An East End Farewell

by Yvette Venables

  We stopped the cars. It was impossible to go any further but we had to try and get back to the yard, otherwise we knew we’d be there all night. We had covered our mouths and noses with scarves, as you felt like choking if it hit the back of your throat. We sat in silence, racking our brains as to what we could do. I remember sitting there, thinking, How the hell are we going to get out of this? But I’m pleased to say Uncle’s thoughts were far more imaginative than mine.

  ‘Right! Get the broom out the back, Stan,’ he said, suddenly motivated. We always kept a broom in the back of the hearse to sweep up flower petals after each casket had been removed. I went and fetched it. Then he ordered me to ‘take off the brush’, which I did. You all know by now why I didn’t question what he was up to.

  ‘Now, light up that hurricane lamp you pushed in the back this morning.’ I’m glad I had the scarf around my face because I couldn’t contain a grin.

  ‘Here’s the plan. Tommy, you walk in the gutter holding one end of the handle and the lamp. I’ll walk next to the car holding the other end and the car door handle. Stan, open the window a bit so you can hear us and you drive. Charlie’s driving behind, so we need two of the gentlemen mourners to help us out. Take off your coat, Tommy,’ he ordered.

  ‘Bloody hell, it’s freezing, guv, I’ll catch me deaf if I get a chill in me kidneys.’

  I took a breath and closed my eyes in anticipation.

  ‘If you still want a job in the morning,’ he yelled, ‘you’ll GET THAT SODDING COAT OFF NOW!’

  I’ve never seen a coat taken off so quickly. ‘Here you are, guv, all yours,’ he simpered. I smiled again – at least for once it wasn’t me on the receiving end.

  Uncle then crept back to the car behind and explained to the two mourners what he wanted them to do. His idea was that one would walk at the front wing of their car and one at the rear of our car, holding the coat between them, so they could judge where each other was. It wasn’t perfect, but we didn’t have a lot of options.

  With everybody organised and in position we started off. I couldn’t see Uncle Tom, let alone Tommy; all I could see was the faint glimmer of the lamp. We were hardly moving; it was unbelievably frightening – nothing but complete blackness all around us. We crawled along, literally inching our way along the road. It was virtually impossible to see anything through the windscreen, as big flakes of greasy soot stuck on the glass. I couldn’t wipe it off so I wound the window down and put my head out. After several hours we’d managed to reach East London Cemetery in Plaistow, when all of a sudden I saw a flickering red light – a trolley bus. I have never felt so excited to see a trolley bus in all my life!

  ‘Quickly . . . Uncle . . . Tommy, get in! There’s a trolley bus up ahead. I can see the red light, we can follow that,’ I shouted.

  Uncle relayed the news to the mourners, who were walking at the rear, and headed back to their car. Tommy was instructed to hang his arm out of the window holding onto my lamp, so they could try and keep us in view as we sped up.

  ‘You’re going too bloody fast, boy!’ Uncle shouted.

  I couldn’t tell you how relieved I was to see the bus. ‘There it is . . . can you see it?’ I yelled excitedly. ‘We’re almost up to it!’

  Then there was one almighty crash, and we all shot forward onto the dashboard. A second later, a smash to the rear knocked us all backwards.

  ‘I’ve done me neck in!’ Tommy shouted.

  ‘You’ve run into the back of the trolley bus, you bloody idiot,’ said Uncle. ‘I said you were going too fast! Get out and see what’s going on!’ He was roaring now – and you all know what happens when he roars.

  I jumped out to check the damage; the one good thing about the smog was that it concealed my Uriah Heep impersonation.

  When I reached the front of the car I was expecting to see the bus, but what I found was the Beaconsfield Public House covered in scaffolding, with a flickering lamp attached to it and our car imbedded into it. I stood there, assessing the damage. The car was crushed in at the front, but the scaffolding wasn’t damaged at all, so there was some good news – we wouldn’t have to pay out for somebody else’s repairs. But I knew the fact that I had mistaken a pub with scaffolding around it for a trolley bus would never be able to counteract my piece of ‘good news’.

