Honour of the Line (3 page)

Early in 1959 Mum and Dad, who had been on the council housing list for ages, were told they could have a brand new council house which was on the very southern perimeter of the Arches. Bless them, they were so excited, it was right near fields where I could play and was regarded as the somewhat better part of the Arches estate. I became really very upset. Firstly leaving my friends on our block but, more importantly, leaving Grandad. After many tantrums it was decided we would all move but I would be able to spend a lot of my free time at Grandad’s i.e. evenings and weekends, but would always come home to sleep.

By this time adopting children had become far more difficult. The new parents health was a stumbling block and unfortunately poor old Mum had a heart problem. From Dad’s point of view the fact he had gained a criminal record for stealing four bags of coal didn’t help. It had also cost him his job but he managed to get another with a different coal merchant but for less money. It seemed children being adopted would need a more stable upbringing than somebody with a criminal record could offer.

Amid these difficult times a relative by marriage was just starting work in the Adoption Service in the Liverpool area so my parents contacted her. At this point in my life they explained to me about my past but it made no difference to me, I had no idea where babies came from.

After two months of exchanging letters between our town and the one near Merseyside, Mum and Dad were told they would be able to adopt a seven week old girl but would have to travel to Crewe to pick her up. I had a smile as wide as the Mersey, not because I was getting a sister but because of all the train numbers I could get at Crewe. I would be the envy of all my friends. Around this time of my life I had started collecting train numbers, as had nearly all of the boys around the Arches. We were spoilt for choice as the main line still boasted the odd steam train and the cross country route was all still steam hauled. Another real bonus was we were able to sneak to the engine sheds and fill our books up with numbers. I told all of the other kids of the news but although the lads were suitably impressed a couple of the girls said that our new addition would not be a proper sister. Georgina overheard them and told them not to be so unkind and hurtful so they both apologised. Such was the close knit community of the Arches these two lasses, Susan and Patricia, put their pocket money together and bought a cuddly toy for my new sister who was still only three weeks old. I explained it would be four more weeks before we would go to collect her. They asked what her new name was going to be but I didn’t have a clue so I just said Miss McFirley.

On the big day we were up at the crack of dawn and caught the workmen’s train to London and from there a never ending journey on a red bus across town to Euston. We seemed to stop at every single traffic light in London. It was so boring, stop start stop start, but there was no other choice as Mum would not use the Underground. She still had terrible memories of air raid shelters and felt claustrophobic in any form of confined space.

Once we arrived at Euston Dad let me race off up the long platform so I could see what loco was going to pull our train and it was a Royal Scot Class named Royal Army Service Corps, another gem of a spot for my rapidly increasing collection of numbers. Never before had I been on a train where people could walk from one end to the other through the corridors, it was all so exciting, it felt like Christmas Day. Upon departure the loco slipped a little as it tried to gain traction as it struggled to haul the twelve coach train up the incline out of Euston. We were still going slowly as we passed Camden engine sheds to our left and so my book became filled with numbers very quickly. They must surely all be new to me as this was unknown territory. Mum got out the grated cheese and cucumber sandwiches she had made and we all tucked into them and washed them down with the awful stewed tea from our vacuum flask that had already been brewed for approaching four hours.

Our first and only stop before Crewe was Rugby where we seemed to wait an eternity as the loco refilled with water. Speed was very soon gained and I could just about depict the station sign as we hammered through Nuneaton at what seemed like the speed of sound. My Dad had been sound asleep for ages and was snoring like a pig, which made me laugh, but there was only us in the compartment so it didn’t really matter. He was the type of chap who wouldn’t really have cared if the Queen Mother was present. His attitude would be ‘let her pay for a first class ticket then she could sit amongst her own’.

