At the Coalface: The memoir of a pit nurse

After a year in training, and with only half a day per week working in the hospital, it was time for us to be let loose on the wards. At first the building had felt massive, but in reality it was just a regular-size town hospital. One of the first wards I worked on was the Ear, Nose and Throat, where children would come in to have their tonsils removed. As soon as they arrived we’d ply them with ice cream because it not only helped ease their sore throats, it also numbed the area. It was a pretty routine op and afterwards the hospital porter would collect the young patient from theatre, carrying them over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift to prevent them from choking on their own blood. The children would usually stay in overnight. It was my job to care for them because I worked the night shift. Many of them were still young, only seven or eight years old, and, in some cases, it’d be their first night away from home, so I tried my best to comfort them throughout the night.

A month or so later, I was transferred to the casualty department where, because of the proximity of the hospital to the Pennines and the harsh winters there, lots of youngsters suffering from chest infections were admitted. Back in those days, no one had central heating; besides, these were the toughened children of farmers and land workers, so more often than not they’d be admitted wearing a ‘liberty bodice’. The bodices were made out of a thick cotton material with a fleece liner. They would be permanently stitched around the children’s bodies to help them survive the bleak, long winter. Underneath, their skin would be smeared with goose fat to create a disgusting type of body insulation. Most of my time in casualty was spent cutting poorly children out of these liberty bodices so that we could treat them, but inevitably, when the wrappers came off, they stunk to high heaven.

‘All right?’ I asked one little boy as I sliced some sharpened scissors through his outer bodice.

He nodded, his big, wide eyes looking straight up at me. I thought I’d been well prepared, but as soon as I removed the cloth the smell was so bad that it caught at the back of my throat, choking me. I held my breath to stop myself being sick. Soap, it seemed, only reached so far and didn’t cut through goose fat.

Now we were working on the wards, my fellow student nurses and I had transferred from the college house to the nurses’ home, where we slept in between shifts. The nurses’ home was situated inside the hospital grounds, a stone’s throw from the police college. It was down the road and housed lots of nice trainee police officers. Our official curfew time was 10 p.m., but we often broke the rule, returning an hour or two later. To get around this, I made friends with nurses who had a bedroom on the ground floor. As a group, we’d plan whose turn it was to leave their window open so that we could sneak back in through it. However, on one occasion it was so dark outside that all the windows looked exactly the same. I climbed in and fell on a poor unsuspecting nurse slumbering soundly in her bed. She screamed so loud that she woke up the entire block. Thankfully I was lithe and fast on my feet, so I was able to run to my room before anyone realised I was the intruder.

The casualty department was where I first fell in love. Shy and inexperienced, I became smitten with a male nurse called Stanley. He was almost ten years older than me, in his late twenties, but to me, a girl of 17, he was the height of male sophistication. Tall and with smouldering film-star looks, Stanley was so kind to me, and when he bought me flowers one day I was so thrilled I thought I would burst with joy. Afterwards, every time I cut my finger or felt a fishbone stick slightly inside my throat, I ran straight to the casualty department to seek immediate medical attention from the lovely Stanley. There was only one fly in the ointment: Stanley was homosexual. But I was young and naïve, and I’d never heard of a man being homosexual, so I was totally stumped as to why he didn’t consider me in the same way. It was down to the lovely Sister le Fleur to set me straight and let me down gently. She quietly informed me that, sadly, Stanley’s intentions were entirely honourable, and I had mistaken his friendship for love.

‘You’re just not his type, Nurse Smith,’ she sighed, patting me kindly on the shoulder.

‘What do you mean?’ I asked, hurt and a little confused.

‘It’s Stanley. He doesn’t go for girls. He’s homosexual, so I’m afraid you are wasting your time.’

The news hit me like a sharp slap across the face. I was heartbroken, but I realised that, even with all the will in the world, Stanley and I would never be more than just good friends.

Stanley and the other male nurses were very protective of us young female nurses. One evening, I’d worked a particularly long and gruelling night shift when I was overcome with exhaustion.

‘Why don’t you go and have a kip?’ another nurse, called David, suggested.

‘But where?’ I sighed. I was terrified Matron would catch me sleeping on the job.

‘There’s a side room, just down the corridor,’ he said, pointing over to it. ‘There’s a bed in it. Go on, I’ll wake you up in an hour if we get busy.’

