World War IIMr Alex Acheson came to live in Highfields in 1938.
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I was called up in July 1940 and Margaret went on living in the flat. She had a friend from Long Whatton who shared it in Leicestershire, and then, to cut a long story short, when I came back from the war in July 1945, we got together. I was demobbed in January 1946. But as my wife was a teacher and got the long school holidays, I had to go on working normally
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Tell me more about the Labour Party in Highfields,just after the war. Was there a good deal of popular support at the time? Well, if you remember the 1945 selection was a landslide. The great hero of the war, Churchill, in effect, was rejected. I had refused a commission. In my naive way when the Colonel asked me if I would go forward for training for a commission, I am astonished now, I said, "Sir, I wish to earn my commission on the field of battle." I mean how naive can you get? So I was in the other ranks. In the army, and I say this with real conviction, it was a 'class' army – it was 'them and us'. That really was one of the reasons why the overwhelming bulk of the other ranks and the armed services voted for Labour, with their programme of nationalisation and the taking of profit making concerns into public ownership.
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when I came back, I dived into Labour Party work. I covered the Wycliffe Ward which covered the St George's area and some of Highfields up to Spinney Hill. It was a tiny Ward. During the war, the Labour Party had had the political truce, so there was no organisation. Most of the men were either working hard on munitions or things like that. In the army the membership card of the Labour Party in Wycliffe was between thirty and forty and there were only perhaps half a dozen of us who attended meetings.
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Roger Cave came to live in Highfields in 1940, the year he was born.
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I remember during the war years there was a shelter in the yard. Everybody had one really in case of bombs, and also we used to keep our own chickens then because of the shortage of people working on farms. You had to be a bit self contained so we had our own chickens, and also father had his own allotment and that was on Victoria Park, an area that was turned into allotments
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I can remember the shortage of food, although I had never known any abundance of food because I'd grown up with the ration. I suppose we got used to it to a certain extent, but you know because of that there wasn't a lot of variety in the food that we had.
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I was a bit young to remember the bombing but from what my parents said (in 1940) when I was born, I think it was November when the Germans dropped a string of bombs on Highfields. I was taken in a clothes basket when they had the air raid warning to St Peter's School. It was used as a meeting point because the building had been shored up with extra timber so it would stand the blast of bombs. When the siren went off we went to the school to shelter from any bombing, and my parents said they took me in a clothes basket. Infact the night we were there, a bomb dropped only about a hundred yards away from the school building on the corner of Gopsall Street and Sparkenhoe Street, then there was a string of bombs dropped in Highfields Street and down Sparkenhoe Street. After the war, these areas weren't developed for quite a few years. As a child we used to use that as a play area on the bomb sites.
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I think the bombs were only dropped one night on Highfields, but there were other warnings when the siren would go off. These sirens were situated on Victoria Park plus there were anti-aircraft guns there as well for the defence of Leicester and particularly for the Highfields there. Yes, the sirens had a high pitched wail you know which would be quite frightening.
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Was there an air raid shelter in Gopsall Street? No, the only thing was the school, but we would have individual ones in our own backyard as well, it was like a corrugated iron sheet which was curved over the shelter and was submerged into the ground, you would go down steps to it.
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I can remember when I was a child, for bonfire night we used to collect all the rubbish, and after the war we used to store it in this air raid shelter in the street.
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Helen Edwards interviewing Sandy Coleman for Highfields Remembered.
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I can still remember rationing. We didn't have Easter eggs, we used to have cardboard eggs that my mum used to use over and over again that parted with little things inside, and not necessarily things to eat you know, perhaps things that we'd perhaps taken a shine to. My mum had decided, right, at Easter I'll give that to Sandy or I'll give that to Anne, and it used to be inside your Easter egg.
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Dr Stuart Fraser lived in Highfields from 1946 the year he was born.
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My mother in fact was born in a nursing home on Severn Street in 1922 there were quite a number of small nursing homes scattered around just off the London Road there that is a part of Highfields. I don't know what it looked like and I don't know much about it because in fact I think it was destroyed when the sticker bombs went through Highfields in the second world war.
