Clydesiders at War

by Margaret Thomson-Davis

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  1939

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  1940

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  1941

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  1942–43

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  1944–45

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  By the Same Author

  Copyright

  1939

  1

  The only thing that hinted at what an ordeal it must be for Wincey was the way she kept nervously tucking her hair behind one ear. Dark, ruby red hair, it was. Her fringe seemed longer too, as if she was trying to hide behind it, yet her steady, determined stare was still the same.

  She was sitting in the Gourlay kitchen. The table was pale and grooved by the many scrubbings Teresa Gourlay had given it over the years. Around it sat Teresa and Erchie, and their daughters, Florence—a slim girl with large dark eyes and a proud tilt to her head, and the plump, round faced twins, Euphemia and Bridget. Granny sat in her wheelchair at one side of the fire, her short grey hair fastened with a large kirby grip, her fawn crocheted shawl clutched round her shoulders. Doctor Robert Houston sat at the other side of the fire.

  The oppressive silence was only broken by the sparking of the fire in the old fashioned, black grate.

  Then Florence said, ‘You’re kidding! You must be.’

  Wincey shook her head.

  ‘But you said … I mean, that first time when I found you, you said you were an orphan. Your mother and father had been killed and you had nobody else and you were going to be shut away in an institution.’

  ‘No, Florence, you said that. You always had a very dramatic imagination.’

  Wincey remembered every detail of the night Florence had found her and every word that had been said. ‘So you’re an orphan?’ Florence had said.

  Wincey had nodded.

  ‘So you’ve run away so they won’t put you into an orphanage, or into the workhouse?’

  Forgetting her tears, Wincey had stared curiously at the girl. She managed to nod again.

  ‘Och, never mind,’ Florence had said. ‘My Mammy’ll take you in. She’s always taking folk in.’

  ‘Is she?’ Wincey said in surprise.

  ‘Och, aye, our place is like a doss house sometimes. Girls come down from the Highlands and stay at our place for a few days until they get fixed up with a nurse’s job at one of the hospitals. My Mammy used to come from the Highlands. Come on.’

  ‘Well, you didn’t contradict me,’ Florence said now. ‘Did you?’

  ‘I was just a wee girl and I was frightened. I thought I’d murdered my grandfather and everybody would be after me, including the police. I just wanted to hide away somewhere where I could feel safe. And you were so kind to me. I know this must be a shock for all of you, and I’m sorry, but I just couldn’t tell you before.’

  ‘Why couldn’t you?’ one of the twins asked. ‘You’ve had plenty of time. You’ve lived with us for donkey’s years. You owed it to us. You’ve taken our name. Our Mammy and Daddy have been your mammy and daddy. We’ve been like sisters.’

  ‘I know, I’m sorry.’

  Granny piped up then, ‘Ah always knew she wis different frae us. A bloody capitalist. We were quite content wi’ oursels wi’ oor Charlotte an’ Teresa workin’ one sewin’ machine in that wee hoose in Springburn Road. Then, before we know whit had happened, she had Erchie fixin’ up machines frae aw ower the place. Then it was that auld warehouse made into a factory—an’ then we’d moved hoose a couple o’ times.’

  ‘Now, now, Granny. You know fine it wasn’t just Wincey, it was Charlotte as well.’ Teresa’s eyes darkened with sadness at the thought of her eldest daughter, who’d died so tragically in a road accident. ‘And this is a much better place than the wee house in Springburn Road. Think of our nice bathroom now, instead of the lavatory out on the landing. And it’s been Wincey who’s been paying for these two nurses to come in every day to see you.’

  ‘Aye, well,’ Granny muttered.

  ‘I wanted to tell you,’ Wincey said. ‘I longed to tell somebody, but I felt so guilty and frightened. If it hadn’t been for Robert, I expect I’d have taken the secret to my grave.’ She glanced at Robert Houston who had taken over as family doctor after his father had died. He smiled his encouragement. But Wincey noticed that, as usual, his smile was not reflected in his eyes. He had very serious eyes.

