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Don McDouall was evacuated from London during World War II when he was five years old. He was sent to the small country village of East Hanney to live with Grans and Grampy at a house called Tamarisk. When the war ended nobody came to take him home and he was sent to a children's home. When the children's home closed he was given the choice of returning to Tamarisk or to live in another home, he chose Tamarisk. He now lives in Australia.
In January 1950 my employment started, on the same farm as Grampy was employed, Mr Walter Smith's farm. After nearly ten years of fending for myself I suddenly found myself with not one but two fairy godmothers. One was a welfare officer by the name of Mrs Holmes and another officer called Mr English.
Both officers were friendly towards me, but I didn't trust anybody any more. Each of them visited me alternately once every month. They had been doing so since I turned fourteen. I never worked out why they started to be interested in me perhaps they were feeling guilty and were trying to make amends.
Anyway here I was working full time on a farm. Forty-eight hours per week stretched over five and a half days, I was paid thirty-five shillings a week. Out of this I paid seven and sixpence to the taxman. Three and sixpence into the compulsory pension scheme and lodgings with Gramps came to nine shillings a week. The London County Council paid Doss another twelve shillings a week. This left me with fifteen shillings per week to buy clothes and live as it were. Poaching rabbits usually averaged another ten shillings a week in my pocket.
My first stint of employment was 'Threshing'. I remember those cold frosty days of January when your toes were frozen in your wellies. The rickyard contained numerous ricks of different grains that had been built back at harvest time. These were now demolished to remove the grain from the chaff and straw. All this was achieved by feeding the sheaves manually, one by one into the threshing machine.
With a great deal of noise, dust and vibration the straw came out one end and the grain came out the other end. Chaff with clouds of dust came out the bottom. The straw that came out of the back of the machine fell onto the lowest end of an elevator. It then traveled up the elevator into the Baling machine, which I worked. My job was as the main operator and I had a 'Land girl' working with me.
While the war had been on this sort of work was often carried out by POW's (Prisoners of War). Many were Italians who wore chocolate coloured battledress with large orange circles painted on their backs. Italian POW's were employed on farms without any guards. There might be one lone old soldier with an equally old Lee Enfield rifle but no bullets. When I was a small boy, one such Italian prisoner carved me a small wooden hedgehog.
Sometimes, during the war, you would see German POW's going to work on farms. These men always had real soldiers guarding them. We would just stare as they marched past, we were always afraid of Germans. Whereas with the Italian POW's all the village kids would yell out 'Toosha rala' as the prisoners passed by. This was supposed to be something very rude in Italian!
One day I became stupidly lax in my concentration. I was most likely flirting with the young land girl working with me on the baler. The girl kept making faces at me across the top of the machine. The baler was a very dangerous machine at the best of times. There was a great big notice in red and white baked enamel stating 'Danger beware of springs. Keep hands off needles'.
I had read this notice a thousand times. I waited for the ram to retract then pushed the needle through, but instead of letting go of the needle I kept my hand on it. The ram traveled forward and my hand went to the other side of the spring shroud. It was too late! I couldn't get my hand back and I had to watch while the machine finished its cycle.
The back of all my fingers got scalped by the frame as the ram returned. When got my hand back out I had no fingernails left or any flesh on the back of my fingers and I could see the bones. The pain was agonising but I felt so stupid I made out nothing had happened. Somehow I worked through the rest of the day not telling anyone what had happened but that night I couldn't stand the pain any longer. I got on the bus and went to the doctor's surgery in Wantage.
The doctor wanted to know what had happened and I told him I had fallen off my bike. I don't think he believed me, but he patched me up and gave me some painkillers. I went to work the next day not telling anybody what had happened and somehow I managed to do my job. To this day I still have the scars on the back of my hand and my little fingernail never grew properly again.
Don McDouall, Australia, 2001
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