  As I stood there, a little voice in my head screamed, ‘Run away! Go on, go! Nobody will see you. GO!’

  Even though I wanted to run, I couldn’t. I was twenty-four, I had been to war, for heaven’s sake. I was a man! I had to stand up and take the rap. I swallowed hard. ‘Oh, dear God, please help me. I’m going to get hung, drawn and quartered.’

  I was then shaken out of my thoughts.

  ‘Stan, what the hell’s going on?’ Uncle yelled. ‘We can’t see a thing. Is the trolley bus driver with you?’

  I walked back. ‘Er . . . no, it’s er . . . just me. It’s not a trolley bus at all, it’s . . . scaffolding,’ I muttered behind my scarf.

  ‘It’s what?’ he roared. ‘Speak up, what’s the matter with you, boy!’

  I pulled the scarf away from my mouth. ‘I said, it’s not a trolley bus. It’s scaffolding.’

  ‘SCAFFOLDING! We’ve hit scaffolding. I don’t bloody believe it!’ He jumped out of the car and made his way to the front. I followed as he bent down to inspect the damage, muttering under his scarf. He then quickly stood up, turned and grabbed the lapels of my overcoat, and started shaking me backwards and forwards, screaming, ‘You’re a sodding simpleton, Stan, that’s what you are. A sodding simpleton! WHAT ARE YOU?’

  ‘A sodding simpleton, Uncle,’ I replied in rhythm to his shakes, and this time I really had to agree with him.

  After my public humiliation, we managed to get the cars started and carried on the way we had before the doomed ‘trolley bus’ sighting. We got back to the yard about forty-five minutes later, but the nightmare wasn’t over, as we all then had to venture out again in order to find our way home.

  It took me another wretched two hours to get home. I came across people in the street completely disorientated, and cars had been left abandoned. It wasn’t too bad while you were on the main roads, but when I say it wasn’t too bad I mean that the visibility varied from between eight to five feet. When you left the main road to walk down the side streets, that’s when it dropped to about a foot. It was horrible, as the atmosphere felt sinister, and the blackness and silence made it unsettlingly eerie.

  People were hanging onto the privet hedges that lined the front of the houses, working their way along the street inch by inch, counting the houses until they came to their own. But if you lost count you would then have to feel for the number on the front gate or walk up to a front door and try to find which number you were at before carrying on. It was such a relief when you actually did get home.

  But even when you got inside you could still see it in your rooms, hovering like the deadly spectre it was, leaving a thick film of black dust in its wake; there was no escaping it.

  I couldn’t believe it when I looked in the hall mirror – my hair was thick with black grease and my face, from my red, sore eyes up, was full of oily black smudges.

  You would meet people whose lips were actually blue. They wouldn’t survive for very long; their lungs had been inflamed by breathing in the foul, toxic air and they were slowly suffocating to death. You’ve heard the saying ‘dead man walking’, well that was them; you were literally meeting the living dead. Hospitals were rapidly filling up, and where patients thought they could escape the smog in those safe surroundings they shockingly discovered it had infiltrated the wards and the corridors of the hospitals too. No matter where you went it followed. More than 100,000 people were afflicted with health problems after that dreadful week, and heaven only knows the amount that suffered a premature death later on because of it.

  Not only did it affect every person in the East End, and also parts of Central and South London, it also impacted on farming communities who had filled Smith
field market with cattle to be sold and slaughtered for food. Some collapsed, gasping for air and many animals had to be destroyed, as their lungs had been so badly infected they had turned black and were deemed inedible.

  Over the next few days, London virtually came to a standstill. Headlines read: The Great Smog grows worse; death toll rises; London paralysed, no buses, taxis, coaches, trains or planes; Hospitals full to bursting.

  When it cleared, thankfully due to a wind that picked up, it left every building, plant and tree looking as if they’d been sprayed with an oily black residue. Although it took weeks, the rain eventually washed it away, and as it did so the gutters flowed with vile-smelling filth.

  For every person who lived through those dreadful five days, their memories will be as grim as the smog itself.