  ‘Robert persuaded me to write to my real parents and tell them everything, and also to confess to you. He gave me the courage. But please don’t think I’m not grateful to all of you. I have felt that you, Teresa, have been more of a mother to me all these years than my real mother. And Erchie, you’ve been more of a father than my real father. And Florence and Bridget and Euphemia have been my only sisters.’

  Erchie jerked the peak of his cap, or ‘bunnet’ as he called it, further down over his brow. He always wore a bunnet outdoors and indoors because he was bald and said he felt the cold in his head something terrible. He always wore his boots indoors too. Teresa, who had given him a nice pair of checked slippers for his birthday, had been forced to wear them herself.

  ‘Well, hen, as ah’ve often said, ye’ve aye been like ma ain flesh an’ blood. Ah knew somethin’ was worryin’ ye, right enough. That was why me an’ Teresa decided eventually to ask Doctor Houston’s advice.’

  ‘I’m glad you did now, though God knows what’ll happen next. They’ll get the letter tomorrow. It took me weeks to get it right but in the end, I just told the truth. I put it in the post earlier today.’

  ‘It’ll be a terrible shock to them after thinking you’ve been dead all these years.’ Teresa’s gentle face creased with worry.

  ‘They’ll probably wish I was after reading my letter. They’ll maybe want nothing to do with me. They never actually had much to do with me when I lived with them.’

  ‘You were only—what—twelve or thirteen when you came here,’ Teresa continued, ‘Now I can understand why you never told us your full name, and would hardly ever put your foot outside the close. But your parents must have been distracted with worry and grief, thinking their wee girl had been drowned in the Clyde. They’ll surely be overjoyed to have you back.’

  ‘That’s what I keep telling her,’ said Houston. ‘I’ve had one hell of a job trying to make her see sense. She’s about as difficult and thrawn as Granny here.’

  ‘Well, wan thing’s for sure—that auld rascal deserved tae die,’ Granny said. ‘An’ if ah had the chance, ah’d huv murdered him masel. Him an’ his munitions factory. He wisnae content in causin’ the death o’ folk in his slums, he had tae find a way tae kill a lot mair.’

  Houston groaned. ‘Wincey did not murder her grandfather.’

  ‘She’s just telt us she did. She’s just telt us that wis the reason she was feart tae go back tae her real mammy an’ daddy.’

  ‘He died of a heart attack. He had a heart condition. He had been
abusing her for years and she was in a state of shock. That was why she didn’t run and get his heart tablets. I keep telling her. But it’s quite common, unfortunately, for the victim in this sort of case to feel everything’s their fault. It never is, but it’s always a devil of a job to get them to believe that.’

  Wincey detected the glint of impatience in his eyes. She had seen it before and knew that it wasn’t caused only by her guilt. The hatred of her grandfather and the bitterness she felt towards her family were going to cause her to lose him.

  Theirs was a strange, uneasy sort of relationship. She knew she loved him, but he insisted that she could not truly love anyone else until she could love herself. And also forgive her family, including her grandfather.

  She’d been trying to follow his advice. According to Houston, writing the letter to her parents had been an enormous step in the right direction. But she felt far from sure, remembering how isolated she had always been as a child.

  Her father was Nicholas Cartwright, the famous poet and novelist. Wincey remembered how he was usually shut away in his paper-cluttered, book-lined, writing room. And when he wasn’t immersed in his writing, he was either in the downstairs sitting room or the upstairs drawing room talking with friends. Her mother, Virginia’s interests were political. Her first husband, James Matheson, had been a disciple of the celebrated Red Clydesider and pacifist, John Maclean. Matheson had long since been crippled by a stroke and hirpled about with the help of sticks. He had a grotesquely twisted face and, as a young child, Wincey had been rather afraid of him. He had also become friends with her father, and he and his political friends regularly filled the tall, terraced house, with lively discussion and heated debate.

  Her older brother, Richard, sometimes took part in these verbal confrontations but as often as not, he was out playing cricket or rugby, or getting into some sort of mischief. However, in the eyes of the family, he could do no wrong. Tall, dark and handsome like his father, he had, as Matheson said, ‘the gift of the gab’. He could have been a politician but they all knew that if he had gone into politics, it would have been as a true blue Conservative, like his grandparents. He never made any secret of the fact that he had no truck with his parents’ radical views, or with Matheson’s fervent socialism.

