Manchester at War, 1939-45

by Graham Phythian

  (North West Sound Archive)

  NO ‘CONDITION’

  In reply to Mr Molloy concerning oranges, I have an off-licence and general store and I am pleased to say I am open to sell to the public whether they come from Hong Kong or Timbuktu as long as they have their points book. I don’t make any conditional sales such as most fruiterers do before you can get certain goods off them.

  You can only sell them once so sell out of your window and remember, this war won’t last forever.

  E. E. Dennison, Salford 7

  (Manchester Evening News correspondence, 1 November 1943)

  SIX

  YANKS

  Even before the Japanese attack on US bases at Pearl Harbor in December 1941 precipitated the Americans into both Asian and European wars, there had been a feeling in Britain that the US were at least potential allies. The build-up of American troops in Britain began in January 1942, and reached a high-water mark in 1944 just prior to the D-Day landings. A total of around 1.5 million American servicemen were either stationed throughout Britain, or passed through on their way to the European battleground.

  American GIs on parade in Albert Square in 1942. This was the first year of the American presence in the UK. A Division of the Lancashire Home Guard is in the background. (Manchester Central Library Local Images Collection: M09823)

  JUNE COWAN

  The Americans were billeted in Withington and Didsbury in 1944. I remember drawing back my curtains one morning to see all these American soldiers standing at ease in two long rows along the grass in the centre of the road, together with all their kit, waiting to be taken to their ‘new homes’. We had four billeted with us and they were all charming. They only slept in the house as they had their canteen nearby.

  We learned later that they had arrived in Liverpool earlier that morning, having crossed over on the Queen Mary, then a troop ship.

  In front of the Palatine cinema (where the DSS offices are now) the Americans had erected their kitchen and canteen facilities, which were always busy.

  One enduring memory I have is of seeing a company of soldiers marching in formation down Wilmslow Road towards Fog Lane/Lapwing Lane traffic lights. They were all shouting in unison, ‘Hup – two – three – four’, followed by some words in rhyme, then back to ‘Hup …’ etc. There were plenty of jeeps around, decorated with Betty Grable-type pin-ups and girls’ names.

  BOB POTTS

  My memories of the Yanks were up close and personal. There was a battalion based at Worsley Old Hall, officers and men, and during the Easter break in 1944 they took over our school playing fields, St Mark’s School, Worsley, for their sports. Now, at the time we knew there were Yanks in the area because we used to see them in the village. They used to play baseball on our school field as well; they were like professionals, we went along just to see them play the baseball.

  An Evening News cartoon from April 1941 illustrates the early expectation of a US–GB alliance. (Manchester Evening News)

  One day an officer turned up, a major, and he said, ‘Do you have to use this footpath to get to school?’

  It was just a rough old track, centuries old, and we all said, ‘Yes!’

  He said, ‘I guess we’ll have to do something about that.’ And they built us a new footpath from Worsley Courthouse up to the old school. The school’s gone, it’s been rebuilt further away, but the footpath’s still there.

  The next American I saw, I was on the way from the orphanage [Ryecroft Church of England Children’s Society Home] to school, during my dinner break, when three American soldiers approached me, and these were the first ones I’d seen apart from the officer, and they got near to me – they were in combat dress, they weren’t in regular uniform, all tall, youngish, in their twenties – and one of them smiled at me and he said, ‘We’re gonna win the war for you.’

  I thought, ‘Oh, whoopee! Anything to get out of the home!’

  A few weeks later they turned up in their hundreds for their sports on our school playing fields. They had a tug-o’-war game, and baseball, and a few other activities which I can’t really remember. We were scrounging off them: chewing gum – they didn’t give us any money – I don’t think they could afford to give us any money! – but pencils, anything they had on them.

  What struck me was that the officers and the men addressed each other by their Christian names. I thought that was highly unusual, but probably because they were all from the same town. The men were in their twenties I would say, and I think the major was about thirty; he looked like a movie star, very handsome. Although the men were boisterous, they weren’t hooligans, but I noticed that the officers were watching them all the time. The officers never took their eyes off the men.

