With my 14th birthday well behind me, it was now time to think really hard about what I was to do with my life. I really didn’t want to follow in my fathers footsteps and become a stevedore, nor did I particularly wish to go into an apprenticeship of any sort. With my education, or should I say the lack of it, other than those options the scope was limited.
I was good at art, and would like to have followed that course - to become an architect, or to have gone to art school, but again I was handicapped by my poor schooling. Not that it was my fault! The education system then seemed to have been good or bad - unfortunately the school I was in was of the latter sort.
There had always been a nagging thought in the back of my mind that maybe I should follow the family tradition on my mothers side and join the Navy. I decided to speak with my mothers youngest brother, uncle Norman, to put the idea to him and perhaps it would help me finally make up my mind.
I thought about it almost all of the time, whether at school or doing my paper rounds. I had almost made up my mind when, at last, my uncle visited us on one of his leaves (he always made a point of visiting my mum).
I got to talk to him and told him of my dilemma. He gave me some very good advice. He told me how hard the first few years would be, particularly at HMS Ganges, which was then a boys training establishment only about 20 miles from where I lived in Ipswich, Suffolk. The training school was on the peninsula of the two rivers on that part of the east coast of England: the river Orwell, and the river Stour.
He told me that whatever I did as I would be entering the Navy as a seaman (Norman was a Petty Officer (Yeoman of Signals). The visual signals part of the Communications branch he assured me would soon be defunct. Another uncle was a steward; another a chef; and all their uncles had been in the Mob too.
Being a seaman, at some point you will have to specialise (this was called being a Non-Substantive Rate). He urged me, no matter what, to try my utmost when the time came, to opt for the Radar Branch; almost still in its infancy then. But as he saw it, it would play a major part in the future of the Navy.
I also sought advice from one of the better teachers we had at the school, a Mr Phillips. He taught science (if you could call it that) at my school, Priory Heath Secondary Modern. The science class mainly involved pouncing about with Bunsen burners.
Mr Phillips was very pleased to hear that I had chosen a career rather than just becoming a labourer of some sort, a fate most of the schools graduates ended up doing in some factory or other.
He spent some time with me, informing me that it was almost certain I would have to undergo an educational test on signing up. He also said there may be an IQ test. He could help and guide me on the former, but on the IQ test, as he put it, "You’ve either got it or you don’t!” And he said in my case, from his experience in teaching me over the last three years or so, I had it.
When our sessions were over, he had told me about things I had never heard of. For instance, Ohms law and various other things. I said to him “How come after the years I have spent here it is only now you are telling me these things which you say I will need to know?” I could see the sadness in his eyes. He just hung his head having no answer to give me.
I then told my parents of my plans. My father just said “Well, it’s up to you boy.” (he never ever called me by my name, unless in company). My mother I could see was close to tears. Whether this was pride, sadness or fear, I don’t know. But in the end, both gave me their blessing.
I took myself off to the recruitment office in town, but was told I must come back in a few months time, as I was then just about 14 years, 3 months old, and must be at least 14 years, 9 months old before they would consider my signing on.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Having decided that joining the Royal Navy was the right thing for me to do, my life had to carry on much as before. I still carried on with my paper rounds, reading all the comics I had to deliver every Thursday (the papers were always late on that day!). On Fridays, I think I also had to deliver the weekly editions of the Radio Times and The Listener. These magazines were made of newspaper, but they were about half an inch thick, and most people on my route (about 120 of them) seemed to have them delivered every week. I had two options: make about two or three trips (because of the weight), or borrow my father's trade bike. A trade bike was a normal looking bicycle with a very large metal frame over the front wheel to take a basket, tin box or something to enable the rider to carry large loads (like my Times and Listeners).
Dogs could be a problem, as they are to all paper boys. If their owners continued to let them out, and I had to run a bit fast to avoid them, I would remind the owners. Most were good and kept their dogs inside when they knew the papers were due, but one or two didn’t. These needed to be taught a lesson in a way that I couldn’t be blamed for. The next time the dog was inside, and snapped at the newspaper as I pushed it through the letterbox, I just held on to it. Thus the dog's owner would receive a shredded pile of paper - completely unreadable!
I was also still attending school, of course, but it would only be until summer holidays, when I would unofficially leave. My 15th birthday was coming up days after the holiday, so it was deemed it was a waste of time my returning.
