Ecclesfield Memoirs submitted by
Catherine Chalmers (1940)
I came to Ecclesfield Grammar School in Sept 1935, a very shy little girl, who didn’t make friends easily and, to
make matters worse, as we had moved around a lot I didn’t have a South Yorks accent. My father was a pharmacist who
worked for Taylors, opening new stores working there for 2 years then moving on to the next one. He opened the one
at Chapeltown in 1926, so my sister Jean was born in High Green.
Then in 1932 or 33 Taylors got rid of all their older men, so Dad started up on his own but it didn’t work out, and
he came to work for Mr Lawrence, who wanted to open a store in High Green.
I had been awarded a scholarship, which was given each year to a girl from High Green. A lot of people, including
one of the teachers at the school, said that I shouldn’t have got it, so I wasn’t very popular. She said that I
shouldn’t even be in that school as I was a foreigner, and some of the folks said I couldn’t be Scots as my name
didn’t begin with Mac. Two years later my sister got the same scholarship,
and as they awarded two that year, she didn’t get the same hassles that I did.
When I went with my friend Hilda to get our uniforms, we had to kneel down and the gym slip had to be no shorter
than 2 inches from the ground. We later had a gym mistress who wore hers much shorter than we were allowed! We were
proud of our uniform, Green Gymslip, White Blouse, Maroon Blazer, Dark green knickers and black shoes and
stockings. Later we got pale green dresses for summer and white ankle socks. The boys wore grey shorts or slacks,
and of course we all wore the TIE. I still have one.
Pupils were not allowed to use the front doors, and the girls went up some steps by the Netball court, to a side
door leading to the cloakroom. Rows of hooks to hang our coats, with a bench underneath to sit on while we changed
our shoes, which were left under the bench. Boys had to use another entrance by the Gym at the other end of the
school. (As an aside, the gym was converted into a library during the 1960's, and was used as such as late as
2000).
We went first to the big Hall (Old Hall, I
assume) for morning prayers, then to our classes. I don’t know how they decided which class
we went to, but Hilda and I were in 2C. We have remained friends ever since, actually better now than then. We were
also put in Houses. I was in Priestley, our colour was green, Fairfax was yellow, Bronte red and Strafford Blue.
There were two plaques to be won each year, one for sports and one for academics. One year Priestley won both.
I have used the book "50 years on" to try and jog my memory. Since I don’t recall much about the first two years, I
must have been an average student. But in 4C I was top of the class, and again in 5C. I still have the book
prizes that I won, one of them is much the worse for wear as my children used it a lot, "The Wonders of the World".
Bernard Lax was always second, which didn’t please him at all, but we have recently become friends via the
internet, thanks to the Ecclesfield website.
I didn’t excel at sports, but wasn’t too bad at rounders (I'm still a Baseball fan --Blue
Jays--) and field Hockey. I have the school photo of 1935 and find it hard to name more than 6 pupils. The teachers that I remember were Mr
Harrison, Miss Worth, who was a strict discplinarian but could be very kind to any girl who didn’t feel well, Mr
Doughty (Geography), Mr Stewart (Maths,I think), Mr
Clay (English) and Miss Garbutt (Home Economics).
Mr Clay taught English and later wrote several text books, which were widely used. He was quite wealthy in his
later years, but he never realized it. One day he phoned the niece who helped to look after him to say his TV had
broken down, and could he possibly afford a new one? Hilda said he still wore the old raincoat that he wore when we
were in school.
In English Lit, he had us act out the parts instead of just reading them, and one day we were in the science lab
(why?) and Ernest Marshall was Caesar who had been killed. Kathleen Platts was reading the "I come to bury Caesar,
not to praise him" speech and she was fidgeting. What we could see and Mr Clay couldn’t was the dead Caesar
tickling her ankles!!
Miss Garbutt taught sewing and cooking. She once told me that I would never make a sewer, but I fooled her as later
I made my wedding dress and all my childrens' clothes. She did teach us how to make basic patterns and to smock,
both of which I used later. We must have wasted a lot of good food in cookery, I remember one Ginger pudding, which
was so hard, we played ball with it on the way home.
School dinners were in the big hall. They were probably very nutritious but NOT
memorable. I did not have a good appetite, so the boys at my table were always glad to get my extra meat.
My favourite place was the library. We were only supposed to go 2 days a week, but I used to go every day after
dinner, and as the other classes were not using it I was never kicked out. I think I read nearly every book in
there, still have a lot of books, including some that are over 100yrs old. I still read a lot, mostly murder
mysteries and historical novels.
We had several after-school clubs, and in 1938 I joined the Drama Club. We did a forgetful play "The Man Who
wouldn’t go to Heaven". I was ill when it was cast and was given the role of a boy who had been killed on a
motorbike, and had to borrow slacks and hat from the brother of one of the girls.
To get to school we used to get the bus in High Green. I walked down from Potter Hill, called on Hilda and we then
went on together. This bus took us to the school gates, but going home we had to go down to the bus stop outside
the Yorkshire Penny Bank in Chapeltown, and get the bus that came through Grenoside. Sometimes in summer, we didn’t
wait for the bus home, but walked to Lane end, where we got a path which led through the fields to High Green. I
remember one morning, we had a terrific snowstorm, and the bus never arrived so Mr Harrison sent the younger
children home. He said that he was going to walk to school, and Hilda and I could either go home or walk with him.
