Call The Midwife: A True Story Of The East End In The 1950S

by Jennifer Worth

  In high excitement, Fred explained that he had just had a brilliant idea. He would keep a pig. It could live in the chicken run, which he could easily convert into a pigsty, and in no time at all the pig would be ready for the bacon factory, and his fortune would be made.

  Sister Julienne was enchanted. She loved pigs. She had been brought up on a farm, and knew a lot about them. She said that Fred could have all the peelings and waste from Nonnatus House, and advised him to go round the local cafés begging similar favours. Shyly she asked if she might come to see the pig when it was installed in the hen/pig house.

  Fred wasn’t one to hang around. Within a matter of days the pigsty was complete. He and Dolly pooled their resources and a pink, squealing little creature was soon purchased. Sister Julienne was profuse in her praise.

  “You’ve got a fine pig, there, Fred. A real beauty. You can tell by the width of the shoulders. You’ve made a good choice.”

  She gave him one of her sparkling smiles and Fred turned as pink as the pig.

  Fred yielded to Sister Julienne for advice about bran mash and nut mix, as well as supplies of food waste from local cafés and greengrocers. They were frequently seen in deep and earnest conversation, Fred sucking his tooth and whistling inwardly as he concentrated on the detail. Sister also advised him on hay and water and mucking out, and she impressed us all with her knowledge in the art of pig rearing.

  It was a busy and happy time for Fred. Each day at breakfast we heard details of the pig’s progress, her lusty appetite and rapid growth. As the weeks passed, mucking out consumed more of Fred’s time and labour. However, this proved to be a money-maker. Most small houses had tiny back gardens, no more than a yard in most cases, but quite sufficient to grow a few things. Tomatoes were popular, and so, surprisingly, were grapevines, which grew exceedingly well in Poplar and produced succulent fruit. Word soon got round, and Fred’s pigshit was in great demand. He concluded that there was no losing with pigs. The more he fed her, the more thick, black stuff she excreted, and the more money he made. Within a few weeks the sale of manure had covered the initial cost of the piglet.

  The whole of Nonnatus House, Sisters and lay staff alike, took a deep interest in the pig and Fred’s financial aspirations. We read in the papers that the price of meat was rising, and concluded that Fred had been very shrewd.

  However, the vagaries and vicissitudes of the market are notorious. Demand fell. The bottom dropped out of pigs.

  The blow was heavy. Fred was glum. All that feeding and mucking and raking. All the plans and hopes. And now the pig was hardly worth the cost of slaughter. No wonder the bounce had gone out of Fred’s bent little legs. No wonder his North-East eye drooped.

  Sunday was a day of rest in Nonnatus House. After church we were all gathered in the kitchen, having coffee and cakes left by Mrs B. from her Saturday bake. Fred was packing up to leave, but Sister Julienne invited him to join us at the big table. Conversation turned to the pig; his fag drooped.

  “What’m I goin’ to do wiv ’er? She’s costin’ me money to feed ’er an’ I can’t ge’ nuffink for ’er.”

  Everyone sympathised and muttered “hard luck” and “shame”, but Sister Julienne was silent. She stared at him intently, and then said, clearly and positively, “Breed from her, Fred. You could keep her as a breeding sow. There will always be a market for good healthy piglets, and when prices pick up, as they will, you could get a good price for them. And don’t forget, a sow always delivers between twelve and eighteen piglets.”

  Such advice - so obvious, so simple, yet so unexpected! Fred’s mouth fell open, and his fag dropped on to the table. Picking it up with an apology, he stubbed it out in the ashtray. Unfortunately it was not an ashtray; it was Sister Evangelina’s meringue, which she had been on the point of eating. She remonstrated with characteristic vigour.

  Fred was abashed and apologetic. He picked up the meringue, brushed off the ash, picked the fag end out of the cream, and handed it back to Sister Evangelina. “Piglets. Tha’s the answer. I’ll be a pig breeder. I’ll be the best pig breeder on the Isle.”

  Sister Evangelina snorted, and pushed the meringue away from her with disgust. But Fred noticed none of this. He was in a trance, muttering, “Piglets, piglets, I’ll breed pigs, that’s what I’ll do, I will.”

