It is now 1939 and the war clouds are gathering. Hitler and his hordes are swarming all over Europe. The feeling everywhere is that it will only be a matter of time before we are dragged in. Mum is worried sick because she knows that Bill and I are likely to be called up. (Our Edie is now about ten years old.)
The rest is history. War came, and my mum's worst fears were confirmed. Our Bill was called up and he went into the army. He loved it!! (We had all thought that he would hate it, but not so!). I was working on khaki in the mill, when I too, got my call up papers. Many people were exempt, but it transpired that I was not, and was required to do some kind of war work. Munitions, the Forces or the Land Army ... these were the options open to me. I chose the Land Army.
I didn't leave home immediately. I had to wait for my uniform and various papers to be sent through. In the meantime, dad became our local Air Raid Warden (Brownroyd). We all had to go to the school, where we were issued with gasmasks. Everyone carried one at that time, but gradually people got fed up with them and left them at home! (Not so the ARP Wardens however ... they carried them all the time.) Mum had the cellar made into an air raid shelter and we had a door put through to our neighbours in the front house.
Mrs Legge, (who lived in the front house) was a good friend of mum's. She had two boys and a girl. George, her eldest son, went into the army. He was a prisoner-of-war for a long time. The other boy, Freddie, was too young to be called up. Her girl, Lily, went mates with me for a while.
Cousin Annie's husband, Bob, was also an Air Raid Warden. The chapel where he was caretaker was made into an Air Raid Centre. As it happened, Bradford only had one air raid, and that was caused by a German pilot who had strayed from 'the pack'. He just jettisoned his bombs and headed for home! We were very lucky. I was at home that night, I remember. Dad was on duty, walking around looking for anyone who might be breaking the blackout regulations. He told us to get into the cellar, but our Bill and I watched from the door. All Bradford seemed to be lit up! It's a good job there weren't many people about at that time! (It was about nine or ten o' clock at night ... all the pictures had turned out and gone home by then).
We went down into town the next day to view the damage. The Rawson Market was a smoking ruin, along with the Odeon Cinema, but apart from this there wasn't a great deal of damage done. I don't think we'd be so lucky now if there was a war, it would be the end for us all. So many horrifying engines of destruction have been perfected since then.
Our Bill got his call up soon after that night, and he was sent to Catterick. I was still at Bailey's when my papers came. My friend, who worked with me, went into the A.T.S.. I wanted her to come with me, but she didn't fancy working on the land. (I didn't fancy going away at all, but I had no choice in the matter!)
I eventually got my uniform through and was instructed to report to Wisbech in Cambs., where I would be picked up and taken to Pratt's Flower Farm at Walpole St. Peter's. Mum and dad went down to the station with me to see me off. I was to catch the 9.30 train to Peterborough.
So there I was, just nineteen years old and weighing about seven and a half stone, packed off to do land work; and work it turned out to be, as I was shortly to find out! On the train I noticed this middle-aged gentleman in my carriage. He was dressed in black and wore buttoned gaiters. I quickly realised that he was someone high up in the church. He smiled and asked me where I was going. "Wisbech," I said. He smiled and informed me that he was Dr. Blunt, the Bishop of Bradford! He was going as far as Peterborough, on Church business. We had a long conversation and he shared his coffee and sandwiches with me, which his housekeeper had put up for him! As I got off the train at Peterborough he wished me all the best in my new job. What a nice man he was!
At Peterborough I had to cross over the line to another platform, where I had to wait over an hour for a train to Wisbech. I found about seven other girls all going to the same job. We all waited about half an hour before a lorry finally rolled up for us. We ll piled in, kit and all, and off we went!
We travelled about seven miles and then bumped along half a mile of cart track, finally pulling up outside an old barn! We climbed some ricketty old steps into the top of the barn and there discovered cubicles, each with one camp bed and three blankets! The weather, I might add, was very cold. (It was early March) The cubicles were partitioned off with curtains, and it was so draughty they were blowing about! We were cold, tired and hungry after our long journeys, but no-one seemed the least bit concerned about us!
For the first few days I was really homesick, and I cried every night. There was a little cottage nearby where we got our meals, such as they were! There was a lady from the village who came to help with the dinners. Two girls had to get up each morning at six am and make the breakfast. We had burnt toast and porridge quite frequently! At least I knew how to cook ... some of the girls hadn't a clue! We had to light a fire to make the toast and it was a pig of a job to light it! The grate was all broken out, and we had to light the fire on the hearth. Sometimes there would be a mouse in the milk bucket! I would fish it out, and no-one would be any the wiser! It was either that, or no porridge at all. I began to think that my friend had had the right idea in joining the A.T.S. At least they got decent food!
After about two weeks of washing in cold water, along with the lousy grub, my friend and I had had enough! I had met Rosa on the station at Wisbech and we became firm friends. Rosa came from Liverpool. Her dad and brother were in the Merchant Navy on the same ship. The other girls in our 'gang' were from London, and two from Leeds. One of the Leeds girls married a local boy and stayed in Wisbech. I wouldn't have stayed if they'd paid me pounds ten! As it was, I only got about three pounds a week, but when we went on 'piece work' in the strawberry season I often earned more.
The London girls soon got fed up with things. Within two weeks they were off back home to London! Rosa and I would go to the village pub for a drink and a game of skittles. We got talking to the landlady there, and told her that we hadn't had a warm bath since we'd arrived over two weeks ago! She said we could have a bath at the pub once a week, if we liked. Even this had its setbacks ... we had to pump the water up into the bath! We finally settled it by both getting in together! It was grand, though to get a warm bath. I would scrub Rosa's back and she would scrub mine. We had a lot of fun!
One Saturday we were nattering with the landlady and we told her how primitive it was at the barn and about the poor food. She told us that she had a friend at the other end of the village who had a big house, and who might perhaps take us in as boarders. I suggested to Rosa that we should go and ask; after all, she could only refuse! So off we went to see the lady in question. We knocked on the door and a motherly looking lady answered it. She said her name was Mrs. Falkinder. We asked her if she would take us and we gave her a note from the landlady at the pub. She read it and looked at us rather dubiously. She told us that she would talk it over with her husband when he got home from work. She would let us know the next day.
