This is a story about Yorkshire folk - about my family and me. For a long time now I have had a notion to write about my early life in Featherstone, a small mining community on the Yorkshire Coalfield. The time is 1921..... I was the middle one in our family. My brother Bill was one year older than me, and we were very close and always played together. My sister Edie was born ten years later, after we had removed to Darton nr. Barnsley, but I will tell you about that later in my story.
My dad was a miner at Featherstone Main Colliery at this time. I remember my mum saying that I was born on the hearthrug and that she had lain there for some time before any help arrived. She always blamed this for her poor health in later years. She had quite a time with two babies.... we lived with my grandma and grandad at that time in a small terrace house. Soon afterwards my grandma died and grandad remarried so we were left in the old house. the house, I remember had a big spare bedroom. We didn't have anything in it so our Bill and I used it as a playroom. We used to pedal around it on a three wheeler bike - mum used to go spare!! I started school when I was five.... I didn't like it then and I can't say as I ever liked it afterwards. I was shunted into Miss Sutton's class and I wept all day! I always remembered there were three dolls in that class - a beautiful one with long hair and two wooden ones. Somehow I always seemed to get shoved off with the wooden ones. Looking back now, it seems to be the story of my life - down the years things have always happened like that, life has always dealt me 'the wooden ones'.
We weren't too bad off moneywise at this time. Dad didn't get a big wage, but we managed. He was working on the coalface and earned about four to five pounds a week. We managed to save a little money in the Co-op and life seemed to be treating us quite well until out of the blue our troubles began.... 1926 - the General Strike.
Almost overnight we had nothing. Dad had to withdraw all his savings for us to live on. Mum had to go to work in the pea fields. We had to live somehow. My brother and I would go and help her to carry the buckets of peas to the scale. It was hard work I can tell you! I was very small and thin and it took some doing carrying even half a bucket of peas! I think mum got about two pence ha'penny a bucket for this back breaking labour. (She got about the same for 'potato scrattin' as well.) We didn't know it then, but we were to do these jobs for many years to come.
Dad didn't have much luck getting a job. He was out of work for about four years. He was a big man on the strike committee, as a result of which most of the pits around Featherstone wouldn't set him on. They said he was a 'bother causer' because he stood up for his rights. We had to give our terrace house up and go to live at Purston in a little cottage - much less rent of course. It was nice there:- We kept a few bantams so we were never short of eggs. Mum got a job cleaning the bank at Featherstone, so things were a little better.
It was as a result of my mum's bank job that Mrs. Foster came into our lives. She had had to retire from the bank job and she had put in a good word for my mum. She was going on seventy then, but she was a great person. I can see her now ... tall and slim, she always wore a man's leather belt around her waist. Her house was spotless - you could eat off her floors! He fire grate fascinated me, the black lead shone! She had a brass fender which I would help her to polish, along with two blackleaded horses. I loved going to see her. She had a big piece of her wedding cake under a glass dome - it seems they kept things like that years ago.
But the best thing of all was Polly, her big green parrot. He was about forty years old then and still going strong! A sailor friend had originally brought him for her. The only thing he ever said was 'hello'! My mum thought a lot about Polly and she brought him little titbits every day. Mrs Foster warned mum not to put her fingers inside the cage, but she took no notice until one day the inevitable happened- he bit her finger very deeply. She had to have an injection in case of tetanus. It put mum off Polly for quite some time! Mrs Foster had other things I liked very much - glass walking sticks filled with coloured sweets and also two ornaments with glass clusters hanging from them. I wish I had them now, fifty years on!
Mr Foster was very old and not well at all. He would always be propped up in bed with lots of pillows. Sometimes we were allowed up to see him and he would let us play with his gramophone. In those days you had to wind them up! Our favourite entertainers were George Formby and Sandy Powell. Sandy is still going strong, God bless him! We would shout out his catch phrase - 'Can you 'ear me mother?!' Mrs Foster had no children of her own, so she had got two boys from Doctor Barnardo's Homes and brought them up herself. That's the kind of woman she was!
Talking of kind people; we had a Great Aunt Emma who was just the same; she was a staunch 'Gospel Haller' and she practised what she preached. We would go to see her every Sunday. We always got a penny apiece and a big piece of spice cake. She lived in North Featherstone in the Old Vicarage. It was a very old house, built in 1500, about the same time as the church. It had been made into two houses and Aunt Emma lived in the front part. Dad told us that there was a passage in her cellar that went right through to Pontefract Castle! Being a miner, and unafraid of dark cavities, he had set out to explore it one day but had found it in such a dangerous and crumbling condition he had decided that it was perhaps better to explore no further. Dad had lived there when he was a little boy. Alas, the old house has now been demolished.
Uncle Tom, Aunt Emma's husband, was a gamekeeper. He would take us through the woods sometimes and explain about the trees, flowers and herbs. He always had his spaniel, Dash, with him - also his gun. Our Bill always wanted to hold the gun, but Uncle Tom would never let him handle it. He would say "When you get older I'll show you how to use it", but he never did. By the time our Bill was old enough, poor Uncle Tom had passed on. It was all rather tragic:- he got the idea that he had cancer and it preyed on his mind so much he hanged himself! Aunt Emma had been out shopping, and when she came back she found him. It was a terrible shock for her. It was very strange when it all came out, for the autopsy found that he didn't have cancer at all. It was a double hernia, A simple operation and he would have been fine!
By now I was going to Purston School, which I found much better. Our cottage was very small, just two bedrooms, living room and kitchen:- no front room like our other house. We were, however, blessed with a lovely big garden. Dad filled it with potatoes and vegetables. We also had a good hen run, where lived a bantam cock who was an absolute menace! I wouldn't dare go feed the hens until our Bill had put the cock safely in the pen. He would have to go in with the sweeping brush!! The cock would always fly for your face, and in the end dad got rid of him.
We settled nicely at Purston despite dad being out of work. He managed to get odd jobs unknown to 'the dole'. If they had found out they would have stopped his two pounds. It was little enough to keep four of us. At Purston we were paying four shillings and sixpence rent. In those days it was all gaslights; kelly lamps and candles for the bedrooms. In bed I would read for hours on end by the light of a single kelly lamp. Mum would play pop if she caught us! Our Bill would swop lots of comics with his mate. He would have 'Hotspurs', 'Rovers', 'Wizards'. 'Film Fun' and 'The Beano'. I used to love adventure stories. I am now in my seventies and I still love books.
Life was very tranquil at Purston and mum always said it was big mistake that we ever left. But leave we did, as a result of Uncle Jack, Dad's brother. He worked down the pit at Woolley Colliery and he told us that he could get him a job and a house. So off we went to Darton, near Barnsley.
The house at Darton was very nice. We had a bathroom, which in those days was a big improvement. Dad was now working with Uncle Jack. They lived on the other side of the road from us. There was Uncle Jack, Aunt Laura and Cousins Celia, Joyce and later, Edward. I'll always remember that house when we first arrived - the garden was one mass of wallflowers! The scent was lovely. It's strange how things stick in one's mind after all those years. I was duly enrolled at Kexborough School, along with my brother Bill. By now I was about eight years old and Bill nine.
