miles or so from the city centre.

The hall had been the home of Sir Ronald Matthews and his family since 1928 and, I learned, he had many connections with the city of Sheffield. He had been Master Cutler of Sheffield in 1922 — 23 and was a director of several companies, including the London and North Eastern Railway.

At the beginning of the war he had arranged for the furniture and personal effects of his family to be stored, and then he offered his house for the use of the Railway Company for the duration of hostilities. As a result of this offer, all the furniture, files and paraphernalia of a large office workforce had been taken to Aston and fitted into unbelievably sumptuous surroundings.

When I arrived for my first day at work in 1943 the contrast between Aston Hall and the dingy office complex on Victoria Station was immeasurable.

My first view was from the top deck of a corporation bus. As it left the road and made its way towards the hall I saw splendid wrought iron gates and, beyond, a curving drive between immaculate lawns.

We alighted at the main entrance and I could see rolling pastures, trees and shrubs on three sides of the building. To the north, at the back of the hall, were large kitchen gardens and, running alongside the boundary wall, a small wood provided shade and privacy.

On later exploration I was to discover a formal garden — a fine example of topiary — a rose garden, and two very well maintained tennis courts.

When I walked into the hall I expected to be met by an office environment but it appeared to be in its original state. No desks vying for space or filing cabinets crammed into corners, but a beautiful mosaic floor beneath a broad and pillared staircase which swept upwards to the first floor balcony. The library had been left virtually untouched with rows of leather-bound books filling shelves on three walls, and rich dark brown velvet curtains framing the windows of the remaining wall.

The drawing room was a light and airy room, having windows on two of its sides, and it was elegant, too, with a polished wooden floor, scatter rugs and azure velvet curtains from ceiling to floor. The Chief Engineer and his two assistant engineers occupied the library and the drawing room respectively. The third room had been a large dining room but now served as a drawing office, and with draughtsman’s desks and piles of blue prints scattered around, only the size and shape hinted at its former glory.

In its wartime role all the rooms in the hall bad been adjusted to suit the requirements of its new occupants.

Even the ballroom on the first floor had succumbed to the need for office space. Its beautiful sprung floor was given scant regard by the busy clerks, but with the raised musicians’ dais at the end of the room it was redolent of gracious living, of winter balls and summer tennis parties.

I enjoyed my job. The work was varied and interesting and, along with my colleagues I took full advantage of the surroundings.

Lunch would be taken in the canteen to a background of cheerful music from the radio, and then we would play tennis on those excellent tennis courts, or stroll through the gardens, even sunbathe on really hot days.

On cooler days we would take a brisk walk through the wood or go down to the stables. Horses were no longer kept there. It was here that a table tennis and billiard table had been taken from the hall providing a cheerful break from work on a wintry day.

But the war was never far away.

In the first few weeks of my new working life I had been struck by the dichotomy of the workforce; far more women than men, and, whereas most of the women were teens or twenties, the men were middle-aged and upwards. Then I realized that the only young men were three fresh-faced 17 year old trainee draughtsmen who were embarking on an apprenticeship which would be cut short on their 18th birthday. And on three separate occasions in the first few months I was at the hall we wished all of them well as they went from room to room to shake hands and say goodbye.

Whenever the news was being broadcast there would always be someone near to the radio in the canteen and we would be updated on events.

Usually this did not disrupt the flow of work but on 6 June 1944, when non-stop news coverage was given to the D.Day landings, we gathered around the radio in silence listening to the drama taking place on the beaches of Normandy. No-one spoke. We all knew it was a sombre and momentous occasion in the war.

This, of course, proved to be the case and the longed for victory arrived a year later.

The ending of the war was followed swiftly by the lifting of the Essential Works Order which meant I could now choose my own employment and in 1946, with the railway employees back once more in office on the grubby platform on Victoria Station, I took stock of all possibilities in the new post-war era and moved on.

Aston Hall never reverted to private ownership. In 1948 it was sold to the Yorkshire West Riding County Council who converted it into a psychiatric hospital. Then, several years later, it was bought and converted into a country hotel.

The mosaic floor and pillared staircase still greet visitors to the hall, but the wartime canteen, where we gathered round the radio on that momentous day in June 1944, has now become part of a larger and much grander restaurant.

Brenda Harford Sealey.

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