Citizen Armies, page 27
part #2 of Jackson Family Saga Series
‘Here’s to 1943,’ he said. ‘An’ may it bring a few more victories.’
*
January was a dismal month, cold and grey and far too often soaking them with rain, but it obliged them with a victory on its very first day when the papers reported that the Japanese were withdrawing from Guadacanal. Then, just over a fortnight later, on a very dull day when Jim and Rosie were huddled by the fire listening to the wireless, they heard that the Soviet army had broken their sixteen-month-long siege of Leningrad and finally driven the Germans out. It was estimated, the announcer said, that 100,000 German troops had either been killed or had died from starvation and extreme cold since the Russian army started their siege.
‘Hitler bit off more than he could chew when he invaded the ol’ Russkies,’ Jim said, with great satisfaction, ‘an’ serve the bugger right. Now they’ll start pushin’ him around, an’ he won’t like that.’
And as if to prove him right, a few days later they heard the news that the Germans who had occupied Stalingrad had surrendered. Hitler had promoted General Von Paulus, who was in command there, to the rank of field marshal, saying that ‘field marshals never surrender’. But field marshal or not, Von Paulus surrendered to a young Soviet lieutenant which, however you looked at it, was humiliating for him and his boss.
But the news that Gracie and Mary ached to hear, still didn’t come. The Eighth Army were still slogging it out in Africa, but they hadn’t captured Tripoli, which everyone knew was their next and probably final target. Bertie and Sam sent them letters at reassuringly regular intervals to report that they were ‘OK,’ and Bertie ventured to say that when they’d pushed Mussolini out of his African empire, they ought to be due some leave. But there was no news of victory or leave. And the wait went on.
Then, on 21 January, some local news was brought to them by the tram telegraph, and it was as bad as it could be. On the previous afternoon, a German bomber had managed to dodge under the radar and had bombed the Sandhurst Road School in Catford, where 150 children were gathered in the hall, waiting to watch a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. There’d been no air raid warning, and the barrage balloons weren’t up, so the German plane had a clear run to dive-bomb the place and blow it to pieces. Forty-one children between the ages of five and fourteen were killed along with six of their teachers and many more were injured. It took all day and most of the night to dig the dead and injured out of the wreckage.
It took a long time for local people to digest such a horror, and there was a lot of painful and useless anger, especially in the pubs and the market.
Mary and Gracie were still waiting for the news they wanted to hear.
It came a few days later, as all news, good or bad, eventually must. And this time it was very good indeed. The Eighth Army had captured Tripoli, as the announcer told them in his calm and measured way. ‘Armoured cars of the Eleventh Hussars entered the town before dawn. By midday the Union Jack was flying in the main square, the Piazza Italia. General Montgomery, in his familiar Tank Corps beret and battledress, received the formal surrender.’
The next day they crossed the border into Tunisia. And a month later the two girls got the letters they’d been yearning for. ‘We’ve got some leave coming at last. Be home soon. Probably in May.’
Chapter Nineteen
It was a rapturous homecoming on a magical afternoon in May, when the sky was the colour of milky opal and distant buildings were bleached to pale blue shadows. Everything about it was easy and lethargic. The passengers emerging from their newly arrived train at London Bridge ambled along the platform, as if it was too much effort to put one foot in front of the other. Nobody banged the doors. Even the steam from the engine hung suspended above the funnel, too exhausted to rise and disperse.
But Mary and Gracie took one look at the two khaki-clad figures easing out of the second coach and ran towards them, shrieking their names, ‘Sam!’ ‘Bertie!’ And the two soldiers dropped their kitbags on the platform and waved to them. And seconds later, with an impact that took their breath away, they were standing with their arms round their lovers, where they’d yearned to be for so long, being bombarded with kisses and more kisses and more kisses until their lips were sore, and held so close they could barely breathe, and nothing else mattered because everything was right with their world. At last, at last.
The platform had emptied before they came to their senses and began to breathe normally.
‘Now then,’ Bertie said. ‘We got everything planned. Ain’t we Sam? We’re all gonna stay with my old dears up the Elephant. They’ve found two bedrooms for us, an’ they’re gonna feed us of a morning, an’ we’ll have the rest a the day to ourselves. We’ve got our ration cards an’ everythin’. Come on.’