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The interesting thing is about the servants that my grandparents had is that my parents never had any servants at all in the house from 1947 onwards, after the war of course, but up until before the war my grandparents had always had servants and they used to get their maidservant by going to the Countesthorpe Cottage Homes for orphans and when a girl had to leave school she then took up residence and lived in the house and then went usually because she was getting married, and in fact the last servant my grandparents ever had in 1939/40 she married from my grandparents house, this was of course in Evington and she kept in touch with my grandmother until she died.
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Mr Tirthram Hansrani came to live in Highfields in the late 1940s.
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Food and clothes were on ration. It was hard to get eggs and butter. It was hard to get clothes. We got ration tokens from an office on Albion Road.
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Mrs Hazel Jacques came to Highfields in 1942.
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Did they say what sort of hairstyle you had to have? Yes, it had to be cut short with a ribbon in it. Yeah. It wasn't until one of the little girls, one of the Catholic girls came in (her name was Margaret), with black ringlets, (oh, she was pretty) she didn't want her to have her hair cut, so we said we wouldn't have ours cut either. You couldn't cut those ringlets off you know, we all objected . We hated the hairdressers! The lady would get the clippers and cut the back of our hair, like a boy. It was awful! We hated it! If the sirens went off we used to say, "Hope the hairdresser is bombed!"
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Spinney Hill park, now that had a big hole dug in it, and all the soil went along the other side of the fence in the park, near the poplar trees, they've been cut down. The lads used to ride up and down on their bikes and run up and down the hills. And what happened with the hole they dug in the middle? The hole? Well, it was filled with water, and a big concrete casing put round it, and I don't know whether there was anything on top, but somebody did get drowned in it.
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We had a shelter built in our backyard, it was underneath an ammunition factory! Oh, it was quite funny, that! Ma used to let us stay in her sitting room, the french doors used to be open in case we had to run to the shelter. When we slept in the shelter we were in all these bunks. Coventry came in for the very bad bombings. Tichborne Street got a lot of the bombing here in Leicester.
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After the war, when the King and Queen drove through the park, I was in the Guards then, not the Guides- it was the Salvation Army Guards who leader looked after us.
When the King and Queen came, they wanted two girls to stand with the standards at the gate, so me and Betty Matthews stood one side of the gate with the flag, and I stood the other side with the Salvation Army flag and the Union Jack! The King and Queen came through and the King saluted the flag! The minute that the car had gone, everybody was running across the park to go and get another view of them.
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The victory parade was about 3 miles long and it lasted ages. The streets were packed with people coming back, you had to be careful your shoes didn't get stuck in the tramlines. The trams used to run up East Park Road.
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Was there rationing during the war, did that sort of affect you at all? Ooh, yes. There was rationing. The rations used to come from the receiving home on a Thursday or a Friday. When ma was away this Miss Gillespie, she made us put the groceries away, so it was like bags of sugar had to go in the sugar bin, cereal oats for the porridge, and while we were unpacking them the tea fell in the porridge! Oh! We couldn't get all the tea out of the porridge because every time you put your hand in, it was sort of mixing in with the porridge. So we told Miss Gillespie (who had very bad eyesight and couldn't see hardly anything) who said to leave it as it. So when the porridge was cooking at night, we thought, "Oh, it smells alright." We went to bed, but the next morning we found all this brown, tea leaved porridge coming through the hatch. We had to eat it else we couldn't go to the cinema!
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We lived near the gasworks before we went in the home, on Lothair Road. As I say, they bombed Cavendish Road. I think the bombs were meant for the gasworks. But they missed, and with living on East Park Road I think we were pretty safe.
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quite a few little places got the odd bomb or two. Tichborne Street, Upper Tichborne Street. Ma used to call us out of bed, get us all downstairs, then she would put the cocoa on. We used to always have a mug of cocoa while the bombing was going on. We sat there and sang hymns, or wartime songs, or even, "She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain ". Did you feel frightened? No, I didn't feel frightened, it was lovely! I used to enjoy it! There was a knock on the door one night, we were sitting there in candlelight, ma said, "Oh, I wonder who that is?" "It's the Germans ma, it's the Germans!" Anyway, she said, "You stop here." We stopped in the cellar while she had to go right up to the front door. We went to the cellar steps to see who it was, and it was Father Huntley,the Vicar. He always used to come and see us, and he also had a mug of cocoa with us! Ma used to say, "Are you going to sing some hymns?" We said, "Oh no, no." We would tuck our legs up in our nightgowns and wrap the blankets round us and hide!