The following morning she smiled and told us we could move in on the Monday! We flew back to the barn on our bikes, we were so pleased! We packed up all our kit and we were duly installed at Mrs Falkinder's on the Monday night. We got lots of catty remarks from the other girls who envied us our good fortune.
It was to prove good fortune indeed. Mr. and Mrs. Falkinder were like a mother and father to us both. The food was first class, and we had a lovely feather bed to sleep in. (We didn't want to get up in the mornings, it was so comfortable!) Mrs. Falkinder was an excellent cook considering that she only had two primus stoves to cook with! Everything was paraffin, not only the stoves, but all the house lighting as well. (It was, however, much better than struggling with candles back at the barn!)
Once, at the barn, we had a narrow escape with fire. I was wearing a woolllen dressing gown, I recall, and I leaned over to shut a window. The candle caught my sleeve and the flames went right up my arm before I could put it out! It gave me one hell of a scare! That barn was a creepy place ... on one occasion, in the middle of the night, we heard someone with heavy feet walking down the middle of the cubicles. After that we always made sure that the door was firmly locked at night!
We were glad to get away from that place, and we were much happier at Mrs. Falkinder's. We could put up with the hard work on the land as long as we had a few home comforts. Mrs. Falkinder kept some hens and a pig, so we got plenty of bacon and eggs. She had flitches of bacon hung up from the beams, and she only had to cut slices off when she wanted bacon. It was very fatty, but I have never tasted any bacon so good! She also had fruit trees, which were laden with fruit in season. We used to help her with the picking; it was too much for her to tackle on her own. I always remember that to get to the toilet we had to pass through an outhouse which was piled high with strawberries packed on trays, ready for the market. Mrs Falkinder had two beehives as well, and lots of honey! The bees would be all over the strawberries, and I was terrified to go near them! Mrs Falkinder could do anything with those bees. She told me that the bees had belonged to her mother and when she died she had taken over from her. She told me that she had had to inform the bees that from now on she would be looking after them, otherwise they wouldn't settle to make honey! I thought it was an old wives' tale, but since then I have found it to be perfectly true!
Many things I have learned since then about country life. Mrs Falkinder was wise in so many things. The house was a lovely old place, and apparently her father had kept it as a pub. You could tell it had been a pub, by the shape of the rooms. Mr. Falkinder worked in Wisbech. He cycled there every day. He was a wizard with bikes, and was always fixing mine because I was always falling off the damned thing! He was also good at mending punctures!
The work at Pratt's was all land work. We were getting the flower bulbs out to put sugar beet and potatoes in. It was all for the war effort. I'm sure I could've done more towards the war effort had I been left doing a job I was experienced in ... making khaki at Bailey's! Anyway I settled into landwork with a load of backache! We were hoeing, weeding and scratting bulbs out all day long. It reminded me of our potato picking days back in Featherstone! We looked very smart in our 'walking out' uniforms. Corduroy pants, fawn shirts, green jumpers and a jaunty hat! I still have my hat badge somewhere around. At work we wore brown dungarees and gumboots. Also leather boots.
Rosa and I went into Wisbech to have our photos taken to send home. We would go to Wisbech on our bikes and leave them with a shopkeeper we knew. He had a closed passage down the side of his shop, so the bikes were safe. We would have tea at a lovely little cafe we found and then go to Wisbechs' only picture house. We usually got home about ten or half past, and Mrs. Falkinder would worry about us. On other weekends we would go to Kings Lynn.
We couldn't go far in the evenings. It was usually half past seven before we got home from the fields, and we were usually tired out! The nearest place for us was Sutton Bridge. There was a big aerodrome there and lots of airforce lads would go to the 'Toc H' Canteen. We were allowed in there, but we couldn't go to the N.A.A.F.I. ... (why, I'll never know!). We made many friends at the canteen. We would sit around and talk, and eat teacakes and sandwiches.
We were at the canteen when we met two nice lads who we went out with a few times. Rosa's chap was a Welsh lad, and he really fell for her! He wanted to take her to Wales to see his folks, but she wasn't all that keen! The lad I went out with came from Birmingham. He had been a drummer in a band before the war. I went out with him a few times before I found that he was married and had two children!! That was that as far as I was concerned! (We still sat and talked in the canteen though, and he would tell me all about his wife and children. I think I must have been a good listener!)
The people in Sutton Bridge were very kind! When we went home on leave we would leave our bikes at Sutton Bridge Station. The Station Master there was a very nice chap.
But the best thing of all about Wisbech was the road back to Bradford! I loved to go home, but home was so far away, and money was tight. I sent a pound home to my mum every week, and I also gave Mrs. Falkinder a pound. That didn't leave me with much! Really I should have given Mrs. Falkinder more, because she did all our washing too, but she knew that we did the best that we could with our money. Because of this you will appreciate that I couldn't go home very often! Once or twice I managed to save for a weekend at home, but I was then more homesick than ever when I had to go back!
One weekend four of us decided to cycle to Sandringham. We set off about nine in the morning I recall, and stopped off at King's Lynn for a cup of tea and a breather. One thing I specially noticed was the endless rhodedendrons which lined both sides of the road leading to Sandringham. The colours were beautiful! We got to Sandringham about lunchtime and we sat down in the grounds to have our sandwiches. There was no-one 'in residence' so we had a peep through the long windows. It was all very nice. While we were there we met some Land Girls who worked on the Estate. They took us all round the gardens. We were very envious of them working there! In the afternoon, I recall, we listened to a band that was playing there. At teatime we set off home. On our way back we stopped at Castle Rising and explored the castle. Altogether it had been a very nice 'day out'.
Another time, I remember, we went to the seaside ... to Hunstanton. We didn't get onto the beach though, it was liberally sown with barbed wire, tank traps and mines! We had to go through two or three roadblocks I remember, and we got lots of 'ribbing' from the army about our uniforms.
