Aprons and Silver Spoons: The heartwarming memoirs of a 1930s scullery maid

by Moran, Mollie

  The crowd swept forward as one, a great tidal wave of love and respect washing over us. Then I saw them, perched upright in their magnificent carriage drawn by six horses. Queen Mary, dressed in a beautiful white coat with a fur stole, her diamonds glittering in the spring sunshine, looked our way as we hollered and cheered like crazy. She gave us a curt little nod.

  ‘She hasn’t changed much,’ I chuckled to the girls.

  Talk about pomp. Hundreds of guards on horseback trotted past, resplendent in their scarlet jackets.

  ‘God save the king!’ I yelled, along with hundreds of others.

  There were no snidey comments, no sarcasm or envy. No front-page examination the next day of what they were wearing or how they behaved. Just total and utter deference. Every single person, man, woman and child, cheered and clapped with total enthusiasm.

  Today the royals have to earn our respect; back then it was a given.

  In response to the extraordinary adoration of the cheering crowds, the king later said: ‘I cannot understand it, after all I am only a very ordinary sort of fellow.’

  As soon as they had gone and the crowds started to disperse, Irene turned to us with a sigh. ‘Oh well,’ she said. ‘Back to me chamber pots.’

  We fell about laughing and, as I linked arms with my friends from below stairs, I didn’t care that we didn’t have a street party to go to and it was straight back to work. We’d seen the king and queen up close and it was a total and utter joy.

  ‘Thanks for letting us watch the procession, Mrs Jones,’ I said gratefully when we got back. ‘Oh, you should have seen it, we was so close to the king and queen.’

  ‘I’m sure you were,’ she said. ‘Now hop to it, them carrots won’t peel themselves.’

  Later, as we prepared Mr Stocks’s evening meal, we were allowed, as it was a special occasion, to listen to the king’s speech on the wireless:

  ‘At the close of this memorable day I must speak to my people everywhere. How can I express what is in my heart as I passed this morning through cheering multitudes, to and from St Paul’s Cathedral, how could I fail to be most deeply moved. Words cannot express my thoughts and feelings. I can only say to you, my very dear people, that the queen and I thank you from the very depths of our hearts for all the loyalty and, may I say, the love with which this day and always you have surrounded us.

  ‘I dedicate myself anew to your service for the years that may still be given to me.

  ‘I look back on the past with thankfulness to God. My people and I have come through great trials and difficulties together. They are not over. In the midst of this day’s rejoicing I grieve to think of the numbers of my people who are still without work. We owe it to them and not least to those who are suffering from any form of disablement all the sympathy and help we can give.’

  My mind flickered to my poor old father, shivering out in his hut, rasping for breath, and my mother still putting on her best face, and a sudden sorrow settled over my heart. What did the future hold for him, for my mother, in fact for all the thousands of people disabled by the war and fighting poverty and destitution? Goodness only knew …

  I tuned back into the speech.

  ‘Other anxieties may be in store but I am persuaded that with God’s help they may all be overcome if we meet them with confidence, courage and unity. So I look forward to the future with faith and hope.’

  It was a stirring speech and, as the national anthem struck up, we all went about our work with a renewed sense of hope for the future.

  A year later our beloved king was dead.

  1936 was the year of the three kings. With the sad passing of King George V came the accession and then abdication of his son, Edward VIII. I should have known that gusty spring morning, when I’d seen the couple in London and noted the look of utter love that shone in Edward’s eyes, that he would always put love before duty. And so, as Edward was pressured to hand the throne and control of the empire over to his brother, there was change in my life too, albeit on a slightly smaller scale.

  We were back in Woodhall in Norfolk in the summer of 1936, four months before Edward’s famous abdication speech, when Mrs Jones turned to me out of the blue one morning and remarked: ‘It’s time for you to get a better job, Mollie. You’ve been here five years now.’

  I stopped rolling out pastry and stared at her, flabbergasted. ‘Well,’ I admitted, ‘I have been thinking about it.’

  ‘You’ve learnt all you can learn here now,’ she went on. ‘You can easily get a job in a bigger house. Pains me to say it but you’re not a bad little cook – when you keep your mind on the job and not on unsuitable boys, that is.’

