Three Landford Evacuees -Part 1

Evacuation September 1939.

The Story of Three boys who were evacuees to Landford Wiltshire.

Three Landford evacuees.

This is the story of three brothers whose lives were fundamentally changed by the events of the 3rd of September 1939.
I will try to make this not only a story of them but of their surroundings and the people who came into their lives at that time and over the next six years.
The three boys were Ivan, Paul and Brian Winter the grand children of Alice Kate Winter of Forest View, Pound Hill, Landford, Wiltshire.
The twins Ivan and Paul were born in Gillingham Kent on the 13th September 1936 to Ron the youngest son of Alice and Ted Winter of Landford Wiltshire and Pauline Winter [nee Tobin], almost certainly premature by two months. I cannot be certain of this but dates tie into this presumption.
Although pregnant my Mum, Pauline, would not ”marry in May and rue the day” so married in St Augustine’s church Gillingham in early June of 1936. Our birth I reckon being worked out as Nov.
However things did not work out as planned. It was in the early hours of the 13th Sept that we started out on our journey into the world, it was even a surprise that there were two of us. We weighed in at just over 3lbs each arriving twenty minutes apart, Ivan first.
3lbs in weight at birth is obviously premature and our Mum had a considerable job on her hands to keep us alive, fed every hour and washed in olive oil. She had a lot of help from her GP Dr Hughes who said if we lived we lived, if we died we died.
It was a fantastic feat for our Mum to keep us going and it does our father little credit that she was soon pregnant again and gave birth to Brian in May 1938.
It must be remembered in those days that announcing that you were pregnant out of wedlock was a major sin; Ron was threatened with police action by Pauline’s Dad not only because she was pregnant but also she was only 171/2 years old.
Common sense prevailed but it did present a problem with informing the rest of Ron’s family, who did not attend the wedding.
This was solved by letting them know he was marrying but also by delaying the announcement of the birth for a couple of months when he informed his family in Landford that he had a brace.
He also falsified his service papers when writing in his wife’s age.
These minor fibs came back to haunt us boys later when living at Forest View.

The warning signs of a possible European war had been in the air for some time, after all we were born during the 1936 Nuremberg rally, a nationalistic gathering of the NSDAP at the Zeppelin field in Germany.
Hitler the gambler may not have wanted a European war but what he wanted would cause one. After false alarms the year before and belligerent talk on many sides through 1939 his march into Poland in September triggered a response unexpected by the German Government and we were at war again but not with Russia who also invaded Poland.
All of these warning signs had alarmed our Dad who had been a Regular Royal Engineer for 12 years and was then an R.E reservist, and he came to an arrangement with his Mum that in the event of a war we should be collected and taken to a safer place at Landford.
My Mother always said that she was not consulted in these negotiations and not entirely in agreement.
The reasoning behind it was clear enough, various air ministers over the years had said that the bomber would always get through and much exaggerated propaganda by the Germans had given the impression that Kent would become an aerial battlefield with a million dead..
As soon as war was declared Gran hired a local Taxi, probably from a relative the local undertaker in Wellow a Mr Hood. They drove the 100 hundred miles to Gillingham on the third of September. In those days such a journey was a major undertaking although the car was an excepted mode of transport they were not very common, in fact this was to be our last car journey for many years.
Pauline and the three boys were bundled into the car with their limited luggage and the journey back to Landford began.

Our father Ron had been recalled to the Royal Engineers for the duration of hostilities and we were not to see him for over another six years.
This was particularly painful for Ivan as the workload of looking after the twins had been equally divided, Mum caring for Paul and Dad for Ivan.
I have no memories of that journey but my Aunt Dorothy has told me that we arrived car sick, tearful and very tired.
The driver and Gran must have been exhausted after two hundred miles of driving.

Settling in and a problem.
My Mum was not a country girl; in fact she disliked the countryside lifestyle.
It is worth a look at the differences in the Town and Country life, which was even more marked then than now.
Whilst Gillingham was not a major town, it was sophisticated enough to have electric street lighting, mains water, gas, electricity and main drainage. The milk may have been delivered by pony and milk cart but there were few horses about and definitely no cows. We had the main bus depot about one hundred yards away, the railway station two hundred yards with the Southern railway mainline between the coast and London. The The Fleur de lye pub at the end of the street and the High street running from the railway station.
There were several cinemas, the Grand, Odeon and Plaza all within walking distance in fact everything a town girl would expect.
Landford was a bit different, whilst Forest View Pound Hill was on the main A36 road with the No36 Southampton/Salisbury bus passing frequently {a service run by Wilts and Dorset and the Hants and Dorset companies]. This was as sophisticated as it got.
No electricity, gas, mains water or main drainage. In its place a paraffin stove for cooking backed up with a built in oven over the fire in the lounge and two swivelling supports beside the same fire to hold a kettle or saucepan.

This oven demanded considerable expertise as there was no control apart from banking up the fire and no thermometer. A primus stove was also available for boiling water but this too was a temperamental beast that first required heating by metholated spirits pressurizing the main fuel paraffin with a built in pump and then lighting usually with the use of a pricker to clear the nozzle from which the paraffin squirted. All a bit scary and requiring a bit of nerve from someone who normally just turned on a switch.
All water for drinking and flushing the toilet had to be pumped up from the well in the garden. This was achieved by means of a manual pump in the washhouse, the water ending up in a large galvanised / rusty tank in the attic.

