One lovely sunny morning Mrs Freeth was hanging out of the studio window cleaning the glass and shaking her duster. The sirens had sounded some time before but nothing much had happened except some gun-fire. Suddenly the noise of planes burst on us and a plane came so low that its shadow could be seen on the sunny studio wall. ‘It’s a German! It’s a German!’ she shouted excitedly. ‘Look at the black crosses on it –’ But now the sound of machine-gun fire and the clatter of bullets was shattering the stillness. ‘Come in! Come in!’ I screamed. But she was as delighted as if she had seen a rainbow and leaned far out gazing up at the sky. I could not resist joining her. A car came swerving and skidding down the Royal Hospital Road and, pulling up with screeching brakes, came into the archway under the house.
‘There’s bullet marks all over his roof!’ cried Mrs Freeth. We heard the bell and went down. It was an army car driven by a corporal and its passenger was a very young captain. Richard told him to come inside and Mrs Freeth, without a word, fetched the brandy and gave him a glass. He was shaking and could not speak. Presently he asked us if it was often as noisy and dangerous in London. ‘Lord yes,’ replied Mrs Freeth, ‘we have it like this nearly every day!’ He was reassured when we said that it was the first time a plane had come so low over Chelsea. We told him about the raider being chased by a Spitfire over the King’s Road on September 14th, but this was the first time we had known the Royal Hospital Road to be machine-gunned. We heard afterwards that the plane had been brought down near Victoria and that the pilot, who had landed by parachute, had had a very rough time from the public. The army car had the marks of several bullets on it and the windscreen was shattered. The young captain was, he told us, stationed in a very quiet part of the country and had just been detailed on regular missions to London. No wonder he wanted to know if this was the usual state of affairs in the capital!
Chapter Fourteen
IT WAS at the height of one of these bad nights in October that Catherine telephoned that her baby was on the way, and that she wanted me to go to the hospital with her. The sirens had started wailing almost as soon as it was dark and there had been several appalling thuds and explosions. She said that an ambulance would be coming soon – could I hurry? I did hurry – all along Cheyne Walk there was activity – and it was only too obvious bombs had found Chelsea again. There were wardens blocking off streets, ambulances and fire engines were dashing round corners, and things kept falling with a clatter as I put my tin hat on while I ran.
Catherine was calm but her set face and compressed lips were enough. She was quite oblivious of the Blitz, as she always was – it might not have existed. All that agitated her was that she should reach the hospital in time. There were few hospitals in London now which could take maternity cases and Catherine was going to St Mary Abbot’s. I saw her into the ward and into bed – Sister didn’t think that she was yet ready for the Labour Room. While I was there several of the patients were asking to be put under the beds. The Sister allowed me to stay although I was not wearing uniform. She told me that I could come in and out as I liked in future provided that I wore Red Cross uniform. She was very kind and efficient and I felt that Catherine would be all right except for the growing intensity of the Blitz. I asked how the patients stood it. ‘They’re not too bad,’ Sister said, ‘sometimes we get one who panics – that’s dangerous – they all panic then. We have to be severe.’ Before I left she had put a card over Catherine’s bed. When she had gone Catherine looked at it and burst into tears. ‘Isn’t she sweet?’ she said, pointing to the name on the card. At first I couldn’t see what she meant. Her name was on it – that was all – then I saw that the prefix ‘Mrs’ had been inserted and it was this which had caused the tears. ‘The others won’t know,’ she said, crying again.
She was abnormally sensitive about being unmarried. I left when two nurses came to take her to the Labour Ward – her pains had started. She clung to me and cried – but silently and stoically. I knew that she would bite her lips until they bled but that no sound would come from her during her labour. Catherine was one of the bravest girls I had ever met. She had always been obliged to fend for herself and neither bombs nor guns had any fears for her. What she shrank from was the condemnation of her fellow-refugees, their smug references to marriage lines. Her British birth certificate had arrived and she was delighted with it. Her one thought was to join up with one of the Services – she was British and she wanted to fight for Britain. It was very late when I left St Mary Abbot’s. The Sister had promised that they would telephone me when the baby was born. Richard was away on a tour for the Ministry – Mrs Freeth was sleeping in the hall on a camp bed. She awoke to inquire anxiously after Catherine.
