Tommy's War: A First World War Diary 1913-1918

by Thomas Cairns Livingstone

William Power, writing in 1922, described ‘the pleasaunces of Govanhill, Mount Florida, Shawlands, Strathbungo – in short, that vast borderland of tenements and terraces and cottages known as the “South Side”, which at its western end burgeons into the gorgeous villadom of Pollokshields, with lakes, parks, feudal battlements and an outlook over ancient policies to the wooded slopes of Renfrewshire’.14

  The industrial revolution turned Glasgow into the workshop of the world, and increasing scales of production meant ever-bigger factories, shipyards and railway works, which demanded ever-expanding workforces. These workers came from rural central Scotland, the Highlands and islands, and from Ireland, and took whatever accommodation they could find. Few new houses were built to accommodate the new armies of labour and overcrowding was rife as landlords sought to maximise their rents by squeezing large families into small houses.

  One solution to this was the ‘ticketed house’ scheme, instigated in 1863. Town Council inspectors measured each house and issued a ticket that had to be affixed outside its door, showing the size of the house and the number of adults allowed to live there. A typical ticket read ‘2200, 5½ adults’, which indicated that the volume of the house was 2,200 cubic feet and that a combination of adults and children (those under eight counted as half an adult) adding up to 5 ½ could live there. Inspectors made calls during the night to ensure the rules were being enforced by the landlords.

  Nevertheless, by 1921 the Royal Commission on housing in Scotland declared Glasgow the most overcrowded city in Europe, with 40 per cent of households meeting its definition of overcrowded (two people living in one room). The city’s population, which had more than doubled since 1821, was 1.1 million people. Conditions in the centre of the city were horrendous, with 700,000 people living on 1,800 acres of land. As the Royal Commission observed, one-seventh of the population of Scotland was living on three square miles of land.

  The Glasgow Corporation first took serious action to ameliorate the overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in which many of its inner-city citizens were living in 1866, when it passed the Glasgow Improvements Act giving the Corporation the power to demolish the dilapidated and unsanitary houses that at the time covered about 90 acres in various parts of the city. The City Improvement Trust that was set up to implement the legislation formed 30 new streets and widened 26 existing ones. In the late 1880s, the property market had collapsed and the trust could not find any builders willing to build on the ground it had cleared, so the Corporation intervened and began constructing houses itself. The sandstone tenements of High Street, Saltmarket and Calton were the result. Blocks of houses that shared a common central staircase and back court (or garden), these were solidly built, three to five storeys tall, with two to four houses on each floor. Thus, between them, the Corporation and the trust began the public provision of rented housing in Glasgow.

  The tenants who were displaced from the overcrowded slums by the construction of tenements had previously paid £2 a year in rent, and could not afford the minimum £8 a year that the trust was now asking. The tenants of the new houses therefore ended up being the better-off working classes, not the poor whose homes had been demolished. Inspired by the temperance movement of the time, both the trust and the Corporation excluded public houses from their housing, depriving the men in many communities of a social hub.

  The back court, where much of the social life of the tenement took place.

  As well as the work of the trust, the arrival of the railways into Glasgow, particularly around Glasgow Cross, led to the demolition of many slum areas to allow for the construction of stations, bridges, tracks and ancillary buildings. This allowed light and air into a good number of the wynds and alleys of the city.

  Despite these efforts at improvement, during the First World War conditions were still grim in many parts of Glasgow. The Royal Commission on Housing in Scotland reported that in 1921 there were 40,654 one-apartment houses and 112,672 two-apartment houses. A ‘one-apartment house’ was a house with one room, generally with an outside toilet, and was known locally as a ‘single end’. A two-apartment house – i.e. a house with two rooms – was called a ‘room and kitchen’. Thomas and his family lived in the latter, in an apartment composed of a kitchen that doubled as a living room and included a bed recess where the adults slept, and a ‘front room’ or parlour that was only used when guests arrived.

