The Sugar Girls
Page 30
Above all, our thanks are due to the women whose stories form the heart of this book: Ethel Colquhoun, Lilian Clark, Gladys Hudgell and Joan Cook. What we have written is based on interviews both with them and with over 50 other former workers at Tate & Lyle, and we owe a great debt to the following for their generosity, patience and understanding: Eliza Attenborough and her niece Pamela Rozee, Barbara Bailey, Flo Barley, Shirley Benson, Louisa Blaker, Janet and Stanley Copp, Jean Crump, Lily Dalsett, Jean Danrell, Maureen Deeble, Betty Dillon, Joan Dyson, Jim Fittock, Joan Flanders, Betty Foster, Eric Gregory, Pat Griffiths, Win Hardy, Doreen Harris, Jean Hatt, Edna Henry, Pat Johnston, Martin Jones, Esther Kennard, Joan Lee, Sylvie Lowe, Jean Mitchell, Lily Moore, Ted Phillips, Anne Purcell, Barbara and Dave Price, Bill Price, Maureen Richfield, Eva Rodwell, Elizabeth and Cyril Rozee, Betty Southgate, Carol Smith, Renie Smith, Clare Sullivan, Frances Swallow, Winnie Taylor, Edie and Peter Wallace, Florence Waller, Win Webster and her son Mike Hardy, and many others who did not give us their full names or who wished to remain anonymous.
Although we have tried to remain faithful to what our interviewees have told us, at a distance of over half a century many memories are understandably incomplete, and where necessary we have used our own research, and our imaginations, to fill in the gaps. We have also changed some names and details to protect anonymity. However, the essence of the stories related here is true, as they were told to us by those who experienced them at first hand.
For Tate & Lyle, Ken Wilson at the Thames Refinery and Ian Clark at Plaistow Wharf have very kindly shared their time and resources, and allowed us to look around the factories and their respective archives. The accounts written by Oliver Lyle and Anthony Hugill, The Plaistow Story and Sugar and All That, provide a wealth of detail on the history of the company.
A number of local experts have also been extremely helpful. Jenni Munro-Collins and the staff at Stratford Library have borne with our enquiries patiently, calling up dozens of editions of the Tate & Lyle Times and Stratford Express at a moment’s notice. Kathy Taylor’s Newham Story website has been an invaluable resource, and the posts from other members on the forums there have been very useful. Staff at the Museum of London, London Metropolitan Archives and Imperial War Museum have also given generous assistance.
Stan Dyson, whose book Silvertown: A Boy’s Story is a fount of local memories and lore, has been generous in answering our questions. His contributions to the Docklands Memories website (www.docklandsmemories.org.uk) are an invaluable resource, as are the short stories of Keith Lloyd, also collected there.
Nadia Atia’s help was much appreciated in the early stages of our own research, while Clare Barrett and Becky Barry made our lives much easier with their precise interview transcriptions. Jolien Harmsen kindly helped with the patois translations.
It was Louise Stanley at HarperCollins who first conceived of the idea for this book, and we are grateful to her and her colleague Iain MacGregor for entrusting it to us. Our agent Jon Elek has offered sterling support throughout the process, and Ruth Petrie has given advice and encouragement. Michèle Barrett, Alex Hayton, Anna Rice and Darren Rugg offered insightful comments on an early draft. Our copy-editor Steve Dobell has provided sage advice and good humour.
Tracking down former Tate & Lyle workers was not always easy, and the staff of many wonderful day centres and lunch clubs have assisted in the search, among them Gary Ewer at the Royal Docks Learning and Activity Centre in Silvertown, Beryl Callison and Sybil Nightingale at the Ascension Centre in Custom House, Anne Cross at the Kitchen Table Café in East Ham, and Jessica Wanamaker at The Hub, Ray Maybe at the Trinity Centre and Sam Clark at The Place, all in Canning Town. Thanks to their hard work and dedication, many of the women we have spoken to are still in touch with former colleagues, and enjoy the company of new and old friends alike.
Our thanks are also due to Terry Abbott at the Silvertown branch of the British Legion, Suki Kula who runs the Cromwell Stores corner-shop opposite the Thames Refinery, and Norma Reeve and Matt Nicholls at the Newham Recorder. Bill and Rose Perry’s Garden Café on Cundy Road, Custom House, is an oasis for the local community, and we are grateful for their assistance and generosity.
To see photographs of the sugar girls,
and read more about them, visit:
www.thesugargirls.com
About the Authors
Duncan Barrett is a writer and editor, specialising in biography and memoir. He recently edited Ronald Skirth’s First World War memoir The Reluctant Tommy and Vitali Vitaliev’s travelogue Passport to Enclavia. He is co-author of Star Trek: The Human Frontier and, with Nuala Calvi, Zippy and Me, the biography of Rainbow’s Ronnie Le Drew.
Nuala Calvi trained as a journalist at London College of Printing and has written for The Times, the Independent, the BBC and CNN, as well as numerous Time Out books. She has a strong interest in community history and took part in the Streatham Stories project to document the lives of people in South London. She is co-author, with Duncan Barrett, of Zippy and Me.
Copyright
First published in 2012 by Collins
an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
77–85 Fulham Palace Road
London W6 8JB
www.harpercollins.co.uk
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© Duncan Barrett and Nuala Calvi 2012
The authors assert the moral right to be identified as the authors of this work
While every effort has been made to trace the owners of copyright material reproduced herein and secure permissions, the publishers would like to apologise for any omissions and will be pleased to incorporate missing acknowledgements in any future edition of this book.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-0-00-744847-0
THE SUGAR GIRLS. Copyright © Duncan Barrett and Nuala Calvi 2012. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © MARCH 2012 ISBN: 9780007448487
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Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Contents
Preface
1. Ethel
2. Lilian
3. Gladys
4. Ethel
5. Lilian
6. Gladys
7. Ethel
8. Lilian
9. Gladys
10. Ethel
11. Lilian
12. Gladys
13. Ethel
14. Joan
15. Lilian
16. Gla
dys
17. Joan
18. Ethel
19. Gladys
20. Joan
21. Ethel
22. Gladys
23. Joan
24. Ethel
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Authors
Copyright
About the Publisher
Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Contents
Preface
1. Ethel
2. Lilian
3. Gladys
4. Ethel
5. Lilian
6. Gladys
7. Ethel
8. Lilian
9. Gladys
10. Ethel
11. Lilian
12. Gladys
13. Ethel
14. Joan
15. Lilian
16. Gladys
17. Joan
18. Ethel
19. Gladys
20. Joan
21. Ethel
22. Gladys
23. Joan
24. Ethel
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Authors
Copyright
About the Publisher