I was so tired from standing on my feet for hours on end that I did as he said. I shut the door behind me, pulled back the covers and climbed into bed, where I fell into a deep sleep. I’d only been snoozing for a matter of minutes when David came bursting back in through the door.

‘Joan, Joan, wake up!’ His voice sounded panicked and urgent.

Bleary eyed, I sat up and stretched my arms above my head.

‘Has it been an hour already?’ I yawned.

‘No!’ David gasped as he proceeded to unceremoniously drag me out of the room with my legs trailing along the floor behind me. I looked up at him because, for a split second, I thought he’d gone completely mad! I was about to protest when he plonked me down and ran back to close the door.

‘David, what on earth’s going on?’

‘It’s the room,’ he explained, trying to catch his breath. ‘It’s being fumigated. I’ve only just found out. They’re burning some cones in there, but you must’ve been so tired that you didn’t notice. As soon as I heard, I ran in to get you. Sorry, Joan, I didn’t know, otherwise I wouldn’t have told you to go in there.’

It transpired that the fumes had been highly toxic, and if David hadn’t come to rescue me when he did I would have died in that bed. The whole episode shook me, and it made me think about my life, my family and my mum. I wondered what she looked like after all these years. Had she changed? Did she still have the same distinctive red hair?Would she even recognise me? Did she miss us or think of us as often as I thought of her? All these questions and many more burned inside me. They’d always been there, waiting, but now I was older I felt more able and prepared to meet with her to try to understand why she’d left us behind. I desperately wanted to make contact, but I was worried about Dad. I knew it’d hurt him because he’d see it as a betrayal. But then I thought of Elsie ruling the roost. In many ways I’d already lost him because I was unable to go back home. I felt rootless – as though I had no home. I wanted, no, I needed to see Mum, to know that I was still loved. I was fast approaching 18 years of age, and it’d been five long years since I’d last seen her.

A week or so later, I picked up a pen and wrote directly to my Uncle Albert to ask if he had an address. He passed my letter on to a lady, who turned out to be Mum’s boyfriend’s mother. She in turn gave my note to Mum. Weeks passed, so I presumed my request had fallen on deaf ears. I felt quite emotional because I missed my family, but I couldn’t afford to hand over a month’s wages for a weekend visit and I hated Elsie with a passion, so I was beginning to feel pretty desperate. To my complete shock and surprise, Mum not only replied, she even invited me down to London. As I boarded the train I felt a little apprehensive, but also a little excited because I knew this journey would change my life. Although it’d been years, the time melted away as soon as I spotted her walking towards me through steam billowing from the train along the platform at King’s Cross station. She was still as petite as I remembered, and her hair was auburn, just like mine. In fact, standing there on the crowded platform, we could’ve been sisters.

‘Hello, Mum,’ I said as I instinctively held my arms out to greet her.

‘You’re the last person I expected to forgive me,’ she admitted, before falling into my arms. As soon as we embraced I knew that I’d done the right thing.

We travelled back to her flat in Shepherd’s Bush, where I met her boyfriend, Bill, who was a London bus driver. I liked Bill immediately. He was a lovely bloke and totally the right man for my mother. Ironically, Mum worked at a hospital, but as a kitchen assistant, in Roehampton. She also cleaned houses for the ladies of society, and used her previous skills as a barmaid to help organise cocktail parties. Mum was beautiful, bubbly and popular with everyone. I stayed there for a week, and when she suggested that I move to London permanently, my mind was already made up. I wrote to the General Nursing Council and transferred from Huddersfield to Hammersmith Hospital in London. I was told I’d start at the beginning of the next training year, so I moved into the London nurses’ accommodation on New Year’s Eve, 1950. It was miserable spending New Year’s Eve alone but the hospital required that I sleep in the nurses’ quarters the night before my first shift. I didn’t mind because I knew it would be the beginning of a whole new life.

My snap decision to move from one end of the country to the other had left my father devastated because he felt I’d chosen Mum over him, but it wasn’t that at all. I knew it wouldn’t be easy to explain, so I went to see him before I left Yorkshire to break the news to him face to face. I thought he might take it badly, but not as bad as he actually did.

‘You’ll never see Ann or Tony again,’ he threatened. I realised he was angry and still hurting over Mum. ‘After all she’s done, after all I’ve done for you …’ he said, his voice choking with emotion.