  One investigation of Glasgow’s housing in 1922 reported:

  The conditions are appalling. As many as eight persons have been found living in a single apartment, with only one bed. In a two-apartment house, two families were discovered, 11 persons altogether. One of the adults had tuberculosis. In the East End, two families, comprising 15 persons, tenanted a room and kitchen suitable for four persons. This is why Glasgow has to spend £800,000 per year on health measures, principally in the treatment of diseases – tuberculosis, fevers, measles and troubles which flourish in the fetid atmosphere of congested areas.15

  While Thomas, Agnes and Wee Tommy did not live in the worst sort of housing, they did live almost exclusively in one room: the kitchen, where parents and child slept and where cooking, drying of laundry, ironing, bathing and other domestic chores took place and must have made the room pretty damp and noisome. Add coal fires, gas lighting (at a time when the domestic supply was composed of about 10 per cent carbon dioxide, a powerful poison), draughts and vermin, not to mention Thomas’ ‘thick black’ tobacco, and we have a heady mixture of pollutants and toxins swirling around the house.

  The factor, who collected rents and arranged for repairs to houses, was not a popular figure. To Thomas, he was a devil in human form, as wicked as the Kaiser and as deserving of being strafed or lynched. The factor’s duties included supervising repairs to the commonly-owned parts of tenement buildings, such as the roofs, downspout, main plumbing and any back-court buildings such as wash-houses. There was always a lingering suspicion that too many repairs were carried out at too great a price, probably by cronies of the factor. The factor also dealt with advertising vacant properties, assigning leases to tenants, and evicting those who caused a nuisance or failed to pay their rent.

  * * *

  Thursday, 8 February

  Andrew up to see me at dinner time. Tommy got medically examined at school, and passed with flying colours. Class A. I went out for an hour in the afternoon, which I felt to be quite enough. British capture Grandcourt on the Western Front. Anchor Liner California sunk by U-boat: 43 lives lost.

  Friday, 9 February

  Agnes rubbed my manly CIII chest with anointed oil. Andrew up at dinner time. I was allowed up at tea time. Great number of our merchant boats getting sunk. They are going to starve us.

  Saturday, 10 February

  I have still a bad cough. Got up about 4.30 p.m. Got my bosom rubbed at night. British destroyer mined: five saved. Big British victory in Egypt. America funking again.

  Monday, 12 February

  Resumed my work today. Went in at 9.30 and managed to hang on till 5 p.m. Went and saw my doctor at night. He gave me a bottle. Duncan here at night. China protests to Germany. The Scandinavian nations [are] too near Germany, so they say nothing. More British successes in the Ancre. British nearing Kut, in Mesopotamia.

  Tuesday, 13 February

  Foggy and frosty. Feeling very done up at night. Many boats sunk. Munition factory blown up in Yorkshire. British surround Kut.

  Wednesday, 14 February

  Agnes went to her cookery class. This is the last night. White Star liner Afric sunk by U-boat. America still doing nothing. Evidently waiting till the Germans shell New York.

  Thursday, 15 February

  Not feeling well at all tonight. Think I’ll need a day or so in bed. All the coal mines taken over by the government.16 American boat torpedoed. Yankeedom once more excited.

  Friday, 16 February

  I’m not feeling much better. The Great War Loan closes today.

  I did not invest.

  Saturday, 1
7 February

  Great scarcity of potatoes.

  Sunday, 18 February

  Very dark day. We had the gas lit nearly all day. Kept Tommy in bed as he has a bad sort of cold. Feeling ‘no weel’ myself. Great British victory on the Tigris: 2,000 captures.

  Monday, 19 February

  Agnes very bad with her old trouble. Tommy not at school. Being in a weak frame of mind, I paid the gas bill today. Also being ‘non compos mentis’, I thought I had left the door of the warehouse open when I shut up. Went back and found it all right. ‘All out’ at night. British success in Egypt.