It was around this time that Rosa got a telegram saying that her husband and brother were missing at sea. She was really shattered. She was a good Catholic, and I went with her to the Catholic Church in Wisbech to light a candle and pray with her for their safe return. A week went by and we heard no news, and I reassured Rosa by telling her that 'no news is good news'. The prayers must have worked, for a few days later we heard that they had been picked up off the Azores! They had been on a raft for almost two weeks. They then had to spend two weeks in hospital. Rosa was overjoyed, and went home immediately when she found out they had landed. I am sure our prayers must have helped a little. After that Rosas' dad and brother got assigned to separate ships, and they both came through the war safely! Rosa by way of thanks bought a big box of daffodils and narcissi and sent them to decorate the Catholic Church in Liverpool.
Still on the subject of churches, I never went to my own church when I was in Norfolk. The villagers considered us to be 'those common Yorkshire girls' and did not make us welcome! (Why, I will never know, because all the girls were decent girls!) We worked with one or two of the village girls, but we were never particularly friendly with them I recall.
The man in charge of us was called Belding. His daughter worked with him. Enough said! When the strawberries were in season we were put on 'piece work'. All the berries went to Smedley's to be made into jam. If people could see what went into the jam they wouldn't be so keen on it! All the mouldy strawberries went in with the good ones! It was wartime, and nobody seemed to bother. We also picked gooseberries, loganberries and plums. The plum trees would be laden to the ground with plums ... one day, I remember, someone left the gate open and the pigs got into the orchard. They made a right old mess! All the low hanging plums were eaten and trampled! Mr. Belding was furious, and I couldn't blame him! Of course it was 'one of us girls' who was 'to blame' (as was usually the case if anything went wrong.)
I hated those pigs. When we lived up at the barn I had to take a bucket of pigswill into the sty. The pigs would dash at your feet in their greed for the swill. They were really vicious. I got so scared of them I used to tip the kitchen rubbish over the wall into the trough! I have never cared much for pigs since then (except served up on plates that is!) It's strange, but Mrs Falkinder's single pig was never any trouble at all! I am sure that the pigs at the farm ganged up on me when they saw me coming!
Thinking of pork, the meat 'front' looked pretty bleak in those 'lean' wartime days! Everything was coupons and ration books and we only got very small pieces of meat. One Christmas it was especially bad I recall. Anyhow, dad had a friend who was an A.R.P. Warden like himself. His son was in the army - in stores. I don't know how he wangled it, but dad came home with this enormous piece of belly pork! The piece we got was too big for us. You can tell what a big piece it was - we gave half of it to our next door neighbour! We had a good Xmas that year!
After Christmas it was back to Wisbech. One weekend I remember, when we were on leave, we went to Peterborough. We were looking for somewhere cheap to stay overnight when we got talking to some A.T.S. girls. They directed us to a big house in the cathedral confines. The only place vacant was in the basement, in bunk beds. We decided that it would do for one night. (In view of what followed, it proved to be a lucky decision!)
We parked our gear and off we went to look around Peterborough. We went round all the shops and had some tea in a nice cafe. We then went back to get ready for a dance at the Town Hall. Rosa was a good dancer, but I wasn't, and I wasn't too keen to go. In the end, I relented, and I spent most of the evening talking to a Yank. He was a nice lad, air crew, having a well earned break. We had a few drinks, and as the bombing was getting rather bad, we left the dance around 11 pm.
We must have slept like logs, because next day we discovered that there had been a very heavy air raid. All the buildings around us had been bombed! One big hotel had been flattened, and on the other side of the cathedral some houses were smoking heaps of rubble! How they missed the cathedral I'll never know! God must have been with us that night. (I might add that we desisted from any further visits to Peterborough when we were on leave!!)
One night I remember, the Luftwaffe bombed Kings Lynn and we watched it all from Mrs Falkinder's house. We were reasonably safe out in the country. The bombers would come up the Wash to King's Lynn, which got pasted more than once! One night we were cycling back from Wisbech. There was full moon and this black plane came down over us. You could see the Swastikas on the wings it was so low! We jumped off our bikes and dived into the nearest ditch. We weren't taking any chances!
That summer I spent in the Land Army was a real scorcher! We were so hot in the fields that we decided to roll up our dungarees. This proved to be a mistake as we got rather badly sunburned! One of my legs blistered, and it was agony in bed at nights. I went to the village doctor and got a real lecture on the dangers of getting too much sun! In the future we learned from the village girls, who wore big sunhats when in the fields. (We talked Mrs Falkinder into making us one apiece.)
It was about this time that Tess came to join us at Mrs Falkinder's. She was a nice enough girl, who came from Menston, near Ilkley. (I never knew exactly where, I still have a photograph of her around.) Tess had trouble with her ears, and was forever putting peroxide in them. I am sure it did her no good, and I told her so, but she took no notice at all. (I wouldn't be surprised if she isn't deaf by now! I once thought I saw her on a Menston 'bus some time ago, but I didn't like to make myself known to her.)
The summer rolled on and we picked tons of strawberries and lots of flowers. I went home one weekend and decided to take my mother some potatoes and plums. I had a big bag full of them on the handlebars of my bike. It wasn't my day! I came off the bike on a cart track and there were tomatoes and plums rolling all over the place! I aquired two beautifully grazed knees! Anyway, I picked most of the fruit up, and decided to go back, beacuse the handle on my bag had snapped.
I was half an hour walking back, pushing the bike. I managed to borrow a rucksack off Rosa, which was what I should have done in the first place! Anyhow, to cut a long story short, I packed all my stuff and set off again, after making sure that the bike was OK. When I got to Sutton Bridge I had missed the train by ten minutes. So I had to wait two hours for the next train. I was not pleased ... I had arranged for mum or dad to meet me at a certain time, and I knew they would be worried.
I finally rolled into Bradford Exchange at two in the morning! I couldn't get a taxi at that hour, so I had to walk home. It was pitch black, and all the way up Thornton Road were the menacing black silhouettes of seemingly endless mills. All of a sudden a voice boomed out of the darkness - "Where are you going then young lady??" I nearly jumped out of my skin with fright! It was a policeman. I told him that I was on leave, and on my way home. He was very kind, and he walked me right home to our front door and carried all my gear for me! He waited while I knocked mum and dad up. He then bade me goodnight, and off he went.
That weekend I discovered that our Edie had been evacuated to a farm up near Gisburn. So now poor mum had us all separated from her. (I am sure that worrying about us and being short of money brought her illness on.)