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When you go back there today, it must seem very different. Has the area changed? Well, my sisters and myself went back to St Stephen's Church but it's exactly the same as it was. Apart from the building it was full of black people. Really, it's better now. The personality of the church has changed, people are welcoming there, they're not all staid. It's High Church, isn't it? Yes, it is. Father Irwin, he's there now, he's lovely. He and all his black congregation are lovely people. We had a cup of tea with them in their little room at the back that used to be the factory canteen during the war. It was reverted back after the war to a youth club
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Miss Alma Knight was born in Highfields in 1923.
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Our house was considered quite modern, but it didn't have a bathroom which of course it was the Thirties, and then the war started and you couldn't get work done like that. Of course my sister was at school by then, so as soon as we could possibly get it done, our parents had a bathroom put in with hot water, which we thought was absolutely lovely.
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Yes. Did you have public shelters? Yes, we did. They were the brick ones. Mostly at the junction of two or three roads, so if people were out and the sirens started, they could go straight in. Gopsall Street school was also a shelter, and people used to go there. But a lot of people did have their own Anderson Shelters. But unfortunately it was the winter, and the water seeped in a bit.
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I was only about 15. It was quite frightening. I'd gone to the library with my father, to the old Garendon Street library, (those old streets are all gone now) and there were flares and incendiaries. Oh, I was absolutely petrified, you know! We dived into an entry, and was sort of dashing home when we got to Guthlaxton Street. It was about 8 o'clock and everyone had just bought their pints! So of course they all had to come out! We just got to Gopsall Street, my mother was just peeping round the door. She'd picked my sister up and we just got into the shelter.
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they had these sort of places where you were supposed to put waste food, that was for pig food you see, because our relatives in the country used to buy a share in a pig! It sounds a bit funny, doesn't it! They did it through the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. In those days you had an allowance to buy food and you fed them on scraps, then when the poor things died, it was all shared out, you see! You were encouraged to grow your own food, you see.
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Milk was also rationed, we didn't get very much. I volunteered for essential work so we had 10 extra coupons to go towards bread and starch type food which I didn't eat a lot of really. My mother usually kept the meat ration for the weekend. Of course there are a lot of books that have been updated on this now. Things like liver and kidneys, you registered with the butcher, you were all on a rota and you could buy those which was off ration you see.
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My mother and grandma were very very good cooks. They'd preserve food in these glass jars, they made jam, and we had an uncle who had a market garden and he had lots of fruit bushes, blackcurrants and that. But of course, you used your sugar ration up you see, and we all loved sugar. But I mean that was a minor detail, we all came through it. Yes. It makes you realise that even if there was another petrol rationing and food holdup, you can survive on tinned and dried foods you know. They didn't suggest evacuating? No, we had evacuees here. Oh, they actually sent people to Leicester? Yes, and there was a lot of Jewish people came up from London, from Clapton especially, they were bombed very badly there. Oh. And that was actually in Highfields? Yes, yes. And then another very interesting thing was, I think it was 1940, the fall of France, the troops were all evacuated you know, and they were brought up to the Midlands to be billeted here. So we had 5 in the house, and we had 3 soldiers with nowhere for them sleep.
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we had evacuees here. Oh, they actually sent people to Leicester? Yes, and there was a lot of Jewish people came up from London, from Clapton especially, they were bombed very badly there. Oh. And that was actually in Highfields? Yes, yes. And then another very interesting thing was, I think it was 1940, the fall of France, the troops were all evacuated you know, and they were brought up to the Midlands to be billeted here. So we had 5 in the house, and we had 3 soldiers with nowhere for them sleep. Oh goodness! So the billeting officer brought them and said, "Oh, if you've got a spare room, or a spare quilt or pillows they'll sleep on the floor." So you had 3 strange men in your house? Yes, they were absolutely lovely. They looked so desperately tired, some had just got plimsolls on, and a singlet with the battle top. A few had got their haversacks, and one or two had got little bits of rations they just brought across, they'd come over the Channel you see, landed at Dover or wherever and come up to the Midlands.