  Wincey had always felt like she was the cuckoo in the nest. She hadn’t her father’s glossy black hair and dark eyes, nor had she her mother’s long golden hair. A shy child with red hair and freckles, she couldn’t match her brother Richard’s extrovert and daring personality. Always hovering on the fringes of life in Kirklee Terrace, she felt ignored and neglected. More often than not, she was sent out with a dismissive, ‘Go and keep your grandfather company, there’s a good girl.’

  Her grandparents lived in a big grey villa on Great Western Road, not far from Kirklee Terrace. Her grandmother regularly went out to her bridge club and also the church Women’s Guild. Her grandfather couldn’t get out and about because of his heart condition and so she was often left alone with him to ‘keep him company’. Much too often, she realised now.

  Richard was her grandmother’s favourite—he was everyone’s favourite really. She was supposed to be her grandfather’s. She didn’t realise the truth at first. She felt confused and sick and miserable. She didn’t understand what was going on, or why.

  A wave of rage swept over her as she sat at the table in the tenement kitchen, with its recessed, cream-curtained bed. Opposite was the window with the sink underneath, or jaw box as it was called. The view outside was of the back yard, with its midden and wash house. This kitchen, this house, was the only real home she had ever known. The Gourlays had come to mean so much more to her than her ‘real’ family. How much better they had treated her than the wealthy Cartwrights ever had! For years she had been known as one of the Gourlay girls, and that’s how she wanted it to stay.

  ‘What saddens me,’ Teresa’s voice broke into Wincey’s thoughts, ‘is the idea of us losing you.’

  ‘You won’t be losing me,’ Wincey protested. ‘Nothing will change as far as I’m concerned. I’ve been a Gourlay for years, and I’ll always be a Gourlay.’

  ‘Wincey,’ Houston groaned, ‘you’ll have to accept that your whole life will change. For a start your parents will want you to go and live with them.’

  ‘My home is here with Teresa and Erchie and Granny.’

  Florence rolled her eyes. ‘I don’t get this. Why would you want to go on living in a tenement flat in Springburn when you could live in a big posh house in the West End?’ Florence, like the twins, had not long been married and she was especially proud of her new flat in Clydebank. She had acquired airs and graces since working in Copeland & Lye’s in Sauchiehall Street.

  Wincey knew that snobbish Grandmother Cartwright would have described Florence as having ‘ideas above her station’. Grandmother Cartwright had never forgiven Wincey’s mother—her former scullery maid—for having such ideas, and—much worse—for eventually marrying her son. Or, as she put it, ‘trapping him into marriage’. Virginia had been pregnant with Richard, but in 1914, war had intervened and it wasn’t until Richard was six that the marriage finally took place. Mrs Cartwright had taken the child away from Virginia at birth because she had been wrongly informed that her son had been killed in action in the trenches. She believed that the baby was all she had left of him. She hated Virginia for taking her grandson back after Nicholas had been found in a military hospital, and reunited with Virginia.

  To keep in touch with young Richard was the main reason she visited the house in Kirklee Terrace, and was at least frostily polite to her daughter in law.

  ‘I’ve been happy here,’ Wincey insisted. ‘I was never happy in Kirklee Terrace.’

  ‘Things will be different now,’ Houston said.

  ‘Yes, worse!’

  Houston rolled his eyes. ‘Will you stop being so pessimistic?’

  ‘Well,’ Erchie said, ‘at least you didnae turn up on her doorstep without a word o’ warnin’. Yer mammy would probably huv died o’ shock.’

  ‘Of aw the families in Glasgow,’ Granny shook her head, ‘she had tae come frae that bloody lot.’

  ‘Granny,’ Teresa said, ‘watch your language. Wincey didn’t choose her family.’ With a meaningful look at the old woman, she added, ‘Whether we like it or not, we’ve all to make do with what we’ve got.’

