Beyond The Sea

by Jack Lynch

  The sound of the Banshee was one of the sounds of those days but another sound which rang in my ears was the snarling and screeching of wild cats. Out the back of our house there was a sheer cliff that reached up to Harbour View. Various bushes and wild shrubs grew on it and wild cats used to breed there. These cats often wandered to our back door and mammy fed them. She was the only person who could get close to them. They trusted her. It was terrible listening to the tomcats fighting during the mating seasons. Sometimes, it sounded like babies crying. I could hear them out on the shed fighting, and making a terrible racket. At that time, as a young boy, I did not know what mating was, though I knew the sounds of it upset me. One evening I was eating at the kitchen table when I felt something brush against my leg. I looked down and there was a big tomcat doing what came naturally with another cat. Being ignorant of the ‘facts of life’ I kicked the tom. There was an almighty screech and I thought the tom was going to have a go at me. His back arched, hairs stood up on his neck, and his eyes glared. Fortunately, help was on hand and mammy shooed the cats out to the back. Though mammy fed the cats and seemed to like them they were still wild and troublesome to the rest of us. My brother Anthony had a canary for a while, until it was silly enough to get out of its cage and one of the cats had it for lunch.

  One evening, while we were eating at tea-time, daddy looked out the back, and let a mighty shout out of him. The bushes and cliff were on fire. Somebody in Harbour View had set fire to the bushes. We had a good idea who did it, but it was forty years later, while I was home in Cobh on holidays, that a man came up to me and said that he used to live in Harbour View. Despite the forty years time lapse, I immediately recognised him. He admitted that he had set fire to the bushes. We had a good laugh, when I told him of the efforts which were made to control the fire. Guard Donovan had been living close by and he came down to assist my dad in controlling the fire. All they had were a bucket, a small bore hose and very little water pressure. I could have piddled higher than the water from the hose. I don’t remember a fire engine coming, but people in Harbour View assisted by throwing buckets of water down on the fire. The fire badly damaged the shed, which was later demolished. The Insurance money paid for the wall, which was built across the back of the yard near the outside loo, to be reinstated. The wall was necessary more than ever now as the fire had left the cliff devoid of all weeds and bushes and it was a danger to us. At the time of the fire cats and rats scurried in all directions, amid all kinds of squeals.

  Another shed was built and as the years passed this became a holding place for all kinds of wood, bicycles, and a storage space for everything that could not be used in the house. In this shed daddy later built a fish-smoking unit, for all the fish we caught in the harbour. It also became a breeding place for the wild cats that roamed the cliff. These cats in turn kept rats, and mice, at bay. The cats that frequented our backyard kept the mice at bay but the occasional mouse got into the house. I remember one day putting on a jacket, which had been hanging near the back door, and as I was adjusting it I felt something moving near the back of my neck. Daddy got up from the table, and said, “Hold tight, it’s only a mouse,” and hit me on the back with his hand. He reached into the back of my jacket and proudly revealed a dead mouse, which the cat took for a snack. I don’t remember this bothering me at all!

  Later, I kept two hens there and got lots of eggs. I was always afraid that the cats and rats would attack the hens and eggs, but strangely it never happened. There was one period when I thought that the hens had given up laying as I did not get any eggs for about a week. One day I was rummaging in the shed and, lo and behold, I found the missing eggs. The hens had changed their laying habits and now laid their eggs under some wood, which was stocked at the back of the shed. It was lovely to see the pyramid of brown eggs and I had two trips to collect all of them. They were spotlessly clean and did not need to be washed.

  In those days hygiene was very limited and bathrooms were sparse. Most children had only one set of clothes and these were not washed too often. Very few children had underwear. The term ’high water mark’ was commonly used. It referred to when a child’s face was washed. Necks weren’t washed, just the faces and the dirty mark between the washed face and unwashed neck was called a ‘high water mark.’

