In the early days of immigration from Ireland in the second half of the nineteenth century, the newcomers to England often made a poor impression and were disliked, even despised. Signs like ‘No Irish, No Dogs’ were common in boardinghouses. The Irish immigrants were likely to be very poor, lonely and ill-fed, and only wanted the chance to work and lead better lives, but the depth of their poverty and deprivation frequently degraded them and it is true that many sought an escape in the public houses. There developed a widespread view, reflected in the newspapers and periodicals of the time, that the Irish were noisy, dissolute and prone to drunkenness. But there were many who didn’t fit this stereotype. My fore-bears who settled in Sheffield were far from undernourished, destitute or uneducated. They had a small amount of money and were proud, ambitious and determined folk who worked hard and settled well into their new life, eventually buying a small terraced house in Attercliffe, on the outskirts of Sheffield.
Attercliffe was a heavily populated part of the city, with row upon row of back-to-back, redbrick terraced housing with front doors leading out directly into the street, small, square back yards and outside privies. The landscape was devoid of trees and empty of colour but the houses appeared well kept, with white doorsteps and clean windows. This was where my grandmother was brought up.
My maternal great-grandparents, with help from their parents, had managed to save up to buy a passage to England and buy the modest terrace, determined to start a new life away from the devastation of a famished Ireland. Many Irish emigrants settled in Liverpool and Lancashire, but the Touhys moved further east and joined a small expatriate Irish community in Sheffield, centred on the recently built Catholic church of St Charles. It was clear that they both had a firmness of purpose and a driving ambition. Great-grandfather, a clever man who was largely self-taught and a tall, good-looking figure to boot, secured a job in the Sheffield Police Force, becoming P. C. E56 and rising to the rank of sergeant. His wife remained at home to bring up the five children.
Great-grandmother would make sure the windows and sills blackened by the grime of the industrial valley were wiped clean every morning and the front step was whiter than white when she had finished with the white chalk ‘donkey stone’. She prided herself on keeping the smartest house in the street. Washing was done on Monday. All dirty clothes were washed in a large metal tub in the back yard, Great-grandmother using what she called a ‘poncher’ – a long, wooden-handled gadget with a perforated copper dome on the end. Washing would then go through the hand-operated mangle and be hung across the street on a long clothes-line. It couldn’t be left out for too long otherwise it would be flecked with soot.
Once a week the large tin bathtub, kept upturned in the back yard, was brought into the house, placed before the fire and filled with warm water. The children, behind a makeshift curtain, would be bathed before the adults, scrubbed with brush and flannel impregnated with pink carbolic soap until their skin was red. The youngest would be first in, then the rest of the children, and finally, topped up with hot water boiled in a large copper kettle, it was Great-grandfather’s turn. He would be allowed to soak.
Mrs Touhy was a fiercely proud woman who kept her children and herself clean, neat and tidy. She took such pride in the family’s appearance that neighbours sometimes referred to her as ‘the Duchess’ and thought she considered herself a cut above them. They were a little wary of her husband because he was a policeman, but they were not too proud to call him out to settle a domestic dispute or have a quiet word with some of the local ‘hobbledehoys’ who made themselves nuisances.
One story my grandmother was fond of telling was when her father, on duty on Fitzwilliam Street in Sheffield, called into a grocer’s shop to buy some eggs, which he placed for safe keeping in a paper bag underneath his helmet. He was then called to an altercation between a man and a woman who were causing a disturbance. He arrived to find the woman shrieking and her aggressor shaking her violently. When cautioned by P. C. Touhy, the man refused to give his name and ran off. My great-grandfather gave chase but slipped at the street corner and, falling to the ground, banged his head and helmet, cracking the eggs in the process. The woman stopped her wailing and promptly fainted, thinking that the slimy egg whites and bright yellow yolks dribbling down from underneath the policeman’s helmet were his brains.