  I might have imagined it, but she was smiling, actually smiling at me, in a sort of encouraging way. Blimey. Wonders would never cease.

  ‘Get yourself down to Collins Agency in King’s Lynn on your next half-day off. I’ll write you a reference. You’ll be able to get something easy.’

  ‘Thanks, Mrs Jones,’ I mumbled. ‘I’ll do that.’

  Me in the grounds of Woodhall, in a rare moment off duty, aged about eighteen.

  Sure enough, on my next half-day, I dressed up smart and, clutching my reference, headed on the bus to King’s Lynn.

  A stern, bespectacled lady took one look at my reference, looked me up and down long and hard and then referred to a heavy leather-bound book on her desk.

  ‘Well, we do have a position that you would be suitable for,’ she said. ‘Lord Islington needs a kitchen maid. He has houses in Hyde Park and a country estate in Bury St Edmonds, Rushbrook Hall.’

  My heart sank a little. A lord was a step up, but I’d been a kitchen maid for years, ferrying between London and a country estate. It would just be more of the same. But I knew I had to be realistic. I was nineteen, nearly twenty. The next logical step up was cook, but I was way too young and inexperienced to make that position. So for now, it looked as if I was trapped as a kitchen maid.

  ‘I’ll book you an appointment to see Mrs Pickering, Lord Islington’s secretary,’ she said, slamming shut her leather-bound book, indicating that the interview was now over. ‘Make sure you take your references.’

  On my next half-day I took no end of buses and trains to get from Norfolk to Bury St Edmonds in Suffolk. An old bus lurched and bumped along a country road and by the time it spat me out at a stone gatehouse next to some imposing gates, I was hot, dusty and tired.

  Trooping up a long drive to a large moated mansion set in acres of parkland, most people would have been impressed. But as I trudged over the moat, I muttered to myself: ‘Why have the gentry always got to have such long bloomin’ driveways?’

  I was parched by the time the butler hustled me round the servants’ entrance and into Mrs Pickering’s office. She gave me a cursory inspection, looking me up and down through her half-moon glasses. Honestly. It made you feel as if you were livestock at an auction, not a kitchen maid being interviewed for a job.

  ‘Well,’ she said, after a thorough read of Mrs Jones’s reference, ‘you have the necessary experience. There could only be one possible problem.’ She frowned. ‘His Lordship has a castle in Spain which he intends to move to imminently, so the post requires someone who desires foreign travel.’

  My head snapped up like you see in a cartoon. All traces of travel fatigue vanished. ‘Spain?’ I gasped. The sun came out and choirs of celestial angels blew trumpets on fluffy clouds. I could have shouted ‘Hallelujah’ and planted a kiss right on the end of this stern woman’s nose.

  ‘I’ll take it,’ I announced.

  ‘The salary is ten shillings a week …’

  ‘I’ll take it,’ I said again.

  ‘You will have a half-day off once a week and every other Sunday and your duties include …’

  I stopped listening. It didn’t matter if I had to drag a sack of coal from London to Suffolk with my teeth, I was going to take it. Because it meant that finally, finally, my dreams would be realized. I would get to travel to Spain.
/>
  It’s worth keeping in mind that I didn’t really know much about Spain. Few did back in 1936, but in my eyes it was a hot, humid, exotic, fantastical place full of swarthy men and palm trees. Not since I’d climbed to the very top of the tallest tree in the village as a ten-year-old tomboy had the world seemed so big and so full of adventure and magic.

  Now I was getting to live my dreams. I was going to live in Spain. No one in my family, in fact no one I knew, had ever travelled abroad. Alan, that possessive footman, had told me it was an impossibility. Well, I’d show him, I’d show them all! Mollie Browne was going to Spain to live in a real-life castle. Who knew what amazing adventures beckoned!

  On the bus back to Woodhall, my heart was bursting with rapturous joy. Back in the kitchen I raced over to Mrs Jones and planted a big wet kiss on her cheek.

  ‘Get away with ya,’ she scolded, wiping her cheek angrily. ‘What’s come over you, big daft dolly daydream?’

  ‘I’m off to Spain, that’s what!’ I babbled excitedly. ‘Me, in Spain, what about that?’

  Mr Orchard looked up from a bottle of wine he was decanting. ‘Has anyone warned the natives?’ he said drily.