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the billeting officer brought them and said, "Oh, if you've got a spare room, or a spare quilt or pillows they'll sleep on the floor." So you had 3 strange men in your house? Yes, they were absolutely lovely. They looked so desperately tired, some had just got plimsolls on, and a singlet with the battle top. A few had got their haversacks, and one or two had got little bits of rations they just brought across, they'd come over the Channel you see, landed at Dover or wherever and come up to the Midlands.
So how long did you have them for? Well, they had to report on Victoria Park at a lovely Victorian pavilion. That was the headquarters where they all reported, and where they were all sent out to other places. One was sent out to North Africa, he was taken prisoner of war there. Two of them were moved on fairly quickly, one stayed a bit longer, and then we had perhaps another three stay. But they always came round with the billeting officer, and it was all documented properly, you see. They were very very nice, they'd come from lovely homes some of them, and the one who was in North Africa, he was Welsh. He had a little time to go back on leave. His parents had a lovely garden and he brought us some Aster plants, things like that. He took to my granny ever so well, well all of us really, we've got a lot of memories of them. This was seen as a safe area, then, presumably? Oh, it was. Strangely enough, that would be the summer of 1940, it was the November of that year when we got the raids. Of all the Midlands, I believe Derby and Coventry were hit the most. Coventry was very bad. I've got an auntie-in-law and who was bombed 3 times. She had a sick husband you know, and she worked very long hours in an aircraft factory, so it was a hard life, but she's still here bless her, hale and hearty! You know, she's a dear lady, I must go and see her. And you were working throughout the war? Oh yes. I was at the same firm. They had to give up the uniforms of course, I was in the office at that time, and they had war contracts to do. There was PT wear for the army, the uniforms for the ATS, tropical kit for wrens, WAAFs. A gentleman came from London, I don't know whether he was evacuated up here, (he was deaf) but it was the first time I'd ever seen it in Leicester, he had an electric cutter which cut layers and layers of fabric,
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And you were working throughout the war? Oh yes. I was at the same firm. They had to give up the uniforms of course, I was in the office at that time, and they had war contracts to do. There was PT wear for the army, the uniforms for the ATS, tropical kit for wrens, WAAFs. A gentleman came from London, I don't know whether he was evacuated up here, (he was deaf) but it was the first time I'd ever seen it in Leicester, he had an electric cutter which cut layers and layers of fabric, he'd been in the tailoring trade. He laid his cloth out, marked the patterns and then cut them with his cutter! Of course they had a lot of extra people, outdoor staff, and I insurance cards and income tax was all taken out of the wages. The contracts for materials was quite a big, you see. I had a girl a little bit younger helping me. But, it wouldn't have been what you called a reserved occupation, after 19 or 20, so I made enquiries and went to work on more essential work. That was inspection for radios for aircraft, which of course, was all right for the war.
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I insurance cards and income tax was all taken out of the wages. The contracts for materials was quite a big, you see. I had a girl a little bit younger helping me. But, it wouldn't have been what you called a reserved occupation, after 19 or 20, so I made enquiries and went to work on more essential work. That was inspection for radios for aircraft, which of course, was all right for the war. Did you enjoy that? I liked it very much, yes. And that was in Leicester? Yes, but a lot of relatives did that sort of work, one or two were nursing, it was sort of assistant nurse then in those days, of course a lot were in the forces, but my father was still on city transport. Did the buses keep going through the war? Oh yes, and we had some very bad winters. The snow congested on the roads, the snowploughs wouldn't touch them, but they had one or two buses that did have the snowplough on, you see. So it was very bad, you know, my father often had to get up early to walk to Abbey Park depot, get the bus out and clear the roads. There was round the clock working for factories in those days, 24 hour working.
