Convalescence During The War At Marsh Court

A Memory of Marsh Court.

I have mainly unhappy memories of Marsh Court. During the Second World War it was used as a convalescent home for children and in 1944 I was sent there after being knocked down by a car in Tettenhall where I was housed as an evacuee from London. I was also suffering war trauma and I was just four. I remember a long tree-lined drive leading up to a big house with a wooden door and,on the right as you entered, a room with a big dolls house. To distract me I was invited to play with it so as not to notice my parents leaving. It had a moving figure of a little old lady inside and when you rang the door bell she passed by the window. I soon realised my parents had gone and I ran to the door, reached up for the handle, opened it and ran after them as they were walking up the drive. It was as painful for them as it was for me. I don't know how long I stayed there but it must have been for a couple of months at least.
Upstairs there were the dorms (I think on the left) and in my dorm there was another door leading to the ward for children with infectious diseases. That Christmas Santa Claus came. He was dressed in red and had a big white beard. He also had a big bag of toys. Afterwards my parents told me he came from a nearby American camp. The excitement of the children! We were all given a toy each. I was given a doll, the first I had ever had. That very evening I saw a nurse go to the toy cupboard in the dorm, look back to see if I was awake and then take my doll out. There was a child crying loudly in the dorm for infectious illnesses and she took my doll in there, probably to give to her to quieten her. I never saw it again. It was a poor thing to do to a child who had so very little and when I think about it I still feel sad for that little girl I was then, sixty-six years ago.

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