The next time I came home on leave I was walking up Thornton Road when this great black car with an open top appeared. I was amazed to see Winston Churchill sitting there, smoking a fat cigar! He even gave me a smile and a wave! There were very few people about at the time. When I got home, I told mum (I thought maybe I had imagined it!) It was, however, perfectly true, Churchill was, I was informed, in Bradford at the time!
When I went back off leave, the weather was so hot that my hair was bleached white with the sun! And poor Rosa ... she was in a right old state! She caught hay fever and her nose and eyes streamed incessantly! She was up all night sneezing, and in the end she was really ill. She went to the doctor, who told her that she must leave land work at once. So, with that she packed up, said goodbye and headed for Liverpool. I was a bit sickened about her having to leave, but then that's the way of the world I suppose. We promised to keep in touch, but, you know, you soon forget.
I was a bit annoyed with Rosa though. She was one who never darned her stockings. She always had holes in hers. When she left she took all the good stockings and my darned ones and left me all the holed ones!! I thought it was very mean of her, as I had mended her stockings frequently. As a result, I had to darn about five pairs of stockings before I could send my kit in.
Soon after Rosa went I got news from home to say my mum was ill again. I asked off work, and went home, determined that I would never come back. I had never really liked it down in Norfolk, and hungered for the hills and dales of Yorkshire. As it happened, I only returned to Wisbech once more - to collect all my gear and send it back. (It was then that I found all the stockings that Rosa had so kindly left for me to mend!)
My best friend at home was a girl I had worked with called Renee. She went down to Norfolk with me to collect my kit. I will always remember that journey. The train was packed and we had to sit on our cases in the corridor for the whole trip. We were dead beat when we finally got to Wisbech. Still, I wasn't too bothered, I was going back to Bradford!
So much for the Land Army! I was now at home again, looking after mum. I couldn't go back to the mill, much as I would have liked to, for I was still required to do war work. I stayed at home for a few weeks and then I reported to the Labour Exchange. Such a palaver as never!!'Why had I left the Land Army?? Why wasn't I doing war work?' In the end I finally settled on going to Thorp Arch near Wetherby to fill shells.
So here I was, packing kit yet again; this time to go live in Leeds. I was taken with another girl to York Road in Leeds, from where I would travel every day to work at Thorp Arch. The couple I went to live with in Leeds were very nice to me. They might have been my own mum and dad! They had two sons, one married and one in the army and also a girl - Audrey. She worked at Thorp Arch too, but on the opposite shift to me. She would be getting up when I was going to bed! (It was a big feather bed I recall, and I never wanted to get up, it was so comfy!) I will always remember their kindness. As soon as I got in off the night shift, a good breakfast would be waiting for me, along with a hot water bottle to take to bed.
We had an hour's train ride to work and the carriages were never heated. It was often freezing cold, and we arrived at work frozen stiff! There were two or three different stations around the works, where we could get off. I used to get off at 'Ranger Station'. We would then go into the 'shift house' to get changed. We would take our outdoor clothes and shoes off, and put them into a bag, whereupon we would climb over a barrier to the 'clean side' where we would don yellow coats, pants, scarves and 'magazine' shoes, along with a red turban. We also had to remove all our jewellery and hand it in. (Our money was kept in a bag around the neck.)
We were now ready for work. We would make a beeline to the canteen for a cuppa before we started. There never seemed to be any cups available and we would finish up drinking tea from a basin! One consolation with this was that we got more tea, but it was no fun holding a basinful of hot tea, I can tell you! We also had to take our own knives and forks, because so many got stolen.
My job at Thorp Arch was putting yellow powder into 'ack ack' shells. It was very easy work. We didn't think it was dangerous, despite the occasional 'red alerts' we had while I was there, When we finished work we had to go to the 'wash house'. When we washed our hands the water would turn red! We had to keep washing until the water became clear. As a result of working with the powder my skin turned yellow. I looked like a 'heathen chinese'!
We wore a coat badge at Thorp Arch which had a design of two crossed shells with the legend 'Front Line Duty' (Which I suppose it was in a way.) I was very happy at Thorp Arch because I could come home every weekend and see to mum. By now our Edie had come back home, and mum sent her down to Grandma Dann's in Unstone for a few weeks. It was costing too much for her on the farm at Gisburn. They were always sending for new clothes for her which mum could ill afford.
I would have stayed at Thorp Arch, but fate decreed otherwise. As a result of working with the yellow powder I caught dermatitis. (My skin was always sensitive - as a child I had eczema and every autumn my skin would break out!) They moved me to another department, this time putting discs on detonators, but still my skin did not get any better. Finally the works doctor sent me home. I was sorry to leave Audrey and her mum and dad.
So here I was back home again, and reporting to the Labour Exchange once more! The same old story again! 'You have to do war work you know!'
By now the war was going well for us. Our Bill was now somewhere in Italy. He had gone there from North Africa with the Eighth Army, and was now a corporal. Uncle Jim, mum's youngest brother, was in the Guards. He was overseas too, in the 'tank mob'. I still had to do war work, as I have said, so this time I was sent to Hepworth and Grandage's on Wakefield Road to inspect pistons. I stayed there for two years. It was a nice, steady job, and mum was very happy to at least have one of us at home with her.
Mum was not well at all. We decided to put in for a council house, as dad and I thought it might perk mum up a bit. We finally got one on Blythe Avenue, Girlington; not so far from where we were already living. It was nice to have a bath and hot water again, and a nice garden to sit out in.
The war was still going well for the Allies and 'D Day' was imminent, (although we didn't know it of course!). I remember all the motors, tanks and army lorries which stretched from York Road in Leeds all the way to the coast. We went to York to visit Uncle Nathan and Aunt Rose. Aunt Rose, I remember, was working on the aerodrome at Church Fenton.
I made many friends at Hepworth's, and some of them I would encounter later, back in the mills. The mills, I recall, were all working like mad, churning out khaki. Trust a war to create plenty of work!! (I am afraid that today Bradford is finished as a wool town, which is very sad. We made the finest worsted and botany cloth in the world. I would defy anybody, even now, to make better! Nowadays it's all manmade fibres and synthetic rubbish!)