  Also, they attended church, which was just a few hundred yards away from the school. So I saw the American officers at church.

  BRIAN SEYMOUR

  The only Americans I can remember was one Saturday morning when I was coming back from the butcher’s; two American soldiers on Great Clowes Street, and one of them stopped me and said [in an American accent], ‘Can you tell me where the Grozz-Veener Hotel is?’

  And I said, ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘The Grozz-Veener Hotel?’ And it was a pub, called the Grosvenor, and I’ve never forgotten that.

  Manchester Racecourse was where the Americans had their base during the war. What was the racecourse, it’s the university buildings now, Littleton Road [site of present Salford Sports Village, Lower Kersal]. During the war there was no racing, and the American Army took over.

  American soldiers marching past Sale Town Hall during the 1944 ‘Salute the Soldier Week’. (Trafford Archives)

  DONALD READ

  But what really brought the war home to us in Didsbury was the coming of American soldiers into our midst as part of the build-up for D-Day. They were billeted throughout the district, I think compulsorily. We had no room to spare over the shop, but Auntie Elsie had a box-room unused in her council house at Burnage, and my diary for 4 April 1944 recorded laconically: ‘Auntie E has a Yank soldier’.

  The Americans appeared quite suddenly in Didsbury village, walking around confidently in uniform or speeding through in jeeps. Most of them seemed to be officers, and I soon worked out the various badges of rank on their shoulders. I saw them at closest quarters in the village barber’s shop, when I went there every few weeks for a basic ‘short back and sides’. This was the British fashion of the time, presumably because it was a simple style requiring little attention, and so became the standard haircut for British soldiers. The Americans also wore their hair short, but with more styling. They expected to sit in the chair for much longer than we did, giving the barber detailed instructions about what to trim and not to trim. Obviously, they were used to dealing with full-blown hairdressers, and paying accordingly, rather than with traditional British barbers.

  I never spoke to an American soldier, and my parents may also never have done so, for the Americans had no reason to come into our shoe shop. But I observed them with approval, for I knew they had come to help us win the war. And yet, unlike those teenage girls slightly older than myself, who met Americans at dances and were given nylons (and babies), I was not excited by the American presence. I simply took it for granted in the circumstances. The American ‘invasion’ did not affect my everyday life.

  (From A Manchester Boyhood)

  US BAND PLEA

  Manchester is to celebrate the Anglo-American week. Is it possible for the American Army to provide one of their own regimental bands to play in Manchester and lead a parade of American troops through the city? They would receive a real Lancashire welcome.

  S. T.

  (Manchester Evening News correspondence, 28 October 1943)

  ROY MATHER

  There were Americans based at Belle Vue. Where the speedway was, and the Exhibition Hall, the government took that over, but prior to that the army was in. Then when the Americans come, they moved the army out and put their – t
hey were coloured, it was a black unit. They were a transport unit, they parked all their vehicles on the car park at Belle Vue. Prior to D-Day, when they came, all around Burnage, round that area, they was billeted. These were white troops, they was billeted in houses, and General Patton was based at Knutsford – that was his headquarters.

  American MPs at Piccadilly bus station, in the summer of 1942. (Manchester Evening News)

  All round Belle Vue, we used to go round, asking ‘Any gum, chum?’ That was a treat, getting the candy as they called it.

  On VE-night all the Yanks were in town, and the Gaumont long bar was full of Yanks. The Gaumont long bar was on Oxford street, and it was by the cinema. They all used to come there, and all the girls as well.

  DOREEN NEEDHAM

  There is one thing I remember of that time. American soldiers must have had a barracks or something nearby, because they were often marching along Crossley Road in front of the school [Levenshulme High School for Girls], and as the railings around the school had already been taken away to go towards making munitions, it seemed like an open invitation for the soldiers to lie on the grass and watch us during our sports lessons – hockey and lacrosse. It’s kind of sad to think about it now, as it’s possible that many of those soldiers were killed on D-Day or thereafter. I wonder if many of them living remember Levenshulme?

