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Part 2:
Rationed at every turn!

The German raids against Britain continued nightly from September 1940 to May 1941 and although the invasion did not take place when expected, I do not think the fear of it evaporated for a long time. Every evening at 6 p.m. we were all glued to our very large radios and listened intently to the news and Winston Churchill's inspiring speeches. Although at nine years old, I probably did not understand a lot, I still get a deep thrill when I hear that rumbling voice proclaim:

‘We shall not flag nor fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France and on the seas and oceans; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills. We shall never surrender.’

Whatever his other shortcomings, Winston Churchill was a wonderful war leader, and I do not know if Britain would have made it without him. Like so many others, I experience a deep sense of gratitude to him for his inspiration and leadership in those dire days.

Then there were the amazing young men of our air force in their Spitfires, defending us night after night. We glowed with pride as we cheered them on, although distressed by the appalling casualties. Most of us kids could identify the sound of a Spitfire and could differentiate it from a Messerschmitt bomber. As you can imagine, 1940 - 1941 were pretty grim years, not only for the troops and their families but also for most people in Britain, especially for those in London and the big cities. Civilian casualties rose relentlessly. Even so, although we were in North London, we did not have to endure what the people in the East End of London endured as dockland received a nightly pounding, as did the ports and other strategic cities.

As Christmas 1940 approached an appeal went out asking families if they would offer hospitality to Commonwealth troops who were stationed in Britain over Christmas. My mother, true to form, responded and two Canadian soldiers came and stayed with us over Christmas. Although petrol rationing was imposed shortly after war was declared, food rationing did not start until January 1941. Many goods were hard to obtain, though, so I imagine that the meal was a pretty simple one and quite a headache to put together.

The Blitz continued to take its toll of everyone. There was no light relief. At that time there were no televisions, nor computers, mobile phones nor music centres or anything like that. Some people might have had a gramophone but we did not. All we had was the radio, as I have mentioned. It was such a relief, before the news, when we heard Big Ben chime to know it was still there and had not been hit. We did not go out to films because of the raids. I do not even know if cinemas were operating at all. Also holidays were out of the question during the war years, certainly for our family.

As Hitler had been unable to annihilate the RAF and the British Navy and the weather had turned against him, he decided to postpone all thoughts of an invasion of Britain in 1940 and turned his attention to the British merchant navy deciding that the best thing to do would be to starve Britain out. Throughout the winter of 1940-41 and beyond, air and submarine attacks on British merchant ships mounted and heavy losses were sustained. Food rationing was introduced in January 1941 probably just a few days after my 10th birthday!). Initially, butter, sugar and bacon were rationed, shortly to be followed by meat, dairy products, breakfast cereals, jam, canned fruit and nearly everything else. We ate a lot of bread (which was not rationed until after the war had ended!) Before jam was rationed the only kind you could buy was rhubarb and ginger jam. I got heartily sick of it. One day, however, when I was shopping with my mother we suddenly saw a shop window full of tins of jam. 'Children's Delight' the notice proclaimed. 'One tin per customer'. Delighted we went into the shop and made our purchase. Imagine our disappointment when we got home and opened the tin to have with our bread at tea time and found - yes, you have guessed it - it was rhubarb and ginger! Jam was rationed soon after that and then you could get a choice of several varieties, but as each person's ration was one 1 lb. jar per month, once you had made your choice you had to have that one jam or marmalade for breakfast, lunch or tea (for as long as it lasted) for the whole month! As it did not last for a month I gave up taking sugar in my tea and put it on my bread instead, especially as the weekly butter and margarine rations were finished long before the end of the week. Tea, the stable comfort of the British in times of crisis, became rationed in July 1940.

At ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ House we had mince eeked out with oatmeal on Saturdays and meat on Sundays For the rest of the week our main meals were our school dinners most of which were pretty disgusting. The worst was ‘Bones and Beans’ which consisted of mutton bones with little fragments of stewed mutton clinging to them floating, together with some haricot beans in a watery sea of liquid which by no stretch of the imagination, could be called gravy. This was usually followed by a stodgy pudding covered in an almost sugarless custard made with water, or if you were very lucky, skimmed dried milk. At ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ House, we had porridge and toast every morning for breakfast and ‘high tea’ in the evening which consisted of something like a sliver of bacon (also rationed) and a piece of fried bread, or whatever was available followed by loads of bread (until that was rationed!) and a cup of tea. Every child was surrounded by his/her own personal weekly rations of butter (2oz ); margarine (2oz — the other 2oz was kept for cooking); a small jar of sugar and 1 lb. of jam which each month you could choose but whatever you chose, that was your lot, as I said earlier, for breakfast, supper and tea for the whole month. After trying all types of jam most of us found we got less sick of marmalade. Fortunately our strict Scottish upbringing before the war had got us used to having either butter on our bread or jam but never both at the same time. Every evening the children had to set the table and carry in trays of sugar, jam, etc. At the beginning of the month, of course, these trays were very heavy, too heavy for a ten year old, and one month I found the tray of twelve or so full jars more than I could manage and dropped it. Most of the jars smashed and little, if anything, could be retrieved. You can imagine how popular I was that month! One of the girls had an uncle in the merchant navy and very occasionally when he came on leave he would bring jars of lemon and orange curd and the occasional bar of chocolate.. The visits from him were for us a glimpse of heaven. On Saturday evenings we occasionally had bread and dripping: ie. the meat-flavoured fat (from the newly cooked roast, which we were not going to eat until the next day) which we spread on our bread. Although I do not think I could stomach it now, at the time we thought it was delicious. (Small households never had a enough ration books for a roast but with a large group like ours we were lucky enough to have one, although it was cooked the day before we ate it to make it go further.) Sometimes towards the end of the month when our rations had run out, the cook concocted a spread made out of parsnips and synthetic banana essence to spread on our bread. Bananas themselves were unobtainable. Later on, bread and tinned goods (when they became available probably after the war) were also rationed.

Everyone was issued with a ration book: buff coloured for adults, blue for school children and green for babies. The latter two groups were issued with extras considered essential to growth such as orange juice and milk for babies and schoolchildren who were given extra milk at school. To obtain their rations, people had to register with a local grocer and butcher who would then remove or stamp the necessary coupons when a purchase was made. The meat ration was not enough to last anything like a week and if you were just a small family you could forget about seeing a roast ever. Bigger institutions with more ration books available fared better. My mother tended to buy mince as that went further than anything else. After the war when rationing was still in force (until 1954) the ration for some items was even reduced. By that time I had we had acquired a dog and, nothing daunted, I remember once going in to the butcher’s and asking him if he could give me a bone for my dog.

'Bone for your dog!' he exclaimed without producing a hint of a bone, 'Bring him in here and I'll make him into sausages!'

People were allowed one egg each per week if available which they often were not. Dried egg powder became an occasional alternative when available, and those people with hens often tried to preserve their eggs with varying degrees of success. They used a preservative called ‘waterglass’ and the results were often unsuccessful. You knew immediately whether anyone had been trying to preserve their eggs by the aroma of sulphur which might accost you as you walked into a friend’s house. Many people who had even the smallest of gardens kept hens. Marguarite, a friend of my mother’s, kept three hens all of which had names, one of which was ‘Mrs O’, short for Olive, the lady who had given it to her. One day she invited my mother and myself round for supper. This was very unusual in days of rationing. Even more unusual was that a roast chicken appeared on the table to our delight and astonishment.

‘This is Mrs O’, announced Marguarite as she was about to carve. I was so upset I burst into tears and could not eat a mouthful. I had often stroked and chatted to Mrs O when we had been visiting.

For those who could not get home for their meals during the day ‘British Restaurants’ were set up in the towns. They were usually in a very basic temporary buildings with very basic ‘utility’ tables and chairs and, in my opinion, pretty disgusting food. We went once but never again. Gradually proper restaurants opened again after the war.

Any spare milk was turned into dried milk but this too, as far as I know, was not freely available. Fish was not rationed but was virtually unobtainable. Initially sweets were not rationed but were also unobtainable and could only be found on the Black Market which my parents refused to have anything to do with. I was very proud of myself when I found some ‘chocolate’ to share with my friends only to find they were chocolate laxatives! Once sweets became rationed the shops seemed to have a reasonable supply! Funnily enough I missed fruit more than sweets and I missed fruit lollies more than I missed ice cream. I remember the excitement when, some time after the war, our greengrocer announced that for the first time in years bananas had come in and children with blue ration books could have two each. Fortunately, I qualified. People were encouraged to grow their own vegetables, and fruit if they could, where at all possible. 'Dig for Victory' became a popular slogan. Even the smallest gardens were dug up and allotments in certain areas were made available. Young women who did not want to join the armed forces or become nurses, often chose to become 'land-girls' where they would work on farms, the regular workers having been called up into the Forces.

