大象传媒

Recollections of the War, by C. Robinson (n茅e Quenby)

I was 14 years old and at Shirebrook Grammar School for Girls at the outbreak of the war in September 1939. I can see our wireless set on a table with the batteries underneath; for I came home from school and Prime Minister Chamberlain had been on to declare war on Germany. I can see us (my parents and I) round the table, listening to it again at night time.
There were coupons, rations, and queuing for food. Weekly rations per person:
1 egg,
2 ozs of butter,
4 ozs of cooking fat,
2 ozs of tea, and
6 pennyworth of meat.
We all had ration books for clothing, petrol, sweets, etc. We weren鈥檛 sweet eaters, so we went on the 鈥淏lack Market鈥�, and exchanged our sweet coupons for food. Father, being a coal-miner, had an extra cheese ration, such as it was.
Meat rationing went on from 1940 to 1954. The magic SPAM was also a "meat" which was fried, baked, coated with breadcrumbs, etc., etc. to add to the rations. (When I went to Australia in 1950 the meals on the ship were out of this world for the three weeks of the voyage).
We were all given identity numbers, mine was RCJB 185 3.
My mother was a nurse and midwife, so she had to go to the FIRST AID POST when the sirens went, in case she had to treat any casualties, fortunately there never were any.
Father, being an ex-Army man, joined the HOME GUARD and every Sunday morning he went away and trained with others in case we were ever invaded. Fortunately that never happened either. They were, as it was called, on the Home Front.
Mother could sew and she made our black-out curtains out of some black material and we put them on a stick and covered the windows. Many shop and school windows were criss-crossed by white tape to prevent blast damage. We got used to lying in bed, we had no air raid shelter, listening to the siren which heralded an air raid (they used the pit siren) when the German bombers came over. Their drone was very different to our bombers, and we could hear theirs come over Shirebrook, turn and go back to bomb Sheffield. On a clear sunny day we could see the Barrage Balloons that encircled Sheffield; they were supposed to prevent any enemy bombers getting close to the city for night time bombing. I don鈥檛 think they were a great deterrent, unfortunately.
We were never bombed in the country, but a land-mine did land and explode in the fields by the railway bank. Fortunately only a cow was killed! Father went next morning and picked up a piece of nylon rope that had been on the land-mine鈥檚 parachute. I had kept it since that day and have just given it to the Mansfield Museum.
I remember going into the village and seeing Palings, the local fish shop, with all it鈥檚 shop glass on pavement and road. That was the only war damage I ever saw.
It was very exciting to see the soldiers, billeted in one of the pubs, drilling on the local market place. At school we had to carry our gas masks every day; horrible drill putting them on, going in to the air raid shelter (a very few times); having to eat plenty of potatoes (called pig potatoes) because of rationing; planting fruit for the war effort; taping the windows, but otherwise the war did not affect our daily lives.
Aged 17 in 1943, I went to St. Gabriel鈥檚 Teachers' Training College, which had been evacuated to Doncaster from London, hiring local colleges premises. I took my bicycle with me, a black utility one, and every day I cycled from the house where I was billeted on the outskirts of Doncaster, into the town. Another student of St. Gabriel鈥檚 was billeted in the same house and we became friends. She was called Patricia Read then, and came from Peckham in London. Patricia would come back from going home and tell us of the devastation in London, which we were hardly aware of in the country.
There were many more air raids while I was there, and very strict rationing. The people with whom we were billeted (Mr. and Mrs. Bennett) had two children and we two students, so our rations were quite plentiful, though we had a lot of lamb stews, and, from America, dried eggs. Those eggs were cooked in many glorious ways. America, once she came into the war in 1941, helped us out with Lease Lend Aid as so many of our ships and convoys were being sunk by the German submarines, until, with the invention of depth charges, the submarines were not so effective. We saw American soldiers, airmen and other nationalities for the first time in the town, and at dances, where it was safe to walk home two miles, even in the black out.
There was one glorious night, a big, big celebration. We walked to town which was heaving with people. It must have been VE night in May 1945. No drinking, lots of dancing, hugging and kissing, very daring, and then to walk back, my friend and I, in the blackout.
In Shirebrook we had Bevin Boys - they went down the local mines. We had prisoner-of war camps at Cuckney, Langwith and Pleasley. I remember exactly where they were in their wooden huts.
I little realised how I was affected by the nearby air raids, even though I was never in one. While I was in Australia on a farm (1950 鈥� 1955) I became very upset when the farmer, turning the handle of the separator (to turn milk into cream), created the sound of the siren. It took quite a while for me to calm down. I never forget that episode, so how were those poor people who were bombed every night and had no homes to go back to affected for the rest of their lives?

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