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This story was gathered, written and submitted to the ��ѿ��ý peoples War project by June Martin

7 GARDEN VEGETABLES AND ALLOTMENTS
A further way to supplement a family’s rations was to grow your own vegetables. My father grew beans and peas, onions and lettuce and brussel sprouts. Carrots were never successful as our district was plagued with the “carrot fly”. Other families, with smaller or no gardens, could apply for “plots” to grow their own produce. Many of these were allocated at Stormont, in the grounds of the Parliament Buildings, where I spent many a Saturday afternoon on my little school friend’s plot hunting for ladybirds in the tall grass! I thought it was quite normal for our front garden to be given over to potato plots and one of my favourite meals, all home produced, was mashed potatoes mixed with beaten egg and salt. Our front garden was fenced off with a wooden fence but in the early war years the iron gates had been removed to “help the war effort”, i.e. presumably to be melted down. At least my mother did not have to surrender her gold wedding ring as I later learnt many German married women were obliged to do!

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