‘I thought you lived in Bermondsey,’ Mary said, as they ambled off toward Borough High Street. ‘Wasn’t that what you said?’
‘I did as a kid,’ he explained, ‘but no-one can live there now. The old dears got bombed out. So now they’re living up the Elephant.’
That sounded alarming. ‘Were they hurt?’
‘No,’ he said easily. ‘They was in the shelter in the next street. They always went there of a night. Jest as well really –ʼ cos when they come out that night, most a their street was gone. They was in a church hall for a week or two, an’ the WVS fed ʼem an’ found ʼem clothes an’ that, an’ then they got this place. Bit rough an’ ready, but it’s home. You’ve got the address. I gave it to you when we got married.’
Mary was full of sympathy for his poor parents but as he wasn’t making a fuss, she didn’t either. She’d forgotten the address he’d given her but then there’d been so much to attend to with that wedding, she’d just handed it across to her mother. There’s a lot I don’t know about my Bertie, she thought, and we’ve only got ten days together.
‘I used to live in Newcomen Street,’ she told him. ‘Not far from here. We’ll be passing it in a minute. That part of the Borough’s taken a pasting too.’
‘Was your place bombed an’ all?’ he asked.
‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s still standing. Me an’ Gracie cycled down one evening to see. The south side of the street’s been flattened but the shop where we used to live is still all right.’
‘We turn off at Harper Road,’ he said. ‘That’s in a bit of mess, too.’
And that’s an understatement, Mary thought, when they finally reached the place. Even in the gentle light of that hazy afternoon, it looked grubby and battered. But the pub was still in one piece and so was a small terrace of sooty houses, and her mother and father-in-law were watching for them out of the window and came out into the street to kiss their son and welcome them all in.
‘We got it all arranged,’ Mrs O’Connor said. ‘Ol’ Mrs Grey’s gonna put you up. She’s got two rooms upstairs she don’t use on account of her legs, and she says you can have one each. She’s a nice old lady. You’ll like her. We’ll have a little cup a’ tea, an’ then I’ll take you in an’ introduce you an’ you can get settled.’
It was a nice large mug of tea, hot and strong and accompanied by a plate full of scones ‘to keep you goin’ till supper.’ And then they picked up their bags and walked down the street to Mrs Grey’s.
Mary and Gracie took to Mrs Grey as soon as they saw her. She was old, gentle, amiable, rather timid and very well named, for everything about her was grey. Her hair, which she wore in a straggling bun, was almost white, her skin so pale it hardly had any colour at all, her few remaining teeth grey-brown, her eyes a faded slate-grey but smiling her welcome. Even her clothes were grey, for she wore an old grey skirt and her blouse was ecru. But she gave them a timid smile and said they’d be nice an’ private upstairs. ‘I don’t get up there on account a me legs, so you’ll have it all to yourselves. Go on up. They’re both the same size more or less, so you can choose which one you want, can’t yer?’
Bertie tried to tell her how kind she was, but she held up her hand to stop him. ‘It’s the least I can do,’ she said. ‘With you out in the desert an’ all. Go on up. The beds are all made. Your mum done ʼem.’
So they carried their bags upstairs and took to their beds and began their second honeymoons. And oh it was so good to be together again.
*
Rosie was disappointed that her two girls and their husbands only visited her once during their leave, but she kept her thoughts to herself and made some scones to welcome them. And she was glad she had when she saw how relaxed and happy they all looked.
‘We went to Hampton Court yesterday,’ Mary told her. ‘It was lovely there down by the river. Wasn’t it, Bertie?’
He agreed that it was, grinning at her. And watching them, Rosie remembered the day she and Jim had taken their little daughters up river to the self-same palace in an old steam boat, and what a rattling old tub it was and how much they’d enjoyed it. They were very young then, she thought, remembering, and now they’re married women with separate lives.
‘Did you go on the river trip too?’ she asked Gracie.
‘We went up West to see a show,’ Gracie told her.
‘Good?’ Jim asked.
