ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½

When war was declared on September 3rd 1939, I was a nineteen year old girl living at home with my parents and two older brothers. The house was a 1930s 3 bedroomed semi-detached, in a row of similar houses. We had a garage cum workshop, a back garden and a small front garden, but no driveway to the garage, so only my brother's motorbike could get to it. We did not have a car, washing machine, telephone or fridge. My mother washed clothes and bedding in a hot tub and used a mangle to take the excess water out. The mode of travel was by public transport or on my brother's motorbike, or walking. Contact with friends and relatives was by post. The house was situated on land bordering an old quarry, about three miles from Bolton town centre. My parents had recently sold their business- a shop and a small row of houses which were let and my mother worked in a mill before the war. I worked for a firm making ladies and children's underwear.

At first, nothing happened except all the young men in the Territorial Forces were called for active service. I became a member of the Red Cross attending lectures on first aid and demonstrations of mock air raids. After about 6 months all homes, where possible, were supplied with steel Anderson shelters. My father dug a large hole at the bottom of the garden and erected the shelter, then covered it with soil. A deeper hole was dug in one corner of the shelter to collect drainage water. It had a door, a couple of bunks and a chair. It was always damp and cold and was used only when absolutely necessary, and was vacated immediately the 'all clear' siren sounded. I went into the shelter only once- that was when bombing started over Manchester about 12 miles away and came to Bolton as well. In Bolton, [my home town], we had only a few air raids and little damage.

All homes had to have blackout curtains and the smallest light or even a lit cigarette attracted an Air Raid Warden. At this stage, food was not rationed or in short supply. The younger of my two brothers was conscripted into the RAF as ground crew. My oldest brother was an engineer on maintenance at a Power Station and so was in a reserved occupation.

In 1940, I was working at the underwear manufacturer and was also working part time as a Red Cross Nurse at Bolton Royal Infirmary. Later, in 1941, I was accepted as a probationer nurse for a 3 year training. The hospital was an old Victorian building with large wards. The windows of the ground floor wards were bricked up and all other windows covered all over with sticky tape to prevent flying glass. The hospital had our ration books and I lived in the Nurses ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ [affectionately known as '41'] and was provided with food and my uniform. For off-duty entertainment all staff were invited to the local NAAFI.

Three wards of Bolton Royal were used for military wounded: two wards of British wounded and one of German wounded. During an air raid warning, all walking patients went down into the cellars- all others especially in first floor wards had mattresses under the beds and it was quite an upheaval at 1:00 am to transfer all patients to a safer place. I worked on German and British occupied wards. In the beginning we had guards at the ward entrance for the Germans- but these patients were so well cared for that no one ever attempted to get out, so the guards soon disappeared.

At times, we had to prepare German patients for repatriation. Many patients did not want to leave to go back to Germany. We had lots of fun with the British wounded men- mostly were gun shot injuries and lacerations; some were malaria; they were all army patients.

The German ward was a mixture of army and air force, most were friendly and grateful for their care, but just a few were arrogant Nazis who played German marching music all day long on a record player. We had a lonely Russian soldier in with the Germans, how he was with them we never knew- he spoke no German and no one spoke Russian. We had a lady visitor who spoke Russian and she visited very often.

Our occupational therapists came to the wards and all were encouraged to make leather goods or draw or basket weave. Our Russian patient made me a pair of gloves.

We heard rumours of concentration camps, but the German refused to believe them, I think they knew nothing of such places as Belsen. It was a much happier ward for the British Army and they were free to go out anywhere they pleased.

At one of the NAAFI concerts I met an RAF fellow who invited me to his home in Elstree. During the week on leave in London, all was very quiet, it was early 1943 and a lull between the fire bombing and the V2 rockets. I was amazed to see Londoners settling down for the night in bunks on the platforms of underground stations. Men, women and children down every night. I saw very little of the blitz; my hospital never received any casualties from bombing raids because there were very few injuries in Bolton. Manchester was really bad- we used to watch the night sky lit up from the bombs.

The food in hospital was just adequate but we probably fared better than my mother and father who were both working in a munitions factory. When off duty [which wasn't very much] I would enjoy dancing with friends at the local Palais-de-dance.

All through the war since 1941 I was studying for my state registration as a nurse, and gained this in 1945 just before VE day.

After VE day, a few of the forces were returning home and there at the Palais I met a soldier home on sick leave. John Hayward had joined the war effort as an engineer; travelling to his job in the oilfield at Abadan meant going through Cairo, and General Wavell was there looking for qualified engineers so John joined up. He served first in North Africa. From there he was moved to Greece and was captured in Crete in 1941; the prisoners were marched through Greece to arrive eventually in Eichstatt where he remained a POW until the end of the War. He had been wounded by American planes; his camp were being moved further into Germany from Eichstatt when the American planes strafed them and so he was brought home wounded. Once better he was stationed at a REME depot in Preston.

On VJ day in September 1945, John Hayward,my now soldier fiancee, came to a huge bonfire celebration at my hospital- just outside the children's ward. No fireworks then!

I married John on June 1st 1946. I had no clothing coupons for a wedding dress, so a friendly tailor used Army clothing coupons and made me a suit for my wedding. Food and clothes were rationed for another few years. It made catering for my wedding very difficult.

I did not realise how difficult it had been for food, clothing and furniture during the war as my food [poor though it was] was provided by the hospital. I know I fared better than my parents.

Long after the war, I wrote to Frank Evans and his wife Marion, in Melbourne, Australia. Frank was a manager in Myers stores in Melbourne, but had met John in the POW camp and we exchanged letters until Frank died.

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.