大象传媒

Starting work in Wartime chapter two.

Wire works.

Monday morning bright and early a good breakfast and dressed in new clothes and overalls for work I arrived at the Office of Brown Brothers Sheet Iron and Wire works. Dick Brown was in charge of the wire works Arthur Brown in charge of the Sheet Iron and Ernie was the outside work and contracts. Mrs Brown Arthur鈥檚 wife was in charge of the office, truly a family affair.
Dick took John and I upstairs to a room where men were making wire baskets (trugs) he said to one of them teach Frank and John how to lap rings. It was at this point I realised we stood out like shiny button sticks in a latrine cleaning party, my instincts told me we were in for trouble, it came.
The chap who was to teach us the mysterious art of lapping rings took us to a corner near the stove and proceeded to teach us the way it was done. We sat on stools with a pile of rings on a rod and smaller rings on another rod there were bunches of thin wire hanging off hooks.
You take one outer, a wire ring around twelve inches in diameter, one inner about eight inches in diameter one thrum the thin wire cut to length wrap the end of the thrum around the top of the large ring centralise the small ring and proceed to wrap the thrum in loops around the two rings until arriving at the start you tied off the thrum. The tension had to be exactly right or the ring fell apart, too tight and it buckled and so I tied my first wreath base. Not my idea of war work but as you can guess thousands were needed.
We sat around lapping rings by the gross, each gross stacked and tied together then out of the door as fast as we could lap them. Any one who was free would come and lap a gross of rings as we were on piece work so much per gross, Dick and Ernie Brown often sat in telling us jokes or we would sing as we lapped it was not something you had to give your whole mind to. And so passed the first couple of weeks, it was very social in the change of people and it seemed we were all equal while doing that job. There were various sizes and each size change we would race to be first finished a gross, a few coppers would change hands and us lads with our young fast fingers would often take the pot. It was my belief Dick and Ernie could have won hands down but let us lads have it.
Dick came to me and said I want you making the wire rings . You cut the wire to length bent the ends in a vice then put them through a hand roller. When you had a pile it was onto the spot welder, clamp each end into a vice so the joint did not quite touch and press the button, the two ends glowed then snapped together with a splash of sparks unclamp and next plus more money.
That was it the lads knew I was going downstairs into the sheet iron in a couple of months a job they all yearned for, here this toffee nosed upstart comes in gets the best jobs? Not on, and so to my first real bare knuckle fight.
We all trooped up to the top floor at lunch time the workers from downstairs clutching their cans of tea and sandwiches, entertainment as well as a break was great, a drop of blood with the sandwiches never went amiss.
The men formed a circle and the self appointed ref was taking bets, we had self appointed seconds who whispered duff advice into our ears, mine said let him hit you twice then lay down that way you will not get killed. Thanks a lot I thought.
My opponent was about a year older than me and had worked since he was thirteen, he was muscled up. I had science from the boxing club and boxing at school They did not know that. Being not exactly small or without muscle I was not too worried. The ref said right get too it and in my usual way I went straight in and could tell by his face he had not expected that so we stood and hammered each other. If I was getting some good smacks in the ref would call time we would get wiped down with a dirty sack more bets change hands and off again, If I was getting hammered the rounds seemed a lot longer, I think we had a bent ref. Both bleeding and tiring fast I think we both knew we were a match. Suddenly a voice shouted that is it lads call a draw and get your idle selves back to work, when Dick shouted we all moved fast. There was nearly another fight when the bookie refused to give the money back for a draw and Dick put his arm round my shoulder and said well done lad I like spirit so he must have watched the whole thing. I found I suddenly had a lot of new friends most had not expected me to fight, they had me down as a softy from the flesh pots of Norton Green, you live and learn.
Dick from then on used me for his personal runner. Each morning he gave me money and I would go into the High Street and buy cigarettes for the lads. It meant calling at every shop and kiosk where some of the girls knew me as a dancer so I had to promise my life away to get more of the good cigarettes. I danced with some real dogs to get those cigarettes and one woman who looked as old as my gran would not give me any until I gave her a kiss, it was like kissing a smoke stack but it got me plenty of the good ones. The things we did for England.
Taking a bag of cigarettes back they would be sold to the lads who all wanted the best ones and so I was bribed. The result was I always had more money than Dick had given me, I told him but he just winked and said keep it you earned it, too right, having to kiss smoke stack had earned me the right to that extra cash. One lad who came to work in plus fours and changed into overalls at work liked the Pasha and would take them when every one else refused. He put them into a long holder and puffed scented smoke over every one, the comments he got are not printable on this page.
Christmas arrived with the parties and New year festivals I had a wonderful time and the war we had thought nearly over suddenly started again as the Germans attacked on the 16th December into the Ardennes I might get into it yet, in the new year 1945 things changed again, more of that later.
End of chapter two.

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