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Did the buses keep going through the war? Oh yes, and we had some very bad winters. The snow congested on the roads, the snowploughs wouldn't touch them, but they had one or two buses that did have the snowplough on, you see. So it was very bad, you know, my father often had to get up early to walk to Abbey Park depot, get the bus out and clear the roads. There was round the clock working for factories in those days, 24 hour working. Sometimes he had quite a long working day and didn't come home at the proper time. After the war, were you still a teenager or in your early twenties? I was in my twenties then, yes. What did you do then? Well now where was I then? Yes, I was still in the same job, that was Gent and Company. But yes, it was very interesting work, quite exacting, you know. Then there was a changeover to civilian work, and a lot of people did had to go. At the time I had a long spell of very poor health. It may have been due to growing up in the war years, working long hours along with the poor diet. It was mostly due to an illness I had when I was a teenager, I was in and out of hospital quite a bit with various illnesses. But then I worked at another very nice firm, Davenset, Partridge Wilson. They were very kind if you were genuinely ill. I did loads of different jobs there. My sister worked at various jobs since she'd left school. She worked at one or two firms. She went to Gent and Company. They needed somebody in the purchasing office, so she said, "Oh, you know, I'll ask for you", so I applied and got the job. I was there until I was made redundant. I didn't actually retire you know, it was sort that I was redundant before retirement. Like a lot of people. I think the last few years was, possibly not quite so good, it was taken over with different staff coming in and very fragmented, you know. In the old days it was just like a big happy family. You had your Christmas dances and parties, it was a really lovely experience. But funnily enough, the last year I was there was the happiest. I worked at another branch, and then I went back to the main branch for the last year and it was very nice there. But unfortunately they closed the department down and even the manager went. What year was that? Yes, that was during all the redundancies in the 80s, yes. But I still find lots to do, committees and helping people and adult education, I'm back again tomorrow! Oh I love it there, it's absolutely lovely. It's at Wellington Street. I see they're expanding out into these sort of lunchtime things, where there are talks on different subjects. You don't have to book it. If you've got a free lunchtime you can go in you see, which is a lovely idea. So really you've taken up education again. Yes, I'm very interested in it, so if you know of anybody in education who'd like a bit more information about the old days, but just on a local level, you know. So you've stayed in the last house you moved into? Yes, my sister comes to stay. She was here recently, she'd have loved coming in, you know. Yes, she's married and lives in Cheshire. Oh, so she's gone quite a distance away. Yes. But you can get here quite quickly, they'd like me to go and stay for a week, you know. But you've never wanted to move from here? No, no I love it, yes. But, I'm afraid I do get a little bit upset about the smears that this area gets. Yes. You know, it's from people who don't even know you. I'll perhaps just go and have a cup of tea somewhere, and I'll say, "It's a bit breezy, I've walked into town." They say, "Oh, and where do you live then?" "Highfields," "Oh, you mean Highfields! Nobody respectable lives there, why on earth do you live there?" Well if anyone should know about it, it should be you! Of course! Yes! I mean we've always had lovely people there. Yes. But going back a few years, there was a bit of trouble with people drinking too much, it used to cause bits of arguments, but of course it was in the house then you see. I mean, they were the loveliest people when they'd not had a drink! That was the thing in those days. So how would you say Highfields has changed over the time that you've lived there? There's a lot of Asian people taken over the shops, and the newsagents is lovely. I think that is gorgeous, that newsagents. I mean, even from when white people had it, it's never changed a bit. It's really welcome to go in there, friends go in and have a little chat, and look what's on the front of the Mercury you know, and they say that if you're going to be a bit late they'll save things for you. They are lovely people in there, so that has never changed a bit, you know. But as I'm in town a lot I do quite a lot of grocery shopping in town. But the little corner shops are very nice in Gopsall Street, that's always been a grocery shop. But you've lost things like Charnwood Street. Oh, yes! When we had the survey for the improvements, a lot of us put, "Wish Charnwood Street would come back." I see! And strangely enough, that year I mentioned, the last year I was at the firm, which was a very happy year, there were about 6 or 7 gentlemen and a girl, well she'd be in her late twenties, she was West Indian, she was awfully nice to work with, she might perhaps have been 30, she remembered Charnwood, her mother taking her! So you see, she was a real Caribbean girl, and she loved what we loved.
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Mr Aidan Maguire came to Highfields in 1962.