  Sister Julienne, practical and tactful, handed another meringue to Sister Evangelina, and said, “You will have to take the Pig Breeders’ Guide, Fred, and find a good stud boar. I can help you, if you need help in the first instance. My brother is a farmer so I can ask him to send a copy.”

  And that was how it all started. The Pig Breeders’ Guide arrived, and Fred and Sister Julienne were soon poring over it. It was disconcerting to see Fred attempting to read, because he had to hold the page to the left of his South-West eye in order to read anything at all. Even when he could make out a sentence or two, the language of pig breeders was completely foreign to him, and he could not have managed without Sister Julienne, who translated the strange jargon into comprehensible Cockney.

  A good stud boar was selected, a telephone call made, an agreement reached, and a small open truck arrived from Essex.

  Sister Julienne could hardly contain her excitement. Instructing Sister Bernadette to take charge of the House in her absence, she put on her outdoor veil and cloak, pulled a bicycle out of the shed, and cycled off to Fred’s house.

  The Essex farmer was a rural gentleman of settled habits. He had scarcely ventured beyond the peaceful confines of Strayling Strawless to Market Sodbury. His thoughts, as he drove his open truck with his stud boar into the heart of London’s Docklands, have not been revealed to us. The boar, resting his head contentedly on the side of the truck, jogged along for several miles without arousing much interest, but once in the more densely populated streets of London it was a different story. All the way through Dagenham, Barking, East Ham, West Ham, and down to Cubitt Town on the Isle of Dogs, the pig drew crowds. He was a large animal whose only exercise was that of copulation. His nature was comparatively docile, but in ten years his tusks had never been cut, and in consequence he looked more ferocious than he really was.

  As the truck turned in at the end of the street Sister Julienne arrived on her bicycle and met Fred. Together they approached the farmer, who stared at them without saying a word. Sister Julienne stood on tiptoe, looking over the edge of the truck, and brushed back her veil which had been blowing towards the pig’s tusks.

  “Oh, he’s a beautiful fellow,” she whispered excitedly.

  The farmer looked at her, sucked his pipe, and said, “I don’t believe this.”

  He asked to see the sow. The entry to Fred’s yard was via a side passage that ran between the houses, at the end of which was the boundary wall to the docks. The Thames ran behind it. The farmer was thus confronted with the towering sides of ocean-going cargo vessels.

  “They are never going to believe this. Never,” he muttered, as he stooped to pick up his pipe and the keys that had fallen from his hands.

  He was directed into Fred’s yard.

  “There she is, an’ lookin’ for a bi’ of fun from that there big bugger o’ your’n.”

  “Fun!” growled the farmer, “This bit of fun will cost you one pound, cash in hand.”

  Fred knew the cost, and had the money ready, but grumbled nonetheless. “Cor - pound a poke - that’s more’n they gets up West, that is.”

  Sister Julienne remonstrated: “It’s no good grumbling, Fred. A pound is the going rate, so you had better pay up.”

  The farmer eyed the nun strangely, but Fred handed over the money without another word.

  The farmer pocketed the cash, and said, “Right! We’ll bring him round.”

  But that was easier said than done.

  A crowd had gathered, and was growing all the time - word travels fast on the Isle. The farmer backed his truck up against the passage, lowered the rear trailer board, and leaped into the truck to drive the boar down, but the
boar refused to budge. A pig’s eyesight is poor, and, to a creature accustomed to the open countryside of Essex, the passage must have looked like the black hole into hell.

  “Get up and help me,” shouted the farmer to Fred.

  Together they pushed and walloped and shouted at the boar, which got nasty, and looked as if looked as if it might be tempted to use its tusks after all. The crowd in the street gasped, and mothers pulled their children back as the boar slowly and tentatively, descended the ramp on its tiny trotters and entered the passage. Even then it was not plain sailing. The alley was narrow, and the bear very nearly got stuck. The two men pushed from behind. Sister Julienne ran through the house, through the pig yard and the outside gate, and into the passage with turnip tops in her hand, which she said would entice the pig forward. She held them under its nose, but still it would not move.

  Fred had an idea, “Wha’ we needs is a red hot poker to stick up his arse, like wha’ they do with camels in the desert when they wants ’em to go over a bridge. Camels won’ go over water, you know.”

