12 minute read
Victoria Sibthorpe (by John
by NBAA
VICTORIA SIBTHORPE
July 1928 by her son JOHN
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We were born in the fifties just after the war really, so things were just the way they were. Ours was the kind of home where your Dad ruled. Life had its ups and downs; some days we would have loads of money, some days we wouldn’t’. My Dad Ronald Victor Sibthorpe was a gambler, but he was also an entrepreneur. He used to make shakers and he would import fish from Africa and sell it at the market. He was good at what he did, so we would never starve. There was always food on the table, you know what I mean, and we had good clothes.
Victoria S Robert, my mum, made our clothes. When I went to school she made my trousers. When I was young and couldn’t afford flares , my Mum made them for me.
My Mother was half Spanish, half Irish, she had long Black hair. I suppose a bit of a beaut’ really. She was one the few whose hair stayed Black, most of my Aunties went blond. I don’t know why, probably because they thought that it was – Black man’s kryptonite. Nearly every one of my Aunties or Mum’s friends who were with Black people at some point or other dyed their hair blond, but my Mother stayed Black haired.
I think they met at a forces club and got married at Salford – Registrar, I believe.
Mum’s sister married a guy from Sierra Leone. Her brother married a white girl, so it’s weird to say, that we have a white cousin, whereas all the rest of the family are half caste. Mum had six siblings; my Auntie Marion, Auntie Adie, Auntie Doris, Auntie Minnie who died, a brother called George and a brother called Victor, who died.
My Uncle George treated us alright. It was just that we have this side of the family who we just don’t have contact with. I couldn’t tell you where any of them are. I know one has got a daughter, but apart from that, I can’t tell you anything. The only connection we had was my Mum, who when we were little, would drag us along, to my Aunties, and that was it.
There were only two Black families that lived in our area. One of them was the Walkers, and the others were the Davies who lived on Camp Street. The others lived on Broughton Lane and we lived further down. But, there weren’t many coloured people at all. My Mum didn’t seem to have any problems with it, no.
Mum very rarely went out; she only went out when my Dad took her out. She wasn’t one of these people who went, you know, raving or anything. You know what I mean? She would go to the Western Social Club when it was open, but I don’t think she would have gone to the Reno or anywhere like that – never.
My mother was really a bit timid. She stood up to him, but in a way, I considered her timid. At times I didn’t think it would ever work between my parents because like she was always leaving him, and we would have to hide. At one point we lived on Acker street which is up near the MRI1. I remember I had to take my brother and sister to school on Waterloo Road, in Cheetham Hill. We had to get two buses and hide from my Dad, so he wouldn’t find out where we were living, coz he would come and get my Mum back. But she always went back.
He used to hit her sometimes; we witnessed it, but you tended to accept it because he hit us as well. It was the old way like ‘you don’t listen, you will feel’.
When I was young he ran a book-makers. He was pretty talented, very intelligent and well respected. He used to stay out. He’d go gambling and not come home. I remember once he went gambling in Moss Side and my mother took us down and said, ‘Is Ronnie in there?’ They said ‘Yeah’, ‘Well tell him his kids are outside’ and just left us outside. Of course, he went off his head.
Mum always worked. She was a machinist, she worked for the same bloke, Davis’, for thirty, forty years. We went to wherever she could get a flat. It wouldn’t seem like planning to us. We would just come home, and she would say ‘we are going’ and we move out to a place she had arranged. She could have gone to my Aunties, but then my Auntie was also married to an African from the same village in Sierra Leone. Obviously if they were to meet up he’s going to say ‘Well, I don’t want to tell you but’... My father passed away first. I was a disappointment to him because I was the first Black boy, well the first coloured person to go to Salford Grammar School. In all the six years that I was there I was the only one. Dad expected great things from me, but I chose not to realise my potential.
My mum was made up. Like I have said, she used to get my school uniform and would make sure my shirts, and everything were always right. My Dad was the same, he was proud of me, he got me a tutor – all the normal things. But he was very strict, so we had our little clashes. When I got old enough, I just decided that I didn’t want to speak to him, and I didn’t speak to him for about eight or nine years. I just used to drop my wife and kids off, and if there was a party I’d ask, ‘Is my Dad in there?’ ‘Yep’ ‘Not coming in, no thank you, see you later when I pick you up’.
I liked being cuddled, yeah, by my Mum I suppose; at sometimes I must have, yeah. But with my Mum, it was like carrot and stick wasn’t it? As soon as my Dad went out of the house you did what
you wanted, and your Mum would threaten you with your Dad. Then as soon as you heard your Dad’s key go in the door, you start begging your Mum not to tell your Dad. If she tells, she is horrible, if she doesn’t tell then you have got one over on her and you would do it again. Sometimes she would tell your Dad then you would get beaten, so, it’s just life.
I thought it was a bit strict, but I mean, they are your parents aren’t they and you can’t do much can you? You can’t do much until you are like fifteen or sixteen, then you get the hell out of there. I got caught climbing on a garage and they took me to court. My father gave me a choice, to go home or to go in to a Children’s Home. I said, ‘I would rather go into a Children’s Home’. They didn’t let me go, they knew it was my bravado. I just didn’t want to be at home. But I was happy yeah. I always did what I wanted to do, so I was happy.
