The Sugar Girls: Tales of Hardship, Love and Happiness in Tate & Lyle’s East End

‘Come and give us a cuddle then!’

By the time Ethel left at the end of the day, her uniform was stiff with sugar. She had forgotten how messy the packing could be. The last time she had worked on the machines she had found the whole experience rather exciting, but now it seemed the ultimate humiliation.

When Ethel got home that afternoon she hurriedly took off her sticky clothes. She was dreading having to explain to her mother what had happened at work. All she could think of was how she had reacted when Ethel’s friend Gladys had not progressed beyond sweeping the factory floor.

When it came to it, Louise Alleyne was remarkably restrained. Perhaps she could see the distress on Ethel’s face, and couldn’t bring herself to compound it with criticism.

‘Don’t worry, love,’ she told her daughter, pulling her close. ‘You’ll be up there again before long. I know my girls.’

It was small consolation for Ethel, who felt she could scarcely sink any lower in her own estimation, let alone her mother’s.

It was not long, however, before the family had more serious problems to deal with. Louise had been in poor health for a while, and one night after the evening meal, when Ethel and Dolly were still sitting at the kitchen table and Winnie was playing outside, she posed a troubling question to her two elder daughters.

‘If anything happened to me,’ she asked, ‘would you want Dad to get married again?’

There was an awkward silence while the question hung in the air.

‘Well,’ Ethel said thoughtfully, trying her best to channel a wisdom that belied her 16 years, ‘I suppose so, if that’s what Dad wanted.’

They both looked at Dolly to see what her response would be.