If only we knew things in advance…
Halcyon days, poets call them, those days of calm before a storm. Now I have little sense of smell with which to taste or enjoy food, but still in my dreams I can recall that scene as if it were yesterday: Newt and Frank on their hands and knees scrubbing for dear life while I brushed the blacking on the grate and tried to hide the evidence, all to no avail. I got such a rocket from Mam for wasting precious sugar and there was no cinder toffee to put in their knapsacks. I sent them on their way to war empty-handed. It still breaks my heart to think how unprepared we all were for what was to follow.
6
1916
Hester felt proud of her effort. A thick bowl of broth, with mutton bones, pearl barley, vegetables chopped and lots of salt and pepper. They were having a penny dinner in the church hall to raise funds for the new Women’s Institute. To her surprise she quite enjoyed getting stuck in, wearing a long white apron and a lace-edged cap, while Violet Hunt chatted away about all the things this new society might do to help the war effort.
‘We need a committee and you must take the chair, of course, Lady Hester. There are groups springing up all over the district. It’s all very exciting.’
Violet was becoming a staunch ally and, for a vicar’s wife, most liberal in her views. It was she who suggested it might be politic to invite the chapel women. This was an interdenominational institution, after all, open to all women, married or single, and a splendid way of galvanising all their working parties into one big effort. Instead of lots of separate meetings in order to publicise all the new directives from the government about saving fuel and food and equipment, they were going to pass on useful tips and skills.It would give the wives of soldiers something to occupy their evenings after an outbreak of khaki fever in the district and some unfortunate incidents between visiting soldiers and local women.
Hester stirred the soup pan, sniffing the delicious aroma. Who would’ve thought a year ago she would have to cook some of her own meals, tidy her own room, see to some of her mending and, her most daring venture to date learn to ride a bicycle.
Cycling up and down to the shops with her basket was most invigorating in the fresh air, and once or twice on a bright day she’d ventured further afield, shortening her riding skirts to prevent them catching on the chain. Sometimes down the green lanes with stonewalls enclosing her, she heard the curlew bubbling over the fields as she watched the lambs gambolling, almost forgetting that there was a war on. It was all so peaceful and serene. It was impossible to contemplate that five hundred miles away young men were being killed.
She was getting used to the boys being away now, believing Charles when he’d said that they’d not be shoved across the Channel without proper training. Their letters were brief chatty notes full of a world she hardly knew these days. Hers in return were full of how war was changing her domestic life, how the village community responded to the sad news of boys who would never return home. She told them about Violet’s new idea to form the Women’s Institute like the ones set up in Canada, which her sister had joined.
But the casualty lists were never far away from everyone’s mind. Charles hinted that there was a big push coming when the weather faired up; a push in which hersons would surely be involved. The French were taking a pounding, holding their forts at Verdun against terrible odds and suffering atrocious bombardments, so the paper said.
Keep busy and don’t think too much was her maxim now. Fill every day with things to do, shore up the gaps with busyness. The garden was turned over now into one big allotment, and potatoes chitted and planted before the ninth of April, the traditional date for planting here. She’d been on her hands and knees with the best of them now she was down to just one
Halcyon days, poets call them, those days of calm before a storm. Now I have little sense of smell with which to taste or enjoy food, but still in my dreams I can recall that scene as if it were yesterday: Newt and Frank on their hands and knees scrubbing for dear life while I brushed the blacking on the grate and tried to hide the evidence, all to no avail. I got such a rocket from Mam for wasting precious sugar and there was no cinder toffee to put in their knapsacks. I sent them on their way to war empty-handed. It still breaks my heart to think how unprepared we all were for what was to follow.
6
1916
Hester felt proud of her effort. A thick bowl of broth, with mutton bones, pearl barley, vegetables chopped and lots of salt and pepper. They were having a penny dinner in the church hall to raise funds for the new Women’s Institute. To her surprise she quite enjoyed getting stuck in, wearing a long white apron and a lace-edged cap, while Violet Hunt chatted away about all the things this new society might do to help the war effort.
‘We need a committee and you must take the chair, of course, Lady Hester. There are groups springing up all over the district. It’s all very exciting.’
Violet was becoming a staunch ally and, for a vicar’s wife, most liberal in her views. It was she who suggested it might be politic to invite the chapel women. This was an interdenominational institution, after all, open to all women, married or single, and a splendid way of galvanising all their working parties into one big effort. Instead of lots of separate meetings in order to publicise all the new directives from the government about saving fuel and food and equipment, they were going to pass on useful tips and skills.It would give the wives of soldiers something to occupy their evenings after an outbreak of khaki fever in the district and some unfortunate incidents between visiting soldiers and local women.
Hester stirred the soup pan, sniffing the delicious aroma. Who would’ve thought a year ago she would have to cook some of her own meals, tidy her own room, see to some of her mending and, her most daring venture to date learn to ride a bicycle.
Cycling up and down to the shops with her basket was most invigorating in the fresh air, and once or twice on a bright day she’d ventured further afield, shortening her riding skirts to prevent them catching on the chain. Sometimes down the green lanes with stonewalls enclosing her, she heard the curlew bubbling over the fields as she watched the lambs gambolling, almost forgetting that there was a war on. It was all so peaceful and serene. It was impossible to contemplate that five hundred miles away young men were being killed.
She was getting used to the boys being away now, believing Charles when he’d said that they’d not be shoved across the Channel without proper training. Their letters were brief chatty notes full of a world she hardly knew these days. Hers in return were full of how war was changing her domestic life, how the village community responded to the sad news of boys who would never return home. She told them about Violet’s new idea to form the Women’s Institute like the ones set up in Canada, which her sister had joined.
But the casualty lists were never far away from everyone’s mind. Charles hinted that there was a big push coming when the weather faired up; a push in which hersons would surely be involved. The French were taking a pounding, holding their forts at Verdun against terrible odds and suffering atrocious bombardments, so the paper said.
Keep busy and don’t think too much was her maxim now. Fill every day with things to do, shore up the gaps with busyness. The garden was turned over now into one big allotment, and potatoes chitted and planted before the ninth of April, the traditional date for planting here. She’d been on her hands and knees with the best of them now she was down to just one
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