by Jack Lynch
Of course the other thing that rationing also brought to the fore, alongside an ability to make do, was an increased lack of hygiene when it came to food. As food became scarcer and scarcer people’s standards of hygiene dropped and as needs grew, our parents’ tolerance for the unhygienic increased. The shop-keepers around the town used to place the vegetables on the pavements outside the shops when they were first delivered, and dogs would come along and urinate all over them and nothing was cleaned before sale. It was very different to how it is now. People never washed their hands after handling the soiled vegetables and flies were everywhere on the cooked and uncooked foods. I think we must have had every germ and virus going without being aware of it. There was no such thing as keeping cooked and uncooked meats apart and there weren’t any fridges or freezers to store the food in. There were no detergents to clean and degrease surfaces and household utensils. During the Emergency all these issues became even more problematic now that everything was so scarce. Brown paper, used to tie up the food before a purchase left the store was becoming less and less available and so often food was just carried out as is.
Home grown produce, like milk, was often easier to obtain at this time as it wasn’t brought in from outside. Milk was delivered to houses directly from the farm then. Paddy Barry used to come along in his pony and trap and measure out the milk from metal churns. The measuring device was called a ‘Pawnee’, which was a tin half pint or pint size container on a long metal handle to reach down into the churn. Usually we got a little ‘sup’ for the cat from Paddy when he arrived. He was always very nice to us and we were pleased when he later married my Aunt Kate. There was another milk supplier in the area that some people used, though my parents never did because the milk was warm and watery and sometimes had hairs floating in it. At that time all the milk came straight from the cows and went direct to our doors so I don’t think there were any health checks on the animals.
We were very resourceful in many ways during those lean times. It was impossible to get petrol products and coal so turf and wood became the main heating fuels. Daddy hired a plot of ground in Carrignafoy and we grew our own spuds, cabbage and various other vegetables there. I used to have to dig trenches, sow the seeds, and cover the vegetables with manure. I was the one who had to do the digging and bring the vegetables home and yet everybody ate the fruits of my labour! I caught plenty of fish for us to supplement our meals and preserved them by salting or smoking them. One summer daddy decided to build a fish-smoking unit in the backyard. The basic equipment was a cleaned out five-gallon oil drum with the lid removed. A hole was cut out in the centre of the bottom of the drum. A broom handle of the same diameter was now inserted into the hole and the sawdust was packed tightly into the drum. The broom handle was then removed and the drum was placed on a few bricks where some kindling was burned under it. The flames licked into the hole and the sawdust continued to smoulder and give off smoke. The smoke soon filled the inside of the purpose built enclosure, which had lines strung from side to side. We hung mackerel, congers, whiting and pollock on the lines until they were smoked. Over-smoking caused the fish to be virtually cooked, in which case we just ate them straight from the smoker, or from the clotheslines in the kitchen where the smoked fish were hung for use later.
It was one of my jobs to get bags of sawdust for the smoker from a builder named J.J. Healy at Top O’ The Hill. I used to put a full bag of sawdust in between the crossbar and pedals of the bike and freewheel down Middleton Street, around the cathedral, and down Harbour Hill back home. I recall one trip that ended in tears; I was coming down Harbour Hill on the bike, which was loaded with a big bag of sawdust. Just as I got to Harbour Row a young boy ran across the path in front of me, I immediately hit the brakes but it was too late and I hit the ground almost at the same time. I came over the handlebars and remember nothing more except May O’Sullivan, the shopkeeper from nearby, asking me if I was OK.
It was three days later when I awoke in bed, with mammy and daddy leaning over me, that I first spoke;
“Was it love?” I kept asking them.
