The Last Chapter Read online

He said “come on lets go” so out we went and sure enough bobby’s dad was at the door and shouted over “Alright Tom” what was it he found. My dad told him it was a P.O. for 5/- and he was taking it to the police station. I am a bit vague about the outcome of it all, but he either took it to the police or managed to get back home without being seen and eventually cashed it. But as I said five shillings was a fortune.

  Dad couldn’t have been much nearer to his work place it was at the bottom of Rose Vale on “Greaty”. At the time it was called Criddles & Co cattle foods, later it became Billington & Son Ltd. My dad worked for them for fifty one years they would never employ anyone as loyal as my dad. Sometimes dad would take me down to his work and I used to watch them working, moving the cattle food around. Then loading the wagons for moving the cattle food to the farms all around Lancashire. The smell of the foods and various other products they used was very strong. I used to enjoy going down to the works and the men making a fuss of me, I got to know them all after a while. One of the men used to call me “Dinky” and I often wondered why he called me that name. I found out much later, apparently when my dad was in this teens he was called “Dinky” so this man carried it on with me. My dad had been at Billingtons from the age of 16yrs and retired after 51yrs there.

  In Rose Vale them days there was a corner shop that sold everything and was always open till late at night. Mr Dorr’s run the shop with his wife, nearly everyone got their stuff on the slate. It was only a converted house but he must have made a small fortune. My dad used to send me for 5 Players Weights every night, it was only a few doors away from where we lived. During my childhood, Gt Homer St. was full of shops, every conceivable trade. Duffys were on the corner of Rose Vale they sold almost everything such as toiletries, iron work such as flat irons, kettles and pans etc. There were butchers, cake shops, grocers, chemists on both sides. If you go down there now I don’t think you will see a shop. On Saturday these days they have a big market place.

  King George V and Queen Mary opened the tunnel in 1935-36. The two monuments are still there to this day at the entrance to the “Kings” tunnel.

  Another ritual when we lived off Great Homer St. was the trips along to Cazeneau St. Market. Every Saturday evening we’d be marched around the market and sometimes ended up walking into London Road. I remember us going into T.J’s and my dad bought me a watch, a pocket watch for 2/6d, that’s about 15 or 16 pence in modern money. The big fish market in Ranelagh Street was another haunt of ours on Saturday evenings. Everything was sold there, fish, meat, fruit and vegetables. I distinctly remember seeing a man walking pas a meat counter and sliding a joint of meat into his bag. It was the 1930s and a lot of people were on the breadline. I told my mother, but she told me to take no notice, it wasn’t our business.

  The Mersey tunnel was being built about now and quite a lot of men were employed to get it done. It must have been hazardous because quite a few of them were killed. I remember walking through Cazeneau St. Market and I heard an old man saying to somebody “She’s just lost her husband in the tunnel”, he was talking about his daughter.

  The environment and living conditions couldn’t have been much worse. My Nin would regularly open the door to the landlord and show him a huge rat on her shovel. It was so bad my uncle Vic who lived with my dad’s sister Ethel laid traps for the vermin. The traps he used were the kind that caught them live, and then he’d get Nigger and Ginger the two cats ready then release the rat which didn’t have a chance. Some of the neighbours did things you couldn’t forget. Such as Mrs Riley, she had a gang of kids but she was a Roman Catholic and she took a lot of abuse from other people. One particular day the ganged up to get her out, my mother came to the door and in no uncertain manner she told them what she thought of them. Our next door neighbour Mrs Riley was very grateful for the help. The Johnson twins were my age and not matter what the weather they’d come out in bare feet and if it rained they would dam the gutters with lots of paper and then have a ball trampling in the water. Then there was Jessie Sefton who lived a couple of doors away from us. She had two boys Ronnie and Gene and a husband she was forever fighting with. She had a foul mouth and was always borrowing things mostly from my mother. Ronnie was about my age and didn’t seem to be too bright. I don’t know much about Gene, he was younger than me. The boys were left to defend themselves, according to the stories, Ronnie ended up the top man in the “Fire Service” and Gene was a Catholic Priest.