We loved it at Darton. We roamed the fields and woods. I recall that the miners had made a swimming hole down the pit fields. They dammed the beck up and created a pool about six feet deep. Uncle Jack and dad were both good swimmers. I used to take swimming lessons at school, but I was never a strong swimmer like they were, and our Bill was quite hopeless! He never could swim - in fact on one occasion he almost got himself drowned! We used to go down the side of the wood to a lovely village called Cawthorne. Here was a big estate with parkland and lots of deer. (I wonder if they are still there now?). There was an open air swimming pool at Cawthorne, and on this particular day our Bill had gone down there on his own. It was getting around tea time and nearly everyone had gone home. Bill was dashing around the pool and he slipped on the wet concrete and fell into the deep end, fully clothed! Luckily for him there happened to be someone on hand. A man pulled him out and gave him artificial respiration. He took him home and his wife dried him out and gave him his tea.
Meanwhile, back at home it had got round to 7pm and mum was worried to death. We were all out searching for him. It was nearly eight o' clock when this car finally rolled up and who should get out but our William! His clothes were still a bit damp, but otherwise he was ok and that was all that mattered. As a result of this adventure he was barred from going down to Cawthorne for quite some time!
It's funny, but when he fell in he had his school cap on, and he never lost it from off his head! Our Bill never learned to swim after that, but he wasn't fated to die by water that's certain - later on he was almost drowned at Anzio and lived to tell about that too!
Things seemed to go smoothly for a time at Darton. Mum would take me to Barnsley on a Saturday afternoon. We would get cheap meat and vegetables in the open market. One Christmas we went and I saw this lovely bisque headed doll dressed in lemon silk. Mum promised that she would get it for Christmas. Grandad was coming to visit this particular Christmas for a few days. Christmas Day came and I was beside myself with anticipation for the doll. But what a letdown! The doll I got was only half the size of the one I'd seen, and it didn't have a pot face! Story of my life!!
Dad didn't last long at Woolley Colliery. The coal seams there were very low and he was always working up to his knees in water. One morning he woke up and found that he had arthritis in both hips! He had to go for heat treatment, and they finally got him walking with two sticks. He tried to get compensation from the colliery, but they didn't want to know! Suddenly we didn't have any money at all and dad had to go to the Board of Guardians in Penistone to obtain relief. They gave him ten shillings and a food voucher!
The next two years were pretty desperate for us. One Christmas dad and uncle Jack went up to the woods to get a Christmas tree. They dug and dug, but they had no luck. In the end, uncle Jack had to come back for a saw and they sawed two down. Mum got two rabbits and stuffed them. Times were hard, but us kids had plenty of fun. I remember dad and uncle Jack once went to the woods and came back with ten partridge eggs! They shared them, but aunt Laura refused to cook theirs so we got them all. Mum put them in the frying pan. (They weren't too bad either - nearly like hens eggs). Wintertime at Darton was cold. Mum had to put coats on the beds to keep us warm!
I had two good friends at Darton. Beatrice Futters and Dora Blackburn. Dora lived next door. Her dad and older brothers worked down a footrill in the woods at High Hoyland. I must explain that a footrill was a pit you could walk down - a drift mine. One day Dora came round and asked if I could go with her, her father and brother to the pit. It was quite an experience! They put us into this tub on wheels and pushed us all the way down to the coal face. It was a long way down I recall, and the coal glistened on both sides of the gallery. There was plenty of water about too; it was trickling down the walls in little streams. Dora's dad worked the pump to get the water out. For my part I was glad to get back into the open air. I don't think I could ever have worked below the ground.
Dad was in the pits for over twentyfive years, and when I was very small I would listen for the sound of his clogs coming up the street. He would come in coal black and mum would get the big tin bath out and put it in front of the fire. We had a side boiler in the fireplace, heated by the fire and we would take turns to fill the bath for him. Pithead baths were unknown in those days - mum always called Darton " a bread an' maggie 'ole," we were so poor.
It was about this time that Mr. Gregory came into our lives. He was an old aged pensioner mum took in. He had been a church organist and we had some lovely times with him playing our old harmonium, and us all singing. He was a grand chap and he helped mum no end. At that time mum was expecting our Edie. I was only ten and I went with her to Barnsley to get some cheap nappies and bits of fents for cot blankets. In those days, well known brands of baby powder were unknown. Mum would buy some called 'violet powder'. (By the way, the main brands of cosmetics in those times were 'Ponds', 'Snowfire', and 'Full Nana'. The perfumes were 'Californian Poppy', 'Devon Violets' and 'Evening in Paris'!)
I remember our Edie being born. She was a lovely baby - dark solemn eyes and dark hair. I loved her and looked after her all the time. Round about this time our Edward was born, he was uncle Jack's first boy. His first two children had been girls, Celia and Joyce. (Joyce was named after my mum).
Poor dad! He was still out of work, and we had very little money. It was to get some extra money that he suddenly got the idea of breeding canaries. We had some half cousins at Clayton West, whom we would visit often. We would walk from Darton to High Hoyland and then down into Clayton West. Here lived cousin Edith, Harold and three girls, Mabel, Elsie and Mildred. Cousin Harold bred canaries and he had won cups and prizes at agricultural shows. He gave dad a pair to breed with. Cousin Edith was a marvellous cake maker and I'm sure many people in Clayton West who knew her would agree with me. I loved to visit my cousins. Mildred always let me play with a lovely doll she had. It was sad, for poor Mildred was fated to die in the near future from Bright's Disease. (She was a good swimmer, and always going to the baths. It was said that she got cold in her kidneys which triggered the disease off.)
But to get back to the canaries. dad bred quite a few and made quite a bit of money out of it. We had one special bird called Billy. He would sing and sing all day long and he would sit on mum's head and 'dive bomb' our plates at mealtimes! When we finally left Darton to go back to Featherstone we couldn't take him with us because we were going to live with some people. We were all upset, but dad gave him to an old lady next door who had always wanted him. Mrs Higgins had him for quite some years and I remember that whenever I went to visit Aunt Laura's I would always go round to see 'Our Billy'. He would always know me right away.
When we had first moved to Darton we had taken our three wheeler bike with us. We would go tearing down Wentworth Road hell for leather, with me standing on the crossbar at the back! On one occasion we couldn't take the corner at the bottom and off we came! I was the lucky one. I went onto the grass but our poor Bill hit the concrete! His face and his leg were a mess! It took all the skin off the side off his face. Mum put the bike away for some time.
We kids loved Darton but mum didn't. Money was scarce for her and she could barely manage. She wanted to go back to Featherstone and make a fresh start, and what a time we had when we eventually moved! We moved in with this family dad knew. They had about four kids besides us three. We all slept in this big attic I recall, and it was terrible! The other kids were awful - dirty and cheeky. I got nits from them and had to have my hair cut short as a result. It was the worst time in my life. Anyway, mum knew how bad we all felt and she got onto dad to try and find us somewhere else to live.
We next moved in with an old chap who needed some help in his house. We had half of the house and in exchange mum did all of cooking and cleaning for him. We were much happier there.
Mum however, wasn't happy with this arrangement. She wanted a house of her own. After some time dad got wind of a house at North Featherstone where we had lived before. It was in poor condition and quite filthy, but dad took it anyway. Mum was overjoyed - even though it would mean lots of hard work.
The old man I might add, wasn't pleased. He cried when he heard we were leaving him! Mum and dad asked him to come and live with us, but it was no use, he wouldn't give his home up. Mum promised she would come back to do his cleaning for him and a bit of baking.
