Child from Home

by John Wright

  I thought the nurses looked really nice as they prepared to go off duty. The staff nurses proudly wore a large, ornate, silver filigree buckle on their belts and the red bands of their navy-blue cloaks were crossed over the white bibs that protected their royal-blue dresses. The colours seemed so bright and very patriotic and I felt happy and secure in their tender care and didn’t want to leave.

  After being discharged I was still weak and had to stay off school for some time to recuperate. During the day Mrs Harris allowed me to lie on the settee in the parlour and, as the snow lay deep on the ground outside, I felt snug and warm under a couple of blankets. She kept the curtains drawn as the light still hurt my eyes and I quite enjoyed being the centre of attention for a change. Gran came to see me and brought me sweets, comics and chocolate but I was disappointed that Mam was not with her. I thought she might have come to see how I was getting on. In fact, I was starting to forget what Mam and Dad looked like and their images were becoming as fleeting and as insubstantial as ghosts. When I started to wallow in self-pity, Gran shamed me by telling me what Uncle John was going through at that time. She said, ‘He is a prisoner in Germany now and he and the others were taken 400 miles further east in cattle trucks at the end of October. So don’t you go feeling so sorry for yourself. You don’t know when you’re well off.’

  March continued in the same vein and as I braved the icy roads on my return to school the wind passed through my clothes like a flu shiver and I longed for the spring to come. The crocuses still managed to penetrate the soil’s icy heart to burst into flower but, due to the long cold winter, they were late this year.

  It didn’t take long for the undeserved slaps and the beltings to start up again, but when it came to my turn I tried a different tactic. I had learned the hard way and as soon as Mrs Harris took down the leather belt, I would run full pelt into the bathroom and crouch down in the small space between the lavatory pan and the wall. At other times I would squeeze into the space between the end of the bath and the wall. Either way, when she lashed at me she hit the wall, the pan, the bath top or herself more often than she hit me. She would finally give up and go away fuming and mumbling. ‘I’ll see to you later, you crafty little devil!’ she called over her shoulder. I would stay there until I heard her go upstairs then, I would dash outside and make myself scarce. When I came back she had usually cooled down a bit.

  As the austere whiteness of winter gave way to the fresh leafy greenness of spring the days grew longer and lighter and we played out again after tea. We had the freedom to roam as long as we returned at the times set for our unappetising, frugal meals. By this time I had started to put a bit of everything on my fork in order to disguise the taste of the things I didn’t like – a habit which persists to this day. The grass in Widd’s field was lush and green again but we made a point of avoiding the fairy rings. The grass on their outer edges was darker than the grass inside the circles and Sylvia said, ‘I read a book that told of children stepping inside these rings and not bein’ seen agen. It seems that the fairies ’ad tekken ’em away.’

  In April I was nine and Harry would soon be sixteen, when his apprenticeship would begin. He would then go to the abattoir in York once a week to learn the skills of the slaughterman and be taught how to kill and dress animals. Harold Atkinson was good to him in that way and he was to have a thorough grounding, which would stand him in good stead for the future.

  I clearly remember the loud crunching of the gravel as the steamroller rumbled and hissed forward and back as it resurfaced Usher Lane. We all rushed outside to watch, taking care to avoid the flying chippings, as a man walked in front of it spreading the gravel with a rake. The roller had a big, whirring drive wheel and belt. The driver in his greasy flat cap had to turn the knob on the top of the tiny steering wheel many times to make the great roller alter direction by just one inch. I loved the smell of the hot tar fumes as the fire flamed and roared beneath the boiler. Unfortunately, I got a taste of a different kind of belt when Mrs Harris found spots of tar on my clothes afterwards.

  One day we got a surprise when Renee ran up the side path and started hammering on the back door. When Mrs Harris opened it she was red in the face and trembling and almost fell into the house.

  ‘What on earth’s the matter?’ Mrs Harris enquired.

  ‘There’s hundreds of cows charging down the lane,’ she gasped.