My old schoolmate from Featherstone, Margy, was now in the A.T.S.. She was stationed at Queensbury for a little while and she would come to see us. We were all pleased to see her, it brought back so many memories. We had so much to talk about! I was still getting very worried about my mum though. Finally it transpired that she would have to go into hospital for a hysterectomy. She went through the operation ok, but she lost a lot of blood. They couldn't give her a blood transfusion because all the blood supplies were being sent to the soldiers at the front. The doctor told dad that the blood loss had weakened mum's heart and she would have to take it steady. We brought her home, but she was never very strong afterwards.
It was around this time that I acquired an interest in the occult. I became keen on spiritualism. I used to go with mum to the Open Circle. One night, I recall, I went with my friend Laura. We were sitting by the fireplace, and someone had just put the draw tin up. The medium was just starting to give messages, and everyone was enthralled! Suddenly there was an almighty crash that shook everyone rigid! It was the draw tin! Of course, being so young, we were blamed for it, and were kicked out of the meeting, even though we were quite innocent. I wonder to this day if it really was a spirit that knocked the draw tin down! It certainly wasn't us! We never went to that place again. (But I have never since lost my interest in the occult!)
So I looked after my poor ailing mum, and continued to inspect the pistons at Hepworth's until one morning I woke up to find that the war was over and suddenly, everyone was COMING HOME!!
copyright © Annie.E.Jarratt 2002
I eventually got my uniform through and was instructed to report to Wisbech in Cambs., where I would be picked up and taken to Pratt's Flower Farm at Walpole St. Peter's. Mum and dad went down to the station with me to see me off. I was to catch the 9.30 train to Peterborough.
So there I was, just nineteen years old and weighing about seven and a half stone, packed off to do land work; and work it turned out to be, as I was shortly to find out! On the train I noticed this middle-aged gentleman in my carriage. He was dressed in black and wore buttoned gaiters. I quickly realised that he was someone high up in the church. He smiled and asked me where I was going. "Wisbech," I said. He smiled and informed me that he was Dr. Blunt, the Bishop of Bradford! He was going as far as Peterborough, on Church business. We had a long conversation and he shared his coffee and sandwiches with me, which his housekeeper had put up for him! As I got off the train at Peterborough he wished me all the best in my new job. What a nice man he was!
At Peterborough I had to cross over the line to another platform, where I had to wait over an hour for a train to Wisbech. I found about seven other girls all going to the same job. We all waited about half an hour before a lorry finally rolled up for us. We ll piled in, kit and all, and off we went! We travelled about seven miles and then bumped along half a mile of cart track, finally pulling up outside an old barn! We climbed some ricketty old steps into the top of the barn and there discovered cubicles, each with one camp bed and three blankets! The weather, I might add, was very cold. (It was early March) The cubicles were partitioned off with curtains, and it was so draughty they were blowing about! We were cold, tired and hungry after our long journeys, but no-one seemed the least bit concerned about us!
For the first few days I was really homesick, and I cried every night. There was a little cottage nearby where we got our meals, such as they were! There was a lady from the village who came to help with the dinners. Two girls had to get up each morning at six am and make the breakfast. We had burnt toast and porridge quite frequently! At least I knew how to cook ... some of the girls hadn't a clue! We had to light a fire to make the toast and it was a pig of a job to light it! The grate was all broken out, and we had to light the fire on the hearth. Sometimes there would be a mouse in the milk bucket! I would fish it out, and no-one would be any the wiser! It was either that, or no porridge at all. I began to think that my friend had had the right idea in joining the A.T.S. At least they got decent food!
After about two weeks of washing in cold water, along with the lousy grub, my friend and I had had enough! I had met Rosa on the station at Wisbech and we became firm friends. Rosa came from Liverpool. Her dad and brother were in the Merchant Navy on the same ship. The other girls in our 'gang' were from London, and two from Leeds. One of the Leeds girls married a local boy and stayed in Wisbech. I wouldn't have stayed if they'd paid me pounds ten! As it was, I only got about three pounds a week, but when we went on 'piece work' in the strawberry season I often earned more.
The London girls soon got fed up with things. Within two weeks they were off back home to London! Rosa and I would go to the village pub for a drink and a game of skittles. We got talking to the landlady there, and told her that we hadn't had a warm bath since we'd arrived over two weeks ago! She said we could have a bath at the pub once a week, if we liked. Even this had its setbacks ... we had to pump the water up into the bath! We finally settled it by both getting in together! It was grand, though to get a warm bath. I would scrub Rosa's back and she would scrub mine. We had a lot of fun!
One Saturday we were nattering with the landlady and we told her how primitive it was at the barn and about the poor food. She told us that she had a friend at the other end of the village who had a big house, and who might perhaps take us in as boarders. I suggested to Rosa that we should go and ask; after all, she could only refuse! So off we went to see the lady in question. We knocked on the door and a motherly looking lady answered it. She said her name was Mrs. Falkinder. We asked her if she would take us and we gave her a note from the landlady at the pub. She read it and looked at us rather dubiously. She told us that she would talk it over with her husband when he got home from work. She would let us know the next day. The following morning she smiled and told us we could move in on the Monday! We flew back to the barn on our bikes, we were so pleased! We packed up all our kit and we were duly installed at Mrs Falkinder's on the Monday night. We got lots of catty remarks from the other girls who envied us our good fortune.
It was to prove good fortune indeed. Mr. and Mrs. Falkinder were like a mother and father to us both. The food was first class, and we had a lovely feather bed to sleep in. (We didn't want to get up in the mornings, it was so comfortable!) Mrs. Falkinder was an excellent cook considering that she only had two primus stoves to cook with! Everything was paraffin, not only the stoves, but all the house lighting as well. (It was, however, much better than struggling with candles back at the barn!) Once, at the barn, we had a narrow escape with fire. I was wearing a woolllen dressing gown, I recall, and I leaned over to shut a window. The candle caught my sleeve and the flames went right up my arm before I could put it out! It gave me one hell of a scare! That barn was a creepy place ... on one occasion, in the middle of the night, we heard someone with heavy feet walking down the middle of the cubicles. After that we always made sure that the door was firmly locked at night!