I was so tired that I fell asleep after counting twenty-three bombs. It was extraordinary how soundly I slept now that the Blitz was on. Before it had started I often found difficulty in getting to sleep – but now I was no sooner in bed than sleep came. I sometimes thought that should a bomb hit the house while I slept thus, I would know nothing and never wake up – and this was how many people died. I had seen them dug from the ruins, their faces peaceful as they lay in their night clothes. It was only horrible when they were laid on the pavement or in the street uncovered, with their faces turned up for all the world to gaze at while blankets were awaited to shield them from the curious.
We could always judge the intensity of the previous night’s raid by the time at which the milkman and the newspaper boy arrived. The post was surprisingly punctual no matter what had happened. The bread van which came from the King’s Road was also a comment on the previous night. The milkman as usual knew all about last night’s bombs. I knew that the Royal Hospital had had three UXBs because Suzanne had telephoned me. She also told me that St Mary’s Church in Cadogan Street, where the refugees mostly worshipped, had been hit. The milkman was rattling off a string of streets, Lower Sloane Street, Lacland Place, Riley Street, and St Stephen’s Hospital had all been hit. There were UXBs all over the place – Sydney Street, Tetcott Road, and Shadburn Street – and it was a job to find a way anywhere, so many streets were barricaded off. He had just started telling us about the pub, the Six Bells in the King’s Road, being hit when the baker, who had arrived and was listening, cut in with, ‘That was the night before last.’ ‘Excuse me,’ said the milkman politely, ‘but it went last night – it was all right yesterday when I went by on me rounds.’ ‘It was the night before last,’ insisted the baker. ‘Our bakery is only a few houses down – don’t you think we heard the bloody bomb in the bakery?’
They would not leave it alone and became very heated. I knew that the baker was right from the Control Room – the Six Bells had been hit by an HE two nights ago, but it was impossible to get a word in, they were shouting so angrily at one another – all about a bomb. It was extraordinary how heated people became about times and dates of bombs. It had been another bad night – that was certain. In the middle of this violent argument the telephone rang. It was the hospital. Catherine had a daughter. She was fairly well – they were not too satisfied. I could come and see her if I wished. I was thankful for the news that she was safe – I had heard from Control that Kensington had had a very bad night and the milkman said that the hospital had been hit. Mrs Freeth was terribly upset until the baker assured her that the milkman was a ghoul who liked to exaggerate every incident and add on a few of his own. But he had been right about the hospital.
When I got there I found Catherine in a different ward. The one she had been in had been damaged. She had only just been brought back from the Labour Ward after the baby was born when the bomb had fallen. She had been placed under the bed as so much glass and plaster was flying about. She was quite conscious for they had not given her an anaesthetic – but she was terribly exhausted. She had not cared when she heard the bomb fall and the explosion which followed. There had been a lot of mess and dirt; the nurses were tired and the patients seemed tense and strained. I did not like the look of Catherine – o
r her apathetic attitude towards the baby. ‘She doesn’t want to look at it – she isn’t interested,’ said the Sister. I thought she was too ill to care – and I told Sister a little of what she had been through. ‘She had a pretty awful time last night,’ she said. ‘The bomb fell just as she was being brought back after the birth.’
I was shown the baby – she was exquisitely pretty. Most new-born infants are only beautiful to the mother, but Catherine’s baby was lovely – like a curled-up rose. ‘She is lovely,’ I said enthusiastically as I held her close to Catherine. ‘I should love one like her – she’s adorable.’
‘You can have her,’ said Catherine tersely, turning her face away from the child.
In the evening when I returned again she was feverish, with brilliant eyes and flushed cheeks. She was still refusing to nurse or even touch the child. I thought she was ill. She had some fever, they admitted. Her hands were dry and burning hot as she clutched mine and she seemed slightly delirious in her talk. I could not stay longer as I was on duty and had a number of refugees to attend to. I promised to return the following evening and bring her several things which she wanted.