  Along with poor hygiene healthcare there was another part of our lives that was in need of serious review. Going to the dentist was a nightmare. Any ache was the signal to have the tooth out, regardless of the cause. No fillings, no sympathy, just the tooth pulled. The school dentist was a butcher and we put up with pain rather than let him get his needle, pliers and hands on us. We knew by the stories of the other children that nothing was worse than getting a tooth pulled so we lived constantly with toothaches and pain, it was preferable to the alternative. Other dreaded diseases were diphtheria, scarlet fever, and mumps, which also took many lives. People spoke in whispers when a new outbreak occurred. The children dreaded inoculations and I remember closing my eyes, yelping, and being scared when the time came for mine. It’s funny how a little needle sets the nerves on fire. Applying iodine with a feather to the throat treated any sore throat. It was not pleasant but it worked.

  Head lice were rampant and it was difficult to avoid getting them. We were all martyrs to the fine steel toothcomb, which had to be applied regularly to keep our heads clean. It was also used to remove scabs from the head. In fact, I remember daddy washing my head in methylated spirits to get rid of the nits and head lice. I just could not avoid them. All the children and adults suffered from the same afflictions. The fumes from the spirits nearly choked me but it did the trick. Paraffin oil was also used on the head. I made sure though that I kept my eyes closed all the time while the washing and combing was going on. In school I could see the damn lice crawling on children’s hair and everybody was scratching himself, or herself, furiously.

  From a health point of view we were all given regular doses of horrible castor oil, senna pods, and syrup of figs, to relieve constipation, and ‘clean the bowels.’ These medicines were harsh, and tore the stomach out of us, and the pains inflicted were worse than the constipation. All of it was a far cry from modern treatments but effective in their own brutal way.

  Daddy, himself, never believed in following instructions on bottles or packets. If the dose should be one teaspoon then he figured that two, or even three, would be more beneficial. He swallowed a half bottle of Milk of Magnesia regularly, whilst remarking “that’s great tack”. Mrs. Cullen’s headache powders were in great demand for headaches, colds or flu. The powder was put on our tongues and we had to swallow it with milk, or water. It was horrible and made us gag. If we were lucky, it was mixed on a spoon with jam and then this was easier to swallow. ‘Parishes Food’ was a tonic full of iron and that, plus ‘Virol,’ which was a mixture of Cod liver oil and malt, were given to us regularly. Hot poultices were frequently applied to ‘ripen’ boils, or to extract pus from wounds. This was a quite painful practice as the poultice, made up of bread soaked in very hot water, was kept pressed against the sore, or boil. Ear aches and tooth aches were very prevalent. Tooth decay and wax in the ears were the main reasons for these complaints.

  Obviously, tuberculosis was a much feared affliction. Many people, including children, died from it and others were sent to sanatoriums in Sarsfield’s Hospital, in Cork. Consumption is another name for Tuberculosis (TB.) I attended many funerals of school friends and adults who died from this scourge.

  When I got a bit older I developed the common complaint of acne or blackheads. These were usually on my forehead and daddy took great pleasure squeezing them with his fingers or by using a metal watch key to get them out. Often he drew blood and soon my blackheads developed into horrible boils. I got very embarrassed by this and wished they would leave my face and go to my neck, under the hair so that they would be hidden. They went to my neck alright and also stayed on my face. I was told, “They will go when you get married.” It was going to be a
long wait!

