My life story - Henry J Macey (best books for 20 year olds .TXT) 📗

the families, one tap set in the garden in front of the toilets, all water would be drawn for the families’ needs, in buckets to be poured into the copper for heating to have baths and the washing of clothing, or cold water to the sink to rinse the soap from the clothing, I remember standing in that stone sink myself to be bathed, the rest of the family would use a tin bath in front of the fire.  All four cottages shared the two outside toilets, which were at the end of the garden, with eight adults and fifteen children, there were sometimes agonising waits outside the loos.

 

In the early day of 43, there were a great number of Americans soldiers and airmen stationed in camps around Wellington, they would drive through the town, and we would wave and shout at them and they would throw chocolate bars to us.  Some of the bars would turn out to be chocolate laxative; we would feast on them and have the runs for days.  There were good times to be had as well; the Xmas party’s at the camps where all the kids got presents, and for the older girls, there were dances to go to, chaperoned of course.

 

When these servicemen were confined to their barracks, ‘we realise now it must have been the days before D-day,’ a large number of young people mostly girls went out to the camps, to speak with them through the wire fencing.  Some would run errands for them mostly things they needed from the shops, or to take messages to someone they wanted to see, then suddenly they vanished, we had been so used to seeing them around that the town looked so empty without their presence.  My eldest sister has told me ‘when I pressed her for information of those days’ that there were many weeping young ladies following their disappearance.

 

After the war ended there was great rejoicing in our house, for we were told our father would soon be returning home for good, then there came the question will we stay in Somerset or move back to smoky old London, Somerset won hands down, my mother and sisters liked the clean country air, and of course the boys my sisters had met. My father did like his gardening, as he had never really had a garden before, he turned the whole garden into a food factory, but his greatest joy was his chickens, I remember the postman bringing boxes of day-old chicks; that my father had bought from a catalogue.

 

He reared them to provide eggs, some to be eaten some to be hatched, these, in turn, would be reared to provide food for the table.  His layers were prized, and safe from the table, he had his favourites; one, in particular, was a large rode island red cockerel, a huge beast that was almost as big as me, well, I was only about five then; it would chase me whenever I stepped out of the door, I had to wait until it looked away then run like the wind to get to the gate.

One day it was found running around with its neck broken, the head hanging to one side,  I got the blame, which was quite unfair, just because I had a stick in my hand at the time, didn’t mean I did it, did it? We couldn’t afford to waste good food so mum cooked it for Sunday dinner, I tucked into it with relish, knowing from now on I could go safely out into the garden, with the rode island red sitting nicely in my belly.

 

School! I did not like it from the first day, my mother dragged me there kicking and screaming, where she left me to wonder, was she ever coming back for me?  The task of making sure I got to school fell to my second elder sister Ellen, she objected to this job, for it meant she had to go home straight from school, and not socialise with her school friends 'meaning boys', so for revenge, she would hold me by the collar, and kicked me all the way there and back.

 

I was no good at school sports, so I always played the left-back position, left-back in the sports store, cleaning the equipment for the others to use.  I was no good at classroom work ether, always at the back of the class out of the way, so the bright sparks and teacher’s pets could impress the teacher from the front.  I found out later I was dyslectic, and even today I write bear when I mean bare, thanks to the man who invented word processors and electronic spell checkers you are reading this today, I excelled in geography and history and had a knack for remembering dates and places of battles and so forth.

 

There seemed to be more snow in those days, or did it look deeper because I was smaller.  Behind the milk factory, there was a hill, we used as a ski run, with sheets of corrugated iron as sledges, we would hurtle down the slope with no fear at all, to crash into the wall at the bottom.  In the hills around Wellington, there were fruit farms owned by large landowners, in the summer my mother with a large number of woman from the surrounding area would pick the fruit from low bushes, the mothers would take their children along with them, the young ones tied to their backs so they could not get lost.

 

It was back-breaking work for the woman, for the little they were paid, I was there to help mum, but in truth, I would eat more than I put in the basket.  On summer holiday trips to London, we would end up in the hop fields of Kent, dad used to joke you pick the hops, I’ll drink the beer.  It was on one of these trips, my father taught me the meaning of patience, as I loved riding on the old trams, my favourite being the Rotherhithe tunnel.  From the Elephant and Castle, we would take a horse-drawn tram to the terminus just south of the river, from here we would wait to catch an electric tram, for the run through the tunnel.

