Annie Groves - A Mother’s Blessing

‘Is that Pete Ridley outside with his milk float and horse?’

‘Yes, Dad,’ Molly confirmed, protesting when her father opened the back door. ‘Where are you going? He’ll leave the milk on the doorstep like always.’

‘’Tain’t the milk I’m after, it’s the horse muck,’ he told her forthrightly. ‘Right good for the allotment it’ll be. And that reminds me, there’s a few of the lads as will be coming round tonight to talk about the allotments. We’re going to be forming a committee, seeing as how we’re going to be part of the war effort and “digging for victory”,’ he told Molly proudly before disappearing through the door to speak to the milkman.

‘Wait up, Molly,’ June puffed. ‘You’re walking too fast.’

‘I don’t want us to be late,’ Molly answered her worriedly as she waited for June to catch up with her. ‘I’m sure that Miss Jenner is going to be looking for any excuse to make trouble for us.’

‘So what? With old man Harding looking to take on extra workers, he’s not gonna want to lose good machinists like us. He’ll have the Government to answer to if he doesn’t get them uniforms made on time.’

Since the other girls had also arrived a few minutes early, Molly suspected that they all shared her wariness of Miss Jenner. A handful of girls she didn’t recognise were huddled together just inside the workroom, looking uncertain and anxious. One of them didn’t look much more than fourteen, her thin arms and legs poking out of her worn dress.

Molly smiled at them as she tucked her hair up and pinned it back, before putting on her overall. Earlier in the year she and June had treated themselves to a new hairdo apiece at Lewis’s, where Molly’s hair had been cut into the style favoured by the actress Vivien Leigh for her role in the much-anticipated Gone with the Wind .

Molly had just seated herself at the machine when the work bell rang shrilly.

Immediately the door opened and Miss Jenner came in, her lips pursed as she silently inspected the rows of expectant machinists.

‘From now on we shall be having a roll call every morning five minutes before you start work. Anyone not here for that roll call will lose a day’s pay.’

An outraged mutter of protest filled the room but Miss Jenner ignored it, walking over to the new girls.

‘Hardings has an important role to play in the war effort and you will find that I run this machine room with the same discipline and dedication with which an army commander controls his men. Since I understand that none of you has any previous experience as machinists, you will each sit beside a machinist and watch her work. Then this afternoon you will be given your own machine and you will start to work properly. Every garment made in this factory will be inspected by me, and if it fails to meet the high standards our fighting men deserve, then the machinist will be fined for the cost of the time and the material lost.’

A gasp of indignation filled the silence.

‘Well, I’m gonna tell her straight I’m not puttin’ up wi’ it. Not for one minute I’m not,’ Sheila fumed later, after the dinner bell had rung and the girls were all clustered together talking, after enduring a morning of silence.

‘I’m tekkin’ meself down to the Metal Box as was, first thing tomorrow morning. Crying out for workers there, they are, so I’ve heard,’ said another girl.

The new girls all looked so exhausted and worried that Molly couldn’t help but feel sorry for them.

‘I’m right worried that they won’t keep me on,’ Jean Hughes, the girl who sat next to Molly, confided whilst they ate their dinner, Molly having surreptitiously given half of her sandwiches to Evie, the stick-thin new girl, when she saw that Evie hadn’t brought anything to eat.

Molly knew that Jean lived down on Daffodil Street, one of the ‘flower’ streets close to the docks, and, after listening to Irene, was worried that she wouldn’t be able to keep a job that she had confided to Molly was a bit of a step up for her.

‘You’ll do fine,’ Molly assured her kindly. ‘It’s just that we haven’t got used to Miss Jenner yet.’

‘I’m sick of this ruddy war already,’ Ruby complained, ‘and it hasn’t even started yet. Our mam’s acting like she’s got ants in her pants ever since we got them blinking leaflets. She’s had us at it all weekend up in the attic, clearing stuff out. ’Ave yer done yours yet?’ she asked June.

‘No. We could have done it tonight, only this one,’ June emphasised scornfully, nodding her head in Molly’s direction, ‘has taken it into her head to go and sign up for the blinkin’ WVS tonight.’

‘Oh, me mam’s in that,’ one of the new girls chirped up, causing June to frown at her.

‘Well, I’m thinking of joining,’ Sheila put in quietly. ‘They’ve bin asking for help round our way with this evacuation of all the kiddies coming up. Me sister’s going mad about it. Seven months gone, she is, with her second, and her husband away in the merchant navy. She wants ter stay here in Liverpool, like, but our mam’s told her as how she should do as the Government wants.’

Throughout every city thought to be at risk from enemy attack, parents had been issued with government instructions, telling them that they were to be ready for the mass evacuation of their children at the end of August. Children were to be taken to their local schools ready to be marched class by class and school by school to designated railway stations, from where they would be evacuated to the country along with their teachers. Parents had been told what clothes and other equipment each child was to have, and local industries and town halls had stepped forward with promises to give each child food and drink for the journey. Volunteers were needed to assist with this process and to help take charge of the children when they arrived at their schools ready for the evacuation.

Those people who would be housing the evacuees were going to be paid by the Government for doing so, and already there was a great deal of resentment being felt amongst the poor of Liverpool about the fact that other people were being paid to look after their children whilst they were denied any such help. The WVS, most of them mothers themselves, had been recruited to help the Government with this evacuation.

June was still in a huff with Molly about volunteering when they got home, but the discovery that the postman had brought letters from both Frank and Johnny evaporated the tension. June, pink-cheeked with excitement and relief, pounced on her envelope. ‘At last. It seems ever such a long time since Frank left, and I’ve missed him that much.’

Late afternoon sunshine poured in through the back door, turning June’s hair dark gold as she sat down on the step to read her letter.

Having put the kettle on to boil, so delaying the moment as long as she could, Molly went to join her, opening her own letter with a heavy heart.

Johnny’s handwriting looked almost childlike. He wasn’t allowed to tell her where he was, or what he was doing, he had written, before going on to complain that he hated the food. Her letter was much thinner than June’s. There was no mention in it of when he might get leave, nor any hint that he might be missing her – but that made her feel more relieved than disappointed, Molly admitted to herself.

‘What’s the return address on yours?’ June demanded.

Molly showed her.

‘They aren’t in the same camp then: Frank’s is different. Does Johnny say when he’s likely to get some leave?’

‘No, does Frank?’

‘He says they haven’t been told anything much and that he’ll let me know as soon as he’s got some news.’

The kettle had started to boil. Molly got up and went to make the tea.