We were glad to get away from that place, and we were much happier at Mrs. Falkinder's. We could put up with the hard work on the land as long as we had a few home comforts. Mrs. Falkinder kept some hens and a pig, so we got plenty of bacon and eggs. She had flitches of bacon hung up from the beams, and she only had to cut slices off when she wanted bacon. It was very fatty, but I have never tasted any bacon so good! She also had fruit trees, which were laden with fruit in season. We used to help her with the picking; it was too much for her to tackle on her own. I always remember that to get to the toilet we had to pass through an outhouse which was piled high with strawberries packed on trays, ready for the market. Mrs Falkinder had two beehives as well, and lots of honey! The bees would be all over the strawberries, and I was terrified to go near them! Mrs Falkinder could do anything with those bees. She told me that the bees had belonged to her mother and when she died she had taken over from her. She told me that she had had to inform the bees that from now on she would be looking after them, otherwise they wouldn't settle to make honey! I thought it was an old wives' tale, but since then I have found it to be perfectly true!
Many things I have learned since then about country life. Mrs Falkinder was wise in so many things. The house was a lovely old place, and apparently her father had kept it as a pub. You could tell it had been a pub, by the shape of the rooms. Mr. Falkinder worked in Wisbech. He cycled there every day. He was a wizard with bikes, and was always fixing mine because I was always falling off the damned thing! He was also good at mending punctures! The work at Pratt's was all land work. We were getting the flower bulbs out to put sugar beet and potatoes in. It was all for the war effort. I'm sure I could've done more towards the war effort had I been left doing a job I was experienced in ... making khaki at Bailey's! Anyway I settled into landwork with a load of backache! We were hoeing, weeding and scratting bulbs out all day long. It reminded me of our potato picking days back in Featherstone! We looked very smart in our 'walking out' uniforms. Corduroy pants, fawn shirts, green jumpers and a jaunty hat! I still have my hat badge somewhere around. At work we wore brown dungarees and gumboots. Also leather boots. Rosa and I went into Wisbech to have our photos taken to send home. We would go to Wisbech on our bikes and leave them with a shopkeeper we knew. He had a closed passage down the side of his shop, so the bikes were safe. We would have tea at a lovely little cafe we found and then go to Wisbechs' only picture house. We usually got home about ten or half past, and Mrs. Falkinder would worry about us. On other weekends we would go to Kings Lynn.
We couldn't go far in the evenings. It was usually half past seven before we got home from the fields, and we were usually tired out! The nearest place for us was Sutton Bridge. There was a big aerodrome there and lots of airforce lads would go to the 'Toc H' Canteen. We were allowed in there, but we couldn't go to the N.A.A.F.I. ... (why, I'll never know!). We made many friends at the canteen. We would sit around and talk, and eat teacakes and sandwiches. We were at the canteen when we met two nice lads who we went out with a few times. Rosa's chap was a Welsh lad, and he really fell for her! He wanted to take her to Wales to see his folks, but she wasn't all that keen! The lad I went out with came from Birmingham. He had been a drummer in a band before the war. I went out with him a few times before I found that he was married and had two children!! That was that as far as I was concerned! (We still sat and talked in the canteen though, and he would tell me all about his wife and children. I think I must have been a good listener!) The people in Sutton Bridge were very kind! When we went home on leave we would leave our bikes at Sutton Bridge Station. The Station Master there was a very nice chap.
But the best thing of all about Wisbech was the road back to Bradford! I loved to go home, but home was so far away, and money was tight. I sent a pound home to my mum every week, and I also gave Mrs. Falkinder a pound. That didn't leave me with much! Really I should have given Mrs. Falkinder more, because she did all our washing too, but she knew that we did the best that we could with our money. Because of this you will appreciate that I couldn't go home very often! Once or twice I managed to save for a weekend at home, but I was then more homesick than ever when I had to go back!
One weekend four of us decided to cycle to Sandringham. We set off about nine in the morning I recall, and stopped off at King's Lynn for a cup of tea and a breather. One thing I specially noticed was the endless rhodedendrons which lined both sides of the road leading to Sandringham. The colours were beautiful! We got to Sandringham about lunchtime and we sat down in the grounds to have our sandwiches. There was no-one 'in residence' so we had a peep through the long windows. It was all very nice. While we were there we met some Land Girls who worked on the Estate. They took us all round the gardens. We were very envious of them working there! In the afternoon, I recall, we listened to a band that was playing there. At teatime we set off home. On our way back we stopped at Castle Rising and explored the castle. Altogether it had been a very nice 'day out'. Another time, I remember, we went to the seaside ... to Hunstanton. We didn't get onto the beach though, it was liberally sown with barbed wire, tank traps and mines! We had to go through two or three roadblocks I remember, and we got lots of 'ribbing' from the army about our uniforms.
It was around this time that Rosa got a telegram saying that her husband and brother were missing at sea. She was really shattered. She was a good Catholic, and I went with her to the Catholic Church in Wisbech to light a candle and pray with her for their safe return. A week went by and we heard no news, and I reassured Rosa by telling her that 'no news is good news'. The prayers must have worked, for a few days later we heard that they had been picked up off the Azores! They had been on a raft for almost two weeks. They then had to spend two weeks in hospital. Rosa was overjoyed, and went home immediately when she found out they had landed. I am sure our prayers must have helped a little. After that Rosas' dad and brother got assigned to separate ships, and they both came through the war safely! Rosa by way of thanks bought a big box of daffodils and narcissi and sent them to decorate the Catholic Church in Liverpool.
Still on the subject of churches, I never went to my own church when I was in Norfolk. The villagers considered us to be 'those common Yorkshire girls' and did not make us welcome! (Why, I will never know, because all the girls were decent girls!) We worked with one or two of the village girls, but we were never particularly friendly with them I recall.
The man in charge of us was called Belding. His daughter worked with him. Enough said! When the strawberries were in season we were put on 'piece work'. All the berries went to Smedley's to be made into jam. If people could see what went into the jam they wouldn't be so keen on it! All the mouldy strawberries went in with the good ones! It was wartime, and nobody seemed to bother. We also picked gooseberries, loganberries and plums. The plum trees would be laden to the ground with plums ... one day, I remember, someone left the gate open and the pigs got into the orchard. They made a right old mess! All the low hanging plums were eaten and trampled! Mr. Belding was furious, and I couldn't blame him! Of course it was 'one of us girls' who was 'to blame' (as was usually the case if anything went wrong.)