  12

  Lily

  1955 (age 27)

  As I told you before, I kept Cuckoo Maran chickens and sold a dozen of their eggs every fortnight for £1. I sometimes wished if I’d had a chicken coop full of them, plus £1 a time for every person whose asked me about embalming, I would be a very wealthy man.

  Embalming is a fascination for many people; there’s a morbid curiosity that surrounds it. We started using it during the mid-1950s, as it was just catching on then in our part of the world. We had no training, so we employed the services of Lear Embalming Co., who were based in Carshalton. They were George and Josephine – a husband and wife team. The process at that time could be carried out in several places: our workshop in Ford Street, the hospital mortuary – if a post mortem had been required – or it could even be done in the home of the bereaved.

  It took quite a time to take off. As I said, people just didn’t know what to expect. The most common reaction when it was offered to them was ‘No thanks, I don’t like the idea of it’ or ‘We don’t want them to be cut up.’ I would then explain that there wasn’t any cutting-up involved. If the body had been autopsied, that’s when you could say that it had been ‘cut-up’, but the embalming process required only several small incisions to enable the preservation liquid to be introduced into the body. It was in fact originally known as ‘temporary preservation’.

  You remember the story about Mr O’Leary and how his body had blown up full of gases, and how it leaked liquids in the decomposition process? Well, that was the norm in those days, as there wasn’t an alternative. It was a traumatic experience for the mourners to see their loved ones decompose in front of their eyes, so embalming stopped all of these processes and allowed them to view the body for their final goodbyes whilst remaining in virtually perfect condition.

  There is another skill attached to this too, which is the cosmetic side, and it can also be a great help in the reconstruction of heads and faces. If the person has been involved in an accident, it enables the family to see them once again before the funeral takes place, which certainly wouldn’t have been advisable beforehand.

  Embalming has been around for thousands of years. It started in Ancient Egypt with the mummies but it became more widely available to the public in America. It started to be used more frequently during the American Civil War, which started in 1861. Dr Thomas Holmes – known as ‘the Father of American embalming’ – was engaged by the medical department of the Union Army to set up battlefield embalming stations, to enable the bodies of soldiers to be returned home in the best condition possible.

  The kind of fluids used was a trade secret but arsenic was the primary agent. This is highly poisonous, so it killed or stopped the microorganisms in the body that caused decomposition.

  You can imagine how dangerous it was, using this highly toxic substance to perform an embalming. Any trace of the arsenic may have been digested in some way by the embalmers; this would result in their death, so being an embalmer was not a sought-after profession.

  The other problem was that, throughout the 1880s, embalming had become increasingly popular, but over time the wooden caskets would degrade, which then allowed the remains, that were full of arsenic, to be exposed to the earth that entombed them. This resulted in entire cemeteries becoming hazardous, as the ground and any surrounding water supplies, wells, rivers etc., became toxic due to the release of so much poison.

  Fortunately, in the early 1900s, arsenic was banned, due to concern for the health of the embalming practitioners and the contamination of land. The fluid now used is formaldehyde.

  It was mid-afternoon when I took a call from an extremely distressed man; I could barely make out what he was saying.

  ‘My daughter was . . . killed this morning.’ I then heard sobbing on the other end and gasps for breath. After a short while he said, ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t worry, sir, take all the time you need. I’m here when you’re ready.’ I sat with the phone against my ear and continued listening to him crying. ‘Would it be easier if I came around to see you?’ I suggested.

  He blew his nose and sniffed. ‘Could you? It would be . . . better, I think.’

  ‘Of course, what’s your name and address?’ I asked.

  ‘Tony Rickwood. Wilson Road. East Ham.’

  ‘I’ll be there in about half an hour.’

  ‘Who was that, boy?’ Uncle called from the office.

  ‘A Mr Rickwood from Wilson Road, sounds absolutely devastated. Said his daughter was killed this morning.’

  ‘Poor devil. D’you want me to go? It’ll be a tough one.’

  ‘No, it’s alright. I’ll go, but thanks for offering. I’ll take the van, if that’s OK?’ I said, grabbing my overcoat, hat and scarf, as it was a bitterly cold day.

