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“This story was submitted to the People’s War site by volunteer Anita M. Howard (nee Sackett) from Essex Action Desk CSV on behalf of herself as A.M.Sackett and has been added to the site with her permission. She fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

Bananas were difficult to get during the war as they were imported from abroad and when they did get into the greengrocer’s there was always a long queue for them. Also if you lived in the Midlands as I did as a child, bananas rarely reached those parts as the towns nearest the ports had them before us.

Some years ago I was asked to write a poem about the taste of bananas for a children’s anthology about “taste.�
I remembered queuing up for bananas but found it difficult to describe how they tasted but I wrote the memory of the “queuing up.�

BANANA QUEUE

She called over the fence,
“Tell yer mum, bananas is in
round the corner.
Om jist going afore they’re orl gorn.�
Then off she strode in her felt hat
And brogues.

Bananas were rare
and mum longed for one
but she was at the factory
and Gran was out.

Alone, at home I brooded,
Then crept upstairs
Hand hovering over
the dinner money box.
Heart thumping
I took a shilling
Rushed to the shop
And joined the queue
Of stern faced women.

I arrived home
Triumphant, with my trophy.
Mum greeted me, wide smiled.
Can’t remember the taste
Though we had them for tea,
And she wasn’t cross about the money.

Anita Marie Sackett 2005

I told this story to my Auntie Dolly, my mum’s best friend, many years later and she told me the next story about bananas in her broad Northamptonshire accent.
She had a cousin in Ipswich near the docks and often returned home with some.

AUNT DOLLY’S BANANAS!

Bananas, gal,
You coon’t get ‘em
For love nor money.
Ever so rare they wur
Roun air way
During the war

But at me cousin’s
Near the docks
There they wur
‘Undreds of ‘em.
Large as life.
You coda knocked me down.
They ullwas got ‘em
When the ships cum in.

W’all you shooda seen me ,gal,
Carried as many as I cood.
Wern’t arf popular
When I got ‘ome
I can tell yer!

Anita Marie Sackett 2005

Aunt Dolly is well over 90 now and is no way “bananas.�

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