The new house at North Featherstone had two bedrooms, a living room and a back kitchen (no baths in those days). We went up there one evening to see it. It was crawling! Bugs were running up the walls in droves! There were so many blackclocks on the floors, you could pick them up by the shovelful! Further investigation by dad revealed that they were breeding behind a wooden partition in the small bedroom. He tore it all off, along with the skirting boards and plastered the lot with hot creosote! Then he put everything back as it was. The rent man had come to call while dad had been removing the skirtings and he had played pop! (He was, however, much friendlier the next week after dad had replaced it all.)
We were not very popular with the people next door. It seems that the creosote drove the vermin through the walls into their houses! We never saw any more bugs after that, but we always had a few blackclocks. It seems that the houses were built on pit ash and the beetles bred in it. We would find them in the set pot and in the sink. I really hated them! Our Bill would pick them up, but they scared me stiff! He would chase me round the house with them! Dad always said he could smell if a house had bugs.
The house at North Featherstone was hard work. We stripped TEN layers of wallpaper off the walls and then we colour washed the lot. Mum got everything really nice and clean. The house was floored with blue and red tiles and we scrubbed them and put tabbed rugs down. Eventually we got the place shipshape. But it was hard going.
Talking of bugs put me in mind of a little story that happened around this time. My mother came originally from Unstone Green near Chesterfield. In the holidays she would take us down there to visit grandma. She had five lads and one girl. At this particular time there were only three lads living at home, Harry, Jim and Joe. Our Tom, mums' other brother had died of TB. He was only twenty one. He knocked his arm in the pit and TB started in the bone. He was a grand lad.
Anyway it happened that one very hot July we went down to Grandma Dann's for a few days. Mum noticed that the lads had spots on their legs, and asked grandma what they were. She said they were due to a mild infestation of 'summer fleas'! Our Bill slept in the big bed with the lads that night. During the night poor William came running in to us, scratching like the devil! Dad went in, lit the lamp, turfed all the lads out, and examined the bed. He found the 'summer fleas' alright, but they weren't what grandma had thought - they were bed bugs. It seems that someone had given her the bed and she had thought it a great gift. It was a great gift alright! Trouble was she hadn't looked it 'in the mouth'! The next morning dad sent us all out for the day. He then fastened up the windows and doors and stoved the whole house. He put the bed outside and painted it with his universal panacea - creosote! That was the last of grandma's 'summer fleas'.
We had some great times at Unstone. Sometimes we would go there on the train- in the guards' van! Mum would put us on the train at Featherstone Station and we would travel all the way down to Unstone Station where grandma or one of the lads would pick us up. Our Bill once stayed there for a whole year and went to Unstone School! This was as a result of mum having appendicitis and needing an operation. (Appendix removal was a serious business in those days).
Grandma Dann lived in the same cottage for over forty years. Unstone was a really lovely village. There were lots of woodland walks and a sparkling beck. I must say that our Bill was forever in the beck getting his feet wet! Mum would gather pounds of blackberries while we were there. She would make big pies that the lads all enjoyed. Grandma kept a few hens which produced lovely fresh brown eggs. I would go and collect them for breakfast. Living next door to grandma was uncle Herbert. He was a keen gardener who grew just about everything in his big allotment. WE never went home to Featherstone without lots of vegetables. Mum always said he took after grandad for that, He apparently used to show roses and vegetables, and was never to be seen without a rose in his coat. I never knew my Grandad Dann. He had died in the first war from Spanish 'Flu. In my grandma's back garden at Unstone was an earth lavatory with two wooden seats. Our Bill and I would squat there side by side, reading comics! We loved Unstone, and I will come back there again later in my story.
Back in Featherstone my mum was still worried sick over money. Dad was still out of work. He got an old pushbike and cycled all the way to Halifax because somebody had told him there was work to be had in the quarries. When he got there he saw big notices saying 'IRISHMEN PREFERRED'. It seems that where vast numbers of English folks were on the dole, Irishmen could come here and walk into jobs, simply because they were prepared to work for less wages. Dad was fed up when he came home, - and he never forgot it - it was to colour his later opinions.
Times were still hard and dad was on the 'means test'. He got two pounds a week to keep five of us! To come home from school to jam and bread was a regular occurrence. I could have gone to the Salvation Army for free dinners, but I wouldn't go. The kids that went there were rough and threw their dinners about! (It didn't bother Bill, he went there frequently!) I was a very quiet child, but I thought a lot. I felt a lot for poor mum, it was such a struggle. No wonder she was fated to die at forty-six years of age, worn out by her labours.
I remember one occasion when we had hardly anything to eat in the house. We answered a knock at the door and saw the butcher's lad standing there. He pushed this big parcel into mum's hands and off he went! Inside the parcel we found oxtail, liver, sausages and stewing beef! We had three really good meals, but we never did find out who'd sent it! Mum always said that God knew we had nothing and it was his way of helping us.
I was now back at Featherstone School. (Gordon Street to be exact). I still didn't care for school, although I no longer did too badly at lessons. I learned more when I left school, through reading library books. I was back with my best friend Margy and my other friend Betty. Margy was an only child and her dad had a regular job at the pit, so they were much better off than us. Mrs Knapper (Margy's mum). was a good cook, and she made all Margy's clothes. Sometimes my mum would get a fent in the open market that was held at Featherstone in those days, and Mrs. Knapper would make me a nice dress or skirt. Margy and I were great friends and I would stay at her house. Sometimes Margy took piano lessons and I would go down and wait for her to play out.
We all went to the Ebenezer Chapel - to sunday school, and to evening service with mum and dad. We were never allowed to roam about on a Sunday. On Sunday afternoons we always went for walks with mum and dad. The Sunday School Anniversary was a big thing in our lives. Mum always managed to get me a dress especially for that. We had black patent shoes with ankle straps, I recall, and white socks. I remember that on one Anniversary mum got a lovely fent of blue silk in the market and Mrs Knapper made Margy and me two lovely dresses with flared skirts and cape collars. We looked like sisters. Margy came for me to go to chapel. I wasn't quite ready so Margy had to wait. Our Edie, who waws then a toddler about three, cried to come with us. We dashed out of the back door to dodge her and Margy slammed the dor onto her flared skirt! There was a loud tearing and poor Margy's new dress was left half in the door! She didn't know what to do, she thought her mum would go mad and crack her! Anyway my mum went down and told Mrs Knapper what had happened, and Margy ended up in a lemon satin dress that year!
That year we went on the lorry to sing. The lorry would be trimmed up and a small organ put on it. We would all stand there in our best dresses and straw hats, singing away! We collected quite a bit of money for the chapel funds and the chapel treat. In the evening we would all stand on the platform to sing and recite poems. I had a fair stock of poems in those days. Grandad would give a shilling to whoever recited the best poem. Here is the poem I said at the Chapel Anniversary.
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU SAY
In speaking of a person's faults,
Pray don't forget your own.
Remember those with homes of glass
Should seldom throw a stone.
If you've got nothing else to do
But talk of those who sin,
It's better to commence at home
And from that point begin.
You have no right to judge a man
Till he be fairly tried;
Should you not like his company
We know the world is wide.
Some may have faults, some may have none
The old as well as young
Perhaps we may, for ought we know,
Have fifty to their one.
So let us all when we begin
To slander, friend or foe;
Think of the harm one word may do
To those we little know.
Remember, curses sometimes
Like chickens roost at home,
Don't speak of other's faults until
You've got none of your own!
copyright © Annie.E.Jarratt 2002
We weren't too bad off moneywise at this time. Dad didn't get a big wage, but we managed. He was working on the coalface and earned about four to five pounds a week. We managed to save a little money in the Co-op and life seemed to be treating us quite well until out of the blue our troubles began.... 1926 - the General Strike.
