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This story has been written onto the ´óÏó´«Ã½ People’s War site by CSV Storygatherer Lucy Thomas of Callington U3A on behalf of Marjorie Mahoney nee Watson. They fully understand the terms and conditions of the site.

Part 3

POOR GERTRUDE

I had three toys. One was a golliwog, which an aunt made for me out of coloured felt, called Golly. The other was a knitted dog called Trudy and the third, and goodness knows where a three-year old dug this name up from, was a doll called Gertrude. Now, Gertrude was very special and would be worth a lot of money today. She had a lovely china face, with moving eyes, long blonde hair and beautiful pink cheeks and a rosebud mouth and she was dressed in a sort of lace dress. I was showing her to the Italians in the cottage next door and I dropped her headfirst on the tiled floor and of course the head shattered and that was the end of poor Gertrude. But Brunet took great pity on me, because obviously I burst into tears and was very upset for a short while, and he presented me with another doll which he'd made out of straw and covered in fabric and done the best he could. I don't know what happened to that. I probably put it aside and looked at it and daren't play with it because of memories of Gertrude. After all, a child doesn't know what's really going to break and what won't.

HERE COMES THE FIRE ENGINE, THERE GOES THE HAY STACK!

There was a Fire Service and I can still remember the sound of the fire bell on the engine, if one could call it that. It was all a bit "Heath-Robinson" and, hopefully, when it was called out it would start, which could be a problem. All the firemen had gone to the war and the people who were manning it were sort of stopgaps, total amateurs with more enthusiasm than aptitude. On one day, there was a stack fire in the village and I can remember great excitement when we rushed out to hear the fire engine. When Father came back, having gone to try and help, see what he could do, he told Mother with great resolution that he hoped he'd never have a fire because the crew were absolutely useless. They'd set off from the fire station in Snaith and when they got to roll out the fire hose, they had left it in Snaith at the station. The farmer's wife was not best pleased but she was persuaded to give them cups of tea while they watched the stack burn down and then when it was all tidied up, they all went home. I'll bet they didn't do that again.

MEND AND MAKE DO

Nothing was wasted during the war, even cast-off clothes, which could be in parts very threadbare, with a lot of patching — even patching on the patches. There came a time when it wasn’t viable any longer to either patch or wear such clothes. So, they were washed in a tub in the wash house, hung out to dry very thoroughly and then they were cut up into strips about three-quarters of an inch wide and about four inches long. It didn’t matter what colour it was as long as it was hardwearing — what was left of the original garment. They were made into what we call ‘peg rugs’ — a large piece of washed hessian, hemmed, and then half a peg to make the hole in the hessian. Then the clip of material was pushed and pulled through, so that the loop at the back was flat and the tufts came through to the top and that was the wearing bit. When they were first made, they were put in the parlour and then, when they were going a bit tatty, were moved into the kitchen in front of the fire, which was nice for feet and helped things look a bit nice, be a bit more comfortable. Then, when they were really past redemption, they ended up in the dog kennel outside for the sheepdog, so nothing was wasted. Everything had one life, or two, or three, or four!

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