Pumping was the early morning job of Aunt Dorothy who seemed to do it with considerable enthusiasm usually with a tortured tune on her lips.
This means of deriving water instilled a strong message in the users, “Don’t waste it”.
This meant that where possible two uses had to be found for each pint from the tap.
Disposal of waste water was also a novelty to the townie, a septic tank at the bottom of the garden was the recipient although in the summer as much as was decently possible would be put on the garden. A large tank at the back door fed from the gutters provided a useful reservoir and would be used for all except drinking and provided a handy home for mosquitoes.
The septic tank would require infrequent emptying and this would be carried out by an unwilling recruit who fertilised Mr Grayers field with the malodorous contents. Not a great job on a hot summers day. Uncle Leslie did the job before he went off to war; he survived this task by always having a cigarette in his mouth while he bucketed out the contents.

Aunt Dorothy one day famously fell into the septic tank via the cast iron covers, she saved herself with her elbows, every one seemed to find it funny except Doll.
Instead of the so easy electric lighting at 117a Trafalgar St, Gillingham at dusk or usually a bit later, there seemed to a rule don’t put the lights on until someone falls over, the Aladdin lamp was lit. This gave a very pleasant light for a couple of yards radius. This was enough to read or sew at the table.
When bedtime came candles would be lit to see the way to bed, a very cold bed in the winter fortunately there was three of us to warm it up.
All of this was very primitive to our Mum who was 20 years old, her 21st birthday falling in December of 1939.
She missed her Ron who had gone off to war somewhere and she was sharing a home with Gran 60 and Dorothy 34 who did not really hit it off with her. There was little in common between them and Ron had been/ was Grans favourite son; the circumstances of the wedding etc had not gone down well.
Another problem which arose was that I had been cared for by my Dad, in order to share the work load of twins, and any attempt by the three ladies to do anything for me was met by “No, Ron does that” after a few of these remarks patience was lost by Dolly who said B… Ron. {Her memory not mine]. First lesson for the not quite three year old.
My Mum had an even bigger problem and this only came out much later. If the mother of the children looked after them there was of course no need for another carer.
Gran nearly sixty would not be affected but Dorothy at 34 was a different case. As a single unattached female she could be drafted to the services, war work or the woman’s land army. This she did not want to happen although it would no doubt have changed her life.
So on one side we have our Mum, not very happy in an unfriendly household, she said later that Albert was the only friendly one of the family. Against her we have Gran, Dorothy who had not and did not want to leave the family home and Leslie her brother in law.
The situation became such that our Mum departed back to Gillingham taking Brian with her.
Dorothy as the carer of us twins was safe and we did not see our Mum again until Dec 1945.
This little story should not be looked at in too bad a light as we were well looked after by Dorothy and I looked on her as my second Mum all my life and it is obvious that our Mum would not have settled in Landford for what turned out to be over six years, although of course we could all have gone back to Gillingham when danger was over in 1941/2 .

Family politics.
It must be remembered that in those days getting pregnant before marriage was definitely not the way to go about things
Our dad had met our Mum at a fair being held on the military Lines at Gillingham when she was 15 and he was 24. He was serving in the Royal Engineers and was based in the Kitcheners Barracks at Brompton.
In spite of warnings from her family not to go out with soldiers the relationship blossomed. I do not know if her parents knew but her sister Diana certainly did.
Unfortunately in April 1936 she found out that she was pregnant. She once told me the story that as a 16 year old she was told at the shop where she worked that she had to give a man sex or he would become ill; she must have believed that tale. It rather matches Dorothy’s story that her Mum told her that if she came home with trouble she would be sent to the workhouse. She said that she had no idea what the workhouse was and absolutely no idea what the trouble could be.
My Mum’s Dad threatened Ron with the police as Mum was so young but common sense prevailed and a wedding was planned. However our Mum, being a bit superstitious would not marry in May so on the third of June 1936 Pauline and Ronald married in St Augustine’s church near 104 Milton road Gillingham, her family home.
My father, obviously feeling a bit guilty or foolish smudged his service record where Mum’s age was written.
We were I believe due in November or December of 1936 but arrived as a twin on the 13th Sept weighing in at 3lbs each. Paul was born a few minutes after Ivan.
This of course created a problem for Ron, as he did not want to let his family know that he had to marry, problem solved by delaying the news of our arrival for several months and then informing them that he had a brace. This is a repeat of an earlier section but is necessary to write what follows.
When we arrived in Landford with all of our papers it was clear what he had done and the truth was out to Gran and Dorothy but they decided that this information was not to be made public so one year was knocked off of the twins age. We were always reminded at birthdays that we were to say that we were one year younger than we really were, I’m amazed they got away with it.
We were even sent to the local St Andrews school one year later than we should have been. The school register seen in 2004 shows our date of birth as 13/9/37 and to compound the lie Brians as Oct 1938 when in reality it is May 1938.
In 2005 it seems incredible that this charade should have been carried out to the obvious detriment of the children’s education. I have no idea what happened when we returned to Gillingham in Dec 1945 and had to start school at Barnsole road infant’s school.

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