At the Coalface: The memoir of a pit nurse

‘There’s a college in Huddersfield. I’ve put your name forward because they take nursing recruits from the age of 16.’

My face lit up. Mrs Hargreaves had watched me progress as a young cadet. I’d worked hard to get my certificates in first aid and I’d left school as head girl. She paid my fare and travelled with me, taking two buses and changing at Leeds, so I could attend my interview in Huddersfield. It was such a long journey that it took up half the day, but as soon as we arrived at nursing college I knew I’d done the right thing.

‘Tell me, why do you want to be a nurse, Joan?’ the matron asked. She was a shrewd woman in her early fifties, tall and thin – the type you could never hope to fool – and she frightened the life out of me. Her hair was covered in a stiffened white headdress, which she’d wrapped around her head at sharp angles, making her look a bit like a nun.

I twisted my hands nervously in my lap because I was unsure what to say. I spoke straight from my heart. ‘I want to look after people; it’s what I’ve always wanted to do. I just want to make a difference.’

The matron nodded and glanced down at my application form in her hands. She tried to hide it but I noticed the small flicker of a smile play across her lips, and I knew I’d done well. A few weeks later, a letter confirmed it when I was offered a place on the year-long course. I was excited beyond words as I made plans to move to nursing college. Although I felt a pang of guilt at leaving Dad, Tony and Ann behind with the horrid Elsie, I knew I had to do it because nursing college would be my escape route to a better life, and I was determined to grab it with both hands.

2

Nurse in Training (#ufa4c5668-c4b9-5095-a361-ebfb2e0f45bd)

The nurses’ training college was situated inside a large Victorian house, set in its own grounds. It was a tall and imposing building, and was a good ten-minute walk from Huddersfield Royal Infirmary. All our nursing training was done inside the house, which had enough room to accommodate a dozen people, but we travelled to the hospital one afternoon a week so that we could gain real work experience. I was one of ten live-in nurses in training. We were all aged between 16 and 17 years old. It was a new course and it taught would-be nurses everything from scratch, from cooking what we called wholesome ‘invalid food’ to how to launder sheets and clean and correctly disinfect a room. The cookery courses were fun but the food wasn’t as joyful or, indeed, very appetising. We were taught how to make everything from junket – a type of blancmange using sour cream – to beef broth, and tripe and onions. On one occasion I forgot to soak my cut of salt beef overnight. The following day I prepared and cooked my ‘beef tea’ – or broth – as I’d been told, seasoning it along the way. But when I went to take a sip I almost gagged, and then I began to splutter and choke. Within seconds I’d spat it out, my face a sickly shade of green.

‘Whatever’s the matter, Joan?’ one of my fellow students asked as I dashed over to the sink to try to rinse away the awful taste.

‘Eurgh, it tastes like seawater!’ I gasped.

I couldn’t work out where I’d gone wrong until the teacher came over and sampled some using a spoon. She took a sip, pulled a disgusted face and shook her head in dismay.

‘You forgot to soak your cut; that’s why it tastes like a bag of salt. You’d kill a patient if you served this,’ she said, plopping the spoon back inside the bubbling pan.

I bowed my head. I felt such a fool because, as usual, I’d tried to run before I could walk. Of course, I failed that particular task, but afterwards I vowed to always taste the food as I went along. A few months later, when it came to my cookery exam, I decided to prepare the same beef broth followed by some junket. I took my time, sampling it until it tasted absolutely perfect before setting it out on a tray. But when I looked around at the other trays I realised something vital was missing – a vase of flowers. I had no money, so I decided to improvise. I nipped outside into the garden where I ‘borrowed’ a small handful of pretty pansies. Standing them up inside a clean fish-paste jar, I added a sprinkle of water and then I was done. It was hardly a bouquet, but it did the trick. In spite of my last-minute DIY floral arrangement, I passed with flying colours and was allowed to move to the next stage of the course – cleaning. I could hardly wait.

My youth and inexperience had left me feeling a little homesick, so I travelled back to Doncaster to visit my family. Of course, Elsie the horrid housekeeper was there and she didn’t seem too impressed when she spotted me coming through the door. When I saw the state of the place I realised why – it was filthy. If anything, Elsie’s low standards had slipped even more, so that I barely recognised my own home. I rolled up my sleeves and got stuck in, cleaning what I could. Ann, Tony and Dad were delighted to see me, even if Elsie hadn’t been. By the end of the weekend, she pulled me to one side to speak with me. We were alone in the kitchen when she grabbed me roughly by the arm.

‘If you want to come home then you’re gonna have to pay your way,’ she hissed, spitting out the words in my face.

‘What do you mean? This is my home.’

‘Yes, but you’re a working woman now. You’re earning, so you need to contribute. It’s only fair on your poor father.’

I shook my head in disbelief. Surely Dad didn’t want me to pay to come home at weekends. But Elsie was adamant.

‘If you want to come home then it’ll cost you 2 pounds, 12 shillings and 6 pence,’ she demanded, holding out her grubby little hand.

‘But that’s what I earn in a month!’

She shrugged her shoulders as though it wasn’t her problem.

‘It’s not up to me,’ she insisted. ‘It’s what your dad says I should charge you.’

I was flabbergasted because Dad had never asked me to pay before. I felt a knot of anxiety clench inside my stomach. What if things were more desperate than I thought?

‘I can’t afford it,’ I argued.

Elsie ran a hand through her unruly, thick grey hair. She tucked a greasy strand behind her right ear and turned back towards the sink. ‘If you can’t afford to pay then you can’t come home, it’s as simple as that.’

