2nd January 1943

Saturday

Up at 7 to see a lovely clear dawn.  Cold, but the wind almost gone.  The stars were glittering, dying out before the faint hazy glow from the east, and the last remnant of the moon still hung in the southern sky.  Cycled off at ten minutes to 8, and as I went along saw the glow becoming brighter and yet brighter, the sky absolutely cloudless, changing from pale gold to yellow, then orange, then pink.  Distant trees, stacks and farms looked as if drawn in charcoal.  The water glittered in the cart furrows.  Passed ten horses going to work in Dead Lane, huge shapes in the dim light.  The sun’s orb appeared just above the horizon as I passed over East Bridge, and every window going up East Hill flashed crimson.

Very busy all morning.  Capt. Folkard brought back from Writtle another mad scheme, under which all the 1943 Cropping is to be revised, each farm to be done under the personal supervision of a member of the Committee.  In our case, this would mean each member visiting about 85 farms and holdings – a physical impossibility.  Writtle and the Ministry go from one insanity to another, and I have no doubt that if this sort of thing goes on there will be a serious decrease in production, because farmers would rather give up than be “messed about” in this way.

Back to office this afternoon, after an hour at Bourne Mill, to see one of the Land Girls with Nott.  She is a leather-worker by trade, and used to be with Bliss & Co, London.  She has the delightful name of Caesarina Woollains.  We want her to act as a sort of ganger, in an effort to get the Land Army pulled together again, but I fear nothing much will come of it.  The girls do exactly as they like since Joanna left, and have now reached the stage where they simply refuse to get out in the morning.  Poor old Authey can do nothing with them.

Away at 4, in a sudden rain storm, to pay out money at Mile End and Boxted.  Called at Roses.  Dodo Rose looks rather frail.  She was laughing over a very funny thing in this month’s number of the magazine “Horizon”.  In a very interesting article on women working in a factory, it was recorded that one of the girls said “Bugger the foreman”.  The offending word has been carefully erased with a pen-knife in each copy, no mean task.  Curiously enough, there is a short story in the same issue containing the words “bugger”, “sod” and “bastard”, all unexpurgated.  After a little thought it dawned upon me that you may print the word as a noun but not as a verb!  The English sense of decency is a very curious thing.

Brought back with me tonight a “Common Place Book” compiled by Henry Laver between 1893 and 1903, all choice items of Colchester lore, including the true story of Ann Mortlock, the woman who, in 1857, remembered Headgate, remembrances of men whipped at cats-tails, the last person to be put in Colchester stocks and an exact record of the finding of part of the gateway into St. Botolph’s Priory.  This is a wonderful find, and has never been published.

1st January 1943 - New Year's Day

Friday

Up at 7, to find New Year’s Day streaming with rain, which continued with varying violence until 5 o’clock this evening. 

We received notice this morning that my salary has been raised to £4.10.0 per week, making £234 a year.  This is the most I have ever earned, and is 30/- a week more than I was paid at the Museum.  I have over £200 in the Bank, which I firmly refuse to invest in any Government savings schemes, and my superannuation money.  My horse, trap, harness, etc, must be worth quite £100 at present day values, so I must account myself well-off.  My expenses are small.  I expect I spend more on horse-keeping than I do on myself.

I still remain a Special Constable for shelter duties and I am glad to keep my warrant-card and steel-helmet, either of which might be useful in an emergency.  By very great good-luck I have never been conscripted into the Home Guard.

Of all the things which are now done in this country which make honest men squirm with disgust, I think the conscription of young girls into the Forces is the very worst.  One can quite realise that it is very necessary for girls who have never worked before to do so now, otherwise the country will undoubtedly starve, but to take girls of 20 away from their homes, and herd them together under conditions reminiscent of Reformatory Schools, is a public scandal, yet no organised attempt at protest has ever allowed to have been made. 

Today continued wet, but thank goodness there were no alarms.  Out at 5.15, and got back to Lawford in a fine spell, under a lovely wild, turbulent sky, red, orange and blue, with great ragged clouds sailing along behind me.

Telephoned Molly Blomfield tonight.  She told me her sister Joan is getting married next week to Gabriel Turville-Petre, I believe brother or cousin to Lord Petre.  He is a great Icelandic scholar.  I like Molly very much, but can never see her for any length of time, as she is so much engaged with her ambulance work and with the Claytons. 

Some of my agricultural notes printed in the “Standard” tonight.

Joy tells me that she met a woman today who had been to Huddersfield, and who was amazed to find that only one bombing attack had been made there since the war began, and only four people had been killed there.  This seems quite unbelievable.  I was under the impression that every industrial town in the North had been heavily raided, most of them many times.

Tonight the wind is becoming more and more violent, great gusts shaking the house like explosions.  It is warm and cosy up here, with the candle-light and a roaring fire.  

31st December 1942 - New Year's Eve

Thursday

A lot more snow during the night.  The fleecy grey clouds were blowing away as I walked up to the bus, and the sky was blue, the last thin crescent of the moon still strong enough to throw shadows on the snow.  The sun came up pink and gold, and during the whole day there was hardly a cloud in the sky.