I hated those pigs. When we lived up at the barn I had to take a bucket of pigswill into the sty. The pigs would dash at your feet in their greed for the swill. They were really vicious. I got so scared of them I used to tip the kitchen rubbish over the wall into the trough! I have never cared much for pigs since then (except served up on plates that is!) It's strange, but Mrs Falkinder's single pig was never any trouble at all! I am sure that the pigs at the farm ganged up on me when they saw me coming!
Thinking of pork, the meat 'front' looked pretty bleak in those 'lean' wartime days! Everything was coupons and ration books and we only got very small pieces of meat. One Christmas it was especially bad I recall. Anyhow, dad had a friend who was an A.R.P. Warden like himself. His son was in the army - in stores. I don't know how he wangled it, but dad came home with this enormous piece of belly pork! The piece we got was too big for us. You can tell what a big piece it was - we gave half of it to our next door neighbour! We had a good Xmas that year!
After Christmas it was back to Wisbech. One weekend I remember, when we were on leave, we went to Peterborough. We were looking for somewhere cheap to stay overnight when we got talking to some A.T.S. girls. They directed us to a big house in the cathedral confines. The only place vacant was in the basement, in bunk beds. We decided that it would do for one night. (In view of what followed, it proved to be a lucky decision!) We parked our gear and off we went to look around Peterborough. We went round all the shops and had some tea in a nice cafe. We then went back to get ready for a dance at the Town Hall. Rosa was a good dancer, but I wasn't, and I wasn't too keen to go. In the end, I relented, and I spent most of the evening talking to a Yank. He was a nice lad, air crew, having a well earned break. We had a few drinks, and as the bombing was getting rather bad, we left the dance around 11 pm.
We must have slept like logs, because next day we discovered that there had been a very heavy air raid. All the buildings around us had been bombed! One big hotel had been flattened, and on the other side of the cathedral some houses were smoking heaps of rubble! How they missed the cathedral I'll never know! God must have been with us that night. (I might add that we desisted from any further visits to Peterborough when we were on leave!!)
One night I remember, the Luftwaffe bombed Kings Lynn and we watched it all from Mrs Falkinder's house. We were reasonably safe out in the country. The bombers would come up the Wash to King's Lynn, which got pasted more than once! One night we were cycling back from Wisbech. There was full moon and this black plane came down over us. You could see the Swastikas on the wings it was so low! We jumped off our bikes and dived into the nearest ditch. We weren't taking any chances!
That summer I spent in the Land Army was a real scorcher! We were so hot in the fields that we decided to roll up our dungarees. This proved to be a mistake as we got rather badly sunburned! One of my legs blistered, and it was agony in bed at nights. I went to the village doctor and got a real lecture on the dangers of getting too much sun! In the future we learned from the village girls, who wore big sunhats when in the fields. (We talked Mrs Falkinder into making us one apiece.)
It was about this time that Tess came to join us at Mrs Falkinder's. She was a nice enough girl, who came from Menston, near Ilkley. (I never knew exactly where, I still have a photograph of her around.) Tess had trouble with her ears, and was forever putting peroxide in them. I am sure it did her no good, and I told her so, but she took no notice at all. (I wouldn't be surprised if she isn't deaf by now! I once thought I saw her on a Menston 'bus some time ago, but I didn't like to make myself known to her.)
The summer rolled on and we picked tons of strawberries and lots of flowers. I went home one weekend and decided to take my mother some potatoes and plums. I had a big bag full of them on the handlebars of my bike. It wasn't my day! I came off the bike on a cart track and there were tomatoes and plums rolling all over the place! I aquired two beautifully grazed knees! Anyway, I picked most of the fruit up, and decided to go back, beacuse the handle on my bag had snapped. I was half an hour walking back, pushing the bike. I managed to borrow a rucksack off Rosa, which was what I should have done in the first place! Anyhow, to cut a long story short, I packed all my stuff and set off again, after making sure that the bike was OK. When I got to Sutton Bridge I had missed the train by ten minutes. So I had to wait two hours for the next train. I was not pleased ... I had arranged for mum or dad to meet me at a certain time, and I knew they would be worried.
I finally rolled into Bradford Exchange at two in the morning! I couldn't get a taxi at that hour, so I had to walk home. It was pitch black, and all the way up Thornton Road were the menacing black silhouettes of seemingly endless mills. All of a sudden a voice boomed out of the darkness - "Where are you going then young lady??" I nearly jumped out of my skin with fright! It was a policeman. I told him that I was on leave, and on my way home. He was very kind, and he walked me right home to our front door and carried all my gear for me! He waited while I knocked mum and dad up. He then bade me goodnight, and off he went. That weekend I discovered that our Edie had been evacuated to a farm up near Gisburn. So now poor mum had us all separated from her. (I am sure that worrying about us and being short of money brought her illness on.)
The next time I came home on leave I was walking up Thornton Road when this great black car with an open top appeared. I was amazed to see Winston Churchill sitting there, smoking a fat cigar! He even gave me a smile and a wave! There were very few people about at the time. When I got home, I told mum (I thought maybe I had imagined it!) It was, however, perfectly true, Churchill was, I was informed, in Bradford at the time!
When I went back off leave, the weather was so hot that my hair was bleached white with the sun! And poor Rosa ... she was in a right old state! She caught hay fever and her nose and eyes streamed incessantly! She was up all night sneezing, and in the end she was really ill. She went to the doctor, who told her that she must leave land work at once. So, with that she packed up, said goodbye and headed for Liverpool. I was a bit sickened about her having to leave, but then that's the way of the world I suppose. We promised to keep in touch, but, you know, you soon forget. I was a bit annoyed with Rosa though. She was one who never darned her stockings. She always had holes in hers. When she left she took all the good stockings and my darned ones and left me all the holed ones!! I thought it was very mean of her, as I had mended her stockings frequently. As a result, I had to darn about five pairs of stockings before I could send my kit in. Soon after Rosa went I got news from home to say my mum was ill again. I asked off work, and went home, determined that I would never come back. I had never really liked it down in Norfolk, and hungered for the hills and dales of Yorkshire. As it happened, I only returned to Wisbech once more - to collect all my gear and send it back. (It was then that I found all the stockings that Rosa had so kindly left for me to mend!)