Gracie and Sam answered together, she saying ‘Not bad’, he saying ‘Very funny.’ And that made them laugh at one another.
‘We’re learning which eye to look out of,’ Sam explained, looking rather shame-faced. ‘We don’t always see eye to eye.’
Eyes were sending unspoken messages to one another all around the room, Bertie’s sending a question to Mary, Mary’s sending sympathy to her sister, Rosie and Jim signalling sympathy for Sam to one another.
‘I wouldn’t worry about it if I was you,’ Jim told him, laughing. ‘Takes an age to see eye to eye. We don’t. Not all the time. Do we Rosie? An’ we been married fer donkey’s years.’
‘We agreed about the bomb damage though,’ Gracie said, feeding him a new topic. ‘Didn’t we Sam?’
‘Terrible the amount of it round here,’ Sam said, earnestly. ‘Whole streets, just gone. I couldn’t believe it. It’s going to be a huge job to build it all up again.’
‘Ah!’ Kitty said, getting up from her chair. ‘That reminds me. Hang on a tick. I got summink ter show yer.’
‘Where’s she off to?’ Gracie said, and noticed that her parents were grinning at her.
She soon found out because Kitty was back within seconds. She had a copy of their much-thumbed Beveridge Report in her hand and was waving it at Sam and Bertie.
‘’Ave you seen this?’ she said.
It was Bertie who answered her, and his answer was rather a disappointment because she was looking forward to enlightening him. ‘Yeh! Course,’ he said. ‘We seen it when it come out. One of the fellers had a copy sent out to him an’ he handed it round.’
Kitty sat down, still clutching the leaflet, belligerently. ‘Whatcher think of it?’ she asked.
‘Great stuff,’ Bertie told her. ‘Once we’ve won this war an’ given Herr Hitler what-for, we’ll get cracking an’ make sure we elect the sorta government that’ll deliver it. Anyway, that’s what we reckon, don’t we Sam? My local MP is all for it. I wrote to him, an’ he wrote straight back an’ said so.’
Kitty was impressed. ‘Really?’ she said. ‘Did yer?’
‘Course,’ Bertie told her.
‘I did too,’ Sam said. ‘An’ mine was in favour of it too, or so he said.’
‘What about yer mates?’ Kitty asked. Did they write an’ all?’
‘Some of ʼem,’ Bertie said. ‘Probably.’
‘Didn’t you tell ʼem to?’ Kitty said. ‘I know I would’ve.’
‘You don’t tell tankies what ter do,’ Bertie said. ‘That ain’t the way of it. They’re the most independent men alive, tankies are. Don’t take orders from no one. Only Monty.’
Sam grinned at that. ‘And then only sometimes!’ he said. Which made them both grin happily.
Kitty was looking surprised and cross so Rosie moved in to rescue her. ‘Kitty was a Suffragette,’ she explained. ‘She likes action.’
Sam was impressed and showed it. ‘No!’ he said. ‘Were you really?’
‘Yes,’ Kitty said briefly. She was flattered by his admiration but still annoyed by Bertie’s complacency. If he made an effort he could have a whole tank corps writing to their MPs. What was the matter with the man?
Seeing how aggressive she was getting, Jim changed the subject. ‘So now you got the Eyeties on the run,’ he said to the two young men. ‘What’s gonna happen next?’
‘That’s what we want ter know,’ Bertie said. ‘’Course they got to deal with all the prisoners first, an’ there were thousands and thousands of them. The Eyeties surrendered in battalions an’ they’ve all got to go somewhere. They’re sorting all that out now. But there’s been a lot a’ talk about a second front. In Normandy.’
‘Likely?’ Jim asked.
‘Very,’ Bertie told him. ‘But not without a lot a’ preparation, an’ that’ll take months. We was months preparing for El Alamein.’
‘Perhaps they’ll send you home,’ Rosie said.
‘Fingers crossed,’ Sam said, smiling at Gracie.
‘Oh I do hope they will,’ Rosie said, and got smiled at by all four of her children, daughters and son-in-laws alike.
