The eastern Europeans were mainly Russian, Polish and Czech refugees.31
German prisoners of war were not employed in farming or market gardening operations until the autumn of 1944. All had to live in camps, and they were not allowed to work in the same gangs as Italians, since it was thought that there were a lot of dangerous Nazis amongst them. On the whole, though, the Germans seem to have been good workers. A. G. Street wrote in The Farmer’s Weekly: ‘from the little I have seen of the work of the German POW to date, he seems to be worth three average Italians; since the way in which many of the latter cycle and laze around the countryside is little short of offensive’.32 Dorothy Pembridge remembered barrowing hundreds of lettuces that were to be sold while the Italian POWs sat in the sun watching her and the other girls work. Such righteous indignation is understandable, but it is hard to see why the Italians should have worked any harder than was absolutely necessary to justify their rations. Employers paid the War Ags for these workers; the POWs themselves received £1 a week.
Prisoners of war even found themselves working in mansion gardens. For example, Italians helped to clear out the hundred acres of badly overgrown pleasure grounds beyond the formal gardens at Ditchley Park. For the Trees, prisoners proved to be useful replacement labour for their British gardeners away on active service. And at Nuneham Park in 1945, Harry Dodson worked alongside German POWs. ‘I had no feeling against them,’ he said. ‘Two or three of them had worked in botanic gardens and parks in Germany in pre-war days and one of them especially was very interesting to talk to. He used to tell me the name of a plant in German and I’d tell him what it was in English.’33 However, harmony could be fragile. One under-gardener at Nuneham had been imprisoned in Germany: ‘One morning I suppose the poor chap flipped at seeing these Germans working in the same area as him. He came up through the frame yard in a terrible rage, swinging a rope round with a noose on the end – and if he could get hold of one of them he was going to string him up.’34 The head gardener’s wife and Harry rushed to calm him down, but it was a nasty moment.
In 1939, there were 80,000 civilian German or Austrian nationals living in Britain, as well as many Italians – bakers, restaurateurs and ice cream sellers in the main. Six hundred of these nationals were considered to be dangerous, and were immediately interned. Another 9,000 were restricted in where they went and with whom they associated. The others, many of them Jews who had arrived in Britain after Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, were extremely grateful for the shelter and protection they had been offered, and were free to go where they liked. However, after France fell in May 1940, all aliens, friendly or otherwise, who had not taken out naturalisation papers were interned in camps. Men and women, even married couples, were separated. One camp was situated on York racecourse, another at Huyton near Liverpool, but most were on the Isle of Man. Many of these were comprised of a collection of seaside boarding houses surrounded by barbed wire, so there were little or no opportunities to make a garden.
A number of the internees were immensely distinguished people – scientists, musicians, artists and the like – and when the threat of German invasion lessened substantially, most were set free, beginning in early 1941. One such was an elderly German Jew called Sophus Coutinho, a cactus expert who had been employed at the Hamburg Botanic Gardens before he escaped from Germany. He spent the latter part of the war working in the Cactus House at Kew.35
Amongst those Britons interned as enemies of the state, Sir Oswald Mosley, the head of the British Union of Fascists, was the most notorious. He was imprisoned at the beginning of the war, under Defence Regulation 18B. His wife, Diana,36 was also incarcerated, in Holloway Prison in London. In December 1941, Winston Churchill agreed that the pair might be united. Thereafter they lived in a small house inside the prison walls, and grew vegetables, including cabbages and aubergines, as well as wood strawberries, in a vegetable plot. After the war, Lady Mosley said, in a typically teasing Mitford way, that she had never since grown fraises des bois that tasted as good as the ones she grew in prison.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ANIMALS IN THE BACK GARDEN
WHEN WAR BROKE out, the majority of amateur gardeners had little or no experience of looking after livestock. This was partly because, with the coming of motorised transport in the early years of the century, self-sufficiency – even in the country – was no longer so important. But it was also because householders were not encouraged to keep animals; indeed, quite the reverse. In 1940, however, after meat was put ‘on ration’, the government told local councils to lift all restrictions on people keeping livestock in gardens, in order that they might provide their families with cheap sources of protein.1 Both bacon and eggs had been imported in large quantities from Denmark before the war, but that country was occupied by Germany in April 1940. Bacon was included in the first tranche of rationed foods in January 1940, although eggs remained off ration until June 1941.