  Tuesday, 20 February

  Dirty wet day. Agnes still pretty ill. Tommy very deaf with the cold. I’m not well either. ‘So help me bob.’ British get repulsed at Kut.

  Wednesday, 21 February

  Agnes very ill today. She fainted in the forenoon, and nearly did it at night. I went to my doctor at night and got another bottle. Tommy still pretty deaf.

  Thursday, 22 February

  Nellie Hamilton (Andrew’s wife) up in the afternoon. My niece Lily phoned me today to say that Josephine would be out on Sunday.

  Friday, 23 February

  Agnes’ back very sore today. Duncan up tonight. I feel a little better tonight. All neutral shipping still held up with the German U-boat blockade. Still no potatoes.

  Monday, 26 February

  Fine day. Tommy starts school again today. I don’t feel so chirpy today. German destroyers raid the Channel. A few shots fired into Margate. Not much damage. Great Turkish rout. Kut captured by British.

  Tuesday, 27 February

  The game is up. Had to retire back to bed this morning. Got the doctor in to sound me. Influenza. Milk diet, etc. Andrew up at dinner time to see me. Germans retreating from the Ancre.

  Wednesday, 28 February

  Slight improvement in my physical condition today. Andrew up at dinner time. Duncan up at night. To save our country from defeat and starvation, he has volunteered for National Service. Cunard Liner Laconia sunk by U-boat. Some Americans killed. USA says nothing.

  Thursday, 1 March

  Doctor up. Looks at my tongue, sounds me and says I’m a lot better. Andrew up at dinner time. British still keeping the Germans on the move on the Ancre. German ‘Taube’ drops a bomb or two on Broadstairs.17

  Friday, 2 March

  Wet sort of day. Andrew up at dinner time. I’m a lot better today and eating well. Got up for an hour tonight. Agnes went to my society in the afternoon to report.18 British nearing Bapaume.

  Saturday, 3 March

  Got up today at 5 p.m. I feel a little shaky. Great potato famine all over the world.

  Sunday, 4 March

  Woe and woe and lamentations. What a piteous cry was there!19 The wind blew during the night. When Agnes got up, the house was inches deep with soot and the fire wouldn’t light. We had to remove to the room.20 Agnes spent the day cleaning up the kitchen. I got up all day. I had to! Hetty Cook here about 5 p.m., then Duncan came about 7 p.m. Duncan saw Hetty away. I composed a letter to the factor.

  Monday, 5 March

  I am feeling fine so went round and saw the doctor. Got his permission to start work tomorrow. Andrew looked up at dinner time. Men came up in the afternoon to see the lum. They found that a wee door was off, hence the soot. They put on an old one ‘pro tem’.21 Josephine here at 8 p.m. British destroyer mined in North Sea. All hands lost.

  Tuesday, 6 March

  Resumed business relations today with my firm. Got our kitchen lum swept today for 2/-. Agnes very busy at night cleaning up in the kitchen. Soot still lying about. I stayed in the room in comfort and ease. Feeling better today than I have for many a long day. Got potatoes to my dinner today.22

  Wednesday, 7 March

  Feeling vigorous now, so I broke up some firewood at night. We flitted back to the kitchen today. Looks as if there is going to be great scarcity of food in the near future.

  Thursday, 8 March

  Feeling fine now. Improved the shining hour at night by playing cards with my well-beloved.23 British making for Baghdad. Bad day for British airmen in France. French destroyer sunk by U-boat in the Mediterranean; over 100 lives lost.

  Friday, 9 March

  I cleaned the brass-work of the kitchen at night, while Agnes amused herself with a hot iron. Shipping and food question getting a bit serious. Count Zeppelin (the air raid man) dead.24 RIP.

  British troops marching to Baghdad.