They said I had concussion. They told me that I had walked home without assistance and came in with my forehead bleeding and looking completely dazed. I remember nothing about the walk home. The doctor visited the house daily over the next few days to keep an eye on me. Days later, when I was up and about, they asked me what was I talking about when I had asked them ‘was it love?’ and strangely I had a recollection that the boy who ran in front of me was Clayton Love’s son or nephew. Clayton Love had a shop at the top of East Beach, close to where the accident happened. I was assured I had not hit him and that he was fine. I do not remember getting any more sawdust after that, not because of loss of memory, but because daddy would not let do it again after my accident
Food was so precious it was rare to let it go to waste but there was an occasion I remember when I foolishly did just that. I visited Aunty Lina, in Ballymore, when I was about fifteen years old with a few of my friends and we got a warm reception from her with some delicious cake to eat and cups of tea. When we were leaving, my aunt gave us a supply of potatoes, a dozen eggs and a chicken to bring home to my parents. We cut through the woods at Cuskinny on the way home to make the journey a bit shorter but I was finding carrying the eggs a burden so we divided into two groups and each group got half the eggs to carry. However, being teenage boys our high spirits got the better of us and we proceeded to have an egg fight in the woods. Eggs flew in all directions and we looked a sorry mess when we got home. I sneaked into my room washed myself, changed, and put my clothes with the next load of washing to try to hide the awful waste of food, something I would surely have gotten in big trouble for, especially with rationing in force.
Daddy was inventive when it came to making do and saving money during the days when things were tight. I remember he tried to re-sole damaged boots with tyre rubber. When he found it was not a success he used leather and I later also became quite good at heeling and resoling shoes. I got cuts of leather from O’Donovan’s shop, and soaked the leather in water to soften it before re-shaping the piece to suit the shoe, or boot.
Boys wore boots with metal studs, to save wear and tear and the boots were not always the most comfortable and often hurt the toes. I don’t remember any soft leather being available. We ran and skidded on the studs to leave a shower of sparks as metal and stone touched.
My brother Anthony was lucky as he was too far behind me in years to have to wear my discarded clothes or shoes. It was worse for my sisters as they had to put up with hand-medowns irrespective of size and shape. Being the eldest had its advantages.
Around this time daddy decided he was going to do a job on the kitchen ceiling. The ceiling was cracked and had been whitewashed but was peeling and cracking again and needed something done to it. With the aid of a friend, Jimmy Sheehan, he decided to use panels of plywood and beading to cover the ceiling. At one stage Jimmy was up on the ladder, above daddy, and dropped the hammer on his head. A large lump quickly appeared on daddy’s head.
“Blast you Jimmy, will you watch what you’re doing?” shouted daddy.
Poor Jimmy was all apologies and kept muttering to himself.
Daddy then painted the ceiling a dark blue and since he knew in advance did not have enough paint to finish the job he added plenty of linseed oil to eke it out. The paint never dried and was patchy and sticky for as long as I can remember.
Daddy also used to put paper on walls, where it belongs, and on, where it doesn’t. To understand the trauma of this work it is necessary to realise the problems associated with it. In those days, paper came in rolls, with borders attached, and these had to be trimmed straight by hand. The borders were about a half inch wide and only identified the wallpaper manufacturer. Most rolls were patterned and there was no vinyl available. We tried to keep a straight line, with a bad scissors, and as we unrolled the paper, it often tore, causing a lot of swearing. When we got the paper cut we n
ow re-rolled it, and measured it for ceiling to floor length. We had to make sure the pattern matched. Now the paste, had to be mixed and this was ordinary flour and water. When the paste was applied to the paper, more swearing as the soggy paper ripped when it was lifted. As far as I remember, only paper manufactured in Kildare, for some reason, was available. That part was bad, but worse was to come. As I said, the patterns had to be matched and the paper edges had to be aligned. It usually ended with overlapping paper edges, misalignment of patterns, and various residue patches of dried flour all over the paper. And that was only the wallpapering! The border paper was a finishing touch which helped conceal the defects between the ceiling and wall.