Next evening she had puerperal fever and was being moved to an isolation hospital.
I do not enjoy riding in ambulances. They have a curiously shut-in air as if they are a cage. I cannot imagine why they have to be so completely devoid of windows. It was unpleasant to feel that I could not see what was going on – to ride in darkness through the noisy violent night was quite terrifying because it was obvious that Catherine was alarmingly ill. She was wildly delirious, calling for her fiancé – not lovingly as if she needed him, but reviling him for what she had suffered. It was horrible, because in consciousness not one word of complaint had passed her lips. She had accepted her lot and indeed said bluntly that she had played her part in it – that she had not been seduced but had been as willing as her fiancé. It was this engaging frankness which I liked so much in her. It would have been easy for her to have played the part of the innocent maiden seduced against her will, for she had been only eighteen when it had happened, but no, she insisted, she knew quite well what she was doing – what she did not know was that there would be any difficulty in getting married, that the Germans were going to invade Belgium.
I thought about this now as I drove with her, wrapped in blankets in the ambulance through the black noisy night, right across London, with her baby in my arms. When we drew up at the fever hospital and were directed through a garden to an annexe I saw with dismay that it was only a one-story building like an army hut – and offered little protection from the bombing. But we were there – and Catherine was unloaded and the stretcher taken in. She would not let go of my hands and I had to unclasp her fingers when the nurses came to take her. And now she cried out in despair – she was quite oblivious to what was going on. She was living in some terrible world in which she felt only the need to cling hard to someone she knew. I had been nursing the baby all the way and it was with reluctance that I handed over the tiny bundle of life to the nurses, who exclaimed with delight at it.
For the next two weeks Catherine was desperately ill and I spent my time between the FAP and her bedside, neglecting the other refugees except for their English lesson. They resented it, and remarks about the wages of sin being death were frequent – as were comments on the doubtful moral attitude of the British. Suzanne was amused by this and told me about Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Snow White was a French woman who had taken into her home seven ARP wardens whom she called Les Arpes – hence her nickname. She had justified their being there by saying that she helped their morale by her comforts – whether or not she helped their morals, as Suzanne laughingly said, was another matter. Another pretty French refugee had such an admiration for the RAF who looked after Blossom, the balloon in Burton Court, that nothing seemed able to prevent her climbing through the barbed wire to offer her comforts, as she called her personal charms, to the heroes. Complaints were made to Suzanne about this. It was difficult to deal with, but her delightful sense of humour combined with her own Gallic common sense made Suzanne’s approach to such a problem a marvel of diplomacy. Whenever I had any such worries I invariably confided them to her.
One evening, at the end of a week, I thought that Catherine recognized me again. She was paler and quieter. ‘Am I dying?’ she asked me. ‘Of course not, you’re getting better,’ I said. ‘I don’t care one way or the other,’ she said. ‘If I die will you take the baby – she is to be named after you anyway. The priest was here last night – but I was too tired to talk to him – he said the baby must be baptized and that I should make my confession – but I didn’t want to – and Sister sent him away.’
‘Don’t think about anything but getting better,’ I told her.
But the Blitz was so bad that evening that I began to wonder if any of us would be alive in the morning. The patients were terrified, and Sister, fearing a panic, was entertaining them. She and two nurses, with bed-pans on their heads and gas-masks on their faces, marched up and down the ward pretending to be air raid wardens. Sister was a little shrimp of a woman but she had the courage of a lioness and in a few minutes she had the panic averted and the patients all laughing. ‘Come and do a turn while we take a breather,’ she begged me. A huge bomb shook the building and some glass clattered down. ‘Come on,’ called Sister entreatingly. ‘All I can do are cartwheels – and Russian dancing,’ I said, and tucking up my Red Cross dress into my belt I took the floor and did cartwheels round the ward while Sister and the two nurses provided the music by singing and banging on the bed-pans. Hearing the patients laughing heartily was lovely, and when doing cartwheels it is quite impossible to think of anything else. When the applause had died down the planes had passed over and were giving some other part of London their attention. ‘You’d better go while it’s quieter,’ whispered Sister. I looked at Catherine – she was asleep. She looked like a small tired girl with her hair in two pigtails. The baby was asleep in a cot at the foot of the bed.