  ‘You’re just jealous,’ I snapped back. Cheeky, yes, but he couldn’t sack me now.

  He raised one eyebrow a fraction. ‘I wish you the very best of luck, Mollie. Something tells me you will need it. And, tell me, just who is the lucky man or woman who has the dubious honour of being your new employer?’

  ‘Lord Islington,’ I said proudly. I could tell even Mr Orchard was impressed.

  ‘Aah, Lord Islington,’ he said as if he took tea with him regularly. ‘Lord Islington, otherwise known as First Baron Islington, educated at Harrow and Christ Church Oxford. Former Governor of New Zealand, Privy Counsellor and most recently Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies. Seventy years old now, I believe, but a most impressive gentleman.’

  ‘You sound as if you’ve swallowed a copy of The Times,’ I giggled.

  ‘Less of your sauce, Mollie,’ snapped Mrs Jones.

  It was September 1936 when I took my leave of Woodhall.

  In a way I was sad to go, but life moves on. Besides, Phyllis was getting my job, so she was getting a leg-up too.

  As I packed my small case and clambered down the back staircase for the last time, I found Irene and Phyllis waiting at the bottom, wearing solemn faces.

  ‘Who’s died then?’ I laughed.

  ‘This place won’t be half as much fun without you,’ sniffed Irene, getting a large hankie out of her apron pocket and blowing her nose loudly.

  ‘Yeah,’ agreed Phyllis. ‘Who’s going to get me into trouble now?’

  In the servants’ hall Mr Orchard offered me a stiff handshake, but Mrs Jones surprised me the most when she threw her arms round me and I found my face stuffed into her vast and fleshy bosom. It was like being folded into a giant pile of dough. When I was finally allowed up for air, her pudgy little face lit up with a rare smile that reached her eyes.

  ‘I’ll miss you,’ she said, ‘but I’ll come and see you at your mother’s for tea on your next half-day off.’ And then, as if embarrassed by her unusual show of affection, ‘Don’t you be giving that cook any cheek, you hear me, and don’t burn the béchamel sauce.’ She pushed back a lock of red hair from my face and added softly, ‘And stay out of trouble, Mollie Browne.’

  Untangling myself from her floury embrace, I grinned.

  ‘Trouble – me?’ I said, all wide-eyed innocence. Then I virtually skipped out of the servants’ door and on to my new life.

  Just outside I found dear, sweet, loyal George waiting with a bunch of flowers. No matter that I’d broken his heart, this loyal farmhand wasn’t going to let me go without saying goodbye.

  ‘May I write, Mollie?’ he asked, pressing the flowers into my hand.

  ‘Course,’ I said. ‘Where’s Louis then? He not come out to wish me good luck?’

  At the mention of his handsome older brother, George looked crestfallen. ‘He’s visiting his lady friend,’ he mumbled.

  Feeling a little tactless, I smiled and stroked George’s ruddy cheek. It reddened even more at my touch.

  ‘No matter,’ I said, kissing his warm cheek. ‘You’re here and that’s what counts. You’re a real pal.’

  Then I hopped on my bike and cycled past the woods where I’d enjoyed many a secret tryst with Alan, past the woodshed where I’d overheard racy Mabel and her secret lover, and round to the front of the drive, where I disturbed a pheasant who shot into the air with an indignant croak.

  ‘Watch out!’ I chuckled. ‘Or you’ll end up in Mrs Jones’s soup.’

  I took one final backward glance at the grand old hall where I had spent the past five years in service. The sight of the imposing antlers either side of the large front door brought a smile to my face as I remembered me and Flo tiptoeing past them, scared witless, that night we’d sneaked out to the dance.

  I had laughed, cried, scrubbed, plucked, filleted, diced, scoured, fried, roasted, betrayed and been betrayed, been bullied and bossed, learnt to dance, kiss and cook at this grand and magical old house, deep in the countryside.

  All in all, Woodhall had been the very best of times.

  I may have started as a nervous fourteen-year-old scullery maid, but I was leaving a confident woman on the verge of a new life in Spain. Other people, like Granny Esther, may have knocked my profession down, told me I was nothing but a skivvy for the thankless upper classes, but I knew domestic service was opening up new worlds for me.