  ‘Of course. I’m not planning on going anywhere. I’ll see you later,’ he said, turning back to his account books.

  I pulled up outside a very attractive little house and knocked on the front door. My breath came out as white steam, as I blew onto my frozen hands. It took quite a while to open and when it was I was shocked by the appearance of the man. His face was puffed up and blotchy with crying, and he was physically shaking. There’s absolutely nothing you can do in a situation like that, even after years and years of experience. It’s impossible to know what to say when you are confronted with such extreme grief.

  ‘Good afternoon, Mr Rickwood. Stan Cribb . . . you called me a while ago.’

  ‘Yes, come in, go through,’ he said, pointing towards the living room.

  I walked in and heard him close the door behind me. In the living room a woman was lying on the settee sobbing into a cushion. ‘I told you, I don’t want to see anyone, Tony. I just can’t,’ said the muffled voice.

  ‘It’s the undertaker, love. We have to sort it out, we can’t put it off,’ he said softly.

  ‘I can’t. I just can’t!’ she said, and pushed her face deeper into the cushion.

  ‘Please sit down, Mr Cribb. Can I get you a cup of tea or something?’

  ‘No, thank you, I’m fine.’ I smiled as I sat down.

  He then sat down at the end of the settee next to his wife. ‘Our daughter Lily was killed. She was run over outside school this morning.’ He paused to wipe his eyes, whilst his wife sobbed, trying to cover her ears at the same time.

  ‘She was only twelve . . . our only child . . . an angel, she was.’ He shook as he gulped in a breath of air.

  ‘I’m so very sorry. I just wish I could say something to ease your pain but I know nothing I say will be of any help. But I do understand how difficult this is for you.’ I paused for a second. ‘I think the best thing I can do for you right now is to sort out the arrangements as quickly as possible, then I can get out of your way and leave you in peace.’

  ‘Yes, yes, let’s sort it quickly, if you don’t mind. Let’s just get it done. I’ve been dreading it,’ he said, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.

  His wife slowly sat up. She looked as if she hadn’t an ounce of strength left in her.

  ‘I want to see her . . . please can I see her?’ she asked pitifully, her voice a dry croak.

  I looked at her hu
sband, hoping he would help me out, as I didn’t know what she meant.

  ‘You know you can’t see her, love. They said it wasn’t a good idea,’ he said, as he put his arm around her.

  ‘But I want to . . . I have to! I need to say goodbye. I never had a chance.’

  Mr Rickwood looked at me. ‘Lily was badly injured . . . her head . . . they said we shouldn’t identify her, that somebody else should do it. My brother-in-law’s a policeman, and he did it. We just wanted to see her again . . . as she was . . . it doesn’t seem right not being able to say goodbye.’ He trailed off, pulling his wife into his chest.

  ‘I understand. Anybody in your position would feel exactly the same.’ I paused, leaning forward. ‘But you know, there are things that can be done now, marvellous things which may help you to see Lily again,’ I said encouragingly.

  It’s very hard trying to contain your emotions when you’re witnessing this type of sorrow. I never ever got used to it but I learned to control it. At times like this people are at their weakest emotionally and they need to know someone is there to take responsibility and to help them through it.

  Both of them looked towards me in unison. Mrs Rickwood spoke first. ‘There’s a way we can see her . . . how? Oh please don’t get our hopes up. I don’t think I could bear it!’ she said, wringing her hands. Her husband took one of her hands in his. ‘Do you mean it?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes I do,’ I said.

  ‘But how?’

  ‘Well, if you agree to have her embalmed . . . ’ I started to explain.

  ‘NO!’ screamed Mrs Rickwood, her hands shooting up to cover her face. ‘She’s been through enough. You’re not going to cut her up. You can’t, I won’t let you!’

  ‘Wait, love, let’s hear what Mr Cribb has to say first,’ her husband said, looking at me and nodding to carry on.

  ‘I know of a company who specialises in this type of thing. They’re experts in reconstruction. I’ve seen some of their work, and it’s quite remarkable. I believe that if I got them to look at Lily they’d be able to make her look the way she used to.’