Few things were likely to keep civilians more happily occupied than the everyday care of domestic animals, and happy occupation is what the authorities thought would see the population through the dark days. So, just as with the ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign, there was much more than a whiff of morale-boosting about this exercise in promoting domestic food production.
MAF concentrated its efforts on convincing the population of the value of keeping hens, ducks, geese, goats, rabbits, pigs and bees, and on teaching them to do it in ways that did not endanger the health of either the animals or their keepers. As with vegetable growing, they set about developing a substantial education campaign. Leaflets with titles such as ‘Rabbits for food, fur and profit’ were available for a small sum, while posters with slogans like ‘To save your bacon save your scraps’ were commonplace. There was even a radio programme on the subject of ‘back-yard’ livestock keeping, entitled Backs to the Land (see Chapter Six).
Those who heeded the call to keep poultry were encouraged to ask for advice from the Domestic Poultry Keepers’ Council, which could point them to legitimate sources of supply, while specialist magazines like Poultry Farmer, Feathered World and The Smallholder published advertisements from reputable suppliers that had been passed by the Poultry Advertisement Control Board. If it had not existed, it would be impossible to invent such a body, but the PACB was just one more example of central government’s desire to direct almost every aspect of civilian life. For advice about rearing pigs there was the Small Pig Keepers’ Council, set up by the National Pig Breeders’ Association and the Ministry of Agriculture. This was probably most useful to amateur swineherds when they had to deal with their animals’ carcasses.
There was much discussion in newspapers as to which livestock was the most appropriate for a garden situation. Most seemed to agree that poultry for meat and eggs was easiest, since a few hens could be looked after in quite confined conditions, and though prone to some ills, they were generally hardy, sturdy and cheap to buy. Novice poultry keepers were advised to buy one chicken per person in the house, with one for luck.
Eggs were also the source of protein that was likely to be rationed most severely. At the beginning of the war, chicken farmers had to cut the size of their flocks drastically, by about 30 per cent, when dairy cattle became the top priority for the limited supplies of cereal feed. What is more, beer, which was never rationed, required 600,000 tons of barley a year, which would have fed 36 million hens.2 As a result, in 1941 there were only 12 million hens in the country, which was a sixth of the pre-war number. That is why, from June 1941, shell eggs (as opposed to powdered egg, remembered without affection for turning a greenish colour when scrambled)3 were rationed to just one per adult per week.
Thousands of people took up the challenge of keeping chickens, building hen coops and runs on their back lawns, and even learning how to incubate eggs and rear chicks, if they had tolerant neighbours who did not mind being woken up by a cockerel’s crow in the morning – although allotmenteers had to apply to their landlord for permission if
they wanted to keep a cockerel. Many people plumped for buying day-old chicks, which had been ‘sexed’, to avoid the nuisance and waste involved in rearing cockerels. Pullets, which were eight-week-old chickens, were sold by hatcheries and arrived in labelled cardboard boxes at the local railway station.
According to Alan Thompson, the editor of Feathered World, and columnist for the Daily Herald: ‘The hen’s egg is the finest concentrated food known to man. It is produced by a humble, and slightly ridiculous, creature whose remarkable qualities have never been justly appreciated.’4 So wrote a genuine enthusiast. Certainly, as well as being full of protein, eggs were a necessary ingredient in many recipes, and when a hen’s laying days were over, she made a good, if rather tough, Sunday roast. In those days, the practice of boiling up kitchen scraps to feed to chickens was positively encouraged, and it was possible to keep two or three hens without much expenditure.5 From 1941 on, in return for coupons so that they could buy meal for hens – at 4 lb per month per hen – poultry keepers waived their right to an egg ration. They would still have been better off, however, since a hen might lay 250 to 300 eggs a year. The problem was that the daily allowance of two ounces of ‘Balancer meal’ per chicken was not really enough for a bird to lay well, especially as there was no mixed corn available to supplement it, unless the gardener grew his own maize. The authorities recognised this and put the allowance up by a quarter in June 1943.