We decided to walk, as we couldn’t let an old man like him walk all that way alone!! He must have been in his late
50s!!
Sept 1st 1939 was my brother’s 19th birthday (he'd been brought up by grandparents). He spent that day traveling to
Aldershot to join his regiment, with all the other young men who had been in the Territorial Army. Sept 1st was
also the start of our last year at school but, when Mr Harrison went to open up the school, he found that the Army
had taken possession. It took several days to get them out of the school, but they still had the top part of the
field where the Ack-Ack guns were, so we weren’t allowed on that part of the grounds.
It was decided then to let us out of school a little earlier so that, when winter came, everybody would get home in
daylight. Now we could get a bus at the school gates instead of going to Chapeltown. That first day, Hilda and I
were running down the drive when I slipped and hurt my ankle very badly. One of the teachers took me to hospital
for X rays, and I had a cast on for a few weeks, and that was the end of sports for that year.
That first day all our class turned up except Ernest Marshall, who must have lied about his age, when he went to
join up. He was a rear gunner on a Lancaster and was killed during the war. We have a Warplane Heritage here and
have one of the two Lancasters still flying, and it is a real thrill to see her. I support her financially, and
partly in memory of Ernest. The teachers tried to keep school as normal as possible, I believe there were some
trenches dug, but they wouldn’t have been much use. Several of us had older brothers and cousins in the forces, and
so we listened to the news, but it didnt affect us too much. Living in the country, we didn’t get bombed like the
coast and London, Liverpool etc, and later when they did bomb Sheffield, they missed all the factories and hit the
shopping centre at night when no-one was working.
We had air raid shelters, but never went in them. When the alarms went off, my father who was in the Home
Guard-First Aid as he had been in the R.A.M.C. during WWI would rush off to his post at Mortomley, while we stayed
at home. Sometimes when there was a full moon, we would watch the Germans going over and wonder who was getting it
that night.
The after school clubs closed because of the blackout, as there wasn't enough material to cover all those windows.
When we left School in 1940, we were the first graduating class to have our Speech Day in the afternoon at the
Newton Hall in Chapeltown, presumably because
of the blackout. We all promised to keep in touch but with no phones, that wasn’t easy. Mr Harrison
wanted me to stay on and try for University, but my father said no, so I went to work at Thorncliffe (where else?)
in the light castings wages office, and later at the Tank Factory at Warren Bridge. Hilda became a Secretary, and
later was Mr Harrison's secretary. She married Ron Parrott and never left High Green. Agnes Fox became a
Nurse and married a doctor. Denise Uttley stayed in School and was a teacher, married Derek Happs, a
pharmacist from Hoyland Common. Bernard Lax went straight into the Air Force, rising to Wing Commander. Stuart Orr
was also in the R.A.F. and was shot down but managed to get back. I am sure some of the others were in the forces,
but I lost touch. I married Arthur Reed who had been given early discharge, having burst his ear drums flying, and
is now as deaf as a post. We did a lot of moving, so was only able to hear about people from Hilda and my sister
Jean who also was a Secretary at Thorncliffe. She stayed there even after Newton Chambers was bought out by some
one else, a Norwegian firm I think.
Hilda, Jean & I started going to the dances at High Green twice a week. In those days, young people did not drink
and it was either the dance or the Pub, dancing was much more fun.
Then came Dunkirk, and the dark days, when we fully expected to be invaded. If Hitler had followed those soldiers
across the Channel then, the War would have been over, as we had nothing left to defend ourselves. But thanks to
Churchill, we survived.
They built an army camp at Potter Hill, just beyond our garden fence. At first it was a preliminary training camp,
where the men went for the first 6 weeks of training, and were not allowed out for 2 weeks. But after that most of
them came to the dances, so we enjoyed ourselves, always more men than girls, so we danced every dance. Most of the
NCOs and Officers were just back from Dunkirk, but a few of them came to dance and we got to know them. After the
War, one sergeant brought his wife back to settle in High Green, as he had made so many friends there.
Later we had the Artillery, and then the Americans, most of whom were very nice, but a few thought every girl
should fall for them. There was one nasty incident when a crowd of drunks came looking for Girls, just as the dance
was finishing. I got separated from my friends, but was rescued by a Sergeant who a short time before had been
showing us pictures of his wife and family. I Hope he made it home. For a while we stopped going to the dances.
We all knew that D-Day was imminent, but never talked about it.
After a while it was a p.o.w. camp for Italians who were allowed to go down into the village. They didn’t want to
escape and be sent back to the war. One of them had a piano-accordion, and we used to sit on our back steps and
listen to his playing. Arthur later met a man in Hamilton (Ontario), whose father had been at that camp.
Another thing we did was to go hiking. We used to get the train at Chapeltown with other friends to go to one
or other of the Derbyshire villages, Hathersage being one. We would hike all day to another village, stopping to eat our
sandwiches, buying lemonade to go with them, and sometimes a shandy, if it was very hot. Then we would get the
train back to Chapeltown and walk home. I know that on V.E. day or one day close to it, we built a pile of stones
up to commemorate the event. I wonder if they are still there, and if anyone knows why!!