They’re such good kids, she thought. I do so want everything to work out for them. If I there was anything I could do to make it happen, I’d do it like a shot. But of course, you can’t influence things in a war. You just have to sit tight and take what’s coming.
*
The longed-for honeymoon continued, the weather held, there was no news from Africa or anywhere else much. And soon – oh, far too soon – Mary and Gracie were kissing their darlings goodbye, and they were all on their reluctant way back to reality.
‘I know there’s a censor and all that,’ Gracie said, ‘but if you’re off on some new campaign and you can’t tell me, write and ask how our cat is and then I’ll know.’
He gave her a grin and promised he would, and then the train began to puff and tug in a totally unnecessary way and they were being pulled apart. She and Mary waved until the heartless thing was out of sight. Then she lifted her chin, squared her shoulders, gave her sister a hug and said, ‘Ah well! Back to work.’ And the real world reached out to grab them.
From then on Bertie and Sam sent regular letters home, but there was no news of what was to come and no coded messages about cats. May slid into June without any new events, June became July and still no cats were mentioned. But on the tenthof July the papers reported that the Allies had invaded Sicily, and Mary and Gracie got letters to say that they might not be able to write again for a few days, but that they were fit and well and thinking of them.
‘So the Yanks are in it now,’ Jim said with great satisfaction. ‘That ought ter speed things up.’
It certainly seemed to. Thirteen days later there were jubilant headlines in all the newspapers saying that the Allies had captured Palermo, and they’d obviously done it at speed.
‘In a rapid thrust to the north from the Allied held southern part of the island,’ the paper said, ‘US troops overwhelmed the city yesterday, trapping an estimated 45,000 Axis troops who must now either surrender or be annihilated.’ And the journalist went on to give details. ‘General Eisenhower, the Allied C-in-C, described the success as “the first page in the history of the liberation of the European continent”.’ And even better, from Mary and Gracie’s point of view, the paper then went on to give details about the British Eighth Army, who, ‘under the command of General Montgomery, were advancing on the port of Catania from the south while Canadian forces were advancing on from the east.’
‘Now that’s been well planned,’ Jim said, beaming his approval at the paper.
‘Whatever next?’ Rosie said. After the long-drawn-out campaign in Africa, this invasion seemed wonderfully speedy.
‘They’ll invade Italy,’ Jim told her. ‘That’s where they’re heading.’
Two days later, on 25 July, the Sunday papers reported that Mussolini had been deposed. King Victor Emmanuel had assumed command of the Italian armed forces and had appointed Marshal Badoglio, whom the papers described as ‘anti fascist,’ to be prime minister. And the next day there were demonstrations in the streets of Rome celebrating Mussolini’s downfall, and Marshal Badoglio asked the Allies for peace terms.
It was almost too good and too quick to be true.
*
That year, summer soothed them into a gentle ease. Rosie and Kitty took themselves off into the garden when they got back from their afternoon delivery and sat in the rickety deckchairs – rather gingerly at first because they weren’t sure they would hold their weight – and did a spot of sunbathing, and took it in turns to nurse the cat. Sometimes old Winnie Totteridge came down to join them.
‘It makes a nice change ter sit in the sun,’ she said. ‘Providin’ the canvas’ll ʼold us up. I used ter sit out in my garden a lot afore the war. Can’t now on account a the shelter. They don’t ʼalf take up a lot a’ room, them things. Very useful in the raids, I ain’t denyin’ that, but they don’ leave yer much garden.’
‘No, they don’t,’ Rosie remembered, glaring at her own shelter. Despite its usefulness she’d never really forgiven it for being there. It was stupid of her because she knew what excellent protection they’d been. She’d seen people dug out of their shelters alive when their houses had been flattened. But she still missed her garden. ‘I had a lovely garden here before the war,’ she said. ‘I used to spend my afternoons out here, weeding my vegetable patch, watering my beans, that sorta thing.’
‘You miss it,’ Mrs Totteridge understood.
‘Yes,’ Rosie admitted. ‘I do. It was lovely having fresh fruit and vegetables.’
‘She’s a country gel,’ Kitty teased. ‘Born wiv a spade in her hand, wasn’t yer, Rosie?’
