A Driver's Tale

Although Billy had been born in Burnley his parents were from Yorkshire and returned to Keighley in the West Riding when he was about ten years old. When he left school he went to work in a foundry, he was very interested in working with metals but he had to give up the job because he had a bad chest. He went to work for Hattersleys, a famous loom makers in Keighley. He drove lorries to take looms and parts to many places in Yorkshire and Lancashire. He even married Lily, a weaver he met at one of the mills he visited.

Just before the war broke out the family moved out to Silsden, a small town where people who were not born there were known as, 'Off cummed uns.'

Billy was too old to join the army but Hattersleys, who made some secret equipment for the war effort, made his job a classified occupation because they needed people they could trust in case these things needed to be transported. At times he took something (he did not know what) to the docks in Liverpool. When he arrived at the dock gates a service man had to join him in his van for the duration of his stay in the secure area.

It was clear from the many journeys he had to make, and from conversations he overheard, that there was a problem with the equipment. It appeared that it needed to withstand some kind of great stress. On one occasion Billy, thinking of his foundry experience, politely interrupted the discussion and said, 'Have you tried --------(I don't know what) sir?'. On subsequent visits to the docks he was allowed to enter without a guard.

Obviously he continued to deliver textile spares to mills. Sometimes he took his little daughter with him in the van. One day the went to Knaresborough where a mill was making fabric for parachutes.

Billy was a member of the ARP and drove the mobile unit, a vehicle which carried one of the local doctors (Dr Matty), nurses and medical equipment to any incident where they might be needed. There was no bombing on Silsden but sometimes aircraft came down in the surrounding countryside. One of these was an British plane. One of the airmen managed to escape and the unit arrived just in time to prevent him going back into the burning plane to try to rescue his comrade. They could see that the plane was about to explode and he would certainly have been killed if he had gone back. Members of the unit went to see him in hospital.

This is just one story of how the civilian companies and people of the West Riding contributed to the war effort.

Note: These are the incidents that I heard my parents, particularly my mother, talking about. Obviously as a young child I dod not know all the details.

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