On another occasion he was called to help a drunken man who, having dropped his watch chain down a drain, had tried to recover it and in the process got himself wedged. Reaching down into the drain, the man lost his grip and slipped. When P. C. Touhy arrived he found a crowd of curious onlookers surrounding a pair of legs which were pointing heavenwards. He heaved and tugged and finally extricated the injured man, removing his trousers in the process. Rather than thanking him, the man pulled up his trousers angrily and demanded to know what my great-grandfather was intending to do about the lost watch and chain.
My grandmother, Anne, the youngest of the four sisters, was a bright, lively child by all accounts, excelling in English at school and leaving to train as a secretary. A picture of her shows a tall, immaculately dressed woman, straight-backed and stern, with dark Irish eyes. She met John Mullarkey, a young apprentice engineer at the local steelworks, fell in love and was soon married at St Charles’s Roman Catholic Church, Attercliffe, on 4 August 1900. They set up home in Clough Street in Rotherham, where they started a family. The eldest child was Nora, born 1903, then came my mother, Margaret Patricia (Pat), born on St Patrick’s Day, 1908, then James (Jimmy), born 1912, and last of all Mary Winifred, born at the outbreak of the First World War. Another child, Lawrence, died at the age of four. Mary was always known as Winnie – she was the ‘apple of her mother’s eye’ and used to sit on the front step, a little princess in her white dress with her doll on her lap. Passers-by would comment on what a beautiful child she was. On one occasion a well-dressed woman offered to adopt her. My cousin Jane lent me a picture of her mother as a child, and Winnie was indeed unusually pretty with her great curls, dark eyes and pale skin.
Mary Winifred won a scholarship to Notre Dame High School in Sheffield. The uniform had to be purchased from the designated school outfitters near the school on Cavendish Street but my grandmother, being thrifty and with little money to spare, had the uniform made. When her youngest daughter came home from school that first week to tell her a nun had rounded on her in front of the other girls for not wearing the specified uniform, my grandmother paid Notre Dame a visit and told this particular nun in no uncertain terms that should she humiliate her daughter like that again in front of others she would do the same to her. She also reminded her of her vocation and that she was very fortunate to teach such a bright child.
The Mullarkey family was by no means well-off, but my grandmother managed the small amount of money meticulously. She would shop judiciously and was always on the look-out for a bargain. Once, my grandmother told me she recalled visiting the fish counter at Sheffield Market. Looking elegant in her Sunday best, she asked for any fish heads going free, which she would use to make the most delicious soup. ‘For the cat,’ she told the fishmonger.
‘We haven’t got a cat,’ my mother piped up with all the honesty of a young child.
‘Yes, we have,’ said Grandma, giving her a knowing look.
‘No, we haven’t,’ persisted my mother. Then she announced proudly to all in earshot that her mother boiled up the fish heads in a big pot over the fire for their tea.
Alma Road was the local school, but being from a Roman Catholic family the little Mullarkeys trekked across town to Masborough to attend St Bede’s School, a dark, stone structure next to the church. Originally built in the late nineteenth century to meet the educational needs of R.C. children of all ages, it looked more like a prison or a workhouse than a school, with its blackened walls, greasy grey slate roof, small square windows and enveloping black wrought-iron fence.
Life for the small close-knit Catholic community in Rotherham centred on St Bede’s Church, the
school and the Catholic Club, and was dominated by the priest. The priest’s word was law, and he was held in reverential respect, mixed with fear and wonder. Should any one of his flock miss Mass or leave Confession for too long he would be round asking why, and should a child not be at school it would be noted and mentioned to the parents after Mass.
John Mullarkey, my maternal grandfather, whom sadly I never knew, was by all accounts a practical, industrious and ambitious man and worked hard to become a valued engineer at the great steelworks of Steel, Peach & Tozer in the Don Valley. I have a sepia photograph of him sitting proudly in a Windsor chair, staring at the camera with piercing eyes. He looks imposing with his large beard and high cheekbones, in a dark suit and a white shirt with starched collar. Soon he was ‘on better money’ and was able to move his growing family to a larger house with a garden on Gilberthorpe Street. The Mullarkeys were on their way up in the world.