  Saturday, 10 March

  Went to Calder Street Library in afternoon. Looks as if there is to be a famine in the land. All American boats to be armed. British transport sunk in the Channel by a U-boat. Over 700 lives lost, mostly South Africans for work in France.25

  Sunday, 11 March

  Very nice day and sunny. My father here in the afternoon to borrow a ‘bit’.26 He got it. I went a walk in the afternoon to Queen’s Park and saw the Garden Allotments.27 I have not got one. Rumoured capture of Baghdad by the British.

  Monday, 12 March

  Lily, my niece, and her boy John Martin here at night.28 Government threatens to search houses for hoarded food. Great British triumph in the east. Capture of Baghdad (where the caliphs come from). Turks in full retreat.

  Wednesday, 14 March

  Tommy’s face out in spots. Great alarm. Doctor sent for. He says it is likely his stomach. Gave him some powders. Hetty here when I got home, I saw her away by 10 p.m. train from Queen Street. American boat sunk. British three miles past Baghdad. British army advance on the Somme.

  British artillery men transporting a gun through the Somme.

  Thursday, 15 March

  Nice sunny day, but coldish. Spots seem to be spreading over Tommy. So once more we send out the SOS call to the doctor. His glands are swollen, so we think of the measles. Diplomatic relations broken between China and Germany. China seizes all German shipping lying about.

  Friday, 16 March

  Doctor up in the forenoon. Tommy has the German measles. Doctor says it is a mild case. Duncan up at night. Revolution in Russia. Czar dethroned. The Duma are in full power. The Czar and Czarina are prisoners. British destroyer mined in Channel.

  Saturday, 17 March

  Tommy of course is in bed. He has a cough. Went to Sam’s shop at night. Brought home some sticks. Zeppelin raid over England. One of the Zepps brought down in France. Great British triumph in France. Bapaume captured.

  The Russian crowd in Red Square salutes Joseph Stalin (right) and Leon Trotsky during the Russian Revolution.

  Sunday, 18 March

  Very stormy day. I did not go out at all. British and French advance continues. Grand Duke Nicholas in supreme command of Russian Army. German destroyers raid Kentish coast.

  Monday, 19 March

  Great British advance on 40-mile front to a depth of seven to 10 miles. French advance between 30 and 40 miles. Many towns captured, including Peronne. Turkish rout continues from Baghdad.

  Tuesday, 20 March

  I went myself at night to Ruglen. Business – Sam’s choir in Town Hall making melodious noises. Got home at a late hour. British and French still following up the Germans. British destroyer torpedoed in the Channel. More American boats being sunk.

  Wednesday, 21 March

  Nellie here at night to go with Agnes to the Alhambra to see this sort of thing.29 British and French still advancing. Turkish force cut off at Aden. Riots in Germany.

  Thursday, 22 March

  Bright sunny day, but bitter cold. Agnes got a touch of the bile today. Andrew’s last day at his work today. He goes into military life on Monday. Two British minesweepers sunk.

  Saturday, 24 March

  Dull sort of day. Have got a bad cold in the blinking head. In case of accident, I bathed my feet at night and drunk hot lemonade (imagine). French battleship Danton sunk in Mediterranean by U-boat: 300 lives lost and about 800 saved.

  Sunday, 25 March

  Hot lemonade was a failure. Andrew up to say farewell. His wife cam
e with him. Riots reported all over Germany.

  Monday, 26 March

  I brought home some real medicine, at 1/6 the gill.30 Bathed my feet at night and went to bed happy.

  Tuesday, 27 March

  The ‘fire water’ did me no good. So I got a sweating powder in the chemist for 2d. Am I in for influenza or the measles? Bathed my feet again tonight, put the powder on my tongue, took a drink of common water, went to bed and sweated all night. Bread up again.

  Wednesday, 28 March

  Am feeling not so bad now. Agnes doing some sewing machine work: looks like a fancy quilt. Got a form today, asking me to volunteer for National Service. British hospital ship sunk by a U-boat. Two British destroyers sunk, one by mine, other by collision.

  Thursday, 29 March