  ‘Is that all? You townies have no idea about life in the countryside, have you? A few cows can’t hurt you. It happens every day. Have you not noticed the cow pats all down the road?’

  ‘Well, I can’t abide the big smelly things,’ she replied, still shaking a bit. When she had settled down she gave us the latest news from home. On leaving the house to visit Harry she looked up and down the lane to make sure the cows had gone before venturing out.

  Mrs Rust’s two little girls had been billeted with Mrs Oliver in the big house on the corner of Usher Lane and Station Road for some time when their mother decided that it was safe enough to take them back home to London. There was a family wedding coming up and she wanted them to be there. Sally and Nancy were lovely, well-liked little girls who were never a ha’porth of trouble in school or out of it, and it wasn’t long since they had stood beside us watching the house martins collecting mud to construct their nests under the eaves of the houses. They, like us, had been fascinated on seeing the graceful birds repeatedly swooping and gliding down to gather beakfuls of mud from the edges of a puddle. A few weeks later we heard that their house had been destroyed by one of the first German VI flying bombs. Sally was killed and Nancy, the youngest, had to have both legs amputated.

  At school we were kept busy rehearsing and helping to make scenery for a forthcoming pantomime. Miss Curry, who was in charge of the singing practices, had told us that it looked as if a ‘second front’ was going to begin quite soon. She said, ‘It is vitally important that we in Haxby support the war effort by raising as much money as possible, hence the pantomime.’ Mr Fox decided that the school should put on Dick Whittington as their contribution to the Salute the Soldier week.

  The local committee had set a target for Haxby and Wigginton of £5,000. A huge board was erected under the school clock to show how much was being raised. We didn’t know what a second front was but we got quite excited when Mr Harris told us, ‘It means an Allied army is goin’ ter go over to sort out t’Jerries in Europe.’

  On Saturday 29 April, which was Harry’s sixteenth birthday, the fund-raising began with a concert in the Wigginton recreation hall. In the evening, when it had cooled a little, Mr Harris took us to see the ‘25 pounders’ – the main British field guns at that time – on the green. We were also allowed to stay up late to watch a PT demonstration by baton-twirling men in white vests and navy-blue shorts on the football field. It was the most excitement the village had experienced for some time.

  On the Friday it was our turn. It was the day of the pantomime at the Wiggy Rec, which was well received, and Sylvia, Thelma and I were in the chorus. The hall was crammed to the doors and Mr Fox was as proud as Punch as he appealed to the people to contribute generously to the campaign. As a result £7,400 was raised that week, easily beating the target, and the people of the two villages felt proud at having done their bit. There was an air of expectancy as we waited impatiently for the day of the big invasion and the country seemed full of soldiers on the move. It was all very hush-hush and there was deliberately no mention of the increased activity in the newspapers. There were rumours that the east and south coast areas had been closed to the public and all leave was cancelled.

  The Misses Law and Barker put up the money for Harry to buy a 1936 Norton motorcycle with a leather seat and springy suspension. Petrol was becoming a little more obtainable and Harold Atkinson had let him have some of his, and Harry thought he was the bee’s knees as he cruised around the village on it. He had filled out and was a handsome, golden-haired youth by this time and several of the local girls had taken a fa
ncy to him. He must have seemed very attractive to them as he sat astride his throbbing motor bike as it purred along like a big cat. He used it to get to the abattoir in York.

  When Renee visited again, Harry said to her, ‘I appreciate their kindness and generosity but I get very annoyed at Miss Law’s obsessive behaviour with regard to so-called germs. She even puts sticking plasters on her fingertips and on the door handles. Miss Barker’s brother, Arthur, and his nine-year-old daughter Sarah, came to see them recently in their pony and trap. He got really angry at the way she wraps her knife, fork and spoon in tissue paper and he told her what he thought of it, but it had no effect at all; she was as bad as ever after they’d gone. One day, when the washing was out on the line in the back lane, an old tramp came round to the back door begging. She flew outside in a panic and brought the washing into the house, terrified that he might have touched it and put germs on it, and she washed it all over again. I think she’s a bit loopy and needs to see a “trick cyclist” [a psychiatrist].’ At the end of Renee’s visit Harry offered to take her back to York station on his motor bike, but she retorted, ‘What? Are you kidding? No! Thank you very much indeed.’