  (From the website www.levyboy.com)

  MICKIE MITCHELL

  I used to go to Burtonwood [US camp in Warrington]. I went out with one, he was a member of a Flying Fortress crew. Actually we were going to get married, and he failed to return. He came from Chicago, I would have been a gangster’s moll, wouldn’t I? [laughs]

  We were out one day, four firewomen, and of course we were in uniform because you didn’t get clothes during the war much, and we were in the Grand Hotel in Manchester. We were sat having a drink, the four of us, and there were these American officers sat at a table. My friend said, ‘They keep looking at us, that lot.’

  So I said, ‘Yes, I’ve noticed.’

  My friend said, ‘We dare you to go and ask them to come and join us.’

  So I said, ‘OK.’ So I went over and put my best voice on, I said, [in posh voice] ‘Excuse me, my friends there would like to know, would you like to come and join us?’

  So they said, ‘Oh sure, madam.’ So they came over, and that’s how I met him. He was 6′4″, and I’m 4′10″! [laughs]

  But my mother wouldn’t tolerate him. He used to come in a Jeep sometimes, with him being an officer, but she wouldn’t let him in. I had to go out, ‘Oh, he’s here,’ like that. Sometimes we didn’t see one another for a long time, because I was on shift work, and he was off and back, like that. He failed to return from a raid.

  I used to go to Burtonwood. Of course, their PX I think it was called, the equivalent to our NAAFI, it was dry, they didn’t have drink or anything like that, so that’s why the Americans sort of went mad I suppose, drinking.

  When we were in Moss Side Fire Station, there were quite a few round there, and their military police were called ‘snowdrops’ – well we did, anyway! – because they wore white helmets. Ours were red, theirs were white.

  BRYANT ANTHONY HILL

  At that time I was in the junior school at Royal Oak [Wythenshawe], and it was a massive big playing field – they’ve got houses on now – and it used to run right down to the railway line. I used to wander down and watch the trains on the railway line; I was interested in trains before that. The railway line there, it was a short piece of about three miles between two big junctions: you got two lines at Northenden joined together, you got the short stretch, and it went into three lines at the other end [West Timperley]. There were dozens and dozens of trains going down; there were more goods trains in the war. This passenger train came down, which was unusual because there was none due at that time, and I stood there and it stopped: it was full of American soldiers, and they started throwing money out!

  It was serious money. Now in them days, threepence or sixpence: you were lucky if you got that much. That was the first one, and we must have been the first children they’d seen. Coming through Liverpool, and they’d come up the dock lines and onto the main Cheshire lines, straight through to wherever they were going, and that must have been the first stop. I think the first time I must have picked up about two pounds.

  We got one or two then, over a period of a couple of weeks, and we got told we had to take all the money in. Of course nobody did!

  MARJORIE AINSWORTH

  I remember the Americans being here. You often saw them, and a couple of the girls in the office had American boyfriends that they’d met at the Ritz. One got pregnant. [laughs] There was a lot of that about. I remember another woman who was temporary with us having an American boyfriend, but she was married, and had to write a ‘Dear John’ letter to her husband abroad.

  The Americans used to bring some amazing things over. They were very well cared for, they got loads of little specially printed novels and dictionaries and things like that which were issued to the American forces. They got rid of them or left them, they were great. Printed books were difficult to get.

  You saw them in town, but I never had anything personally to do with them. I was married at the time, and my husband was over with the Americans in the Ardennes, he was caught up in the Battle of the Bulge. He was with an American radar unit, on a special mission.

  DIANE SWIFT

  I remember sitting on the doorstep in Hulme [Dunham Street], and the Yanks walking down our street on the odd occasion. We were told to say, ‘Any gum, chum, please?’ The Yanks I remember were kind people with a smile on their faces.

