Uldale The War Years

A Memory of Uldale.

My mother and I lived in Uldale during the war years, while my father was abroad with the RAF. I recall there were only two cars in the village. We had no electricity, we had paraffin lamps for light, cooking was done on an open fire and oven. My mother always said the cakes were always perfect. We had a radio, this was run on batteries that were brought from the Uldale post office just across the road, they were recharged, large glass-like things that would nearly always run out half way through the play or programme that Mum was listening to. I recall going to the village school just past the post office on the right. There was only one classroom for all the children, youngest at the front (that was me) with the eldest going to the back. It was felt that if you learnt to read and write you were doing well. The school teacher had a fierce face. My father home from leave arrived one day with his camera and took a class photo outside in the yard with our teacher. We still have the picture. My mother's friends were Harold and Elizabeth Boyd, they lived two doors down from our terraced house. I can recall the signpost at the crossroads being replaced after the war was over, I think they were taken down all over the counrtry as part of the strategy. Mr Boyd told the men that we didn't need them since we all knew where the places were. Apart from the post office and the public house across the village there weren't any shops, so shopping had to be done in Ireby, a walk away. I believe the bus service didn't start until some years later and was then withdrawn due to a lack of demand. After the war we moved down to Manchester, returning for the last time as a family for a holiday in 1948. We stayed with the Boyds for part of the time and then down at "Gate Farm" down the village across the crossroads. I have a mind to go back to visit the village again, soon, I often feel that my mother, in her thoughts, never really left the lanes and byeways of Uldale.

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