  No one had any money in those days and daddy tried anything to stretch any money he did earn. He worked long hours drumming up Ordinary Branch Insurance, which gave him good bonuses. A lot of this was done quietly, as he went outside his own territory, and if he was caught, it meant that there would be repercussions, because agents in those areas would object and complain to Head Office. Normally, he got his bonus in March and when he arrived home he’d have something nice for mammy and we all got presents. I remember he once came in with a posy of violets for mammy. I was very young but the delight in mammy’s face at the time left a deep impression on me. He said, “For you, Julia” and he kissed her. Normally, he called her Sheila, but Julia was her Baptism Christian name. That was one of the only times I remember any hugs or kisses being exchanged between them in front of us.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  During my youth it was a rough time for mammy. Not that she was mistreated or anything. It’s just that most women suffered the same dreary existence of hard manual work and lots of children to care for. Daddy did get her some help in the form of Diana Foley as the children started to arrive, we loved her. She was kind and really cared about us, I think Diana’s arrival coincided with mammy’s release from hospital, after the stillborn twins were born in 1929. The bill for the hospital was very costly and daddy was worried sick wondering where he would get money to pay this bill. He made a novena and on the last day of this prayer his insurance bonus arrived for the exact amount of the bill. The power of prayer was clearly present for him.

  Though times were hard we didn’t really know it at the time. We had lots of love and lots of joyful times. We may have been short of money but I remember we often had toys to play with. Often they would be toys we had fashioned ourselves out of odds and ends but that never affected our enjoyment of them. Tops were the big craze when I was growing up. I loved what we called the ‘racer’ top. This was shaped like a mushroom, with a flat circular top, on a pointed spindle. To make them fancy looking we marked the top with coloured chalk. This gave a spectacular gleam as the top spun at high speed. We grew very adept at using the whip to achieve long distances and speeds during races.

  Another game we played was hoops. We scrounged bicycle wheel rims and used a piece of wood or a flat bedspring to beat them up the road. I preferred to use a flat bedspring, bent at an angle of about forty-five degrees. This, I wrapped around the outside of the wheel rim to pull it along. By doing this it eliminated the constant need to beat the wheel with wood. It did however cause a lot of grief to people when they heard metal scratching on metal which caused their teeth to water.

  Boys played football using newspapers, which were wound into a tight ball and tied with twine. It was great fun and we carried on for many years even when we grew up in our teens. Any tin found was kicked into oblivion. Our boots soon wore out and the toe caps were badly scuffed. Polish! What’s that?

  Playing alleys, or marbles, was another common pastime. We played ‘follow the leader’ and the gully between the road and footpath was the play area for this game. The number of shots allowed was specified at the beginning. The first player started off and played his shot, using forefinger and thumb only, and he was followed in turn by the next players. Whoever fired the longest shot became the leader as the game progressed, until one eventually finished first. Another game was for the contestants to place marbles within a circle and then to use their expertise with their favourite marble to knock out some marbles from the circle. Each contestant had to toe a line and there were rules. Contestants tossed for start and if anyone knocked out a marble they had another try. However, the active player had to be quick to call his preference for the type of shot he wanted to take. ‘Risers for a Trizzie,’ meant that he could lift his hand up from the ground, so that he could let his marble enter the circle at an angle, and if there were about six marbles within the circle, it was possible for him to knock two or three out together. The other contestants may call, ‘Knuckle down’ before the contestant got his call away, and this forced him to take the shot with his thumb facing down the ground. This made it impossible to get any aim or power into the shot.

  A fairy story we all loved back then concerned conkers and how if horsehair and a conker were put into a jar of water the hair would become an eel after three months. I can’t tell you the time we all spent looking for these eels before we got wise. Homemade telephones were another source of fun, a far cry from the mobile phones of today. We got two empty tins and made a hole in the centre of the bottom of each tin, where we fitted a continuous piece of string into the two holes. A knot prevented the string from slipping through the hole. Then two of us moved apart, to the full length of the string, and one talked into his tin whilst the other listened to the sound through the second tin. Great fun and it really worked!

  Like these days we dressed up as witches and ghosts on ‘All Souls’ night, or Halloween as we know it now. A lot of the games and activities we played at Halloween then are still enjoyed now. Within the house we played ‘snap apple.’ The whole family played this game. An apple was hung on a string from the frame of the door. Each person had to try and get a bite of the apple without hands touching it. Hands had to be kept behind their backs. This was difficult as the apple kept slipping around the face and knocking you. Also, like some children do these days at Halloween we would float an apple in a basin of water and try and get a bite of the apple using only our mouths, again with our hands behind our backs. Normally, the water was about nine inches deep, so we had to virtually go under the water to trap the apple. There was a lot of snorting and spluttering but it was great fun.