My best friend at home was a girl I had worked with called Renee. She went down to Norfolk with me to collect my kit. I will always remember that journey. The train was packed and we had to sit on our cases in the corridor for the whole trip. We were dead beat when we finally got to Wisbech. Still, I wasn't too bothered, I was going back to Bradford!
So much for the Land Army! I was now at home again, looking after mum. I couldn't go back to the mill, much as I would have liked to, for I was still required to do war work. I stayed at home for a few weeks and then I reported to the Labour Exchange. Such a palaver as never!!'Why had I left the Land Army?? Why wasn't I doing war work?' In the end I finally settled on going to Thorp Arch near Wetherby to fill shells.
So here I was, packing kit yet again; this time to go live in Leeds. I was taken with another girl to York Road in Leeds, from where I would travel every day to work at Thorp Arch. The couple I went to live with in Leeds were very nice to me. They might have been my own mum and dad! They had two sons, one married and one in the army and also a girl - Audrey. She worked at Thorp Arch too, but on the opposite shift to me. She would be getting up when I was going to bed! (It was a big feather bed I recall, and I never wanted to get up, it was so comfy!) I will always remember their kindness. As soon as I got in off the night shift, a good breakfast would be waiting for me, along with a hot water bottle to take to bed.
We had an hour's train ride to work and the carriages were never heated. It was often freezing cold, and we arrived at work frozen stiff! There were two or three different stations around the works, where we could get off. I used to get off at 'Ranger Station'. We would then go into the 'shift house' to get changed. We would take our outdoor clothes and shoes off, and put them into a bag, whereupon we would climb over a barrier to the 'clean side' where we would don yellow coats, pants, scarves and 'magazine' shoes, along with a red turban. We also had to remove all our jewellery and hand it in. (Our money was kept in a bag around the neck.) We were now ready for work. We would make a beeline to the canteen for a cuppa before we started. There never seemed to be any cups available and we would finish up drinking tea from a basin! One consolation with this was that we got more tea, but it was no fun holding a basinful of hot tea, I can tell you! We also had to take our own knives and forks, because so many got stolen.
My job at Thorp Arch was putting yellow powder into 'ack ack' shells. It was very easy work. We didn't think it was dangerous, despite the occasional 'red alerts' we had while I was there, When we finished work we had to go to the 'wash house'. When we washed our hands the water would turn red! We had to keep washing until the water became clear. As a result of working with the powder my skin turned yellow. I looked like a 'heathen chinese'! We wore a coat badge at Thorp Arch which had a design of two crossed shells with the legend 'Front Line Duty' (Which I suppose it was in a way.) I was very happy at Thorp Arch because I could come home every weekend and see to mum. By now our Edie had come back home, and mum sent her down to Grandma Dann's in Unstone for a few weeks. It was costing too much for her on the farm at Gisburn. They were always sending for new clothes for her which mum could ill afford. I would have stayed at Thorp Arch, but fate decreed otherwise. As a result of working with the yellow powder I caught dermatitis. (My skin was always sensitive - as a child I had eczema and every autumn my skin would break out!) They moved me to another department, this time putting discs on detonators, but still my skin did not get any better. Finally the works doctor sent me home. I was sorry to leave Audrey and her mum and dad.
So here I was back home again, and reporting to the Labour Exchange once more! The same old story again! 'You have to do war work you know!'
By now the war was going well for us. Our Bill was now somewhere in Italy. He had gone there from North Africa with the Eighth Army, and was now a corporal. Uncle Jim, mum's youngest brother, was in the Guards. He was overseas too, in the 'tank mob'. I still had to do war work, as I have said, so this time I was sent to Hepworth and Grandage's on Wakefield Road to inspect pistons. I stayed there for two years. It was a nice, steady job, and mum was very happy to at least have one of us at home with her.
Mum was not well at all. We decided to put in for a council house, as dad and I thought it might perk mum up a bit. We finally got one on Blythe Avenue, Girlington; not so far from where we were already living. It was nice to have a bath and hot water again, and a nice garden to sit out in.
The war was still going well for the Allies and 'D Day' was imminent, (although we didn't know it of course!). I remember all the motors, tanks and army lorries which stretched from York Road in Leeds all the way to the coast. We went to York to visit Uncle Nathan and Aunt Rose. Aunt Rose, I remember, was working on the aerodrome at Church Fenton.
I made many friends at Hepworth's, and some of them I would encounter later, back in the mills. The mills, I recall, were all working like mad, churning out khaki. Trust a war to create plenty of work!! (I am afraid that today Bradford is finished as a wool town, which is very sad. We made the finest worsted and botany cloth in the world. I would defy anybody, even now, to make better! Nowadays it's all manmade fibres and synthetic rubbish!)
My old schoolmate from Featherstone, Margy, was now in the A.T.S.. She was stationed at Queensbury for a little while and she would come to see us. We were all pleased to see her, it brought back so many memories. We had so much to talk about! I was still getting very worried about my mum though. Finally it transpired that she would have to go into hospital for a hysterectomy. She went through the operation ok, but she lost a lot of blood. They couldn't give her a blood transfusion because all the blood supplies were being sent to the soldiers at the front. The doctor told dad that the blood loss had weakened mum's heart and she would have to take it steady. We brought her home, but she was never very strong afterwards.
It was around this time that I acquired an interest in the occult. I became keen on spiritualism. I used to go with mum to the Open Circle. One night, I recall, I went with my friend Laura. We were sitting by the fireplace, and someone had just put the draw tin up. The medium was just starting to give messages, and everyone was enthralled! Suddenly there was an almighty crash that shook everyone rigid! It was the draw tin! Of course, being so young, we were blamed for it, and were kicked out of the meeting, even though we were quite innocent. I wonder to this day if it really was a spirit that knocked the draw tin down! It certainly wasn't us! We never went to that place again. (But I have never since lost my interest in the occult!)
So I looked after my poor ailing mum, and continued to inspect the pistons at Hepworth's until one morning I woke up to find that the war was over and suddenly, everyone was COMING HOME!!
copyright © Annie.E.Jarratt 2002