My grandfather’s brother, Patrick Mullarkey, who settled in the north-east of England, fought in the First World War. Something rarely quoted is that more Irishmen died in British uniform during the first two days of the Somme offensive than took part in the Easter Rising. Neither Irish Nationalist nor Ulster Unionist politicians are keen, I guess, on broadcasting this fact, but it is true nevertheless. In 1914 the Irish Volunteers enlisted almost en masse to fight for Great Britain, and Great-uncle Patrick joined up along with 140,000 other Irishmen, from the north and south of the island, to fight for the country in which he had come to live. A sergeant in the Tyneside (Irish) Battalion, he survived the war and went on to work in the shipyard. The only surviving picture of Patrick is on a small crumpled photograph showing a group of laughing young soldiers sitting among their kitbags. How I wish that they could reveal their chatter and lively humour. How I wish I knew more about him.
Such was John Mullarkey’s skill and expertise as an engineer that he was promoted at the steelworks and sent to India to supervise the installation of blast furnaces, taking his son Jimmy with him. Jimmy’s daughter, my cousin Monica, told the story (I can’t vouch for the veracity, for she was a great storyteller, as indeed were all the Mullarkeys) that my grandfather caused a riot soon after he arrived there. The building of the blast furnaces was held up by a passive demonstration against British rule. A thin, bald, insignificant-looking Indian wearing thick round glasses sat in silent protest, blocking the path of the workers to the steel foundry. My grandfather, a large and muscular man, was having none of this and when the small protester refused to move he carried him to the river and threw him in. The man was Gandhi. The troops were called out and mayhem ensued. Shortly afterwards my grandfather returned to England. None of the family spoke about what had happened, but I have a sneaking feeling he had a bit of a temper and enjoyed his Jameson’s whisky a little too much. Most disappointed about his unexpected return was his eldest child, my Aunt Nora, who was all packed and ready to join him.
Aunt Nora and my mother trained as nurses. In the 1920s many of the trainees were Irish or of Irish extraction. Both my mother and my aunt had a natural aptitude for study and soon qualified as state registered nurses, with high marks in their examinations. Nora was quite a beauty and had a succession of eligible beaux. At the time when she was Sister-in-Charge of the Casualty Department at Doncaster Royal Infirmary she was walking out with a doctor, much to the delight of my grandmother, who had very high hopes for her children. She brought them up to believe that they were special and could achieve anything. My mother used to repeat Grandma’s words: ‘Aim for the moon and you might just go through the roof and reach the stars.’
I can picture Aunt Nora now, with her pale, penetrating blue eyes and affable smile. She could be charming, witty and entertaining but, like her two sisters, she had the sharp Mullarkey tongue and did not suffer fools gladly. She disliked in particular people who pretended to be something they were not. She was also fiercely defensive of those in her family, as I was soon to find out.
One Friday (I was about ten or eleven at the time) my mother kept me off school. I had been sick that morning and she said I could stay in and read my book. My father was on the night shift, so he was at home and could look after me. By lunchtime I was feeling much better and my father, thinking a bit of fresh air might do me good, asked me to go on an errand to the butcher’s shop on Wellgate and fetch a couple of pounds of pork sausages for tea.
I was on my way back home, my mouth full of sweets and the sausages wrapped in greaseproof paper tucked under my arm, when a football bounced across Wellgate Road and landed in front of me.
‘Chuck us t’ball back!’ came a shout from behind the black iron railings that surrounded the playground of Wellgate Junior School. I picked up the ball, crossed the road and was about to throw it over the railings when an angry man bellowed at me from the school entrance.
‘You, boy! Get in here!’
‘Me?’
‘Yes, you! Get in here now.’
Clutching the sausages in one hand and holding the football on the other, I approached the scowling figure. He reminded me of Mr Punch with his sharp chin and long beak of a nose.
‘How many times do I have to tell you boys?’ he asked. ‘What?’ I asked.
‘What? What?’ he repeated angrily. ‘What what?’
‘What?’
‘What, sir, that’s what! And empty your mouth. When you speak to a teacher you say “sir”. I have told you boys time and time again not to kick footballs near the road or go outside the school playground at breaks.’ His gullet rose and fell like a frog’s. ‘Now get into school.’
