A WEEKEND AT THE SEASIDE

Nothing could be better than this. Nothing.

I’d been to the seaside before. Of course I had. Lots and lots of times. Mummy had told me. But the last time was ages ago and I could only just remember a stony beach because I'd been there last August and now it was another year and it was May. A Friday. Nine months is a long, long time when you’ve only just had your fourth birthday. Here was me, in the summer of 1938, nearly two years ago now, on a beach in Devon and I was probably feeling the same feelings - but I can't remember anything about it.

But here I was at the seaside again, now, today, but this time I was standing on another beach, a sandy one, which stretched for miles and miles. There was more open space than I had ever seen before, enough to make me breathless with wonder at the vastness surrounding me. And the sea stretching away for ever, blue and sparkling. When I looked out over it, the edge where it met the sky was curved, which proved to me that the earth was round, just like my big sister had told me. Like a huge orange, she’d said. She knew about lots of things. It was a pity she was so bossy-abouty. But at least she was now helping me make a sand-castle while our mum and dad and elder brother lay back on the sand in the afternoon sunshine, relaxing after the long journey, their hands behind their heads. They were all squinting at the distant horizon and seemed completely wrapped up in their own thoughts.

The sand-castle was finished. It only needed the little tissue-paper flags which had been bought especially from a kiosk on the promenade, just behind the beach. No sooner than I had opened the packet, the dozen little flags inside, which were the national flags of more countries than I knew existed, were grabbed out of my hand by a violent gust of wind, scattering and disappearing totally, utterly, irretrievably. This disaster was so unexpected and so complete that I was numbed with shock and did not even cry. In fact I was surprised at my own bravery. Still dry-eyed I soon found myself trotting along the promenade in the midst of the family, licking a consoling ice-cream. I didn't notice the lines of RAF men there, practising how to stand to attention and handle their rifles and march up and down - my big brother told me about all that a long time afterwards. And also about why the weekend ended up as it eventually did.

But what I did see was something absolutely wonderful, a toy I’d never seen before, and that was a multi-coloured windmill on the end of a stick. It was tied to another toddler's pushchair and was whizzing around furiously in the breeze as it passed by. The owner of the desirable object was not even looking at it and, unbelievably, seemed to have an expression of intense boredom on her silly face. Perhaps even smugness. A sense of my own recent loss and a desire to own such a beautiful thing overwhelmed me. Two quiet requests to my parents were followed by a more forceful plea which in turn led to a tantrum which was one never to be forgotten. But despite standing in the grown-ups' path, barring their way and screaming as loudly as I was able, no windmill was going to be bought for me and the world appeared wholly bleak and cruel.

At breakfast the next morning my outlook had long since improved, with thoughts of windmills and lost flags dismissed and the world again full of promise. I had the vague impression that my cheery mood contrasted with that of the other four. They seemed to have lost their high spirits of the previous day but I had no idea why. I finished my boiled egg and, bored with a serious conversation I could not follow, left them to their muttering and slipped off the tall hotel chair. Then down to the floor and under the table where an exciting new territory opened up. As I crawled amongst the legs, both human and oak, I felt some surprise that for once no notice was being taken of such behaviour in a public place. By the time that I had re-emerged, tired of this normally forbidden activity, the discussions had ceased and I was told, gently, that they had all decided it would be better to return home that morning, rather than to stay on to Sunday as they had intended. Daddy would go and get the car filled up while the rest of us had a last look at the sea.

On the promenade I was persuaded, against my better judgement, to accept the treat of a ride on a children’s roundabout (a bit like this one). I was lifted into a small car, painted pink. I grasped the steering wheel and was overcome with self-consciousness as I found myself going round and round in front of a ring of grown-ups. These mums and dads all seemed to be watching the children on the roundabout ever so intently. But I knew that it was just me they were all looking at. I bowed my head, overcome with self-consciousness, and sat for an eternity with my eyes focused on a sheet of metal in front of my knees beyond the steering wheel. It was like a tiny, enclosed world, painted pink, just like the maps of the British Empire, and flecked with rust. Round and round and round. Finally and to my immense relief the ride came to an end. I was lifted out of the car and then I snuggled up to Mummy where at last nobody seemed to be looking at me. She put her arm around me and seemed to press me to her side even more closely than she normally did.