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Of course, everyone remembered the place at the top of Sherratt Road and St Saviours Road. It was the Black Boy. I think it stood out for a lot of people because it was a local public house. Did a lot of people go there? I think they did, it was quite a meeting place. People went on the Saturday night and some of them took the children and some of them didn't. Were the children allowed in? I think they were allowed if I remember rightly. I remember a chap I worked with, Joe Randall, he told me that he used to go sometimes with his father into the 'Snug'. His dad would take him on Saturday nights and they would have a sing song. It was one of those things in them days.
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Marjorie Marston was born in Highfields in 1942.
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I was only three when the war ended, so I don't really remember an awful lot about the war at all. I remember afterwards having ration books still and going to the local shops to buy sweets with the ration books. I also remember masks you know the oxygen masks they used to wear sort of thing, I remember those we had them in the house.
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I remember we used to go to the local shops and get things called locus beans; they were long brown things that we used to chew on instead of sweets because obviously, sweets were short and we could only have a certain amount on a ration book.
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Mrs Margaret Porter came to Highfields in 1923.
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War time memories include the very bad bombing we suffered in the Highfields area in November, 1940. We spent the worst night in our brick air-raid shelter beneath the workhouse wall (not a good position if it had come down). It was so full of people, my dad had to stand in the doorway. We all sat listening to the bombs whistling down, not knowing if the next one was going to land on us. A large land-mine landed with a thump in the middle of Sparkenhoe Street (just above Lincoln Street) making a hole large enough to take a double-decker bus.
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for some time we used to go along to the air-raid shelters in the grounds of the Wyggeston Girls' School in University Road. Here, we used to sit on wooden seats having a sing-song (mostly 'The Quarter-Masters Stores' if I remember rightly), and not sleeping very much. Lack of sleep figured largely in my wartime memories. Any sounds of aeroplanes in the middle of the night were very frightening.
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My teenage years were spent during the war, I can remember painting my legs to save on stockings (in those days probably Lisle, as nylon stockings had hardly come in then) and using Vaseline and soot for eye-shadow! We made pixie-hoods in the winter out of long scarves, and wrapped smaller scarves round our heads in the form of turbans.
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Another war-time memory is of going to Bradgate Park, where the American forces were camped prior to D-day and being entertained by them and given dishes of crushed pineapple.
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Mary Thornley came to live in Highfields in 1912.
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Do you remember much of the first world war. Does anything stand out in your mind? Oh yes, Zeppelins and things like that. I got very scared. I used to go to bed and then come down again and sit outside the sitting room door until they found me sitting there in the cold. Yes, it was rather frightening. Did they make a noise? Yes they did. I can't remember any bombs or anything dropping there. They did bomb Evington Street quite near to my mother. I don't ever remember being hungry or anything, but I think that there was a shortage of some foods.
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I don't know what year it was I should think it might be during the first world war and we had King George V and Queen Mary to visit Taylor Hobsons factory and they came right past our back entrance, so we had a platform made underneath some trees and we had had a beautiful view of them going by. Queen Mary with her parasol and I don't remember the colour but I should think it was pale pink or something like that, that was quite an adventure and quite a lot of people came and joined us so that they could see.
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Mr Eric Tolton was born in Highfields in 1916.
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Can you tell me something about your family background? Well of course, as I say I lost my father in the first world war, I dont remember my him at all, but my mother was one of four children, My aunt Evelyn lived in Worthington Street and the other two, the elder boy lived in Southampton and the other one lived in Oswestry, actually he was a shoe shop manager. Their parents, my mothers parents name was Davis and they lived at number 10 Holland Road. My grandfather worked at Richards, Bunny Richards the Ironmongers, he had been in the Marines. I understand he was one of the first to land in South Africa when the troops landed there. There were no quays or piers, it was a matter of getting out of the boat and clambering ashore. Did you have any brothers and sisters? Ive got a sister who is 92 years old. She has recently moved into Ainsworth House, Manor Road. She is not settling in very well as a matter of fact, but 92 is quite a big age to move.
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I realise that you were very young during the first world war, but do you remember any of it? No, no, I was born middle of the war. The first thing I remember was my father was in Hospital at Lewisham I think it was, and my mother took me down to see him. I dont remember the hospital, and I dont remember seeing my father but when I came out there was a victory procession going by and I can remember my mother lifting me up on her shoulders so that I could see this parade as that went by and thats all I can remember. I was two years old then.