I look more like my Mum because I have a straight nose. Whereas my brother and sister look more like my Dad. But I have got my father’s ways, do you know what I mean? I have got my father’s determination; like if I think I am right, I don’t care what anybody else has got to say. And I think most of my confidence comes from my father.
There is nothing at all I would like to ask my Mother or my Father – nothing at all. As far as I am concerned when someone is gone, they have gone. I have nothing to ask them, nothing to discuss with them; after a while, I don’t even think about them. The reason that picture is there is to remember what she looks like, because otherwise I wouldn’t be able to tell you what she looks like. I couldn’t describe her, I couldn’t describe my father either. People probably think I am heartless, I probably am, but I just don’t have that bond.
My sister and my Mum had a bond because she taught her how to sew and my brother being the youngest – they also had a bond, but me, I just didn’t care about anything, I just cared about me. I don’t care about things that basically - that you can’t do anything about. What I liked about my Mum was that she was so kind, do you know what I mean? You just couldn’t fault her for anything; she would do anything for anybody. She loved cats and dogs for instance and would give money to them. But you can’t really do anything with them can you. I mean I won’t donate to anything. I tell a lie; I have got a dog for the blind which they have ripped me off for. They said donate ten pounds a month, so I’ve gone ‘yeah’. I paid for a year, then one day one of the blokes comes around trying to sell me something else. And I said, ‘You sold me a dog’ and he goes ‘Which one was it?’ and I said, ‘The Black one, how many others have you sold it to?’ He told me he had sold it to ten donors. So, I said ‘In other words you are getting a hundred pound a month to get this blind dog up and running’, so he said ‘yeah’. So, I’ve gone right,’ well don’t sell me any bumph because that costs money’. So, he’s gone ’ok’. About three weeks ago, and this is true this, I can show you the letter; I got a letter telling me that Domino, my dog, has failed to pass training for blind, you know to help assisting the blind because he was too boisterous, so they have handed him over to his handler to keep. So basically, for a year and a half I have paid for a bleeding dog and now they have turned around and told me ‘that it’s ok, don’t worry, you can sponsor another dog!!’ (Laughter).
My Mum used to have a hearing aid that whistled, and we would say ‘Granny, turn your hearing aid down,’ she would just look at you. She would moan all the time. I thought to myself, I am going to learn to moan like you.
I used to say to her ‘Do you want some cheese’ and she would go ‘What?’, ‘Do you want some cheese with that wine?’ She used to say ‘uuuugh, nag, nag, nag, nag’ and I’d say, ‘One day I will be like you, I am going to grow up to be just like you and moan all the time’.
I’m not really a family person. I don’t do all that contact stuff. I used to go and see her regularly when I worked in Trafford Park just before she died, and my brother lived around the corner we used to pop in all the time.
I don’t know when my Mother died, I have no idea whatsoever. I know when my brother died, because he was more important. Sometimes I think of her, but I don’t feel any like ‘oh my God my Mum is dead’.
I do think about my brother Victor sometimes, but not often, but that is only because it is fresh in my memory. Sooner or later it just will be like ‘Right, he is dead’. ‘When did he die?’. ‘Oh, the 4th December’. ‘How do you know it is the 4th December? ‘Because it is Derek’s birthday, that is the only reason’.
My brother’s son found her. As I have said, we used to go every morning before we went to work. It was the weekend and I wasn’t working, so not due to go until Monday morning. My brother, his son, (my nephew), they lived around the corner, so they always used to go in the morning. The back door was always open on the latch and my nephew went running in and then came running back out and said to my brother ‘Granny is not answering, she is just staring at me’. She was dead in the chair. I think it was bowel cancer or something like that. She didn’t have chemo or any treatment. She just died in her sleep. Some of her ashes are in America with my sister. When my brother Victor died, we sprinkled Dad’s ashes because my sister is a bit like that, you know, keeping things shipshape, but not for me. We knew that he also wanted some of Mum’s ashes. I was like ‘Where the fuck am I going to get them from?’ It turned out that four years earlier when his friend transported my Mother’s ashes from the cemetery, then split them up in to two caskets, he had spilt some in his car, but he had never cleaned the boot. Her ashes were still there, so they went and got them out and sprinkled them on his grave. So, half of Mum’s ashes have been to Rhyl four times (laughter).
Sometimes my mum would just sit there and say, ‘I can’t wait to be with your Dad in heaven’ and I used to think ‘what the fuck for?’. She did stand up to him by just walking away when she wanted to, do you know what I mean? Obviously, they were in love in the formative years of the marriage. I’m sixtyseven, and if she died like five – eight years ago they were together all the time I’ve been alive, apart from like the break ups when she took off with us and that would normally be caused by either him hitting her or coming home or not coming home or something like that.
But she loved him and that was just how it was. My Mum loved my Dad and my Dad loved my Mum.