  At Whitsuntide, which was hot and sunny, the hues of the freshly burgeoning leaves ranged from light brown to bright green. The tiny new leaves of the oaks and sycamores were tawny brown and tiny limegreen leaflets were forming on the ash trees. The waxy leaves of the ivy, which clung to the tree trunks, were a shiny, pale green that contrasted sharply with the dark green of the previous year’s growth. The seemingly infinite variety was a delight to the eye but later in the summer the shades would take on a darker, more uniform look. There were masses of pinkish apple blossom on the trees in the orchards and lilac and laburnum trees were in full flower. The hawthorns dripped with sweet, snowy blossom as birdsong filled the air. Unfortunately, the herd of Friesian cattle at Crompton Farm was decimated by an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease and the brown-clad Italian POWs were brought in to assist with the culling and burying. Fresh soil lay in great heaps as they dug deep pits into which the diseased cattle were dumped and covered with lime before the soil was shovelled over them.

  On 4 June high winds and heavy rain swept across the countryside bending the green wheat and blowing the crab apple blossom from the trees along the lane. Several Lancasters and Halifaxes flew over the village in the next day or two on their way to bomb the German defences on the French coast. Then on 6 June the long-awaited news came and we heard John Snagge report that the biggest invasion ever known had begun just before dawn. Workers’ Playtime was interrupted just after ten o’clock in the morning with further reports on the troop landings and the people cheered and wept with joy. Nearly 200, 000 men and 6, 000 ships were taking part in the vast amphibious operation called Overlord that stretched for sixty miles along the Normandy coast. Some 5,000 planes supported the vast armada. There was a mood of euphoria throughout the village and we began to believe that we were winning the war at last and that we might soon be back home with our loved ones. In the days that followed the papers were full of reports and maps showing the progress of the Allied invasion and we followed every move forward from the beaches with great interest. The names of lots of little places in faraway Europe became familiar to us.

  On a hot day in early summer the hazy light gave way to a glowering greyness and the air became humid and heavy. Black and purple clouds gathered and heaved up and before long we heard the deep rumble of thunder. Violent flashes of lightning crept ever nearer briefly lighting up the darkness of our classroom before Miss Francis turned on the lights. The clouds burst and the rain came down in stair rods and raced along the flooded gutters; it really pelted down. Apparently Mrs Fox was busy ironing clothes in her kitchen when she was violently flung across the room. A thunderbolt had struck the chimney blowing all the fuses in the electric box in the corridor. There was pandemonium and panic amongst the children, while in the classroom next to us, Margaret Mann – Harold’s eight-year-old daughter – became hysterical. The normally stern Miss Curry, showing a great deal of compassion on this occasion, did well to calm everyone down. We were delighted when we were sent home for the rest of the day. Then, like a great lumbering beast, the storm moved on and the air felt clean, fresh and exhilarating.

  Although it was cloudy on most days, summer was awakening, and as the runner beans sported their bright red flowers and the pea pods filled out in Mr Harris’s allotment, he brought a bag of them back to the house. Mrs Harris gave me the job of hulling and putting them into a bowl. Nancy had just been given a clout round the ear for wetting her finger and dipping it in the sugar bowl, and to stop me eating any of the peas she told me to whistle as I worked so that she could hear me all the time. When she left the kitchen I got Sylvia to whistle for me while I ate a few of the lovely sweet-tasting peas. Unfortunately, Mrs Harris soon realised it wasn’t me whistling and I got another smack round the head that made me see stars, and I was sent to bed and missed out on my tea – all for the sake of a couple of peas. She had said earlier, ‘If you find a pod with nine peas in it, keep it separate from the rest. It is considered to be very lucky.’ I didn’t find one and it certainly wasn’t lucky for me.