Eventually we slowed down as the train rounded the Stafford curves, I had read about them in railway magazines, they were quite severe and had a speed limit on them. Mum asked me what the station was called and when I told her she gave Dad a few more minutes beauty sleep before calling him to say we were nearly there. Dad seemed calm but Mum’s voice was extremely tense. I remember asking her what my sister’s name was going to be and she got really choked up as she said Daisy, after her Mum who had died giving birth to her.

On the approach to Crewe we were all getting really excited and I just hoped that my new little sis would be a lot less trouble for Mum and Dad than I was. I began to realise I had to change for the better, but how was the problem? We had arranged to meet our distant relative who we had never met or spoken to before, we had only seen photos of her.

We had arranged to meet up with her at the Northern end of Platform 4. We hadn’t been there very long before we heard the station announcer say that the approaching train was for Bristol Temple Meads and it was the 11.35 from Liverpool Lime Street. Could they be on this train perhaps I wondered? We all waited as patiently as we could until finally this very smart lady, wearing a grey suit, walked towards us and introduced herself as Aunty Edie, which I assumed was short for Edith. Pleasantries were exchanged and she then took us to the waiting room which was empty except for a rather weary looking lady, who was probably only in her early twenties. She was accompanied by two young children and a baby in a carry-cot. The mother looked as though she had been to hell and back, it must have been torture for the poor lady. She simply handed Daisy to my Mum and left the waiting room with her other two kids, showing no emotion whatsoever, as neither did the children. To this day my little sister has no knowledge of any sort of her real brother and sister, wherever they are or whatever happened to them.

Official forms were signed by Mum and Dad, we said our goodbyes and Dad carried Daisy as we made our way to the platform for Euston. By this time I had got into the big brother mode and sadly I probably missed many chances to increase my train number collection. There were steam trains everywhere, mostly filthy dirty and in the twilight of their life. When our train finally trundled in it was jam-packed and, to make things worse, the journey time was longer as we skirted the industrial Midlands on a different route which took us via the Black Country foundries of Wolverhampton and England’s second city Birmingham. The fact Daisy was screaming for Britain didn’t exactly make things comfortable, although she did eventually settle down with the pre-made bottle her biological mother had prepared for her.

It was dark when we finally arrived back in Colwood, our home town, and for the one and only time in my childhood we took a taxi. The journey to the Arches only took two or three minutes but I felt so posh. It was a black car and the driver wore a smart suit, a peaked cap and held the door open for us to get out when we arrived at our home. Grandad and his sister were in our house, they had been left the spare key and Aunty Win had a stew on the go which was the first food we had seen for hours.

Around the table everyone seemed so happy but things were quickly wound up as I had school the following day, plus Dad and Grandad had to be up early for work. Paternity Leave was another generation away yet. Work rules were simple those days, no work no pay and if a man were to let his employer down more than once it quite often resulted in him being awarded the DCM. Despite the grand sounding of this title it was an easy way for the boss to tell the worker he had been sacked. The DCM stood for ‘Don’t come Monday’ and all workers feared it.

On Daisy’s first night in her new home she seemed contented and slept most of the night and only disturbed when Dad got up for work. Her early morning crying was a joy to hear and none of us really cared we had been woken up a shade earlier than normal.

Daisy’s growing up was fairly straight-forward and I was kept totally in the picture during all the stages of her eventual adoption, which helped me come to terms with my early days, but at that time of my life I couldn’t have cared less. I had no idea how babies were made, I just wanted to play and have fun. Life was great.

Life was beginning to change lightning fast and by June 1960, two months short of my tenth birthday, I accompanied my parents to the local Magistrates Court where they officially adopted Daisy. This would have been exactly the same procedure Mum and Dad had gone through to adopt me several years earlier when I was a baby. It was a total anti-climax as I was expecting loads of policemen and men with wigs but, in fact, we went into a large room, with massively long tables, where two women and one man sat. These were the Magistrates. Both of the women were old but the man seemed ancient and barely alive. It seemed like he was hovering in and out of consciousness. However, they signed the forms and Daisy was ours forever. Three weeks later she was christened Daisy Alice McFirley at the same church where I was christened.