  Wincey smiled. ‘I didn’t choose the Cartwrights, right enough, but I did choose the Gourlays, and I still do.’

  ‘Well, that’s nice o’ ye, hen,’ Erchie gave her hand a pat, ‘but ye cannae ignore yer ain flesh an’ blood. An’ after aw, it wisnae yer mammy an’ daddy that hurt ye. It was yer auld villain o’ a grandfather. Everybody hated him. Good riddance tae him, that’s what ah say, but yer mammy an’ daddy huvnae done anybody any harm. Quite the opposite, hen. Ah’ve read some o’ yer daddy’s books. An’ yer mammy’s been active at many a socialist meetin’. Ah’ve even been tae a meetin’ that she spoke at, along wi’ that friend o’ Johnny Maclean, James Matheson.’

  ‘Yes, he was my mother’s first husband. My mother knew Maclean as well. I vaguely remember him. I was very young, but I even have a memory of being at his funeral. I remember my father carrying me on his shoulders. I was a bit frightened to see such a big crowd.’

  ‘Fancy! Ah wis there as well,’ Erchie cried out. ‘Whit a turn out, wisn’t it’? Over ten thousand crowdin’ the streets. Aye, James Matheson, that wis his pal’s name. He went tae jail along wi’ oor Johnny. Mair than once. It wis what Johnny suffered in jail that killed him in the end. Ah bet it wis the same thing that nearly killed Matheson. It wis a miracle he survived that stroke.’

  Granny spoke up then. ‘An’ a man like him friendly wi’ yer daddy? Whit’s the world comin’ tae?’

  ‘Now, now, Granny,’ Teresa said. ‘It’s a very civilised way to behave. What good would it do him to be bitter against his ex-wife’s new husband?’

  ‘Naebody got divorced an’ had auld an’
new husbands in ma day. They’ve nae sense o’ shame nowadays.’

  ‘Anyway,’ Teresa smiled at Wincey, but her eyes remained dark pools of anxiety, ‘if your mother and father arrive here tomorrow, or any day, they’ll be made welcome. And …’ she hesitated, then continued with some difficulty, ‘and if you leave with them, we’ll understand.’

  Houston said, ‘You’d better stay off work tomorrow, Wincey, to be here when they arrive. As I’m sure they will.’

  Wincey nodded, tucking her hair behind her ear and seeming to shrink beneath her fringe. She wanted to say that she wished she had never agreed to write that damned letter. No good would come of it, she was sure of that.

  2

  Virginia was on her way to do early shift in the Royal Infirmary, dressed in her Red Cross uniform of navy blue skirt and jacket, white shirt and peaked cap. She’d managed to get her Red Cross certificate, but was finding the experience in the Royal like being thrown to the sharks. The Outpatients Emergency department was especially fraught. At weekends it was like a battlefield, peopled mostly by wounded drunks with a lot of aggression to get rid of. There were other, more distressing cases of women who had been beaten by drunken husbands. Some of them were half dead, with broken bones and unrecognisable, bloody faces. It made Virginia sick, but at the same time she counted herself lucky that neither of her two husbands had ever physically abused her.

  Her first husband, James Matheson, had been—and still was—obsessed with politics. His obsession had developed to such a degree that, although she’d tried her best to help him, most of the time he was hardly aware of her existence. They got on a lot better now as friends than they’d ever done as man and wife.

  She’d repeated the pattern by marrying Nicholas Cartwright. Writing was his obsession. There had been a time when she’d hated Nicholas for isolating her, shutting her off from his life, leaving her to grieve alone for Wincey and to face the terrible trauma of not knowing what had happened to her. There was the awful guilt too. Round and round in her mind went the terrible question: had she and Nicholas neglected the child? They hadn’t meant to, but the house had always been filled with either her friends or Nicholas’s friends. Perhaps they had not always been as attentive to Wincey as they might have been. But she’d always been a difficult child, so quiet and shy. Richard had been a complete contrast to his sister—outgoing, full of energy, always wanting to join in with everything. Secretly, Virginia knew that all their love and attention had been lavished on Richard—and what had that done to Wincey?