Almost overnight we had nothing. Dad had to withdraw all his savings for us to live on. Mum had to go to work in the pea fields. We had to live somehow. My brother and I would go and help her to carry the buckets of peas to the scale. It was hard work I can tell you! I was very small and thin and it took some doing carrying even half a bucket of peas! I think mum got about two pence ha'penny a bucket for this back breaking labour. (She got about the same for 'potato scrattin' as well.) We didn't know it then, but we were to do these jobs for many years to come.
Dad didn't have much luck getting a job. He was out of work for about four years. He was a big man on the strike committee, as a result of which most of the pits around Featherstone wouldn't set him on. They said he was a 'bother causer' because he stood up for his rights. We had to give our terrace house up and go to live at Purston in a little cottage - much less rent of course. It was nice there:- We kept a few bantams so we were never short of eggs. Mum got a job cleaning the bank at Featherstone, so things were a little better.
It was as a result of my mum's bank job that Mrs. Foster came into our lives. She had had to retire from the bank job and she had put in a good word for my mum. She was going on seventy then, but she was a great person. I can see her now ... tall and slim, she always wore a man's leather belt around her waist. Her house was spotless - you could eat off her floors! He fire grate fascinated me, the black lead shone! She had a brass fender which I would help her to polish, along with two blackleaded horses. I loved going to see her. She had a big piece of her wedding cake under a glass dome - it seems they kept things like that years ago.
But the best thing of all was Polly, her big green parrot. He was about forty years old then and still going strong! A sailor friend had originally brought him for her. The only thing he ever said was 'hello'! My mum thought a lot about Polly and she brought him little titbits every day. Mrs Foster warned mum not to put her fingers inside the cage, but she took no notice until one day the inevitable happened- he bit her finger very deeply. She had to have an injection in case of tetanus. It put mum off Polly for quite some time! Mrs Foster had other things I liked very much - glass walking sticks filled with coloured sweets and also two ornaments with glass clusters hanging from them. I wish I had them now, fifty years on!
Mr Foster was very old and not well at all. He would always be propped up in bed with lots of pillows. Sometimes we were allowed up to see him and he would let us play with his gramophone. In those days you had to wind them up! Our favourite entertainers were George Formby and Sandy Powell. Sandy is still going strong, God bless him! We would shout out his catch phrase - 'Can you 'ear me mother?!' Mrs Foster had no children of her own, so she had got two boys from Doctor Barnardo's Homes and brought them up herself. That's the kind of woman she was!
Talking of kind people; we had a Great Aunt Emma who was just the same; she was a staunch 'Gospel Haller' and she practised what she preached. We would go to see her every Sunday. We always got a penny apiece and a big piece of spice cake. She lived in North Featherstone in the Old Vicarage. It was a very old house, built in 1500, about the same time as the church. It had been made into two houses and Aunt Emma lived in the front part. Dad told us that there was a passage in her cellar that went right through to Pontefract Castle! Being a miner, and unafraid of dark cavities, he had set out to explore it one day but had found it in such a dangerous and crumbling condition he had decided that it was perhaps better to explore no further. Dad had lived there when he was a little boy. Alas, the old house has now been demolished.
Uncle Tom, Aunt Emma's husband, was a gamekeeper. He would take us through the woods sometimes and explain about the trees, flowers and herbs. He always had his spaniel, Dash, with him - also his gun. Our Bill always wanted to hold the gun, but Uncle Tom would never let him handle it. He would say "When you get older I'll show you how to use it", but he never did. By the time our Bill was old enough, poor Uncle Tom had passed on. It was all rather tragic:- he got the idea that he had cancer and it preyed on his mind so much he hanged himself! Aunt Emma had been out shopping, and when she came back she found him. It was a terrible shock for her. It was very strange when it all came out, for the autopsy found that he didn't have cancer at all. It was a double hernia, A simple operation and he would have been fine!
By now I was going to Purston School, which I found much better. Our cottage was very small, just two bedrooms, living room and kitchen:- no front room like our other house. We were, however, blessed with a lovely big garden. Dad filled it with potatoes and vegetables. We also had a good hen run, where lived a bantam cock who was an absolute menace! I wouldn't dare go feed the hens until our Bill had put the cock safely in the pen. He would have to go in with the sweeping brush!! The cock would always fly for your face, and in the end dad got rid of him.
We settled nicely at Purston despite dad being out of work. He managed to get odd jobs unknown to 'the dole'. If they had found out they would have stopped his two pounds. It was little enough to keep four of us. At Purston we were paying four shillings and sixpence rent. In those days it was all gaslights; kelly lamps and candles for the bedrooms. In bed I would read for hours on end by the light of a single kelly lamp. Mum would play pop if she caught us! Our Bill would swop lots of comics with his mate. He would have 'Hotspurs', 'Rovers', 'Wizards'. 'Film Fun' and 'The Beano'. I used to love adventure stories. I am now in my seventies and I still love books.
Life was very tranquil at Purston and mum always said it was big mistake that we ever left. But leave we did, as a result of Uncle Jack, Dad's brother. He worked down the pit at Woolley Colliery and he told us that he could get him a job and a house. So off we went to Darton, near Barnsley.
The house at Darton was very nice. We had a bathroom, which in those days was a big improvement. Dad was now working with Uncle Jack. They lived on the other side of the road from us. There was Uncle Jack, Aunt Laura and Cousins Celia, Joyce and later, Edward. I'll always remember that house when we first arrived - the garden was one mass of wallflowers! The scent was lovely. It's strange how things stick in one's mind after all those years. I was duly enrolled at Kexborough School, along with my brother Bill. By now I was about eight years old and Bill nine.
We loved it at Darton. We roamed the fields and woods. I recall that the miners had made a swimming hole down the pit fields. They dammed the beck up and created a pool about six feet deep. Uncle Jack and dad were both good swimmers. I used to take swimming lessons at school, but I was never a strong swimmer like they were, and our Bill was quite hopeless! He never could swim - in fact on one occasion he almost got himself drowned! We used to go down the side of the wood to a lovely village called Cawthorne. Here was a big estate with parkland and lots of deer. (I wonder if they are still there now?). There was an open air swimming pool at Cawthorne, and on this particular day our Bill had gone down there on his own. It was getting around tea time and nearly everyone had gone home. Bill was dashing around the pool and he slipped on the wet concrete and fell into the deep end, fully clothed! Luckily for him there happened to be someone on hand. A man pulled him out and gave him artificial respiration. He took him home and his wife dried him out and gave him his tea.
Meanwhile, back at home it had got round to 7pm and mum was worried to death. We were all out searching for him. It was nearly eight o' clock when this car finally rolled up and who should get out but our William! His clothes were still a bit damp, but otherwise he was ok and that was all that mattered. As a result of this adventure he was barred from going down to Cawthorne for quite some time!
It's funny, but when he fell in he had his school cap on, and he never lost it from off his head! Our Bill never learned to swim after that, but he wasn't fated to die by water that's certain - later on he was almost drowned at Anzio and lived to tell about that too!
Things seemed to go smoothly for a time at Darton. Mum would take me to Barnsley on a Saturday afternoon. We would get cheap meat and vegetables in the open market. One Christmas we went and I saw this lovely bisque headed doll dressed in lemon silk. Mum promised that she would get it for Christmas. Grandad was coming to visit this particular Christmas for a few days. Christmas Day came and I was beside myself with anticipation for the doll. But what a letdown! The doll I got was only half the size of the one I'd seen, and it didn't have a pot face! Story of my life!!