The nightmare really started when daddy wanted to paper the ceiling. After the preparation outlined above, he climbed up the ladder and started to align the edge of the paper with the junction of the ceiling and wall. For ease of handling and controlling the paper was folded like a concertina. It was my job to stand underneath with a floor brush and hold the folded paper in position, while he moved along the ceiling and patted the paper in position. My arms ached and the brush got heavier and heavier, so that I could not hold the paper in position, and soon the paper started to fall off behind me as daddy moved forwards. Eventually, we finished the job, which had the same results and appearance as the walls that had been papered, though perhaps there were even more errors and defects, if possible!
Daddy, in his wisdom, came home one day, with a large tin of paint. Joyfully, he said it was to paint the lower half of the front of the house. He started the job, with me as the eldest helping him as usual. As we layered on the reddish brown paint we realised it looked terrible. Someone even remarked that they thought daddy had painted the house with marine anti-fouling paint that daddy had got cheap in the Haulbowline shipyard. It was a complete disaster. We had to start all over again and repaint it with ‘Blessed Virgin’ blue and white. I felt like praying every time I looked at it but daddy thought it was great!
In 1945 the war finally ceased and despite all the obstacles our family had survived without any great hardship. All credit goes to daddy and mammy for taking care of a family of two boys, and six girls during those tough times.
CHAPTER TEN
The Power House was a red brick building with a large chimney stack that was situated in the Bath’s Quay. It was used to heat the baths used by the emigrants going to the USA. The stack is now the only part left. I was about seventeen years old when I started to work in the decommissioned Power House stacking turf. This was hard and dirty work and I was eaten alive by fleas, which thrived in the turf. My fingertips were tender and sore from the work but as time went by they hardened and gradually came to resemble leather. During the war, turf was brought straight from the bogs and a lot of it had not been dried out.
It annoyed me when I saw the cruel treatment inflicted on the horses used to draw the turf. The turf used to come in at the railway station or to the Deepwater Quay and was loaded into carts and the horse owners were paid for each load which was then taken to the Power House. The more turf they delivered the more money they got. Therefore, the horses were driven as fast as possible, in each direction. In winter the poor horses used to occasionally slip on the icy roads and they had great difficulty getting up with cut knees, which were not treated. These runs went on all day until dusk, and the poor horses were knackered. One particular owner used to beat the poor horse across the head, to make him go faster. I saw blood running from the horse’s head. This man had a bad temper and his cruelty was unbelievable. There were no organisations to prevent cruelty to animals then and I didn’t witness the Guards or any concerned people take action to prevent the man from inflicting hurt to the poor horse.
I also did relief work for the Insurance agents whilst they were on holidays to earn some money. I got to know a lot of people this way and they trusted me to enter their houses whilst they were away. People were much more trusting then. I knew where they left the premium money and book and would take care of my business and leave the house as I had found it. Some cases I came across doing this work were heart rending and really touched me. There were old ladies who could barely afford to pay one penny per week. One particular house always stays in my memory. I used to climb three flights of stairs to the top of the tenement to collect from a woman who was always in her room but whom I never saw during the years I collected from her. As I got up towards the third floor, the smell used to make me heave. There was no light on the landing, which was pitch black, and the room was in total darkness. The smell was overwhelming and many times I felt I would get sick. I used to take a deep breath lower down the stairs, rush up, collect the money from a known spot, mark the book and belt it downstairs as fast as I could. Other lonely people loved to chat to me when I came to collect and I liked being able to bring a bit of happiness to their day.
Working with daddy could usually be easy-going but I do remember once having a big row with him over our shared responsibilities now that I was collecting insurance money. He had asked me to deliver an Insurance renewal form to a house and I had forgotten to deliver it. Next morning we were all at the breakfast table eating porridge. He asked me if I had delivered the form and I said I had forgotten but that I would do it that day. He asked me for the form, looked at it, and then threw it back at me, telling me to make sure it was delivered that day. His face was red and he was in a real temper. Something had set him off and I could not understand what it might have been. It was not my failure to deliver the form - that was for sure. The form landed in my porridge and without meaning to I threw it back in his direction. He immediately got up with a pot and came towards me in a threatening manner to hit me. I jumped up, picked up a small wooden stool close by and held it over my head for protection. Mammy was petrified and Anthony and my sisters gaped in amazement at the scene playing out before them. I looked at my father and said, “If you come at me with that pot, I won’t be responsible for what happens.”
