Eighty Years On

Beltingham House

This year, we commemorated 80 years since the Battle of Britain – the famous and decisive World War II air battle between Britain and Nazi Germany, taking place between July and October, 1940. It was also the first battle in history to take place entirely in the air.

Ian Miller, Shipwright and ex-RAF pilot tells us how it felt to be an evacuee during

WWII. Eighty years ago, we pupils of Walkergate Junior School boarded a steam train to Brampton Station and a bus took us to a large barn type of building in the town centre. We stood in a group while locals walked around us, some looking for a strong lad and others looking for a smart girl – it was similar to a cattle market. However, because these people had spare rooms, they were obliged to take an evacuee or two to live with them, so they had to be careful. Thankfully, I was selected soon along with classmate Bob Matthewson and his brother and sister. The teenage brother missed his pals and the young sister missed her mother and both went home after a week, leaving Bob and I as the only evacuees with poultry farmer Fred Jackson and his wife in their huge bungalow, Culmore on the Tarn Road. As an only child I now had a brother 24/7 and it was great! We had about a mile to walk to school, past Dixon’s Farm and along Tree Road. Our foster mother was a very pleasant lady who fed us well with many extras to our wartime rations. The spare rooms had been used as a B & B so Mrs. Jackson was a good cook too. Often in the evenings she would read stories to us or we would play ludo, dominoes or the Parson’s cat – where we had to go through the alphabet using different adjectives like “the Parson’s cat is an Artful cat, Awful cat, Brown cat Beautiful cat etc.”

There were woods behind our home for us to explore and sometimes we would take a sack and collect fallen pinecones for the fire. Mr. Jackson would also point out to us rabbit runs where he would set his snares – we never saw the trapped rabbits, but we enjoyed eating them. Once we went to play with Billy Dixon at the farm and discovered that there was a beck there which we saw as a challenge. Large stones and clods of turf were used to dam the stream but sadly we didn’t notice that we had flooded the farmyard and were banned from playing with Billy again. The Luftwaffe were in no hurry to bomb Newcastle and my mother brought me home again, possibly to make sure that I was wearing my vest but ending a super six-month holiday. Our neighbour was Head of Carville School and had taken my grandmother on as a helper for some of their evacuees at Beltingham House, near Bardon Mill. The Bowes-Lyon family had locked their belongings in half of the house and let evacuees have the rest, while the family went to live at their other residence at Ridley Hall nearby. Consequently, when bombing did start, I was sent to join my grandmother and this was even better than Brampton, as I had a brother Billy Surtees and two sisters Joyce and Maureen Stone. One evening we all walked to Bardon Mill to get fish and chips, singing all the way and coming back I hurried ahead to put the kettle on and hide under the kitchen table. Unfortunately, when Billy came in, he kicked off his wellies under the table and I got a black eye! Another day I saw a robin in the holly bush in our garden and rushed into the house to tell them that a robin was there and it wasn’t Christmas! Everyone laughed at my ignorance thinking that they only appeared at Christmas. We lived next door to a church but never attended until word got out that Lady Bowes-Lyon intended coming and we were begged to join the meagre congregation. Again, in my ignorance I could not understand all the fuss about her being a lady – after all, my mother was one, using the Ladies while Dad and I used the Gents! For my only attendance I got an album with religious pictures inserted. All good things come to an end and the Bowes-Lyons arranged to have convalescent officers use their house and Billy and I were posted off to Greenhead Vicarage! I cannot remember ever seeing the vicar, but his wife, Mrs. Sumner looked after us. Our bedroom was up the back stairs with a banister on the wall, whereas the front stairs were grand with a wide banister just asking to be slid down. I had just mastered the art of whistling but learned that whistling inside the vicarage was forbidden. Likewise, the grounds were full of trees but young explorers must not disturb the nesting birds! After about three weeks Mrs. Sumner decided that she had done enough for the war effort and I was back home, never to see Billy again. Finally, somehow my parents had me evacuated yet again but this time with my cousins Elaine and Evelyn to a terrace house on Castle View, Ovingham. We were cared for by an old lady who already had a lad called David in her care. At the start of each meal she would say “David, your grace” and he would obediently say it. Across the road was the River Tyne and further along the terrace Clark’s shop with daughter Betty in my class and Winnie next door. Betty was a tomboy with straight blonde hair while Winnie was the opposite, very girlie with permed hair. Once I found a stamp in the grass and took it into school where there was a lad, you’ve met the type, who seems to know everything, nowadays we’d call him Google. He said the stamp was Russian and I asked if that meant a Russian lived nearby. He said obviously not. It had come on a letter from Russia and as it was off paper it was likely dropped accidently by a stamp collector. Anyway, it started my collection. My father asked me what I did at school and I said that sometimes we worked in the school vegetable garden or sang North Country folk songs - he was not impressed! He thought that I should be at a “proper” school with my 11+ scholarship due soon – so my adventures came to an end! I do not ever recall being unhappy at any time.