Dad didn't last long at Woolley Colliery. The coal seams there were very low and he was always working up to his knees in water. One morning he woke up and found that he had arthritis in both hips! He had to go for heat treatment, and they finally got him walking with two sticks. He tried to get compensation from the colliery, but they didn't want to know! Suddenly we didn't have any money at all and dad had to go to the Board of Guardians in Penistone to obtain relief. They gave him ten shillings and a food voucher!
The next two years were pretty desperate for us. One Christmas dad and uncle Jack went up to the woods to get a Christmas tree. They dug and dug, but they had no luck. In the end, uncle Jack had to come back for a saw and they sawed two down. Mum got two rabbits and stuffed them. Times were hard, but us kids had plenty of fun. I remember dad and uncle Jack once went to the woods and came back with ten partridge eggs! They shared them, but aunt Laura refused to cook theirs so we got them all. Mum put them in the frying pan. (They weren't too bad either - nearly like hens eggs). Wintertime at Darton was cold. Mum had to put coats on the beds to keep us warm!
I had two good friends at Darton. Beatrice Futters and Dora Blackburn. Dora lived next door. Her dad and older brothers worked down a footrill in the woods at High Hoyland. I must explain that a footrill was a pit you could walk down - a drift mine. One day Dora came round and asked if I could go with her, her father and brother to the pit. It was quite an experience! They put us into this tub on wheels and pushed us all the way down to the coal face. It was a long way down I recall, and the coal glistened on both sides of the gallery. There was plenty of water about too; it was trickling down the walls in little streams. Dora's dad worked the pump to get the water out. For my part I was glad to get back into the open air. I don't think I could ever have worked below the ground.
Dad was in the pits for over twentyfive years, and when I was very small I would listen for the sound of his clogs coming up the street. He would come in coal black and mum would get the big tin bath out and put it in front of the fire. We had a side boiler in the fireplace, heated by the fire and we would take turns to fill the bath for him. Pithead baths were unknown in those days - mum always called Darton " a bread an' maggie 'ole," we were so poor.
It was about this time that Mr. Gregory came into our lives. He was an old aged pensioner mum took in. He had been a church organist and we had some lovely times with him playing our old harmonium, and us all singing. He was a grand chap and he helped mum no end. At that time mum was expecting our Edie. I was only ten and I went with her to Barnsley to get some cheap nappies and bits of fents for cot blankets. In those days, well known brands of baby powder were unknown. Mum would buy some called 'violet powder'. (By the way, the main brands of cosmetics in those times were 'Ponds', 'Snowfire', and 'Full Nana'. The perfumes were 'Californian Poppy', 'Devon Violets' and 'Evening in Paris'!)
I remember our Edie being born. She was a lovely baby - dark solemn eyes and dark hair. I loved her and looked after her all the time. Round about this time our Edward was born, he was uncle Jack's first boy. His first two children had been girls, Celia and Joyce. (Joyce was named after my mum).
Poor dad! He was still out of work, and we had very little money. It was to get some extra money that he suddenly got the idea of breeding canaries. We had some half cousins at Clayton West, whom we would visit often. We would walk from Darton to High Hoyland and then down into Clayton West. Here lived cousin Edith, Harold and three girls, Mabel, Elsie and Mildred. Cousin Harold bred canaries and he had won cups and prizes at agricultural shows. He gave dad a pair to breed with. Cousin Edith was a marvellous cake maker and I'm sure many people in Clayton West who knew her would agree with me. I loved to visit my cousins. Mildred always let me play with a lovely doll she had. It was sad, for poor Mildred was fated to die in the near future from Bright's Disease. (She was a good swimmer, and always going to the baths. It was said that she got cold in her kidneys which triggered the disease off.)
But to get back to the canaries. dad bred quite a few and made quite a bit of money out of it. We had one special bird called Billy. He would sing and sing all day long and he would sit on mum's head and 'dive bomb' our plates at mealtimes! When we finally left Darton to go back to Featherstone we couldn't take him with us because we were going to live with some people. We were all upset, but dad gave him to an old lady next door who had always wanted him. Mrs Higgins had him for quite some years and I remember that whenever I went to visit Aunt Laura's I would always go round to see 'Our Billy'. He would always know me right away.
When we had first moved to Darton we had taken our three wheeler bike with us. We would go tearing down Wentworth Road hell for leather, with me standing on the crossbar at the back! On one occasion we couldn't take the corner at the bottom and off we came! I was the lucky one. I went onto the grass but our poor Bill hit the concrete! His face and his leg were a mess! It took all the skin off the side off his face. Mum put the bike away for some time.
We kids loved Darton but mum didn't. Money was scarce for her and she could barely manage. She wanted to go back to Featherstone and make a fresh start, and what a time we had when we eventually moved! We moved in with this family dad knew. They had about four kids besides us three. We all slept in this big attic I recall, and it was terrible! The other kids were awful - dirty and cheeky. I got nits from them and had to have my hair cut short as a result. It was the worst time in my life. Anyway, mum knew how bad we all felt and she got onto dad to try and find us somewhere else to live.
We next moved in with an old chap who needed some help in his house. We had half of the house and in exchange mum did all of cooking and cleaning for him. We were much happier there.
Mum however, wasn't happy with this arrangement. She wanted a house of her own. After some time dad got wind of a house at North Featherstone where we had lived before. It was in poor condition and quite filthy, but dad took it anyway. Mum was overjoyed - even though it would mean lots of hard work.
The old man I might add, wasn't pleased. He cried when he heard we were leaving him! Mum and dad asked him to come and live with us, but it was no use, he wouldn't give his home up. Mum promised she would come back to do his cleaning for him and a bit of baking.
The new house at North Featherstone had two bedrooms, a living room and a back kitchen (no baths in those days). We went up there one evening to see it. It was crawling! Bugs were running up the walls in droves! There were so many blackclocks on the floors, you could pick them up by the shovelful! Further investigation by dad revealed that they were breeding behind a wooden partition in the small bedroom. He tore it all off, along with the skirting boards and plastered the lot with hot creosote! Then he put everything back as it was. The rent man had come to call while dad had been removing the skirtings and he had played pop! (He was, however, much friendlier the next week after dad had replaced it all.)
We were not very popular with the people next door. It seems that the creosote drove the vermin through the walls into their houses! We never saw any more bugs after that, but we always had a few blackclocks. It seems that the houses were built on pit ash and the beetles bred in it. We would find them in the set pot and in the sink. I really hated them! Our Bill would pick them up, but they scared me stiff! He would chase me round the house with them! Dad always said he could smell if a house had bugs.
The house at North Featherstone was hard work. We stripped TEN layers of wallpaper off the walls and then we colour washed the lot. Mum got everything really nice and clean. The house was floored with blue and red tiles and we scrubbed them and put tabbed rugs down. Eventually we got the place shipshape. But it was hard going.
Talking of bugs put me in mind of a little story that happened around this time. My mother came originally from Unstone Green near Chesterfield. In the holidays she would take us down there to visit grandma. She had five lads and one girl. At this particular time there were only three lads living at home, Harry, Jim and Joe. Our Tom, mums' other brother had died of TB. He was only twenty one. He knocked his arm in the pit and TB started in the bone. He was a grand lad.
