ĂŰŃż´ŤĂ˝

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See ID No 4110274

And what was available for two children, I was already at Monmouth, which was an expense in itself. Had to be shared between four children, they all had to be treated the same. And my Grandparents at Porthcawl and at Rogiet were exceptionally kind, because they knitted and sewed, and shared what they could. And my Grandmother was good with her needle, so she had hand-me-downs. They were, they were lovely little children.

You came to like anything that filled that you up? We always seemed to be hungry, but we were never without food, but it was certainly not ‘a la carte’! We had wonderful pancakes, and we had wonderful scrambled egg, that was wonderful. Dried milk was horrible, didn’t use that at all, but we always had milk from Sharp’s, so I don’t remember being without milk. No, we always seemed to have porridge of some sort or bread and milk, or some such concoction.

ĂŰŃż´ŤĂ˝ Life

Yes, but they weren’t they weren’t ten, I mean they were under ten! This is Rita and Connie, they were the two that stayed most of the time. Well it must have been near a couple of years I suppose, and we didn’t hear. We didn’t even know the age of the children, we didn’t know their birthdays. And then they went, one Sunday morning, possibly about nine o’clock, there was an uprising at the front door. Father went, and he said there was a very irate women there, who demanded that she take her child. I can remember Father saying that “there are two children here, unless I have written authority I have no right, the children stay with me, I know they’re safe here”. Anyway, she went off somewhere, and there must have been a Billeting Officer, because she came back with somebody. Of course the children didn’t know their parents, well they’d probably been here about two years then, must have been. And the one child, Rita, we last saw little Rita going out screaming and kicking, and Father had no authority to keep her. The Mother said She was the child’s Mother, and she was taken. Father went to have a look round Chepstow later on. And there must have been a coach that had come this way, and it was parked at the back of the Greyhound in Chepstow, and the occupants were all drunk. And Rita was sat screaming on the pavement, and it absolutely upset him. He didn’t approve of the children being here, he didn’t want them here. He didn’t make a great deal of fuss about them, but he knew they were well looked after. But I mean he was busy working, he had enough to do to cope with two of his own, without. We heard no more, we never heard. And then about a month later, the same thing happened again, with Connie, she then went.

Then we had an appeal, from the lady next door who was Mrs Mence. There was a brother and sister, that couldn’t get on somewhere or other, so they were moved. So the boy went and Jean came here, but they were difficult, they were difficult. I think again they were from London, but they didn’t stay, they didn’t stay very long, I don’t know what happened to those. Well it wasn’t a question of them settling, they couldn’t go back you see, I don’t quite know where they went if they didn’t stay here. Probably went to another home, I don’t know.

Well again you see bathing was limited, because we hadn’t got the coal to heat the water. So there were lots of bird baths.

ĂŰŃż´ŤĂ˝ Life

I can remember the day war was declared! we had gone up to Church. The Vicar had a wireless there, we knew that there was going to be an announcement. And he put it on in the middle of the service, and we were all quite thrilled as kids, you know, and we came home. We didn’t have a very good greeting when we got here, because we were told it was nothing to laugh or joke about, it was very serious. So we decided to make ourselves scarce. So we walked down Sharp’s Lane, onto the Wharf, and stayed there, were late for dinner, watching the barrage balloons go up. All along the Estuary there, we watched them going up over Bristol, they were going up, they were inflating them! Yes, I can remember that very plainly.

Um, well there were Black Markets going on. The only thing that I can remember that concerned us, I don’t remember we ever had anything else. But I can remember on one particular occasion, Father had been somewhere, and he had been given a piece of home cured bacon. And he walked up the yard from the Shipyard late one night, with this piece of, I can see him now, home cured bacon. Well it wasn’t home cured bacon, it was a piece of home cured fat. There was no bacon on it, and he had got it strapped under his waistcoat, under his big mac. And when he came in I mean, perhaps my Mother should have been more grateful, she was horrified. That’s the only Black Market I can remember.

Father, a few days after war was declared, arrived with a lorry and both these windows were sand bagged up to the top layer, so that we had some protection. I think we were the only people in Bulwark, I mean Mother was furious, I mean absolutely furious, I mean. Well it wasn’t tight against the window, you could get a body through the window. It was an air vent there, and so that when we had the bombing, the bottom windows were opened, so the blast would go through. Then you see, it was all blacked out.

And when Bristol was bombed so much, I mean, we had a big kitchen table in here. But you had to damp the fire down after nightfall. Yes, because of the smoke you see. And well all these electrical gadgets are things that have come in my lifetime, they weren’t apparent as a child. It was all coal heating. So we were underneath the table, with a big chenille cloth over it. And we did magic shows underneath there, you know with???
ĂŰŃż´ŤĂ˝ Life

And then when Bristol was so badly bombed, I mean, I’m afraid, I think we both had a tanned bottom that night! I can remember it very plainly. I think they were so upset and so worried, and then John and I crawled upstairs and we were hanging out of the bedroom window.

He had a big allotment, in Thornwell Road, and he had so many rows of potatoes from Pritchards Farm, you know, St Tecla was a farm you see. Then there was Langham’s Farm and Sharp’s Farm, so we had three farms here. When you get to the junction of Marsh Road, and going down, that was a continuation straight down the lane was Sharp’s Lane. Well then when you get to Burnt Barn Road, which is the other side of the roundabout, you went along to the end of the road which was Chartist’s Way, where Chartist’s Way is now. Well you went straight down there, which was Langham’s Lane. And there was a big field, used to go and see the lambs on Christmas Eve afternoon, or Christmas Day. They would be underneath the loose wall there. Then the allotments came from Thornwell Road, over to that field, and then if you went straight on, that was the air field where before the war, the planes used to come in I mean they were only biplanes to the Racecourse. And that was the mushroom field, and then you walked straight down there you see to Harry Gale at Mathern Farm.