  “You stick a red hot poker up his arse, and I’ll stick one up yours, mate,” the farmer threatened, and continued pushing.

  Eventually the boar was coaxed down the passage into Fred’s yard. A crowd of children followed, and more went into neighbouring gardens and hung over the fence.

  The farmer got cross. He spoke with slow emphasis.

  “You’ll have to clear this crowd away. Pigs are shy animals, they won’t do anything in front of an audience.”

  Again, Sister Julienne took charge. She spoke with quiet authority to the children, and they crept away. She, Fred, and the farmer went into the house and shut the door. But Sister could not resist the temptation to peep out through the curtains to see how the sow took to her “husband”, as she insisted on calling the boar.

  “Oh Fred, I don’t think she likes him - look, she’s pushing him away. He’s definitely interested, do you see?”

  Fred stood by the window, sucking his tooth.

  “No, no, not like that!” cried Sister Julienne, wringing her hands in anguish. “You mustn’t bite him. That’s not the way. Now she’s running. Fred, I’m afraid she might not accept him. What do you think?”

  Fred didn’t know what to think.

  “That’s better. There’s a good girl. She’s getting more interested, do you see, Fred? Isn’t it wonderful?”

  Fred grew alarmed.

  “He’ll kill ’er, he will. Look at ’im, the big bugger. He’s biting her. Look ’ere, I’m not standin’ fer this, not no ’ow. He’ll kill ’er, he will, or break ’er legs or somefink. I’m gonna put a stop to this, I am. It’s barbaric, I tells yer.”

  Sister had to restrain him.

  “It’s all perfectly natural. That’s the way they do it, Fred.” Fred was not easily pacified. Sister and the farmer had to hold him back until it was all over.

  The Nuns were assembled in the Chapel, kneeling in private prayer. The bell for Vespers sounded just as Sister Julienne entered Nonnatus House. Flushed and excited, she raced along the corridor, leaving behind footsteps of a sticky and highly pungent substance on the tiled floor. In haste, she composed herself, took her place at the lectern, and read:

  “Sisters, be sober, be vigilant, for your adversary the Devil roareth around like a raging lion, seeking whom he may devour.”

  One or two of the Sisters looked up from their prayers and glanced sideways at her. A few sniffed suspiciously.

  She continued:

  “Thine adversary roareth in the midst of thy congregation. Thine enemy hath defiled thy holy place.”

  The sniffs got louder, and the Sisters glanced at each other.

  “But as for me, I walk with the godly.”

  The sacristan filled the censer with an unusually large quantity of incense and swung it vigorously.

  “In my prosperity I said I shall never be cast down.”

  Smoke filled the air.

  “But thou, oh Lord, hath seen my pride and sent my misfortune to humble me.”

  There was unrest amongst the Sisters. Those kneeling closest to Sister Julienne shuffled a little distance from her. It cannot be easy to shuffle sideways whilst on your knees and wearing monastic habit, but in extremis it can be managed.

  “But thou dost turn thy face from me, and I was troubled, and I gat me to my Lord, right humbly.”

  The incense swung furiously, smoke billowing out.

  “And I will say unto my Lord, I am unclean. I am unfit to dwell in Thy Holy Place.”

  Coughing broke out.

  “And I cried aloud What profit is there in me? I am undone. I shall go down into the Pit. Oh Lord, hear my prayer. Let my cry come unto Thee.”

  Eventually, and not before time, Vespers concluded. The Sisters, red-eyed, choking and spluttering, filed out of the chapel.

  It took a long time for Sister Julienne to live down the opprobrium of having filled the chapel with the odour of pigshit, and I am sure that God forgave her long before her Sisters did.

  OF MIXED DESCENT I

  In the 1950s the African and West Indian population in London was very small. The ports of London, like those of any nation, had always been a melting pot for immigrants. Different nationalities, languages, and cultures were flung together and intermingled, usually bound to each other by poverty. The East End was no exception, and over the centuries just about every race had been absorbed and propagated. Tolerant warm-heartedness has always been a hallmark of the Cockney way of life, and strangers, though they may have been regarded with distrust and suspicion at first, were not resisted for long.