I was beginning to take an interest in sport and was really looking forward to our school sports day. I was now at middle school just across town and the nine year olds and upwards could take part in the school sports on its rather nice sports field.

Sports Day was really something special for us kids from the Arches because we only got to try our luck twice before returning to senior school on our own patch. The ones from other areas stayed until leaving age was reached. During the evenings I had been practising running at the rec close to Grandad’s house and could easily beat the boys of my age and the majority of the older ones and so all the kids from the Arches thought I would win easily.

Middle school was somewhat more up-market than the Arches school as school funds were collected each term towards outings etc., and also to provide prizes for Sports Day in the form of book tokens. The idea being that books had an educational theme. Prizes were awarded to the first two in each race. A ten shilling voucher for the winner and a five shilling voucher for second place. In my little world I had already spent my winning voucher before the race was run. The bookstall on our station had a book containing all of Britain’s train numbers, it was known as a combined volume and you underlined the numbers as you collected them. Up until this time I just checked them off in an exercise book and had firstly written them down on pages I had torn from the middle of various school books.

Sports Day arrived and it was all very exciting. There was bunting right along the whole length of the straight running track. There was a stage for the prizes to be presented and several teachers had megaphones. It was like the Olympic Games in miniature.

Mine was to be the second race of the day over a distance of 70 yards. The girls 70 yards was the first race. The big event of the day was the 150 yards in which the winners, and runners up of all the age groups faced each other in the golden finale. Although I would have to face much older lads in this event most of my friends thought I would win it. Georgina ran in the girls 70 yards and ran the race of her life to finish 4
th
. She had expected to finish last. She was by far the quickest of her house team, the yellows, but the other colour teams all had runners that could always beat her easily.

Nerves were non existent as we were called to our marks and as the start whistle sounded and the crowd began to cheer I gave it all I had got. After about 40 yards it became all to apparent that two other lads, both from the other side of town, were getting well away from me. Sadly, for me, I finished a well beaten 3
rd
and only just hung onto that. Not only did I get well beaten, but I would not get my chance in the 150 yards, the highlight of the day. I was distraught as one of the teachers, Mr Ellis, gave the 1
st
and 2
nd
in the race a card which would entitle them to their prizes at the end of the day presentation. Both of the other lads, Derek and Tim, came over to shake hands but rather petulantly I refused. Losing was awful, not getting my book was even worse. When Grandad came home from work that night I told him of my failure and he asked if I would be interested in sport, perhaps even learning to play football as I was now old enough to learn the game. Without really thinking I agreed, and unbeknown to me at the time, that snap decision could have eventually changed my life forever.

The morning after Sports Day I went to school feeling rather sheepish. The indignity of defeat was still weighing heavy on my shoulders but everybody was great and carried on as usual. Mid-way through our first lesson, which was arithmetic, one of the senior monitors came to our teacher with a note. Our teacher, Mr Redwood, looked rather stern as he told me I had to report to the Head Master’s office. It seemed I was standing there for an eternity wondering what was going on but I wasn’t frightened as I didn’t think I had offended in any way. Our Head Master’s name was Mr Boddingford and he had the reputation for strict discipline. I found him almost a bully even when he spoke and really didn’t like him very much. That opinion was about to change. He called me in and told me I had let the good name of the school down by my total lack of grace in defeat. Mr Ellis had obviously reported me for not shaking hands. Boddingford ordered me to bend over his table and he thrashed me senseless with the slipper, so severely I was unable to stop shaking and could not begin to eat my school dinner, which earned me 25 lines. As if one punishment wasn’t enough. ‘I must eat the dinner my parents had paid for’ was the line. I felt like adding … ‘I would have eaten it if that bastard of a Head Master hadn’t nearly killed me for such a petty offence’. God only knows what happened for something more serious. I can only assume he beheaded children who were really naughty.