I remember having a top coat, made out of a travelling rug, there very few people that had a new coat during the war. Blankets were used, and if you look at the photographs of children, a lot of children had pin stripe shorts and things like that, if you look at them.

I can remember Miss Curtis, well there were two sisters that had the one shop, where that awful Pub thing is in corner of the square. They had the first shop, and then the Brother had the shoe shop, and the other Curtis had where that restaurant keeps changing hands, that was the Gents Outfitters there. They (Miss Curtis) had black stockings with double spliced knees. Well Mum somehow managed to get enough coupons so I had one stocking one week, and another stocking another week. Then she used the heels and the middles to patch the rest of the stockings, so that I had stockings to go school. Because you couldn’t get them you see. We got our uniform from Hall’s in Monmouth you see, which was a maroon tunic, but black stockings and maroon pants, knickers, bloomers!

Local Events

I can remember the day war was declared! Very easily because we had gone up to Church, and the Church was the little tin Church in the Camp. That’s where Bulwark Church was, as you go up, or you used to be able to go up, I mean I’ve not been some many years now, I wouldn’t know what it’s like up there. But when you went up through the first entrance? in Alpha Road the first very first one, where The Red & White Social Club used to be. Then Maxwells had the bungalow on the left hand side. Long gingery hair the girl had I know, but she was older than me. Well if you went up, there were two lots of huts, and then it was the Church. The Vicar had a wireless there. We knew that there was going to be an announcement, and he put it on in the middle of the service. We were all There wasn’t a lot of excitement up here in those days, there was only the hay making, and that was over.

Schools

And then if you went and turned right before you got to the cottages and went along, that was the school, which was another big hut, you see. They went there until they went to the Secondary School. I went to, I was at Porthcawl, before 37. I went because I was ill, and I went to the sea. Yes, and then I came back to take my scholarship at the Board School. Well it must, I must have come back in the September or the October that I took the scholarship in the January. Miss Scase taught me how to smock, I couldn’t smock before that. She taught me how to smock.

I was at Monmouth School, we went up by train. I used to go from here, there was another girlie that lived in the house opposite. There was just two of us Heather Brinley and myself were the only two. And then Margaret Warren lived in town.

The Town

Mr Warren was the Pharmacist for Dr. Drapes’ Surgery. Where Peter Merrick’s Chemist shop is, the back entrance, about the second house up, you went up the steps there, in Mounton Road. The Surgery was in Hocker Hill Street. On the left to start with, and then eventually it moved when Dr Hardman came, it moved down on the right hand side. But it was where the nice windows were. There is a wine shop there now, Victoria Wine. Then you go down the cobbles until you get to the Five Alls. Well it was, there was a big house on the left, with big lovely windows. That was where the Surgery was. Nurse Evans, was the nurse there, and she was also the Midwife.

Travel

We used to set off to catch our train to school from here in the morning, along Alpha Road. Where the Red & White Social Club used to be, there were two Sentries there, either side. “Stop who goes there, friend of foe” We used to have to go through the Camp, then we turned with the Bungalows on your right, you went right to the end of the bungalows and round the back of the old school, and then you went to the top of the woods, where there was another Sentry. And then we used to go down the steps, right down to the bottom of the steps, with the quarry on your right. Mind you there were no lights, there were no torches, there was nothing. So if you hadn’t got a good instinct and a pair of eyes, you were lost, because there were no lights anywhere. And we went down over the steps, along to the Racecourse Platform, and then from the end of the Racecourse to the first signal box was a very short distance, and the signal box men used to watch us. We just used to go round, and then onto to the train.

It was a bit miserable during the war, because there were no great lights in the train. So you know, you couldn’t read or do anything very much up and down in the winter. They were very dim, there were no lights, and there were no car lights, there were black fronts to lights, and there were just little slits, and then there were no street lamps or anything like that you see. And no house lights.

Voluntary Organisations

He was in the ĂŰŃż´ŤĂ˝ Guard, he was away oh many many hours, all nights some nights. They went out on manoeuvres, and they spent a lot of time at Sedbury Park and Piercefield House.

Wartime Defences

You couldn’t get onto the Wharf, because that was barricaded, but I don’t think the air field was. But you see you didn’t venture very far, it wasn’t a time of celebration.

Work in Wartime

During the war, my Mother was in charge of the laundry at Dinham. Well it was almost a hush hush job, wasn’t it? but I always remember her telling me that all the clothing that was used in the manufacture of cordite was very good quality white flannel.

So off they went, that was the end. So that was when you know Mum missed them terribly, so that’s when she decided that she wouldn’t, she couldn’t, she couldn’t go through the heartache of it. Then we went away for Christmas, and we were told by the authorities, that because we had already had evacuees, that we were obliged and could be summons or something if we didn’t. And they wanted us to have Mums and children, and Mum had reached had saturation point. So she said no she wouldn’t, so she had to work. Well I think she was so very cross because we had had evacuees out of good nature, those children, this was the home they knew, it was a better home than they’d ever had. So she went somewhere to Bournemouth, because it was under the Navy. She went to Poole just outside Bournemouth, and it was rather funny she thought. Whether it was just for safety or whether it was for security I don’t know.

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