 

This day we seemed to be waiting forever, my father just sat and talked to someone he must have known, as I started to get impatient as several trams came and went; stamping my feet I insisted we catch the very next one along.  He looked at me and said “do you really want to go on the very next tram,” I answered him in a demanding voice that I did, so when the next tram left we were on it, going back to the Elephant and Castle.

 

When I was eleven, I joined the Army Cadet Force of the Somerset Light Infantry which I stayed in for the next five years, we did the normal things like marching, rifle drill, and exercises on the moors around Somerset and of course, the two-week camp.

One camp in particular sticks in my memory, I was about thirteen at the time and we were camped at Tregantle Fort, an old Army Fortress in Cornwall, it is just south of Plymouth across the river Tamar, a few miles from the river crossing at Torpoint.

 

The reason I remember it so well was that it was the first time I saw death, and it was not a pretty sight, we were going on an exercise in the moorland adjacent to the Fort and were taken to the starting point in Army trucks.  The track was narrow and built up about three or four feet above the moor, as the truck in front of us was going around a bend, the bank gave way and the truck toppled and rolled down the bank.  It had a canvas roof that offered no protection for those inside, it came to rest upside down, the canopy crushed against the body of the truck, trapping all those inside.

 

The truck I was in stopped and we all jumped out to help, I am ashamed to say that I froze and was violently sick, and had to be carried away by the medics myself, I cannot be sure, but I think seven cadets lost their lives that day.  I rose to the dizzy heights of Colour Sergeant and held the flag at ceremonies, but weapon training was my forte, the Bren gun being my favourite, I knew its history and could strip and rebuild it blindfold.

 

Just before I left school, I got a job as a paperboy, so I had to have a bicycle, here my father took this opportunity to teach me the finer points of finance if you want something you pay for it.  The other paperboys and I formed a cycling club called The Wellington Wobbly Wheelers, and went for rides in the country and around to the nearby towns, my bike was an upright Raleigh, with a lock in the forks to lock the front wheel at an angle so it could not be stolen. On an excursion, to the seaside town of Minehead, we parked the bikes, and played in the sand and went for a swim.

 

On returning to my bike, I was devastated to find I had lost the key, as I didn’t want to damage my bike; and because I had a spare key at home I had to walk my bike home. The other boy rode on without me, with one saying he would go to my house and get the key then ride back to me. I started heading home which was easier said than done, as I had to carry the front wheel because I could not steer it, on the outskirts of Minehead a police car pulled up beside me, and the policeman asked if I had stolen the bike. I explained my predicament, quit tearfully.

 

I must have touched a soft spot in his heart, or perhaps he just wanted to check out my story, because he loaded my bike in the back of his car, with the front wheel sticking out and drove me home, he was on his way back to Taunton and would make the short denture to Wellington.  We passed my friends not long after, and I was home a long time before them.

 

One day, a few of us were sitting on our bikes in town when a fire engine flashed by, closely followed by an ambulance, we raced after it but when we got to the fire, it turned out to be in the coke works where my father was employed, I pulled up just as they were carrying my father out on a stretcher.  His clothes were still smoking and his skin was blackened and hanging from his body, he spent so long in the hospital that we didn't think he would make it, but one thing I can say about my father is he was definitely a fighter, he fought the battle for life and he won hands down, he pulled through, though badly scarred and lived until he was in his nineties.

 

He never went back to work at the gas works but got a job it the milk factory making butter and cheese, I can remember making butter at home myself; out of the buttermilk, he brought home in the old stainless steel flask he carried his tea in. I can remember staring for hours, and add salt to taste and poring the way away, and we had a verity of cheese’s maturing in one of the cupboards, that made the kitchen smell of mould. I have to add here, that this was not contraband, all the workers at the milk factory were allowed a certain quantity of milk, or the like as part of their wages.

 

My first brush with the law was when I was still at school, my friends and I decided it would be fun to go