In May 1941 as I had outgrown all my summer clothes from the previous year, my mother and I went shopping. She bought me a few lengths of pretty cotton material to make some summer dresses. The next month clothes and textiles joined the ranks of the rationed. We had only just got in on time! However, that did not stop me growing in the following years! 'Make do and Mend' became the next slogan as people chopped up their own old clothes to make clothes for their children or make one 'new' dress for themselves out of two old ones. I often used to get my aunt‘s ‘hand-me-downs which I hated. In my eyes they were old-fashioned, adult and frumpy and my mother had not the time, and possibly not the skill, to chop them up and turn them into something wearable. In the end I put my foot down and flatly refused to wear them. It was a great thrill, therefore, when, after the war, some American dresses came into one of the stores in Princes Street in Edinburgh. Looking back they were nothing special but they were wonderful in my eyes as they were not in any way 'Make do and Mend.' The one I liked fitted like a glove which my mother, quite wisely, did not think was sensible so tried to persuade me to choose the other. (By that time I was about fifteen.) The sales assistant, however, was good at her job and pointed out that I had enough ration coupons for both - and that did it and my mother, bless her, bought both! I wore both dresses until they were almost threadbare and loved them! Clothing rationing continued, like many other items, until 1954. A friend whose golden wedding we attended recently recalled how difficult it had been for brides and bridesmaids at that time to save enough coupons for their outfits and also that there was not a great selection of materials. It is no wonder then that when things finally improved, women's fashions favoured long, ankle-length very full skirts made with masses of material - 'the New Look' as it was known in the ’fifties.

As well as the ‘Make Do and Mend’ and ‘Dig for Victory’ posters there were other more sinister ones like those admonishing us to be careful about what we said and not to say anything which might give useful information to the enemy. Two that I remember well were, ’Remember Walls Have Ears’ and ‘Careless talk Costs Lives’. The latter often depicted a couple of passengers on a bus having a good careless chat while Hitler and Goebels were sitting in the seat behind them listening intently. Although it was highly unlikely that I or my friends were in possession of any information which would be of any interest to the enemy, we found ourselves frequently looking over our shoulders to see who might be listening in to our conversations!

One day my mother and father were bubbling over with 'good news'. They had found an unfurnished flat which they had agreed to rent and had written off to the store in London where our furniture and all our precious belongings were stored to ask them to arrange the delivery of these things at the earliest possible opportunity. My mother could not contain her excitement and I went off with her to view what was to be our new home and talk about what would go where etc. This joy, however, was short-lived. The letter requesting the release of our goods crossed another in the post informing my parents that the store had received a direct hit during an air raid, and that, despite our belongings having been in the sub, sub-basement, the whole lot had been destroyed and that nothing remained. We had lost everything. It was a bitter blow.

Although our loss was nothing compared to that of those who had lost loved ones, or had been badly injured in the fighting or in the air raids or even that of those who had been ‘bombed out’ while still in their homes, it was still hard for my parents to come to terms with the fact that they had lost everything they possessed, especially items of sentimental value. Insurance did not cover war damage so there was no help there (although I think the government did give a little compensation after the war had ended).

Then we received news that my cousin, (my father’s sister’s son had been killed in action, aged 19). Things were difficult for the family and it was decided that the best thing for me was for me was to return to Edinburgh, ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ House and my old school which I did.

Later I discovered that my relatives in Rhodesia had tried to persuade my parents to send me out there instead of evacuating me to Scotland but Mum and Dad did not feel they could face sending me so far away and were also worried about ships being torpedoed. I must say I am very glad they did not evacuate me overseas. They felt vindicated in their decision when shortly after they had refused my relatives’ invitation, tragically a boatload of children were torpedoed on their way to Canada where they were being sent as evacuees.

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