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Jo Jones (nee Waterman) recalls her schooling at Bude after the family moved from Worthing in West Sussex.
St. Catherine's was a private school for girls. In Bude, there were the boys private school St. Petroc's, St. Catherine's and then the council schools.
The school, St. Catherine's, was actually three terraced houses knocked together at it were. After all this time, no longer living in Cornwall, I cannot remember the name of the road. It faced the Bude Golf Links and towards the centre of the town.
Just five minutes walk down the road was Crooklets Beach. The best beach for surfing. The next beach over was Summerleaze and the harbour and entrance to the canal.
The Principal was a Miss Weir (Maggie). Her sister, Miss Flossie Weir, did the housekeeping and cooking. And the Vice Principal was a Miss Lucy Player. Miss Weir always dressed in flowing dresses with little modesty inserts in the neckline. Miss Flossie was not quite so old fashioned and Miss Player, who was younger than both the other ladies favoured blouses and skirts.
Our classrooms by today's standards were small. No more than a dozen pupils in any class. The school uniform was the ubiquitous navy blue serge tunic with long sleeved vyella blouses and ties in the P.N.E.U. colours.
It was usual to wear navy blue knickers in those days. I remember it was quite normal to stick one's handkerchief into the leg elastic of one's knickers for lack of an adequate pocket. In the summer the uniform was a very simple green cotton dress with a round neck and short sleeves. My mother said it made us all look like orphans.
Even on the coldest days the classroom windows were kept open. It was quite common to be able to see our breath. And many of us had chilblains (partly due to our poor wartime diet); and it was not uncommon to see a child wearing mittens in the struggle to keep warm. (Mittens in the old sense -- gloves with no finger tips.) There were gas fires in each classroom but they were very rarely lit.
The area behind the building was surrounded by a high stone wall and the whole yard had been cemented. It was marked out for 'netball'. But most of the time we used it at recess for roller skating. We were all roller skating mad. If you didn't have skates you were nobody! Those days the skates either had metal grips which you tightened onto your shoes at the toes, or they were attached by two sets of leather straps.
A blackboard in the hall gave out any announcements and the names of those playing netball at the end of the morning classes were put up there. I was very keen. Not very talented but willing.
For gym (we had no formal gymnasium) we brought out the horse, balancing beam, the stands for jumping rope etc. to the yard. If the weather was not good enough for this, callisthenics were done in the largest ground floor room where services and rollcall were held.
Eurhythmics was the vogue those days. We had pale violet coloured dresses with green bands at the neck and sleeves and the skirt was slit either side for ease of movement. We had to move to the music. But it was not graceful like dancing.
It was obligatory, as Lucy Player was a keen guide, to be a girl guide. There was only one instance that I can remember when the doctor's daughter decided she wanted no part of it. No one else ever had the nerve.
We wore shapeless blue uniforms with leather belts from which we could attach useful things, though I cannot for the life of me remember what. The uniform had two capacious pockets in the top. Very useful for hankies and the 'penny, paper, notebook and string' that Lucy Player exhorted us to carry at all times.
The older girls with well-developed bosoms must have hated those pockets which accentuated what they would have preferred to hide. We were a very self-conscious lot.
We learnt the Morse code, how to semaphore, went on hikes and made camp fires in damp fields. This latter was meant to be accomplished with one match. I certainly never succeeded and blatantly used as many as it took. As I usually landed up with the wettest part of the field perhaps it was overlooked.
We made ourselves evil and unsanitary 'dampers' of flour and water and stuffed jam in the hole left by the stick they were cooked on. They tasted wonderful. We cooked sausages on sticks too and came home smelling of wood smoke.
We guides were divided into little groups. Each group was given the name of a bird. I belonged to the Swallows; my elder sister was a Kingfisher. Each group had a leader and a second. My leader was very keen and I am sorry to say found me a great disappointment. No aptitude and no ambition.
If the truth was known, we came from a family of non conformists and it went against the grain to even try to conform.
The first time the air raid siren went off in Bude we were all solemnly hustled to the ground floor where we sat around until the all-clear went off. After that, we never bothered again. Bude was not a German target.
The German planes flew over frequently and the Ack Ack camp occasionally fired at them. One bomb was unloaded by a bomber on its way home and damaged some houses but fortunately with no causalities.
In the summer the school had the use of some grass tennis courts overlooking the cliffs and the sea, and it was a joy to play there. However, these were let go when war came.
The school also used the swimming pool built into the base of the cliffs between Summerleaze and Crooklets and there we learnt to swim. Miss Weir with a walking stick in her hand would coach each child. The beginners had the handle of the walking stick hooked into the straps of the bathing suit! Those waiting for a lesson would shiver and shake on the rocks alongside. English summer days can be cool.
Years after school, when I was a newly wed, I went and visited Miss Weir and Miss Flossie. Miss Weir was bedridden then and Miss Flossie looked after her. The school no longer existed. They seemed to have such kind memories of me as a pupil, quite undeserved I am sure.
But they were incapable of thinking unkindly of anyone. They and Lucy Player lie at rest in the Poughill Churchyard, close to a soldier who died at the battle of Stamford Hill.
Jo Jones, Canada, 2002
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