My heart plummeted like a stone. I’d only just received my first proper wage but I paid what I owed and left, knowing I’d never be able to afford to return. I wanted to ask Dad why he needed to charge me but I thought better of it because I didn’t want to embarrass him. I also worried that he’d take Elsie’s side instead of mine. That must be why the house was in such a state. Dad must be broke, I reasoned on the bus journey back to Huddersfield. The rain pattered softly against the glass of the window, mirroring how I felt inside – both tearful and miserable. I stared at my reflection, trying my best not to cry. The bus slowly wound its way out of Doncaster, leaving my home far behind, and I returned to college where I threw myself into my studies. If I couldn’t afford to go home then I’d use my time wisely and try to become the best nurse I could. Thankfully, my housemates were a joy to live with, and slowly, as each month passed, we learned the basics of nursing. One day, we decided we needed to get fit so we got up extra early, donned our shorts and went for a brisk run around the park. Feeling totally invigorated, we decided to run another circuit, and then another, until we’d jogged around constantly for two hours. We returned to the house en masse, where we washed, ate breakfast and got ready for our day’s lectures. But we were so shattered by the run that we promptly fell asleep in the first lecture. The teacher was puzzled and asked why her class were so sleepy.

‘We were trying to get fit, Miss,’ a voice called from the back of the room.

The teacher looked across a dozen sets of bleary eyes as we began to yawn in unison.

‘Well, it didn’t seem to work, girls, did it?’

The following morning, I ached so much that I thought I’d broken something. My legs were too stiff at the knee to bend. I spent the rest of the day walking around like the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz. After that, I decided that if I wanted to get fit then I’d have to do it in moderation, not all at once.

Our year-long pre-nursing studies were essentially split into an introduction course and three blocks of learning: three months in the hospital kitchen learning how to cook and prepare ‘invalid food’; three in the laundry, washing the dirty and bloodied sheets; and the final three with Home Sister, learning how to thoroughly clean the house to her incredibly high standards. Looking back, it sounds extreme, but it served a purpose, because by the time we’d finished we all had the same impeccably high standards. But it wasn’t all work – far from it. It was also lots of fun. One day, we were kicking our heels after lectures when I decided to play a practical joke on the Sister in charge who, despite the house being huge, slept in a bedroom on the ground floor next to the main entrance. This was to ensure her young trainee nurses didn’t leave or return at ‘inappropriate hours’. There was a medical skeleton in the classroom, so I removed the skull, looped a piece of string around a bolt fastened on the top, unravelled the string and dangled it out of my bedroom window, which was situated directly above Sister’s. I carefully lowered the skull until it was in line with her window. My friends stifled a giggle as I began to swing it to and fro like a pendulum. When it had gained enough momentum I swung it forward so that it tapped lightly against her windowpane.

TAP. TAP. TAP.

By now my mates were killing themselves laughing, so much so that they had tears streaming down their faces. Moments later, the sash window scraped open as Sister popped her head out and came face to face with the dangling skull. But she didn’t scream; instead she craned her neck upwards and caught me holding onto the other end of the string.

‘Hello, Sister.’ I smiled weakly before pulling the skull up as fast as I could.

Thankfully she had a great sense of humour.

‘Nurse Smith, you will be the death of me, I swear!’ she said, laughing, as she popped her head back inside and closed her bedroom window.

From then on I became known as the joker of the house.

A few days later, Sister stopped me on the stairs.

‘Nurse Smith,’ she called. I stopped dead in my tracks and turned to face her, wondering what on earth I’d done wrong.

‘I always know when you’re on cleaning duties,’ she sighed, tapping her foot against the step.

My mind raced. Maybe my idea of cleanliness wasn’t up to her high standards?

I cleared my throat and spoke. ‘Why, Sister?’

‘Because you always make a clatter, dropping the hand brush down the stairs whenever you do it!’ A smirk spread across her face and I watched as she turned and continued down the stairs. I could still hear her giggling away to herself as she walked into her bedroom and closed the door. I laughed too because I knew it was true – I loved the idea of being a nurse but sometimes I tried so hard that it made me clumsy.

I didn’t want to go home at weekends because I didn’t want to see Elsie, and Dad didn’t rent a telephone then so I couldn’t even call him. Instead, I went back to friends’ houses. My pal Glenys lived close to the moor near Castle Hill, just outside Huddersfield. Glenys’s father was a slaughterhouse man so they were poor and working class, just like me. However, her father also had the broadest Yorkshire accent I’d ever heard in my life. By the end of the weekend, as I gathered my things to leave, he mumbled something I didn’t understand.

‘Aht bahn ame,’ he said gruffly.

I shook my head. I didn’t have a clue what he was saying, so I looked to Glenys for translation.

‘He asked when you were going home,’ she explained.

I looked at him and shook my head. ‘Oh no, I can’t afford it,’ I replied.

Glenys’s dad shook his head; now it was his turn to look confused.

Only one girl left the nursing college. She was a sweet enough lass, but she couldn’t keep up. Nursing was such a hands-on job that you had to be physically up to it, as well as mentally. But it did have its perks, namely the respect you got from members of the general public. As a trainee nurse in Huddersfield, I never had to pay a single bus fare. Instead, I was allowed to travel free, and often others would step aside in the queue to let me on the bus first. I valued both my occupation and outdoor uniform – a blue Mackintosh, cornflower-blue dress and black shoes – which I wore with immense pride.