Had to draw a full week’s money this afternoon, over £600, as the banks will shut tomorrow.  Stored it in the Muniment Room tonight.

Missed the 5.15 bus, and had to wait at the Bus-Park for the 6.10.  There was a big crowd waiting, and we waited and waited in the queue, but no bus came.  At last, not before 25 minutes to 7, a Beeston and an Eastern National Bus appeared one behind the other. 

Too tired to do any work tonight.  Spent an hour reading Laver’s “Perlustration of the Banlieu of Colchester” – a brilliant piece of work.  I believe that this, together with the Doctor’s Colchester and Essex Indeces, are the most valuable work ever done by the Lavers.

Poulter told me today that Philip Corder was here recently.  I wish I had seen him.  After the war he is going to give up St. Alban’s Museum, and be Secretary to the Society of Antiquaries.  I wonder if I should ever have a chance to get St. Alban’s?  I believe Corder would help me.

So we end another year of disasters and misery.  As a rule I never attempt to foretell the future, but I do not see how the war can end before 1955.  Assuming that the Russians do not collapse, it is quite possible that the Anglo-American forces will invade Greece or Italy this year.  If successful, attempts will be made on Norway, Denmark and Holland.  If these efforts too are successful, the Anglo-American forces will be in a position to attack Germany, but I do not see this at all likely before 1947 or 1948.  Even if Germany is rendered helpless as a fighting unit, the war is not over.  The Japanese will still be active, and Germany beaten can still help by refusing to release prisoners, just as has been done in the case of the French soldiers.  Meanwhile, we shall never be safe from the German bombers.  All constructive effort is absurd until this menace is removed.

A war of extinction against the Japanese will of course be carried out at no matter what cost on the instruction of the big oil and rubber companies, who must recoup their losses.

And so we face 1943, without hope of peace, in fact many of us too bored and apathetic to care what is the outcome of this terrible, disastrous war.

30th December 1942

Wednesday

Up at 7, to see a wild, white, world, snowflakes beating and whirling against the window, and little drifts all along the window-sills.  The trees and hedges were black as charcoal, and great ragged clouds raced overhead, with the moon peeping through them.

Got my breakfast, and walked up to the village to catch the bus.  Cycling was impossible, as there were drifts a foot deep on the roads.  Soon after 8 the clouds drifted away, and the golden dawn appeared in the east.  Every field was a vast untrodden white carpet, and the magic of the snow had changed the cheap, shoddy little cottages in the village into beauty, through which a few labourers moved silently to their work.  Bus was very late, and came along slowly, throwing up fountains of loose snow.  The sun appeared, and the moon paled in a dense blue sky.  Very cold north wind, but everything seemed better and brisker by this sudden change.  Got through a good deal of work today.

Rushed home to tea this afternoon, and then managed to get to Lawford by 6, when it was still barely dark.  The longest nights are behind us now.

Writing all evening.

29th December 1942

Tuesday

Up at 7.   A lovely fine morning, the moon riding high in the sky.  Cycled in early and went down to Bourne Mill to feed Bob.  

New girl began at the office today.  Heather was very late, and did not come in at all yesterday.  I was most annoyed.  Daphne went out this morning to see her boy off to join the RAF. 

All the shops are still shut, except grocers, chemists, etc.  A sort of reluctant holiday air about the town.

No sign of Nott all day, although he was wanted by a good many people.

Came out late tonight, sailing along before a strong S.W. wind.

Received a letter today from the Air Ministry about a plane-crash at Mersea last November 26^th, when damage was done to crops at Cross Lane.  Apparently a Mosquito aircraft fell there, killing the crew, but I heard nothing of it at the time.

28th December 1942

Monday

Very dull, lowering, sky.  Except for a gleam of sun yesterday afternoon, there has been no break in the clouds since last Thursday tea-time.

Very cold and bleak.  Cleaned my cycle, wrote letters, and mounted photos.  

Parry was saying that in Frank Girling’s opinion agriculture will be kicked down lower than ever before when the war is over.  He has the lowest opinion of Hudson, and says he has done nothing since he became Minister of Agriculture.

27th December 1942

Sunday

Helped feed stock, and this afternoon writing letters etc.  Frank Girling came to tea on his cycle, and stayed for the Christmas dinner tonight.  The other guests were Mrs. Belfield and Penelope.  It was a lovely supper of turkey, plum pudding and cream, and white wine (Sauternes).  Joy is a wonderful cook.

A great deal of talk about the Beveridge Report.  Mrs. Belfield was most disapproving.  She is a real ‘die-hard’ of the old school, but in Dedham there are even more curious views.  It appears that the Revd. Canon Given-Wilson, and several prominent parishioners, disapproved very strongly of the Red Cross Fund, on the grounds that it is a ‘totalitarian’ movement.  Given-Wilson told Mrs. Belfield so himself.  I have heard that there is a good deal said about the way money is handled in Dedham when collected for various public funds.

Walked home with Mrs. Belfield and Penelope in the moonlight, about 11 o’clock.