There was dead silence as my father stepped closer to me. I threw the stool on the tiled floor between us, where it broke into bits. Daddy stopped dead in his tracks, went pale, and left the kitchen without a word. I said nothing, took the form, delivered it, and came home later after much contemplation about the events. I justified my actions due to my age - I was seventeen- and because I felt it could have been more serious if he had hit me with the pot. As it was, only pride was hurt. He came home, that evening and I went up to him, apologised, and said I was sorry for what happened. He smiled and said he was also sorry, and we both hugged. He said he had not realised I was now grown up, with a will and temper of my own. We never again had a difference that was not resolved by talking and in a way that was a real turning point for us.
Around this time daddy converted and opened the office as a confectionery shop. Nicholas O’Keeffe from our road was a confectionery wholesaler and he supplied the sweets and other goodies to daddy. We went to Barrack Street in Cork to get supplies of hard-boiled sweets for the shop that Nicholas didn’t supply and I remember being thrilled watching the sweets being manufactured. A lot of these hard boiled sweets are still available today but some of the more unusual which we bought were Acid Drops, which were square in shape and had a very bitter taste, and Money Balls which were like a small ball, reddish in colour and contained various shiny coins. Many children damaged their teeth biting into these sweets. With today’s regulations there is no way these dangerous type sweets could or would be sold. A popular chocolate bar, which I have not seen for many years, was called ‘Half- Time Johnny’, identified with a wrapper showing a young hurler. ‘Captain Mac’ too was a very popular bar of dairy milk chocolate.
Mammy used the shop to supply her needs for cigarettes and was delighted with the new business venture. I loved the cider we sold, which was classed as non-alcoholic and was really apple juice, so I too was guilty of not paying. The cider was sold by the glass from a gallon jar. The whole family took what they wanted without paying
for it. We did not realise that cash flow was important and just helped ourselves. Mammy could not say no to anybody and gave out a lot of credit too to friends and neighbours. Daddy had his own favourites too whom he allowed credit and as credit was not always repaid our debts mounted up and finally, the confectionary shop closed.
Years later, daddy re-opened the shop and sold women’s and children’s clothes. He did not have a clue about women’s fashions so my late sister Mary ran the shop for a while. Mary wanted to buy in clothes for the younger generation, but daddy wanted to keep the older generation coming in to the shop so there was conflict over which avenue to pursue. As it was that venture ended after a short while too. This was again mainly due to daddy interfering in a product of which he had no knowledge!
Even as I got older I still had a fondness for practical jokes. One time during an election campaign in the Square, Martin Corry, a Fianna Fail candidate, was addressing a big crowd and Dan Hunt and I were watching what was going on with great but non-political interest. I had a mechanical toy mouse, which was very realistic, with me and I wound it up and waited until we saw a group of women at the meeting before letting it off. In the middle of Martin Corry’s speech I watched the mouse scuttle towards the women and hit one on the shoe. She looked down and screamed; “mouse, mouse, mouse!” Her friends panicked. All hell broke loose as people ran, shouted, and generally lost their heads. We doubled up laughing and even though I lost my toy mouse I felt it was worth it to see such havoc caused by my own hand!
Prior to the Emergency, the British Army, Navy, and Irish civilians frequented the Soldier’s Home, a meeting place for the soldiers where meals were available whilst they were in the area. Civilians could also use the facilities available there. After the Ports were taken over, it became a haunt for Irish Military personnel and civilians. We children and teenagers used to go in there regularly to buy Chester Cakes, which were our favourite, and were sold there in the canteen.