Alfred and Sally Warland
Alf and Sally were married on September 12th 1936 at St. Cuthbert’s, Chitts Hill (Wood Green, North London). It was a small wedding attended by Alf’s mother and brother Leonard who was the best man. Alf’s father did not go which my mother never seemed to get over. I heard much later from my cousin that the real reason was because he had fallen and hit his head and was too embarrassed to go in a bandage. Sally’s mother and her grandfather James Horlock were there. Sally made her own wedding dress as she would later for many other brides.
Alf and Sally went to the island of Jersey (Just off the coast of France and very slightly foreign) for their honeymoon.
They moved into their newly built house at 70 Lonsdale Drive in Oakwood (Enfield West). This was a newly built suburban estate made possible by the extension of the London Electric Railway (the Tube) in 1933.
The estate was developed from the South Lodge area of the old Enfield Chase in the Forest of Middlesex. In 1936, the area would have been like any new suburb and not fully developed. Many of the families living there would have seen the father go into London on the Tube as my father did each day. The wife would have stayed at home.
Alf worked as a stockbroker’s clerk in the City of London. He would have walked 10 minutes to the tube station and come home to his dinner around 6pm. My early memories of that were sitting waiting for dinner to be ready and sharing part of the newspaper, the section with Rupert Bear in it.
In September 1939 war was declared with Germany and Alf was called for duty in the Army. He was assigned to the Royal Artillery and manned a searchlight probably at a coastal town. On the plus side this meant he was stationed in Britain. It was still dangerous though as German pilots would sometimes dive down the searchlight beam firing their guns. Those manning the searchlight were prime targets. (My father died in 1967 of leukemia. I have no proof of any kind but searchlights give off high frequency electromagnetic radiation which can cause leukemia).
Later in the war Alf was stationed at a Prisoner of War camp in northern Scotland. I don’t know much about this but I have a yacht made by a German POW out of various parts he must have found in the camp. I suspect this was in exchange for cigarettes.
My father told stories of the prisoners working on farms outside the camp and being given butter and eggs by the farmers ‘because they looked hungry’. I’ve always seen this as one of life’s contradictions. You can be kind to your enemy, He or she likely doesn’t want to be there either and ultimately is not much different from you.
My mother lived at 70 Lonsdale during the war. She did sewing at home to bring in extra cash and I was born in 1943. I have no real memories of this time but it seems fairly normal for a war: I have a picture of my first birthday when all the cousins came for tea and cake.
This area didn’t see the horrendous bombing that took place further into the city though German pilots would sometimes mistake the surface tube line for the main route to the north and try and bomb it.
The war ended in 1945 but my father was not demobilized until 1946. I have a memory of him coming home in uniform and being greeted at the door. Whether that was actual or just imagination I don’t know. Rationing didn’t end fully until 1954 when I was eleven. Yet I have no memory of not having enough to eat including sweets. I do remember having to take a teaspoon of orange concentrate (which my mother never diluted) and one of cod liver oil, each day.