‘What? So why are you charging me to come home for the weekend, then?’ I argued.

Dad looked at me and reeled back in horror. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

‘Elsie? A month’s wage just to come home for the weekend? Well, I couldn’t afford it. That’s why I’ve not been back to see you, even though I’ve been really, really homesick,’ I snapped, willing my tears to go away.

It was clear that he didn’t have a clue what I was talking about, so I explained all about Elsie and the monthly wage I’d handed over on my first visit home.

Dad gasped in disbelief. ‘What? And you really thought I’d charge my own daughter to come home for the weekend?’

‘Well, that’s what she told me, so I paid her in full – my first month’s salary!’

I could see Dad was trying to process what I was saying, and then the penny dropped. Elsie had lied to me and kept the money for herself. Dad vowed to deal with her later but I could tell he was hurt and disappointed in me.

‘I can’t believe you thought I’d charge you,’ he said, slumping down into a chair at the kitchen table as though the stuffing had been knocked clean from him.

‘I didn’t know what to believe. That’s why I never came home – I couldn’t afford it.’

He was still trying to digest the news but he gave me a hug and promised to sort something out. Although we’d talked it through, it took him a few months before he eventually calmed down. He wished me well and insisted I was welcome home any time. To make matters worse, before I left the house I saw my coat. It was on the back of Elsie’s daughter, who I presumed had also been hoodwinked by her wicked mother. Although I’d wanted to rip it off her, I held my head high, left the house and never said another word. I realised Dad was stuck with Elsie, because he needed to work to feed Tony and Ann. Still, after our conversation he watched her like a hawk. He slowly built a case against her, which was strengthened when she later stole and sold his best suit and gold pocket watch.

‘I threw her out,’ he later explained. ‘You were right; I think she’d been stealing from me for a long time.’

I felt for Dad, because he’d only taken her on so that he could work to keep a roof over our heads. Now he was back to square one again.

3

Mishaps on the Wards (#ufa4c5668-c4b9-5095-a361-ebfb2e0f45bd)

I returned to London and began work at Hammersmith Hospital, which, unlike Huddersfield, was a post-graduate school. Everything about it seemed better – the building, the wards and my wages, which doubled from a paltry £2 a month to almost £4.

The hospital was also massive in comparison – three times the size of Huddersfield. Before, I’d been able to navigate the wards in less than half an hour, but Hammersmith was so big that it took me three hours just to walk around it all. The main entrance was incredibly grand and housed a small shop just inside the foyer. The corridors cut through the building like arteries, carrying doctors, nurses and patients, and in some places they seemed up to half a mile long. The hospital had specialised units and modern wards spread out over four blocks, and you had to cross a yard to access each one. There was maternity at one end and A&E at the other, mirroring both life and death.

Unlike my old hospital, the maternity ward housed a neonatal unit for premature babies. This was cutting-edge medicine at the time. At Huddersfield, all premature babies had to be rushed to Sheffield for specialised treatment, but in London it was all under one roof. There were also units for radiotherapy and diabetes patients. The place was swarming with post-graduate students, nurses and doctors. Before, there’d been just one matron in charge, but at Hammersmith there was a deputy and a stand-in matron too. It was similar with the sister tutor. At Huddersfield there had been just one, but in London there was one with three under-tutors to support her. I felt totally out of my depth.

As students, we were expected to do everything, usually the jobs that no one else wanted to do. I worked on the children’s ward, where I had the unenviable task of delousing young patients. Initially, I felt totally frustrated because I was treated like a country bumpkin, but after three months working in the children’s ward I transferred to the geriatric ward, where I made a real name for myself after mixing up all the patients’ false teeth. I’d spent three hours cleaning them, and once I’d finished I was delighted. I popped them back inside the sterilised bowl and made my way back up to the ward. However, the smile was soon wiped off my face by Sister.

‘Er, how do you know whose teeth are whose?’ she said, pointing towards the bucket.

I looked at her and then down at the dozen sets of teeth, all spotlessly clean but now hopelessly jumbled up.

‘Oh,’ I replied as my heart sank to my knees.

I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to match the rightful owner to each set, but it was an impossible and thankless task. Some of the patients were elderly and suffered with dementia, so, upon seeing a better pair of dentures, they claimed them even if they didn’t fit. At one point a fight almost broke out. In the end, it took me the best part of the day to try to fit each person to each set, but it taught me the importance of labelling.