  At school Miss Curry told us that the worst storm for forty years had halted all Allied troop movement from the beaches into France. It wrecked one of the huge Mulberry harbours being anchored offshore for landing troops, vehicles and weapons, and the Germans put up stiff resistance with many Allied soldiers having to pay the ultimate price. In the first month of the invasion progress was slow. There were setbacks and many casualties. In the middle of June Hitler sent over his new ‘secret weapons’ believing that they would win the war for him. The first of the VI rockets fell on London causing terror and thousands of casualties. The jet-propelled, cigar-shaped, pilotless planes, which carried a ton of explosives, sputtered and fell silently to earth as they ran out of fuel. They were soon nicknamed ‘doodlebugs’ but the RAF fighter pilots quickly learned how to shoot them down before they could cause more havoc. It was said that they were now destroying eighty per cent of them in the air but 6,000 – mostly in London – had already been killed by them. Bombers with Canadian crews were flying out from the Linton and East Moor airfields to bomb the launch sites in France and Belgium.

  For us in Haxby there was now a sense of time hanging in the balance, of waiting for something big to happen. Day succeeded day, each one much the same as the last, and we were still getting belted and clouted round the earhole. I had just endured a good hiding when Mrs Harris went off the deep end on finding that I had put my big toenail through one of the threadbare bed sheets and Sylvia was made to sew yet another patch over it. As the summer holidays drew near, school felt more like a holding pen than a place of education. When we were sent to do some hoeing on the school allotment, a stubby, wind-ruffled robin redbreast sat close by on the handle of a fork, cocking his head to one side and trilling away to his heart’s content. A child’s senses are wide open and I was filled with wonder and pleasure by the sweet song of the little bird. On another occasion, as we were out on one of our nature walks, we came across a German POW working in one of Outhwaite’s fields. The fair-haired man greeted Miss Francis with the words ‘Guten Morgen’, before he asked her, ‘How old are ze kinder?’ ‘Most of them are nine years old,’ she replied, at which point he took out a small, dogeared, black and white snapshot of a young blonde woman and a small boy. He became quite emotional as he caressed the faces on the photograph with his fingertips. There was a catch in his voice as he said, ‘Zese are mein frau und kinder in Deutschland’, before turning away to conceal the tears that were welling up in his eyes. Some of the POWs had started to carve wooden toys for the children of the village.

  We were taken to the field to play rounders and cricket and Mr Fox bawled at me, ‘Wake up, lad!’ as I stood daydreaming in the outfield while the ball sped past me to the boundary. I was too busy watching the swallows, with their swept back wings, whe
eling, gliding and fluttering to catch insects on the wing. My mind would often slip away when I wasn’t looking and I would go into a kind of trance.

  Gran started to visit more often and I sensed that something was afoot. Plans were being made for George and me to go back to Middlesbrough. I was excited and apprehensive at the same time at the thought of going home and seeing Mam, Dad and Jimmy again. Even though Mrs Harris, with her floppy body that spilled at random from her ill-fitting clothes, had made our lives a misery, it had not been all bad. We had been beaten, sent to bed early and regularly derided, and any praise had been very rare with the criticism oft repeated. However, we loved the countryside and I had shared many happy times with Jimmy and the others in spite of her.

  16

  The Return

  George and I were so excited when Mrs Harris told us that Gran was coming to take us home, but when she arrived I sensed that something was troubling her. The RAF was bombing Germany day after day but I had no inkling of the devastating bombshell that was about to be dropped on me. Gran, normally so steadfast and controlled, took us into the front room, and as she sat us down on the settee there were tears in her eyes and a catch in her voice as she said, ‘I’m very sorry to have to tell you that your Mam and Dad were killed in the bombing of Newport in 1942, so you will be coming to live with me.’