The Great Depression - my memories of the 30s

I was born in 1932. My father was a milk roundsman and we lived above the Express Dairy in Wallington with my sister and 3 brothers where we could watch the milk being loaded onto the carts and see the horses taken to their stables each evening. Although poor we were happy and in 1935 moved to a house rented for 10/- weekly which would be a family residence for the next 60 years.. The only heating and cooking was with what was called a kitchen range, being a fire place and oven in the living room which also heated water for the bath upstairs but which never worked properly as evidenced by the portable bath we kept on a hook on the wall outside. I remember on our initial arrival at the house the lilac trees in bloom with several apple and cherry trees that later and each summer would yield many baskets full of ripe apples and cherries in abundance. In 1937 i went to the infant school at the other end of our road. . A small building next to the church, of the corrugated iron variety. where we wrote on slates. In the winter we had small bottle of milk which through being placed to thaw on the radiator was rather sickly.. By 1939 on the eve or war we had all been issued with gas masks that folded to fit into a small cardboard box we had to carry with us at all times. We now lived close to the boundary of Croydon airport and witnessed the initial arrival of the RAF who flew in to land in ancient Bi-Planes. Later the airmen were billeted in nearby houses. At school the small playing field was dug up for deep long air raid shelters to be built which lat er we would use several times a week as we listened to our own gun barrages and the drone of enemy aircraft over head with their distinctive rise and fall drone. . But thats another story for the 40's forum. - Signed Cessna

Thank-you, Maywalk, for giving us a brief insight into your childhood. It sounds terrible living in the Sisters of Mercy Home. I often wonder why the nuns in these Homes were so cruel. What possible justification can they have had and how did they reconcile their cruelty with their faith? Thank goodness that you were able to return to your family - were they allowed to visit you in the Home or did you feel as though the Home were giving you away to complete strangers when your parents came to claim you?
I hope that you have written all your childhood experiences down for your family and future generations so that they know what your life was like.
Carole

What an interesting read Maywalk, thank you.