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Do you feel that Taylor Hobsons were reasonable employers then? Oh yes, they were reasonable employers, yes, because the Rank people bought them out you know. One of them was found dead in the snow outside the factory. I think this was before I started there. They found his body in Stoughton Street. His brother was still there. The two Taylors, you see, formed the Company. The Managing Director when I started was the nephew of one of the Taylors, Mark Taylor. He was the boss, he was very nice I found. And you worked there right through the war? All through the war, yeah. You werent called up? No, it was a reserved occupation you know.
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Well, you see, I got married in 1937 and the war broke out in 1939. I had started at Taylor Hobsons just before the war. I was there when the war broke out. I had gone to work on a Sunday morning, because obviously everybody knew that war was imminent and they wanted all the records photocopying, you see. I had gone in to help with that and I remember a man named Adams. I dont know whether you know the Ironmongers in the High Street is it? Corner of High Street and Highcross Street, Adams the Ironmongers I think you called them, but that was the family. In that shop there used to be a photograph and Im not sure whether it was the Adams that was one of the bosses at Taylor Hobsons or whether it was his father. I remember him, there was some old cottages lived built opposite to Taylor Hobsons, is it Porter Street? Its all been knocked about since then. He had gone in there to listen to the radio at eleven oclock I think it was. Of course wed all wandered out and were hanging about outside and he came out and told us that we were at war. That was it. I know what it all meant but there you go. Actually nothing seemed to happen then because things were at stalemate, nobody moved. It wasnt until the following spring when things begin to happen and Id got married andwas living at Hartington Road. There was the ordinary stairs and there was another flight with just one room right at the top. When we had the family (four children), we rigged it up as a bedroom but on the night Id gone to work, we had finished at ten minutes to eight. They worked funny hours at Taylor Hobson they worked on a metric system. The day wasnt divided into five minutes, it was seven, eight, we used to start at seven to point eight which was twelve minutes to eight in the morning to point one was six minutes. Anyway, we left at twelve minutes to eight at night and came out of the factory to go home. The sky was lit up with flares and course I dashed off home. I knew this was the night! Was it the night of the raid? Yes I think so. Wed bought a humming top and it was going zrrrrrrh. We went dashing up to the attic to look through the window. We saw the one come down over Freeman Hardy Willis, there was a lot of smoke. Ive never got downstairs so quick in all my life, two flights of stairs! Did you have a shelter? Yes, we did have a shelter a brick shelter in the back. Yeah, I used to go into it but it wasnt very comfortable. Sometimes we would stop indoors, we used to put a blanket or something over the window in case the glass broke you know and came in and there was torpedo type thing, we heard it chugging over the house and there were several houses just below us down Charnwood Street that were flattened by it. We heard it go chugging over and in the morning when we came to look out and looked down Vulcan Road, we saw curtains blowing out the windows, living on the hill it must have saved us because the thing came down like that there.
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Do you remember, were you in the ARP? I joined the Home Guard. All the manufacturing companies had a platoon. I think ours was 22nd platoon that was attached to the places of work. But then either one or two or three platoons formed a Company. Now, we were with Jones and Shipman or was it Pollys? We formed C Company and then of course above that there was the battalion. It was done on the same lines as in the army you know. We used to go on route marches. I joined the Signalling Corps. I learnt Morse code and used to do signalling. How often were you on duty? Well, every Sunday morning there was a parade and usually one during the week as a rule. What did you do? It was held at John Bull and we used to learn Morse Code, signalling with the flags you know. Did you ever need to put it into practise? Not really, we were on a parade one Sunday morning, of course there was a proper procedure with the signalling you know. I forgot now what it was now but you had to stick to this procedure. There was a horse that had broken loose, a milk float with a horse. It was going a bit berserk and the message was to be got to somebody who was nearest to it to go and help but we forgot all about procedure, we were all gabbling away one against the other! We used to go down to the Abbey Park and they sent me right against the far gates on the main road with a wireless. We had got wireless sets then, we had progressed you see, the war was going on, we had got more equipment, but of course the battery on the set that I had or the battery on the sender set wasnt working, so I never got any messages and somebody eventually moved us back and I had to walk back.