As far as I was concerned, it was actually a complete waste of my time being there for the spring and summer term at all. Where in other (better) schools the children were sitting finals, I had a completely different agenda. I was given the task of painting murals on all the walls behind the desks of the teachers in most of the classrooms. Of course it was an easy job, and because no one knew what the hell I was up to, the teachers didn’t bother me. Mind you there were some classes I was expected to attend, especially those teachers who did not want murals on their classroom walls.
One of these was Mr Diss. He was a chap in his 50s, I suppose. I can’t remember what he taught; it might have been math, or should I say sums, because that was about as far as our schooling went in that particular school. He had two peculiar habits as I recall. Priory Heath was a secondary school (in both senses of the word) for both boys and girls. Firstly, Mr Diss would be smoking the whole time we were in his class. He smoked Capstan full-strength; lighting one from the other; his fingers deep brown with the nicotine stain from them as were his lips. His other habit effected quite a few of us in a more direct manner. Upon filing into his class several of us boys were not allowed to sit, but had to stand in a line by his desk. He would stand up, fetch a long plastic strip from the cupboard behind his desk, and proceed to cane each and every one of us in the line; just one stroke on each hand (don’t be silly, of course it bloody well hurt!). If one of us dared ask, "Why were we caned? We hadn’t done anything wrong.” He would just reply, “I am caning you for what I don’t catch you doing wrong!”
The arts teacher was a very good artist and I quite liked him, but he never should have been in a school like ours. He should have been, and eventually was, the arts master in Northgate Grammar school; a somewhat more refined place.
Having some talent in art I was left pretty much to myself in his class. However some of the other students used to play him up from time to time. The art classroom was on the end of the building with large windows on three sides. Where it joined the rest of the school there were two entrances, one from the ground floor, the other from the first floor. These doors were on either side of, and at the back of the room. Now Mr Finch, for that was his name, was always a minute or so late; his mind always on the next painting he would do and sell. His forte was the painting of Thames barges. Before he arrived, sometimes one or two of the lads would place a wooden ruler across the top of the door frame with a pot of paint balanced on it; but they would do so making sure it was pretty obvious it was there! Mr Finch, half in a daydream as usual, would approach the door and suddenly remember to look up (he had been caught before) and he would ignore the booby trap and go around to the other door thinking he might catch the perpetrators red handed. He'd rush in the other door, only to be caught by the second (Mark-2 Trap) placed over that door! To say he entered the classroom red-faced at being caught yet again, was literally true.
Outside of school, I was now big enough, although not officially old enough, to accompany my father to a pub now and then. This was mum's way of ensuring he got home early. My father was a very good darts player, and in his time had visited most of the pubs in a 10-mile radius around Ipswich. He was known in all of them. I remember going into one pub in Tuddenham, I think it was, and my father was greeted in the usual way “Hello, Sonny! (that was his nick name) Long time no see! Is that your younger brother with you?"
“No, it's my son.” “Blimey, I didn’t even know you were married!” So as you can see, these were just drinking mates.
The other thing we sometimes did together was to go fishing. He had an old barge tender about 16 to 18 feet long; on the front of which he had made a small cabin for shelter. It had a Stuart single-stroke engine, with some sort of flywheel, and he kept it at Old Felixstowe near the old and famous Ferry Boat Inn. We would go out fishing with a couple of mates; perhaps off the Fludgers Arms on the Felixstowe front.
The engine would struggle to get us there, but finally we would arrive and we would start fishing. His mates were all stevedores, and not one of us had a decent rod. I used to fish just using the big old centre pin reel. Dad's rod was homemade, with a broom handle at one end and with a large wooden centre pin reel at the other end, tapering to an old golf club handle.
Most times we used to catch good sized codling (about 4 lbs. or so), whiting and various other smaller fish. When we got home mum would deep fry cod cutlets in batter with some home made chips. Lovely!
That was another one of my jobs. I used to work in the Fish and Chip shop. It was my job to put the spuds into a peeler; a large rough wheel in a sort of spin dryer. This used to skin them. From there I checked them, took most of the eyes out, and then put them though the chipping machine into a large galvanised dustbin which had water continuously running through it to make sure the chips were clean and rid of excess starch.
Other than that I often used to ride my new bike. A Christmas present promised if I won a big swimming race. It was a big Hercules Upright with a 3-speed Sturmey Archer gearbox in the rear wheel hub, and a Dynamo, which at night was flipped onto the tyre of the front wheel. I would cycle into the country, lay beside my bike in a field, or on the heathlands which then surrounded Ipswich, and just ponder what my future might be.
No comments:
Post a Comment