  As the years went by collecting picture cards from cigarette packets became an obsession with me. Player’s cigarettes were the tops for these cards. I remember there were about 50 cards in each set and it was great fun swapping with other children. The collections ranged from Footballers, Airplanes, Flags of the nations, birds, chickens, racehorses and flowers.

  Though it might seem now that our times were hard we never knew any different and were probably happier than children today are. We just got on with things and didn’t let anything bother us. The hard times did mean, though, that things in the house were never quite as nice as perhaps we would have liked. All renovations and DIY was usually done by the father of the house. There was never any question of bringing in someone to do any home improvements, things were fixed as they broke and as best they could be until the next time.

  Though there was never any spare cash there was always lots of fun and laughter. On sunny days we would spend the whole day out the front, happy and relaxed and my memories are that the sun always seemed to shine back then. There were lots of children to play with, especially as my brothers and sisters started to arrive at a regular pace. The church quoted the bible; ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the whole earth’ and Irish Catholic families followed. Men loved this law; one the few religious laws then which got the thumbs up ….

  Technology was never a big part of our lives then like it as now, as I comfortably type these words on my computer I recall a memory from early childhood when daddy arrived with a projector to show films for us. We were incredibly excited as it was such a novelty. The one and the only film that I remember was called ‘Early Bird.’ The projector had a very bright light and this made it very hot. The projector was also quite noisy while it played but the nothing could take from the thrill of watching these moving images. The cartoon film was black and white and very grainy. In the film I could see the worm as it came through the hole in the ground and the little bird watched it, ready to pounce for his meal. The same scenes were repeated, again and again, until the bird eventually got the worm. One day, the bulb suddenly got brighter, and brighter, until there was a bang, and out went the light. We never got a replacement.

  The world around in those days was a giant playground. Enjoyment could be had from all and anything that entered our neighbourhood. We were good kids, I think, but like all kid
s we had a mischievous side to us! Roger Cooney was the caretaker of the Baths Quay grounds and we used to annoy the hell out of him by getting him to chase us at any opportunity, the thrill of running for your life from Mr Cooney had us in hysterics, our hearts beating loudly and gave us a surge of energy that kept us just a few steps ahead of him, luckily! Between Harbour Row and the Baths Quay there were bushes, with two pathways from entries about one hundred and fifty yards apart. Down the pathway there were six trees in a row, from entry gate to the Baths Quay. The bushes were part of the ‘empire’ of the Harbour Row boys and girls and they stretched from Kidney’s Strand to the Bench. We played cowboys, Indians, soldiers, and various chasing games in these bushes. We knew each and every shortcut through these bushes; they were our domain, our kingdom. There were various tracks we had made whilst playing that kept us out of sight so it was difficult for anybody to catch us. However, we stuck mainly to the stretch between Kidney’s strand and the gate opposite the Royal Liver Insurance Company’s office, at number 38 Harbour Row.

  I remember one great day that I spent flying through those bushes when I was a young lad. I kept chickens in our back yard and I also had a Bantam cock which my aunt had given me. The chickens wings were trimmed to stop them flying away but the cock did not suffer this ignominy. The cock escaped one day and he flew into the bushes in the Bath’s Quay. He kept evading me as I chased him and soon enough the chase developed into an all out hunt as boys, girls, and adults who were nearby came to help. Eventually somebody caught him and we had to clip his wings too, much to his annoyance. Anyway, this and our daily running and chasing in the bushes annoyed poor Roger Cooney and he tried his best to catch us, but to no avail. To my knowledge no one was caught by Roger Cooney!