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Do you remember the bomb that fell on Highfield Street? Yes. When I first started work at Mellor Bromleys, a young lad named Phil Yates worked there and he used to have fits, he used to have hinges on the front legs of his seat so he couldnt go back you see. Once or twice he did have a fit and a bit of a do about it, but after I had left Mellor Bromleys and was working at Taylor Hobsons, there was a girl in the Drawing Office who was a cousin to this Phil Yates, so I used to get bits of messages about him through her. When this bomb dropped apparently it did him good, yeah it cured his having fits. I dont know whether he is still alive he was bit older than me. He was a dare devil, used to ride on the back of bikes. He never ought to have done the way he had fits! Cause in those days you had a push bike. There was a little bit sticking out the back and youd stand on it and hold on the shoulders of the chap who was driving/riding it. Biggest dare devil under the sun. I suppose thats one way of combating it with a bit of bravado.
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When I started courting we went and played tennis on the Spinney Hill Park. I remember them building a sandpit on the top along the Mere Road. And of course in the winter time, Im jumping up a year or two now, they used to do sledging down the hill, oh it was marvellous because there were one or two odd trees and you had to dodge the trees. The Italian prisoners of war used to come up there sledging from Shady Lane, or was it the Germans? I think it was some of each, Italians for a start and Germans later from the big camp on the Shady Lane there. It was getting towards the end of the war they still hadnt come out, we used to go sledging down the Spinney Hill Park.
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Mrs Muriel Wilmot came to live in Highfields in 1927.
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Then I was called for the army , I had no choice. I could either go on the munitions or join the navy,the WAAFFS or the ATS, that is the army the navy or the air force. I went down to Ulverscroft Road where the silver barracks was. I went there for my selection test and I got put into the army and I went to my training at Terevera Camp, Northampton. I received my basic training at Northampton and then I was posted to the firing camp. I was the only one that had to go to a gun site and I was on one of the big computers that control the guns, where you could see all the information fed into it and then the gun is fired on that information, the ballistics and that sort of thing. I loved my army life.
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I loved it because it was an education in itself. I learned more than I had ever known about anything. You learned to mix, to stick up for yourself and learned to live together. There were 24 girls in one barrack room. We were like sisters, it was lovely. We hadn't got our own friends so we used to go up to London and everywhere, all round the shows and everything.
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We did the basic training; there was marching, learning how to be in the army, learning all the regimentation , learning to take orders, learning how to salute the officers, speak to an officer and all that type of thing, that took six weeks
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Did you ever come back to Leicester to visit while you were in the army? Yes, I used to come back. We used to get shore leave as well. We used to get an afternoon from lunch time, then we would get 24 hours once a month. Sometimes I would come home on 24 hrs but not every time by train then never by coach, always by train from St Pancras .
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Highfields was bombed, Highfields Street itself received a direct hit and several people were killed, it was very bad. We had a land mine so they were out six weeks and they went to back into the country to father's sisters. Until they could come back? Until it was clear for them to come back
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We didn't have any actual damage to the house itself, but we had one very big crack right down the lawn probably from the vibration.
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War wasn't a time of misery for me at all. I mean we all had such a good time, we'd got the NAAFFI where we used to go in the evenings and you could play table tennis, you could sit and read, or you could play bingo. I was in a mixed battery, men and women, which was rather nice and I started courting a gentleman in there but it didn't come to anything.
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Mrs Joan Hands came to live in Highfields in 1940.
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The large shelter had locked doors at each end, and I presume our local Air Raid Warden had a key. As children do, however, a way in was found by some of the gang and we then had a thrilling few weeks. The older boys set up a pretend ‘ghost train’, and we had to run the gauntlet inside the pitch black, cavernous building.
The War was coming to an end. We youngsters did not really understand what that meant, but everyone around us seemed that much less anxious and more ready to tolerate our games. I think it was the afternoon of VE day that we had our street party and what an amazing event that was to a five year-old little girl who had grown up with rationing and austerity. Cakes and jellies were conjured up from nowhere and the Leicestershire ‘cob’ filled with fish paste or corned beef was delicious.
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