大象传媒

Wartime Memories

These are my memories of wartime and how it affected my life.
Wherever you went, your gas mask had to go too! At school, it was worse than forgetting your homework to leave your gas mask at home. Teacher would check everyday and you were sent home straight away to collect it, with a severe reprimand. We had shelters in the school yard and once a week we had practice, like the schools now have fire practice. Also, once a week, we had to put on our gas mask and teacher would come round and put what I think was a piece of paper on the bottom of the mask: if that stuck then everything was ok.

The air raids were usually at night. My father was in a reserved occupation: his job was charge nurse at the mental hospital, a job he was totally dedicated to. He was a wonderful husband, father, nurse and friend. He had a shelter built below ground in our garden, so he could leave us safe whilst he got on his bike to go to help look after his men at the hospital.

I had an older sister Joan, older brother, Fred, and in 1944, a younger brother Danny, but the war years were mainly the three of us older children. My mother was the youngest mum in our cul-de-sac so she was asked to be the Fire Warden. This meant we had a card in the sitting room window and we had the stirrup pump in case of fire. Two older retired men were the ARP Wardens, with tin hats. During an air raid they would patrol their area and, I remember, they would come in our shelter and call out 鈥淓verything OK Mrs Ellwood?鈥� Mum would reply and off they would go to the next shelter. Lots of people had Anderson shelters in their sitting rooms.

The blackout was a nightmare. You had to have this horrible black material at the windows and you had to turn off the lights in the kitchens or hall before you could open the back or front doors. If you forgot, and I never quite understood how this happened, you would hear a really loud voice shouting 鈥淧ut that light out!鈥� When anyone came to the door you had to make sure all lights were out and of course there were no street lights allowed.

I used to be scared when we could hear the planes going over. They only used Lancaster as a marker for bombing Barrow shipyard, so we were lucky; it must have been terrible in the places that got bombed every night.

I remember the evacuees being brought around the street in a crocodile-like line. My mum took one boy in and he stayed quite a while until his parents wanted him home.

Rationing was a problem but my dad came off farming stock so we could get a little help at times. When I was playing out my mum used to say 鈥淲atch for the Co-op truck coming to the shop.鈥� Then we would all run in and our mums would go to see what had arrived. Of course the truck was horse-drawn, as was the dustbin cart and many more. We used to have egg powder that you could make omelettes with but I didn鈥檛 like it, it was horrid stuff. Sweets were in short supply, plus we had to have coupons to buy them, but a little shop near our school used to make parched peas 鈥� hot if you were lucky, cold if you were not. Also, at the Co-op, once in a while we could get a small bag of cocoa powder with some sort of sweetener in. You would wet your finger and then dip it in the bag. Bananas were few and far between and a real treat but they were only available on a child鈥檚 blue ration book. I remember having to go on Saturdays to the bakery and queuing very early in the morning to get bread and a few small cakes. The first people there got the best choice but you were only allowed a few.

One of the slogans during wartime was Dig for Victory and everyone was expected to dig up their gardens and plant potatoes and vegetables. Even the front gardens were dug up and planted. We had fruit trees in our garden and mum would wrap some of the individual fruits up in newspaper and keep them in an old tin trunk till Christmas. The parks all had their railings taken down to be used for the war effort but they were never replaced after the war.

Due to young men having to go to war, schools and shops, offices, hospitals, every walk of life, were short of a workforce so in some places they let married ladies come back, where before the war when they got married they stayed at home. This happened at Scotforth School, we got some teachers back who had left to get married. Due to all the evacuees coming to our school, we only went to school in the mornings and went to a church hall in the afternoons to play games organised by helpers.
Lots of people were evacuated here from Coventry, which was badly bombed, and they worked at a munitions factory in town. A lot of them stayed after the war and are still here today. My in-laws worked at the munitions factory on night and day shifts from six till six. My husband used to say he was one of the first 鈥榣atch-key kids.鈥�

When the war was over the street parties were great fun. Everyone was welcome and people would take their tables and chairs out on the street. Mums would provide food: jam and paste sandwiches, jelly and cakes. The street was decorated with bunting and someone would provide music.

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