We walked back to the hotel where Daddy had already put the suitcases in the car. As we drove off I gave the sea a final wave, as Mummy told me to do, and promised it I would come back as soon as I could. I nestled up beside my sister on the rear seat and looked sadly out of the window at the houses and shops which lined the road out of Blackpool. As we passed a newsagent's there were some newspaper hoardings outside, left over from the previous evening. They told us the headlines of last night's final edition. If I had been able to read any of this - and understand it - it would have told me:

No one spoke.

The little black Ford headed south, towards Birmingham and Streetly.

Towards home and safety.

 

 

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POSTSCRIPT The days after our return home from our weekend away are frightening indeed - but not to me, who is cocooned, protected, and so, thankfully, knows nothing of them. We get back to Streetly on the Saturday afternoon. By the following Tuesday, Rotterdam is being heavily bombed and German forces are pouring into eastern France - "Blitzkrieg", lightning war, the frightening new tactic of fighting. In the evening, the Minister of War, Anthony Eden, announces on the wireless the formation of a new defence force, the Local Defence Volunteers (soon to be renamed the "Home Guard"). My father volunteers immediately, together with dozens of other Streetly and Little Aston men, many of whom are survivors of the Great War and whose memory of war is still recent and fresh and ghastly. They are joined very quickly by my elder brother who has, as yet, no experience of it. On Wednesday the Dutch Army surrenders. On Friday Brussels falls. The following Monday sees the Germans reaching the Channel coast, cutting the Allied armies in two. The British Army is in retreat towards the port of Dunkirk. Miraculously the German army halts for a day or two in order to re-group and the Luftwaffe takes over the role of attacking the hundreds of thousands of troops being forced back into the sea. And finally, on Wednesday, May 21st, ten days after our curtailed weekend by the seaside, my mother sits down at the dining table to fill out a small buff-coloured form. As I look now at that little object, 84 years later, I visualise her on an occasion such as this, leaning forward to dip her blunt-nibbed pen into the bottle of Stephens ink and then, ever so carefully, filling in the information which has to be included. As is always the case when she is writing something important, the tip of her tongue is in the corner of her mouth as she gives her full concentration to the task in hand and the avoidance of any error. A quick check that the address information is correct, the pen is laid own, a dab of blotting paper and the job is done. Within days, by June 3rd, the miracle of the Dunkirk evacuation is completed but during the month things get ever worse. On the 10th Italy declares war on us, Paris falls on the 14th and France surrenders on the 21st making its entire Channel coastline available to invasion forces and behind it a string of Luftwaffe bomber bases within range of all the British Isles. I think of my parents and what was going through their minds at this time as they faced this total disaster and a new, terrifying, ongoing threat. Every Streetly family, every family in the land, was in the same position. WHAT must it have been like to be someone who was responsible for children at that time? How would any of us have coped with it all? Perhaps it does none of us any harm to think of these things, just very occasionally. CM....30 June 2024

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(Main article originally written in 2003 and remembering Friday and Saturday, 10/11th May 1940)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Please see INDEX page for general acknowledgements.
Grateful acknowledgement is also made to:
- The Imperial War Museum (sketch of North Promenade)
- Blackpool Gazette (Road scene)
- The British Newspaper Archive (Newspaper headlines)
- family members

This family and local history page is hosted by www.staffshomeguard.co.uk 
(The Home Guard of Great Britain, 1940-1944)
All text and images are, unless otherwise stated, © The Myers Family 2024  

INDEX Home Guard of Great Britain website

INDEX Streetly and Family Memories 1936-61

L8A3 June 2024 - © The Myers Family 2024