Poultry keepers were also encouraged to feed hens crushed dried acorns and beech mast as well as fish waste, stale bread and dried grass mowings. Those who were also gardeners grew Jerusalem artichokes, lucerne, linseed, mangolds, sunflowers and buckwheat as well, or their neighbours did it for them in exchange for eggs. Most seed merchants sold some or all of these as seed.
C. H. Middleton had nothing but praise for hens: he declared that they would keep down the grass in orchards, clean up the fruit cage of insect pests and fallen fruit in autumn and provide invaluable, strong manure. Chicken manure was especially good for adding to the compost heap because, being high in nitrogen, it accelerated decay. A virtuous circle could be established, if the compost was put on the vegetable garden, where food for the hens was grown. Middleton was of the opinion that the manure from a dozen hens was enough for a ‘fair-sized’ vegetable plot, although it is doubtful that many garden owners had room for twelve chickens.
At a time when domestic refrigerators were the exception rather than the rule, surplus eggs would not keep long, unless they were submerged in ‘waterglass’, when they would last at least six months. Waterglass was a solution of sodium silicate, usually made up in a bucket or earthenware crock. Preserving in waterglass was a popular way of providing eggs for cooking in the winter, when the hens were not laying so prolifically. Surplus eggs and chickens were also given as presents or as barter for other foodstuffs, clothing coupons and so on. In September 1943, for example, Mrs Milburn exchanged a basket of pears and apples from her fecund orchard for a fat cockerel and some blackberries.
So, for a variety of reasons, the number of hens that were kept in back gardens more than doubled during the war to 11.5 million, and by the end of the war these hens were producing a quarter of the eggs consumed in the United Kingdom. And all of this despite the fact that domestic egg production per bird declined in the war years.
For more adventurous spirits or those with bigger gardens and ponds, ducks were a possible alternative. Khaki Campbells were always recommended for their eggs, since they would lay almost every day of the year, while Aylesburys were the first choice for meat. Experts advised that, although ducks puddled the ground terribly with their webbed feet, they did not require a coop, at least in ‘unfoxed areas’,6 a distinct advantage considering the general shortage of timber and chicken wire.
Geese were highly recommended by professionals for their meat as they grew so quickly and could be killed at sixteen weeks, by which time they already weighed over 10 lb. They also lived entirely on grass. But they were not popular with ‘back-yarders’, since goose meat was usually considered too rich and fatty to be palatable, and geese generated copious quantities of droppings so were genuinely not suitable for small gardens. However, in rural areas they did make very good ‘watchdogs’, and they could not fail to amuse their owners. Margery Allingham tried looking after a pair in Tolleshunt D’Arcy: ‘The two geese we acquired last winter [1940] are still wandering round the front meadow like highbrows at a private view, honking at anything which displeases them.’7
Goats, whilst providing unrationed milk, butter and even meat, were also not very popular since they were far from straightforward to look after. They needed both night quarters and space for grazing in the daytime, and it was advisable to tether them securely rather than let them range unfettered, when they would give a whole new meaning to the word ‘omnivorous’. As a correspondent to The Gardeners’ Chronicle warned: ‘There would be no difficulty in finding something the goat would eat, but there might be trouble in keeping it from consuming much that was not intended for its food.’8 C. H. Middleton also had something pungent and to the point to say about this particular animal. When asked by a listener what was the correct food for goats, he replied that his neighbour had some which seemed to thrive on waste paper, woollen socks, lilac and delphiniums. But he rather thought this was not the orthodox diet.