  My Nin used to take me to the “Tivoli” we called it the “Tivvy” to see Cowboy pictures. We went to the “Rosscommon “(“Rossy”) as well, she loved cowboy films. Some of the films were silent ones and I remember the first talking picture coming to the “Tivvy”. Everyone seemed amazed and couldn’t believe it. Nin got quite carried away when she was watching the old westerns. When the baddie was creeping up on the hero of the film to hit him over the head, she used to shout “Look out, he’s behind you”. She never seen television but I am sure she would have loved it. My other Nin didn’t take me to the pictures as often as Nin Lawson but when she did, she got so excited she would screw my cap up and kept on doing it until the end of the film. She used to take me to a cinema near where St. Josephs School is in Cazeneau St. close to town. I think it was called “The Gaity”. It’s not there now in fact I don’t know if the school is still there.

  Just a little story about Christmas. I remember one xmas we had a party at Rose Vale house everyone who came brought me a present, the bed was littered with gifts, of course I thought Father Christmas brought them I was about 5 or 6 at the time. When I was about 8 or 9, I was walking along Grt. Homer St. with my mother and out of the blue, she said “There isn’t any Father Christmas”. I thought my world had collapsed and was so disappointed.

  In 1930 my mother gave birth to my sister Ethel, I remember being disappointed because I had been promised a toy motor car.

  During our trips to my Nins in Rockery St. there was a period when my mother cried a lot, I couldn’t understand why but later on I found out she had lost a baby between me and Ethel.

  My mother didn’t get on with Aunty Betty, her eldest sister. One night Betty turned up at our front door called up the stairs “are you there Sarah”. My mother came down to see what she wanted and was met with a battering, she obviously didn’t expect. Her husband Alf stood on the other side of the road egging her on. I was put to bed afterwards so I didn’t know what went on. I found out years later, my mother followed her (Betty) back to Rockeby St. and reversed the decision if you know what I mean.

  I was only nine years old in 1934 and I think my parents had enough and decided to move. A family called Sinnott lived next door to Nin Walling, MRS Sinnott had two bachelor brothers who lived in Orwell Road Kirkdale. They offered us the use of the house except for the front room and one of the bedrooms. Now, Kirkdale is only little over two miles from Rose Vale, but my mother thought we were going posh, so she told us “In future, call me mother” from then she was always Mother not Mam. We moved in and met up with the brothers, Willy the eldest and Arthur. Willy was an army man, an ex-Sgt Major in the regular army and had a huge handlebar moustache and was continuously stroking it. Arthur was a small quiet man who was quite a good artist and encouraged me to draw, which I loved doing then and still do.

  We had to find a school and St. Lawrence’s C of E in Croyland Street was the most convenient. So I started school there and my teacher was a Miss Marsh, a complete terror who carried a tapered stick about two feet long. If anyone stepped out of line in any shape or form, that stick went into action. Some of us actually thought she was a man in disguise. The heads name was Mr Nevitt, we all called him Ben Nevis after the mountain (Ben Nevis). He was fine and a nice man who, when we went to Westminster Road baths for swimming he would always get in with us. There were some characters in this school, two of them were my best mates Ronnie Smith and Arthur Williams, another pal was Charlie Rimmer. Ar
thur Williams went into the Navy later on and during his first leave died in a fire trying to save two children who were under the stairs. He was only eighteen years of age. Ronnie Smith was the class joker, and got me into more trouble than anybody else. One lad named Grenfell, a ginger headed trouble maker who wanted to have a go with me. So after school hours at 4 o’clock we met by the toilets, a big crowd turned up and we started to fight. I was doing well, I caught him a few times and was finding it easy. Then true to form a lad called Billy Dorman who was much bigger than the rest pushed Grenfell against me, I fell and smashed my head against the wall. He was carried shoulder high as the winner. Mr Jones was one of the teachers at this school. He was always reading, while we were working and never looked as though he was interested in what we were doing. But if anyone stepped out of line, like talking or copying he’d have us out to give us six of the best with his cane. The other teacher was Mr Rowland’s, I wasn’t keen on him with good reason. There was a girl I liked in the school her name was Lily Corkish. One day I sent