Anyway it happened that one very hot July we went down to Grandma Dann's for a few days. Mum noticed that the lads had spots on their legs, and asked grandma what they were. She said they were due to a mild infestation of 'summer fleas'! Our Bill slept in the big bed with the lads that night. During the night poor William came running in to us, scratching like the devil! Dad went in, lit the lamp, turfed all the lads out, and examined the bed. He found the 'summer fleas' alright, but they weren't what grandma had thought - they were bed bugs. It seems that someone had given her the bed and she had thought it a great gift. It was a great gift alright! Trouble was she hadn't looked it 'in the mouth'! The next morning dad sent us all out for the day. He then fastened up the windows and doors and stoved the whole house. He put the bed outside and painted it with his universal panacea - creosote! That was the last of grandma's 'summer fleas'.
We had some great times at Unstone. Sometimes we would go there on the train- in the guards' van! Mum would put us on the train at Featherstone Station and we would travel all the way down to Unstone Station where grandma or one of the lads would pick us up. Our Bill once stayed there for a whole year and went to Unstone School! This was as a result of mum having appendicitis and needing an operation. (Appendix removal was a serious business in those days).
Grandma Dann lived in the same cottage for over forty years. Unstone was a really lovely village. There were lots of woodland walks and a sparkling beck. I must say that our Bill was forever in the beck getting his feet wet! Mum would gather pounds of blackberries while we were there. She would make big pies that the lads all enjoyed. Grandma kept a few hens which produced lovely fresh brown eggs. I would go and collect them for breakfast. Living next door to grandma was uncle Herbert. He was a keen gardener who grew just about everything in his big allotment. WE never went home to Featherstone without lots of vegetables. Mum always said he took after grandad for that, He apparently used to show roses and vegetables, and was never to be seen without a rose in his coat. I never knew my Grandad Dann. He had died in the first war from Spanish 'Flu. In my grandma's back garden at Unstone was an earth lavatory with two wooden seats. Our Bill and I would squat there side by side, reading comics! We loved Unstone, and I will come back there again later in my story.
Back in Featherstone my mum was still worried sick over money. Dad was still out of work. He got an old pushbike and cycled all the way to Halifax because somebody had told him there was work to be had in the quarries. When he got there he saw big notices saying 'IRISHMEN PREFERRED'. It seems that where vast numbers of English folks were on the dole, Irishmen could come here and walk into jobs, simply because they were prepared to work for less wages. Dad was fed up when he came home, - and he never forgot it - it was to colour his later opinions.
Times were still hard and dad was on the 'means test'. He got two pounds a week to keep five of us! To come home from school to jam and bread was a regular occurrence. I could have gone to the Salvation Army for free dinners, but I wouldn't go. The kids that went there were rough and threw their dinners about! (It didn't bother Bill, he went there frequently!) I was a very quiet child, but I thought a lot. I felt a lot for poor mum, it was such a struggle. No wonder she was fated to die at forty-six years of age, worn out by her labours.
I remember one occasion when we had hardly anything to eat in the house. We answered a knock at the door and saw the butcher's lad standing there. He pushed this big parcel into mum's hands and off he went! Inside the parcel we found oxtail, liver, sausages and stewing beef! We had three really good meals, but we never did find out who'd sent it! Mum always said that God knew we had nothing and it was his way of helping us.
I was now back at Featherstone School. (Gordon Street to be exact). I still didn't care for school, although I no longer did too badly at lessons. I learned more when I left school, through reading library books. I was back with my best friend Margy and my other friend Betty. Margy was an only child and her dad had a regular job at the pit, so they were much better off than us. Mrs Knapper (Margy's mum). was a good cook, and she made all Margy's clothes. Sometimes my mum would get a fent in the open market that was held at Featherstone in those days, and Mrs. Knapper would make me a nice dress or skirt. Margy and I were great friends and I would stay at her house. Sometimes Margy took piano lessons and I would go down and wait for her to play out.
We all went to the Ebenezer Chapel - to sunday school, and to evening service with mum and dad. We were never allowed to roam about on a Sunday. On Sunday afternoons we always went for walks with mum and dad. The Sunday School Anniversary was a big thing in our lives. Mum always managed to get me a dress especially for that. We had black patent shoes with ankle straps, I recall, and white socks. I remember that on one Anniversary mum got a lovely fent of blue silk in the market and Mrs Knapper made Margy and me two lovely dresses with flared skirts and cape collars. We looked like sisters. Margy came for me to go to chapel. I wasn't quite ready so Margy had to wait. Our Edie, who waws then a toddler about three, cried to come with us. We dashed out of the back door to dodge her and Margy slammed the dor onto her flared skirt! There was a loud tearing and poor Margy's new dress was left half in the door! She didn't know what to do, she thought her mum would go mad and crack her! Anyway my mum went down and told Mrs Knapper what had happened, and Margy ended up in a lemon satin dress that year!
That year we went on the lorry to sing. The lorry would be trimmed up and a small organ put on it. We would all stand there in our best dresses and straw hats, singing away! We collected quite a bit of money for the chapel funds and the chapel treat. In the evening we would all stand on the platform to sing and recite poems. I had a fair stock of poems in those days. Grandad would give a shilling to whoever recited the best poem. Here is the poem I said at the Chapel Anniversary.
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU SAY
In speaking of a person's faults,
Pray don't forget your own.
Remember those with homes of glass
Should seldom throw a stone.
If you've got nothing else to do
But talk of those who sin,
It's better to commence at home
And from that point begin.
You have no right to judge a man
Till he be fairly tried;
Should you not like his company
We know the world is wide.
Some may have faults, some may have none
The old as well as young
Perhaps we may, for ought we know,
Have fifty to their one.
So let us all when we begin
To slander, friend or foe;
Think of the harm one word may do
To those we little know.
Remember, curses sometimes
Like chickens roost at home,
Don't speak of other's faults until
You've got none of your own!
copyright © Annie.E.Jarratt 2002
We settled nicely at Purston despite dad being out of work. He managed to get odd jobs unknown to 'the dole'. If they had found out they would have stopped his two pounds. It was little enough to keep four of us. At Purston we were paying four shillings and sixpence rent. In those days it was all gaslights; kelly lamps and candles for the bedrooms. In bed I would read for hours on end by the light of a single kelly lamp. Mum would play pop if she caught us! Our Bill would swop lots of comics with his mate. He would have 'Hotspurs', 'Rovers', 'Wizards'. 'Film Fun' and 'The Beano'. I used to love adventure stories. I am now in my seventies and I still love books.
Life was very tranquil at Purston and mum always said it was big mistake that we ever left. But leave we did, as a result of Uncle Jack, Dad's brother. He worked down the pit at Woolley Colliery and he told us that he could get him a job and a house. So off we went to Darton, near Barnsley.
The house at Darton was very nice. We had a bathroom, which in those days was a big improvement. Dad was now working with Uncle Jack. They lived on the other side of the road from us. There was Uncle Jack, Aunt Laura and Cousins Celia, Joyce and later, Edward. I'll always remember that house when we first arrived - the garden was one mass of wallflowers! The scent was lovely. It's strange how things stick in one's mind after all those years. I was duly enrolled at Kexborough School, along with my brother Bill. By now I was about eight years old and Bill nine.