  My dad was a long-distance lorry driver. He used to let me have the day off school sometimes, and always he would stop and give a Yank a lift. The Yank would always give me something: chewing gum or chocolate.

  When I was about fourteen, my friend Irene and I would wander around exploring different places, which was daring in those days. I remember going to All Saints Park on Cavendish Street and Oxford Street. You could smell the rubber from Dunlop’s on Cambridge Street, and we would always talk to a Yank and cadge a cigarette from him. He was very quiet and sad and just stared across the road. Looking back, he must have been homesick. He never said anything disrespectful and we met about four times a week for about six months. He often comes into my thoughts when I pass All Saints.

  A girl I knew had a baby to a Yank; he married her, but she would not go back to America. She would go to the base in Burtonwood, and get £50 every month.

  ANNIE GIBB

  There were droves of Americans, down past the Palace, droves, along Oxford Road. I never went to that place in Warrington, there was a dance hall in Warrington [probably the Casino Club, on the corner of Bridge Street]. I didn’t leave my own area, my dad was [shakes head disapprovingly]. Loads of girls used to go there dancing; they went on the train.

  INSTRUCTIONS TO AMERICAN SERVICEMEN IN BRITAIN

  • Don’t be a show off.

  • NEVER criticize the King or Queen.

  • The British don’t know how to make a good cup of coffee. You don’t know how to make a good cup of tea. It’s a fair swap.

  • It is always impolite to criticize your hosts; it is militarily stupid to criticize your allies.

  (From a US War Department leaflet)

  JEANNE HERRING

  I went out with an American soldier who came to the house. Mother made him most welcome, even though he was of Greek parentage. I wonder why her prejudice didn’t work here. He bought me a pretty gold brooch. I had only known him for a week when he asked me to choose a brooch for his sister, so all unsuspecting I chose a gold one as he said he wanted a good one. When we got outside the shop he gave it to me. He was posted away soon afterwards.

  FRANCIS HOGAN

  The Americans were at what is now Trafford General [Hospital], they took over Davyhulme Park [Hospital] as it was in those days. They had it for quite a few years.
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  They used to come in the pub I used to drink in, the Bird I’th Hand in Flixton. They were very friendly actually. The landlord’s daughter married one. He went and joined the Merchant Navy, he used to come into Manchester up the Ship Canal. She used to go down to the canal to see his ship, and he used to throw contraband to her! He got caught, and I think he got jailed for it.

  A pal of mine, his uncle ran the Bird I’th Hand, and we were never short of a drink there. [laughs] The Yanks used to drink there. Not many of them, but quite a few.

  They had a camp Warrington way, Risley [Burtonwood; Risley was the site of a Royal Ordnance Factory]. A lot of them used to go from there on the train into Manchester.

  They used to get on well with the locals. They got on well with the girls all right! The ones I got in touch with at the hospital I got on OK with. In Manchester, they virtually kept themselves to themselves, except for the women, of course, they were all over them. They were a good crowd, young blokes like we were, out for a good time.

  A postcard from Manchester, postmarked 18 April 1944, sent home by an American soldier to his wife in New York. (Bob Potts)

  TREFOR JONES

  No. 11 Chandos Road South [Chorlton-cum-Hardy] where I lived with my parents from 1940 to 1960, for twenty years. I used to sit on the top of this pinnacle [spherical gatepost top] here, and survey particularly the American soldiers. One lived at the Tomlins’, at the house across the road, and there were several others billeted in the houses further down the road. They would come past, and I’d sit on the gatepost with the well-worn phrase, [laughs] ‘Any gum, chum?’ And they used to give you chewing gum, you know, the American chewing gum. And then they’d go on from here round the corner, turn left, and go to the old wooden St Werburgh’s Hall, and that was the officers’ meeting point, prior of course to the invasion. Why they were up in Manchester I’ve not a clue.