He asked me if I would go with him to Sunderland Empire on the Saturday night which was the night following the dance. There was a play called ‘The Eternal City’. I would only consent if I could pay for myself and at last he agreed. That was the start of the happiest time of my whole life. We were both Church workers, young Conservatives and we both were in a glee party. We seemed to walk and talk and laugh and sing our way through life. Mother never liked him for some unknown reason. He was a strong character and so was she so they clashed. If Ben thought he was in the right no one could move him. He had a strong character, but a good one, and he was a most beautiful writer. He was always trying to improve himself.
I remember all the joys of his success which never changed his attitude to life. His motto was ‘do a good deed whenever you can’. When we first started married life we were just able to manage. We had no money between us as we had been in the same boat. Our mothers had depended on our wages. We had no money for a honeymoon. Anyway, the 1925 strike was impending but it was put off to the following year 1926. During that year Ben had to down the pit for so many days each week. However he always said he would not have missed the experience for all the money in the world. 1926 – It was one of the warmest summers I can ever remember. Nobody wanted to go back to work although many were suffering extreme poverty. Anything the miners have now has been hardly won over the years.
Families lived all the day on the cricket field or the beaches in that summer of 1926. They would sing ‘We have no money but we get great fun’.
The strike lasted a very long time and all of them were very heavily in debt by the time it was over, because many of them were in scheme houses, and could not pay the mortgages they owed to Londonderry Collieries. They were horrifying times and the strike didn’t seem to benefit them at all. Yet they made the best of everything, but I know how extremely worried they were for many years after the strike was over and other people had settled down to living. Yet they seemed to remain undaunted and were a happy brood. They had no money but the food they concocted for their picnics was a credit to their ingenuity. As families sat together and unfolded their ‘bait’, there were shrieks of laughter. Dripping and bread, beetroot sandwiches, pickled cabbage, lettuce, scallions all in sandwiches, rice puddings cold and cut in squares, cold Yorkshire puddings, mashed potatoes spread on bread. Jam was a great treat. Soup and loaves of bread were provided in the soup kitchens. They looked a down and out lot by the time the strike ended, but they were undaunted.
The miners have always been a loyal bunch of men. Mind you, some of them were more loyal to each other than they were to their own wives. My father used to tell many stories of the loyalty a miner bore to his ‘marra’, but Mother questioned it many a time. For instance Dad told the tale, with great relish, of the miner who was hurt in the pit and was taken to the Infirmary. His three ‘marras’ decided to visit him. When they got there the man’s wife was also visiting. Her husband sent her out to the shop on some excuse and when she had gone he said to his ‘marra’, “Look in that locker and you’ll find five pounds. Take it before she comes back, and have a good night on me, because if she gets hold of it she’ll only waste it”. Mother was not amused. My father could always entertain company with a fund of stories like this. He was a splendid man. I can still hear Uncle Bob’s bellows of laughter sitting around our fire on a winter’s night. But that was in the far distant past, and I should not be talking of it now, for this part of my memoirs is supposed to deal with the years that followed.
Life is very varied and memories are both sweet and sad. Today is Sunday, and as it is such a lovely day I have been down to Joan’s for coffee. Isn’t it funny what little things can set one off in the realm of dreams? As I sat looking out on the village green I saw a lovely sight which sent me back into the past again. A bunch of men were playing at quoits, a game I have never witnessed since before the First World War. Even the village bobby was there. Such peaceful scenes restore ones hopes again. I pray night and day that there will be no more wars, as countless will beside me, but my faith is shattered when I hear the news. Men are growing so wise in so many ways, yet never wise enough to prevent wars. They will never learn.
The First World War was over, but we never really recovered. Food and clothing were short for many years. There came the depression again when all wages were cut. Women had to have jobs to make way for the men and things were not good. But at least we were at peace – or so we thought. Even so there were mumblings of a second war which made the peace so uneasy.
When the Second World War did come, housewives were better prepared, at least I know many that were – just as I was. We benefited from the experiences of our parents. I tried to stock as much imperishable goods as I could afford. Tea, sugar, soap, cereals, all had been so scarce in the First World War, so we got in as much as possible. Then when things were rationed we were not found wanting. Bread was rationed but that was a lesson learned. We got what stopped us from starving and had no room for waste. Mother, I remember, got in sacks of flour in the First World War, but often she could get no yeast. She made girdle cakes for us, which were quite nice when eaten warm, but it meant new batches at each meal, so you can imagine her work with a family. Cakes sold in shops were stodgy and unpalatable, but there were queues miles long for them. Many a time people joined queues and didn’t know what for. I know women who spent their days standing in queues and enjoyed it.
Also in the second war we had clothes coupons. This too was a much fairer way, but even so, we had to make do and mend. The poor had never been extravagant, we had always darned and patched and worn hand-me-downs, so we were very little worse off. We even had a little party for my sister’s birthday.
I remember it so well because one of her friends came with a pair of fancy garters on her legs. They were made of miched satin with fancy boots, and of course we thought we should have the same. They were only sixpence a pair said we. But mother was outraged. She had never heard of such waste. When all was said and done our stockings kept up just the same with our pieces of string or old laces and in any case they should be covered up. So no fancy garters. But it makes one realise how far advanced we are nowadays. To look back on the sad and poverty-stricken days of my grandmother makes one wonder in awe how my grandfather fought for his trade union ideals. He always said he would not benefit but “some day our offspring will know better times and so they should”. I long for the peace of my childhood days but never for the poverty.