We loved it at Darton. We roamed the fields and woods. I recall that the miners had made a swimming hole down the pit fields. They dammed the beck up and created a pool about six feet deep. Uncle Jack and dad were both good swimmers. I used to take swimming lessons at school, but I was never a strong swimmer like they were, and our Bill was quite hopeless! He never could swim - in fact on one occasion he almost got himself drowned! We used to go down the side of the wood to a lovely village called Cawthorne. Here was a big estate with parkland and lots of deer. (I wonder if they are still there now?). There was an open air swimming pool at Cawthorne, and on this particular day our Bill had gone down there on his own. It was getting around tea time and nearly everyone had gone home. Bill was dashing around the pool and he slipped on the wet concrete and fell into the deep end, fully clothed! Luckily for him there happened to be someone on hand. A man pulled him out and gave him artificial respiration. He took him home and his wife dried him out and gave him his tea.
Meanwhile, back at home it had got round to 7pm and mum was worried to death. We were all out searching for him. It was nearly eight o' clock when this car finally rolled up and who should get out but our William! His clothes were still a bit damp, but otherwise he was ok and that was all that mattered. As a result of this adventure he was barred from going down to Cawthorne for quite some time!
It's funny, but when he fell in he had his school cap on, and he never lost it from off his head! Our Bill never learned to swim after that, but he wasn't fated to die by water that's certain - later on he was almost drowned at Anzio and lived to tell about that too!
Things seemed to go smoothly for a time at Darton. Mum would take me to Barnsley on a Saturday afternoon. We would get cheap meat and vegetables in the open market. One Christmas we went and I saw this lovely bisque headed doll dressed in lemon silk. Mum promised that she would get it for Christmas. Grandad was coming to visit this particular Christmas for a few days. Christmas Day came and I was beside myself with anticipation for the doll. But what a letdown! The doll I got was only half the size of the one I'd seen, and it didn't have a pot face! Story of my life!!
Dad didn't last long at Woolley Colliery. The coal seams there were very low and he was always working up to his knees in water. One morning he woke up and found that he had arthritis in both hips! He had to go for heat treatment, and they finally got him walking with two sticks. He tried to get compensation from the colliery, but they didn't want to know! Suddenly we didn't have any money at all and dad had to go to the Board of Guardians in Penistone to obtain relief. They gave him ten shillings and a food voucher!
The next two years were pretty desperate for us. One Christmas dad and uncle Jack went up to the woods to get a Christmas tree. They dug and dug, but they had no luck. In the end, uncle Jack had to come back for a saw and they sawed two down. Mum got two rabbits and stuffed them. Times were hard, but us kids had plenty of fun. I remember dad and uncle Jack once went to the woods and came back with ten partridge eggs! They shared them, but aunt Laura refused to cook theirs so we got them all. Mum put them in the frying pan. (They weren't too bad either - nearly like hens eggs). Wintertime at Darton was cold. Mum had to put coats on the beds to keep us warm!
I had two good friends at Darton. Beatrice Futters and Dora Blackburn. Dora lived next door. Her dad and older brothers worked down a footrill in the woods at High Hoyland. I must explain that a footrill was a pit you could walk down - a drift mine. One day Dora came round and asked if I could go with her, her father and brother to the pit. It was quite an experience! They put us into this tub on wheels and pushed us all the way down to the coal face. It was a long way down I recall, and the coal glistened on both sides of the gallery. There was plenty of water about too; it was trickling down the walls in little streams. Dora's dad worked the pump to get the water out. For my part I was glad to get back into the open air. I don't think I could ever have worked below the ground.
Dad was in the pits for over twentyfive years, and when I was very small I would listen for the sound of his clogs coming up the street. He would come in coal black and mum would get the big tin bath out and put it in front of the fire. We had a side boiler in the fireplace, heated by the fire and we would take turns to fill the bath for him. Pithead baths were unknown in those days - mum always called Darton " a bread an' maggie 'ole," we were so poor.
It was about this time that Mr. Gregory came into our lives. He was an old aged pensioner mum took in. He had been a church organist and we had some lovely times with him playing our old harmonium, and us all singing. He was a grand chap and he helped mum no end. At that time mum was expecting our Edie. I was only ten and I went with her to Barnsley to get some cheap nappies and bits of fents for cot blankets. In those days, well known brands of baby powder were unknown. Mum would buy some called 'violet powder'. (By the way, the main brands of cosmetics in those times were 'Ponds', 'Snowfire', and 'Full Nana'. The perfumes were 'Californian Poppy', 'Devon Violets' and 'Evening in Paris'!)
I remember our Edie being born. She was a lovely baby - dark solemn eyes and dark hair. I loved her and looked after her all the time. Round about this time our Edward was born, he was uncle Jack's first boy. His first two children had been girls, Celia and Joyce. (Joyce was named after my mum).
Poor dad! He was still out of work, and we had very little money. It was to get some extra money that he suddenly got the idea of breeding canaries. We had some half cousins at Clayton West, whom we would visit often. We would walk from Darton to High Hoyland and then down into Clayton West. Here lived cousin Edith, Harold and three girls, Mabel, Elsie and Mildred. Cousin Harold bred canaries and he had won cups and prizes at agricultural shows. He gave dad a pair to breed with. Cousin Edith was a marvellous cake maker and I'm sure many people in Clayton West who knew her would agree with me. I loved to visit my cousins. Mildred always let me play with a lovely doll she had. It was sad, for poor Mildred was fated to die in the near future from Bright's Disease. (She was a good swimmer, and always going to the baths. It was said that she got cold in her kidneys which triggered the disease off.)
But to get back to the canaries. dad bred quite a few and made quite a bit of money out of it. We had one special bird called Billy. He would sing and sing all day long and he would sit on mum's head and 'dive bomb' our plates at mealtimes! When we finally left Darton to go back to Featherstone we couldn't take him with us because we were going to live with some people. We were all upset, but dad gave him to an old lady next door who had always wanted him. Mrs Higgins had him for quite some years and I remember that whenever I went to visit Aunt Laura's I would always go round to see 'Our Billy'. He would always know me right away.
When we had first moved to Darton we had taken our three wheeler bike with us. We would go tearing down Wentworth Road hell for leather, with me standing on the crossbar at the back! On one occasion we couldn't take the corner at the bottom and off we came! I was the lucky one. I went onto the grass but our poor Bill hit the concrete! His face and his leg were a mess! It took all the skin off the side off his face. Mum put the bike away for some time.
We kids loved Darton but mum didn't. Money was scarce for her and she could barely manage. She wanted to go back to Featherstone and make a fresh start, and what a time we had when we eventually moved! We moved in with this family dad knew. They had about four kids besides us three. We all slept in this big attic I recall, and it was terrible! The other kids were awful - dirty and cheeky. I got nits from them and had to have my hair cut short as a result. It was the worst time in my life. Anyway, mum knew how bad we all felt and she got onto dad to try and find us somewhere else to live.
We next moved in with an old chap who needed some help in his house. We had half of the house and in exchange mum did all of cooking and cleaning for him. We were much happier there.
Mum however, wasn't happy with this arrangement. She wanted a house of her own. After some time dad got wind of a house at North Featherstone where we had lived before. It was in poor condition and quite filthy, but dad took it anyway. Mum was overjoyed - even though it would mean lots of hard work.
The old man I might add, wasn't pleased. He cried when he heard we were leaving him! Mum and dad asked him to come and live with us, but it was no use, he wouldn't give his home up. Mum promised she would come back to do his cleaning for him and a bit of baking.