‘But …’ I started, trying to tell him that I was not a pupil at this school, but he raised a hand like a traffic policeman.
‘No buts. Into school.’ He pushed me towards the entrance and I was carried along with a group of boys and girls my age as they crowded through a door. I ended up in a tall-ceilinged classroom with high windows, standing at the front with forty pairs of eyes trained upon me.
‘Are you the new boy?’ demanded the teacher.
‘No,’ I replied.
‘No, what?’
‘No, I’m not.’
‘No, sir! And what have you there?’ he asked, stabbing a bony finger at the package which I held.
‘Sausages,’ I told him.
There was a ripple of laughter from the class.
‘Sausages!’ he roared.
‘For my dad’s tea.’
He thrust his face into mine. ‘You are an insolent and disobedient boy,’ he said, ‘and you will soon learn that I do not like insolent and disobedient boys. Any more out of you and I shall cane you.’
There was no way this man was going to cane me, I thought, and could feel anger rising inside. ‘I don’t go to this school,’ I blurted out. ‘I go to Broom Valley Juniors. I’m off because I’m sick. I was on my way home with my dad’s sausages and I was only trying to return a football. Now I’m going home.’ I then headed for the door. Then as a final riposte, I added, ‘And you are not my teacher.’
When I related the story (suitably embellished of course) to Auntie Nora she told me the man had no business detaining me and she would be ‘having a word’ with this particular teacher when she visited the school the following week to undertake the inspection for head lice. I should have loved to have been a fly on the wall when she made her visit.
Auntie Winnie was a bright and lively child and followed in her father’s footsteps to work at Steel, Peach & Tozer as a comptometer operator. Jimmy, athletic, good-looking, always an adventurer and a charmer, joined the Irish Guards. The family was flourishing, and then tragedy struck. Grandfather Mullarkey succumbed to a disease which he had probably contracted in India, and died a relatively young man, having seen only two of his seven grandchildren – my sister Christine and my cousin Audrey.
When Grandfather Mullarkey died, my grandmother, Anne, went to live with my Aunt Nora and her husband, my Uncle Ted. This seemed the best solution, since Auntie Nora and Uncle Ted
had no children and owned a spacious house on the outskirts of Rotherham overlooking Herringthorpe Playing Fields. I would visit most Sundays, to find this formidable, striking-looking woman sitting in the front room at Number 38 Wickersley Road in her wing-backed armchair, watching the passers-by, listening to the wireless or reading a book. She was the archetypal matriarch, ensconced in her chair as if on a throne, presiding over the comings and goings of daughters and sons, grandchildren and cousins, friends and neighbours. On a small table she would have a large china cup and saucer, which I was deputed regularly to top up with good strong tea. If it was not ‘strong enough to trot a mouse across it’, and was ‘as weak as dishwater’, I would be told in no uncertain terms. If I left the spoon in the cup she would comment, ‘That’s how Lord Nelson lost his eye.’
I still recall her, in a dark woollen dress and thick brown stockings, with a cardigan draped over her shoulders and a red scarf around her neck fastened at the throat with my grandfather’s silver tie-pin. She looked rather fearsome at first sight, but when she saw me her eyes lit up and she became this warm smiling figure who treated me with infinite patience and a sort of amused tolerance. From her Irish parents she had inherited a natural charm, a sharp wit, an absence of pomposity and an innate generosity. She clearly enjoyed the visits of her grandchildren and I, being the youngest, always felt she had a soft spot for me. I loved her company, for she was a great storyteller with a dry sense of humour combined with the graceful knack of being a very good listener.
9
My grandmother spoke a great deal about my grandfather but rarely about her own parents, except one Sunday when she told me how lucky they had been to escape the terrible famine in Ireland. Thousands died when the potato blight devastated crop after crop; many others emigrated to America and Australia and some came to England looking for a better life. Perhaps she felt some shame that her parents had survived the terrible suffering and distress through their flourishing trade in making coffins for the poor victims. Her parents had taken quite a risk, she told me, leaving everything behind, but then she added, ‘If you don’t take some risks in your life, you never get anywhere.’
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