  I turned and pedalled down the long gravel drive. With a warm, light breeze kissing my face and my red hair flying behind me, I had soon reached the end. I was just about to cycle round the corner, out of sight forever, when I heard Mrs Jones call after me, hands planted as ever on those beefy hips:

  ‘And don’t forget, Mollie Browne – never stir a sauce with anything other than a wooden spoon.’

  I was due immediately at Lord Islington’s London property near Hyde Park, but I managed to stop at Mother’s for a quick cup of tea before I got the train. Granny Esther was there when I arrived.

  ‘Don’t know why you want to go all the way over to Spain,’ she grumbled. ‘Perfectly good jobs to be had here in Norfolk.’

  I shook my head in despair, making sure to do it by her blind eye.

  ‘Don’t give me cheek, Mollie,’ she snapped. ‘What do you want to go abroad for anyway? It’ll be filthy dirty and them natives have some strange ways about them. They eat funny food –’ she paused for effect – ‘with their hands.’

  I snorted, which just seemed to irritate her more.

  ‘Heathens,’ she spat. ‘They don’t wash, you know. No hygiene about them.’

  Granny seemed to have conveniently forgotten her habit of pouring paraffin before serving up butter when she used to run her country shop.

  All the same, I pondered her original question. Just why was I so desperate to go abroad? I couldn’t put my finger on the exact reason. Most girls my age I knew were desperate to marry and start having babies. Not me. My mostly disastrous brushes with romance hadn’t exactly left me panting for more. I just had this feeling, this strong primeval urge inside me to travel, to see something of the world. I knew that made me different to my contemporaries, but then I’d never felt the same as everyone else anyway.

  Ever since I’d sat in that big old tree as a ten-year-old and mapped out my future, a future far away from Norfolk, my heart was always yearning for more. Now I’d conquered London and I was about to set sail for Spain. Nothing was quite so thrilling as the unknown.

  I was blissfully unaware that the Spanish Civil War had just started and Franco’s fascist troops had mobilized, or that there was widespread poverty, unrest and turbulence. I just wanted to gaze at this hot and dusty country, watch dark-skinned men wrestling bulls under the balmy Mediterranean skies. No more rainy Norfolk days, no more thick and stifling London fog, no more breaking the ice on your jug of wate
r so you could take a wash or shivering in an attic under an old blanket. Just endless sunshine.

  It was the lure of the strange and exotic that acted like a gravitational pull to me. Besides, I had to take the chance. Opportunities like this hardly ever came up for a girl like me. Foreign travel was something you never even considered if you were from a working-class background. The only person in my family who’d ever left Britain was my grandmother’s sister Rose, who’d moved to Australia, and that had taken her three months by boat! Not like nowadays, where people think nothing of hopping on a plane.

  I knew I’d be travelling by boat with the rest of the staff. Just the thought of setting sail from Portsmouth made me tingle with excitement.

  When I finally reached Lord Islington’s Hyde Park property, I was overawed by the size of it. But it’s funny – looking back, I hardly remember anything about that house or the people that worked in it. Just that it was very, very large, with endless dark rooms cloaked in heavy velvet curtains that blocked out the light and no end of staff to cater for one seventy-year-old lord.

  The place was in total chaos. Packing boxes were crammed into every available space in readiness for the move to Spain and Mrs Pickering walked from room to room with a clipboard, organizing everyone.

  The cook was French, which was very exotic in my eyes, and was married to the butler. She was most impressed that I knew how to make a decent Consommé Royale.

  ‘Zis is good zat an Engleesh girl knows zis,’ she said, and not for the first time I found myself thanking good old Flo.

  I’d not been there long when a familiar face poked round the door.

  ‘Here, Mollie, this is grand, ain’t it?’ whispered a male voice.

  ‘Ernie Bratton as I live and breathe,’ I cried, throwing my arms round him. ‘What you doing here?’

  ‘Captain Eric’s in town so we’re staying up at Cadogan Square. Mr Stocks and the rest of the staff are all back at Woodhall, so it’s just the two of us.’

  Ernie Bratton was Captain Eric’s valet and a nicer bloke you’d be hard-pressed to find. He was handsome all right, in his twenties with lovely thick curly dark hair and film-star looks. There was no chemistry between us, more’s the pity, but he was a lovely chap and his ready smile always cheered me up.