I went back by the Underground. At each station the platforms were massed with sleepers – just like the men at Dover after Dunkirk. I had to change at Piccadilly – there was a narrow piece of platform for the passengers marked with white lines. The stench was frightful, urine and excrement mixed with strong carbolic, sweat, and dirty, unwashed humanity. I spoke to the nurses on duty there and admired their stamina. I don’t think I could have stuck out even one long night in that atmosphere. But they, fresh and trim, alert and calm, were there attending to the many aches and pains of that mass of humanity. We hated being sent as shelter nurses from the FAP and the smaller shelters in our district were not to be compared in stench and discomfort with the Underground ones. These girls did it regularly; they were heroines indeed.
Returning one night from one of these visits to Catherine, when she was still desperately ill, I took a short cut through a side street from the hospital. There was no transport and walking was the only way of getting back to Chelsea. There was the usual raid on, and it had been very noisy, but now it was quieter and only occasional bursts of gun-fire shook the silence of the streets. Passing a gap in a terrace I saw a little group of people bending over what seemed to be a hole in what had been the basement of a house but which now appeared to be filled in with debris. A car stood in the road with the notice ‘doctor’ on it. It was dark, but I could see that there were three men bending over the hole and one woman. The woman wore nurse’s uniform.
As I hurried by she turned, said something to the others, then called to me, ‘Nurse!’ I went over. The man bending over the hole straightened up, but I could not look at him because of the appalling sound coming from the hole. Someone was in mortal anguish down there. The woman in nurse’s uniform, who was tall and very largely built, said sharply to me, ‘What are your hip measurements?’ I said, above the horrible moaning from the hole, ‘Thirty-four inches.’ One of the men took a piece of stick and measured it across my shoulders, then
across my hips, and then put it across the hole. ‘Easy – an inch to spare each side,’ he said.
‘Will you let us lower you down there to help that man trapped and in great pain?’ he asked. ‘We’re all too large for the hole – and we daren’t widen it until the Heavy Rescue Squad come to shore it all up.’
‘What must I do?’ I asked fearfully, for I was tired already, and the black hole was not inviting.
‘Just do as you’re told, that’s all,’ said the large nurse. ‘All right,’ I agreed.
‘Take off your coat,’ said the doctor. I took it off. ‘And your dress,’ he said. ‘It’s too dangerous – the folds may catch in the debris and bring the whole thing down – better without it.’ I took off the dress. ‘Fine,’ he said shortly when I stood in the ‘black-outs’, as we called the closed black panties which most of us wore with uniform. ‘It’ll have to be head first. We’ll hold your thighs. Go down first with this torch and see if it’s possible to give a morphia injection or not – I doubt it. Ready?’ ‘Yes,’ I said faintly for I was terrified. ‘Better hold the torch in your mouth, and keep your arms tight to your sides,’ he said. ‘Can you grip the torch with your teeth?’ I nodded – it was as if I was having a nightmare from which I would soon waken. ‘Ready?’ Two wardens gripped me by the thighs, swung me up and lowered me down over the hole. ‘Keep your body absolutely rigid,’ said the doctor. ‘Don’t be afraid – we’ll hold you safe,’ said the large woman. ‘I ought to be doing this – but I’m too big.’
The sound coming from the hole was unnerving me – it was like an animal in a trap. I had once heard a long screaming like rabbits in traps from children with meningitis in India, but this was worse – almost inhuman in its agony. The torch showed me that the debris lay over both arms and that the chest of the man trapped there was crushed into a bloody mess – great beams lay across the lower part of his body – and his face was so injured that it was difficult to distinguish the mouth from the rest of it – it all seemed one great gaping red mess.
A Chelsea Concerto Page 16