One of the undoubted success stories of livestock keeping during the war was the proliferation of ‘pig clubs’. These were usually co-operatives, whereby a group of local people looked after a pig or pigs, collecting swill for their feed and receiving some part of the pig in return once it was slaughtered, as well as a proportion of strong manure for the garden. This swill was kitchen food waste, boiled for an hour to make sure that there was no danger of any disease being passed on to the pigs.
Belonging to a pig club entitled its members to a ration of precious imported meal. Oddly, this ration was rather more per pig than that which commercial pig keepers received. The professionals could be forgiven for feeling aggrieved, since they were the ones with the experience of pig rearing, yet it was their livelihoods that were affected adversely by the government’s almost messianic desire to keep the civilian population usefully occupied.
The social benefits of keeping pigs were frequently stressed. In December 1940, The Times carried an editorial singing the praises of pig clubs, not only for the meat they produced but for their capacity to cheer up their keepers: ‘for those who have little time to spare and sometimes feel harassed by the rush of these days a pen of pigs, especially after they have enjoyed a meal of kitchen waste, presents a restful picture and an antidote to worry’.9
In 1942, by which time there were 4,000 registered pig clubs, it was estimated that amateur pig keepers produced five million pounds of pork products in a year. In Paddington, London, there was a municipal piggery on a recreation ground where, between 1941 and 1943, more than 3,300 pigs were raised. Tottenham, also in London, was famous for its pig club, which was founded by sixty-eight members of its borough cleansing department. These dustbin men owned a hundred pigs at a time and kept special buckets on their lorries for vegetable waste. Miss Violet Hudson, sister of the Minister of Agriculture, opened the first ARP pig club in June 1940; it was based in Wandsworth.
Councils bought special equipment to boil pig swill, and municipal swill bins became a common sight in urban streets. Posters enjoined the public not to put in anything that might harm the pigs, such as tea or rhubarb leaves. The resulting concentrated pig food was sold to pig clubs.
In 1942, the County Garden Produce Central Committee issued guidelines about the gathering of acorns to give to pigs. Schoolchildren were encouraged to collect them for pig keepers, and 5s. to 7s.6d per hundredweight was thought a fair price for them. At the same time, livestock keepers were urged to ask local farmers whether they could glean their fields, after harvest, for grain to give to both pigs and poultry. Gleaning was not something that had been seen in the countryside since the agricultural de
pressions of Victorian times, and it speaks volumes about the shortage of suitable forage for these animals.
As time went on, it became clear that there was insufficient meal left for the needs of commercial pig farmers, so the Ministry halved the ration available to pig clubs, and required them to make available half of any slaughtered pig for distribution, or else give up their bacon ration.
It was also permissible to look after pigs in your own back garden, and a household was allowed to kill two pigs a year, although they had to employ a professional slaughterer to do the deed. Half a side of meat could be sold to the local butcher at wholesale prices. Tuition was available from instructors, such as those trained by the National Federation of Women’s Institutes, on how to carve up a pig into cuts, preserve these in salt (usually in the bath), make sausages and bacon, and cook the various parts of the pig thriftily and successfully.
Pig keepers were notably stalwart, considering the inherent difficulties of collecting good-quality swill without foreign bodies in it, housing pigs when building materials were short, sending a much-admired animal to be slaughtered and having to deal with the cutting up and curing of carcasses. It says much for the population’s attachment to the full English breakfast that so much effort was put into acquiring it.
Lady Addle had something pertinent to say in the pages of Punch about rearing pigs at her large country home, Bengers:
Indeed, Addle [her husband] is himself a considerable pig expert, having for many years personally reared our own special breed, the Bedsocks White. ‘Treat pigs and butlers well and they will never let you down,’ he has often said, and I must say, except for one butler who drank his Napoleon brandy and one pig who ate his wrist watch, it has proved completely true. Addle frequently supervises the mixing of the pig food himself, so as to be certain it is rightly managed. He won’t even trust me to put aside the remains of some of my tastiest dishes, unless he knows just what are the ingredients. ‘That’s all right for your evacuees but not for my pigs,’ he sometimes says . . .10
A Green and Pleasant Land Page 27