The new house at North Featherstone had two bedrooms, a living room and a back kitchen (no baths in those days). We went up there one evening to see it. It was crawling! Bugs were running up the walls in droves! There were so many blackclocks on the floors, you could pick them up by the shovelful! Further investigation by dad revealed that they were breeding behind a wooden partition in the small bedroom. He tore it all off, along with the skirting boards and plastered the lot with hot creosote! Then he put everything back as it was. The rent man had come to call while dad had been removing the skirtings and he had played pop! (He was, however, much friendlier the next week after dad had replaced it all.)
We were not very popular with the people next door. It seems that the creosote drove the vermin through the walls into their houses! We never saw any more bugs after that, but we always had a few blackclocks. It seems that the houses were built on pit ash and the beetles bred in it. We would find them in the set pot and in the sink. I really hated them! Our Bill would pick them up, but they scared me stiff! He would chase me round the house with them! Dad always said he could smell if a house had bugs.
The house at North Featherstone was hard work. We stripped TEN layers of wallpaper off the walls and then we colour washed the lot. Mum got everything really nice and clean. The house was floored with blue and red tiles and we scrubbed them and put tabbed rugs down. Eventually we got the place shipshape. But it was hard going.
Talking of bugs put me in mind of a little story that happened around this time. My mother came originally from Unstone Green near Chesterfield. In the holidays she would take us down there to visit grandma. She had five lads and one girl. At this particular time there were only three lads living at home, Harry, Jim and Joe. Our Tom, mums' other brother had died of TB. He was only twenty one. He knocked his arm in the pit and TB started in the bone. He was a grand lad.
Anyway it happened that one very hot July we went down to Grandma Dann's for a few days. Mum noticed that the lads had spots on their legs, and asked grandma what they were. She said they were due to a mild infestation of 'summer fleas'! Our Bill slept in the big bed with the lads that night. During the night poor William came running in to us, scratching like the devil! Dad went in, lit the lamp, turfed all the lads out, and examined the bed. He found the 'summer fleas' alright, but they weren't what grandma had thought - they were bed bugs. It seems that someone had given her the bed and she had thought it a great gift. It was a great gift alright! Trouble was she hadn't looked it 'in the mouth'! The next morning dad sent us all out for the day. He then fastened up the windows and doors and stoved the whole house. He put the bed outside and painted it with his universal panacea - creosote! That was the last of grandma's 'summer fleas'.
We had some great times at Unstone. Sometimes we would go there on the train- in the guards' van! Mum would put us on the train at Featherstone Station and we would travel all the way down to Unstone Station where grandma or one of the lads would pick us up. Our Bill once stayed there for a whole year and went to Unstone School! This was as a result of mum having appendicitis and needing an operation. (Appendix removal was a serious business in those days).
Grandma Dann lived in the same cottage for over forty years. Unstone was a really lovely village. There were lots of woodland walks and a sparkling beck. I must say that our Bill was forever in the beck getting his feet wet! Mum would gather pounds of blackberries while we were there. She would make big pies that the lads all enjoyed. Grandma kept a few hens which produced lovely fresh brown eggs. I would go and collect them for breakfast. Living next door to grandma was uncle Herbert. He was a keen gardener who grew just about everything in his big allotment. WE never went home to Featherstone without lots of vegetables. Mum always said he took after grandad for that, He apparently used to show roses and vegetables, and was never to be seen without a rose in his coat. I never knew my Grandad Dann. He had died in the first war from Spanish 'Flu. In my grandma's back garden at Unstone was an earth lavatory with two wooden seats. Our Bill and I would squat there side by side, reading comics! We loved Unstone, and I will come back there again later in my story.
Back in Featherstone my mum was still worried sick over money. Dad was still out of work. He got an old pushbike and cycled all the way to Halifax because somebody had told him there was work to be had in the quarries. When he got there he saw big notices saying 'IRISHMEN PREFERRED'. It seems that where vast numbers of English folks were on the dole, Irishmen could come here and walk into jobs, simply because they were prepared to work for less wages. Dad was fed up when he came home, - and he never forgot it - it was to colour his later opinions.
Times were still hard and dad was on the 'means test'. He got two pounds a week to keep five of us! To come home from school to jam and bread was a regular occurrence. I could have gone to the Salvation Army for free dinners, but I wouldn't go. The kids that went there were rough and threw their dinners about! (It didn't bother Bill, he went there frequently!) I was a very quiet child, but I thought a lot. I felt a lot for poor mum, it was such a struggle. No wonder she was fated to die at forty-six years of age, worn out by her labours.
I remember one occasion when we had hardly anything to eat in the house. We answered a knock at the door and saw the butcher's lad standing there. He pushed this big parcel into mum's hands and off he went! Inside the parcel we found oxtail, liver, sausages and stewing beef! We had three really good meals, but we never did find out who'd sent it! Mum always said that God knew we had nothing and it was his way of helping us.
I was now back at Featherstone School. (Gordon Street to be exact). I still didn't care for school, although I no longer did too badly at lessons. I learned more when I left school, through reading library books. I was back with my best friend Margy and my other friend Betty. Margy was an only child and her dad had a regular job at the pit, so they were much better off than us. Mrs Knapper (Margy's mum). was a good cook, and she made all Margy's clothes. Sometimes my mum would get a fent in the open market that was held at Featherstone in those days, and Mrs. Knapper would make me a nice dress or skirt. Margy and I were great friends and I would stay at her house. Sometimes Margy took piano lessons and I would go down and wait for her to play out.
We all went to the Ebenezer Chapel - to sunday school, and to evening service with mum and dad. We were never allowed to roam about on a Sunday. On Sunday afternoons we always went for walks with mum and dad. The Sunday School Anniversary was a big thing in our lives. Mum always managed to get me a dress especially for that. We had black patent shoes with ankle straps, I recall, and white socks. I remember that on one Anniversary mum got a lovely fent of blue silk in the market and Mrs Knapper made Margy and me two lovely dresses with flared skirts and cape collars. We looked like sisters. Margy came for me to go to chapel. I wasn't quite ready so Margy had to wait. Our Edie, who waws then a toddler about three, cried to come with us. We dashed out of the back door to dodge her and Margy slammed the dor onto her flared skirt! There was a loud tearing and poor Margy's new dress was left half in the door! She didn't know what to do, she thought her mum would go mad and crack her! Anyway my mum went down and told Mrs Knapper what had happened, and Margy ended up in a lemon satin dress that year!
That year we went on the lorry to sing. The lorry would be trimmed up and a small organ put on it. We would all stand there in our best dresses and straw hats, singing away! We collected quite a bit of money for the chapel funds and the chapel treat. In the evening we would all stand on the platform to sing and recite poems. I had a fair stock of poems in those days. Grandad would give a shilling to whoever recited the best poem. Here is the poem I said at the Chapel Anniversary.
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU SAY
In speaking of a person's faults,
Pray don't forget your own.
Remember those with homes of glass
Should seldom throw a stone.
If you've got nothing else to do
But talk of those who sin,
It's better to commence at home
And from that point begin.
You have no right to judge a man
Till he be fairly tried;
Should you not like his company
We know the world is wide.
Some may have faults, some may have none
The old as well as young
Perhaps we may, for ought we know,
Have fifty to their one.
So let us all when we begin
To slander, friend or foe;
Think of the harm one word may do
To those we little know.
Remember, curses sometimes
Like chickens roost at home,
Don't speak of other's faults until
You've got none of your own!
copyright © Annie.E.Jarratt 2002
So let us all when we begin To slander, friend or foe;