  Most of the immigrants were young, single men. Men have always been mobile, but not so women. In those days it would have been virtually impossible for a young, poor woman to go jaunting around the world by herself. Girls had to stay at home. However bad the home, however great the hardships and poverty, however much their spirits longed for freedom, they were trapped. This indeed is still the fate of the vast majority of the women of the world today.

  Men have always been luckier, and a footloose young man in a foreign place, once his stomach is full, is after one thing - girls. The East End families were very protective of their daughters and, until recently, pregnancy out of wedlock was the ultimate disgrace and a catastrophe from which the poor girl never recovered. However, it did occur quite frequently. If the girl was lucky, her mother stood by her and brought up the baby. Occasionally the father of the child was forced to marry her, but this was a mixed blessing, as many a girl found to her cost. Whatever the social hardship for the girl, it did mean a continuous infusion of new blood - or new genes, as we would say today - into the community. This may, in fact, account for the distinctive energy, vitality, and boundless good humour of the Cockney.

  Whilst daughters were protected, married women were in a different situation altogether. A young unmarried girl who became pregnant could not hide from anyone the fact that she was unmarried. A married woman could bear anyone’s child, and no one would be any the wiser. I have often felt that the situation is loaded against men. Until recently, when genetic blood tests became possible, how could any man know that his wife was carrying his child? The poor man had no other assurance of paternity than his wife’s word. Unless she is virtually locked up, he can have no control over her activities during the day while he is at work. All this does not matter very much in the broad spectrum of life, because most men are quite happy with a new baby, and if a husband happens to be fathering another man’s child, he is not likely to know, and, as they say, “what the eye does not see, the heart does not grieve over”. But what happens when his wife brings forth a black man’s child?

  The East Enders had hardly faced this before, but after the Second World War the potential was there.

  Bella was a lovely young redhead of about twenty-two. She was well named. Her pale skin, slightly freckled, her cornflower blue eyes would captivate any man, and her red curls would bind him to her for e
ver. Tom was the happiest and proudest young husband in the East India Docks. He talked about her incessantly. She came from one of the ‘best’ families (the East Enders could be incredibly snobbish and class-conscious in their social gradings) and they had married after four years of courtship, when Tom was finally able to support her.

  They had a slap-up wedding. She was the only daughter and her family were determined to do her proud. No expense was spared: a wedding gown with a train that reached halfway down the church; six bridesmaids and four pageboys; enough flowers to give you hayfever for a week; choir; bells; a sermon - the lot! That was just to show the neighbours what could be done. The reception was designed to prove the unrivalled superiority of the family to all the friends and relations. A fleet of Rolls Royces, eighteen in all, drove the most important people from the church a hundred yards down the road to the church hall hired for the occasion. The rest had to walk - and got there first! The long trestle tables had been spread with white cloths, and nearly collapsed under the weight of hams, turkeys, pheasants, beef, fish, eels, oysters, cheeses, pickles, chutneys, pies, puddings, jellies, blancmanges, custard, cakes, fruit drinks and, of course, the wedding cake. Had he seen the wedding cake after he had constructed St Paul’s Cathedral, Sir Christopher Wren would have broken down and wept! It was seven storeys high, each layer supported on Grecian columns, with towers and balustrades and flutings and minarets. It boasted a domed roof bearing a coy-looking bride and bridegroom surrounded by lovebirds.

  Tom was a bit abashed by all this, and didn’t quite know what to say but, as he had said the all-important words “I do”, none of the family really cared whether he said anything else. Bella was quietly enjoying being the centre of attention. She was not a loud or showy girl, but her enjoyment of being the occasion for such extravagance was notable. Her mother was in her element, and bursting with pride. She was also just about bursting out of her tight-fitting purple taffeta suit. (Why is it that women always dress so outrageously for weddings? Look around you, and you will see middle-aged women in things that should have been left behind with their twenties, drawn tightly across expanding backsides, pulled in at the waist, emphasising folds of flesh that would be better covered; ridiculous hairdos; ludicrous hats; kamikaze shoes.) Bella’s mother and several of her aunts had fashionable veils to their hats, which made eating rather difficult, so they pushed their veils up, and pinned them to the tops of their heads, which made the hats look even more absurd.