David Waddington Memoirs Read Free

to make our beds and sweep and dust our bedrooms, and then set about peeling the potatoes. In those days before television we never seemed to have much difficulty entertaining ourselves, but we were very lucky living in the country. At weekends and during school holidays we were not allowed to stay inside the house unless it was pelting down and we roamed the surrounding fields and haunted the farm where the tenant, Dick Earnshaw, treated us with great forbearance. All he got in return was help with hay-making when two or three Irish labourers also turned up to lend a hand and lived in the barn.
    Being a large family we were very self-sufficient. Occasionally, school friends were asked back for tea but, after being subjected to various ordeals to establish their courage and physical fitness – all guests were required to swing on a rope from one side of the barn to the other – some did not come a second time.
    On Fridays in the school holidays we used to get the bus to Burnley to do the shopping. Sometimes my sister Zoe and I stayed on in Burnley and went to see Aunt Dot who lived on Manchester Road. Once we used our pocket money to buy a budgerigar. The shop keeper popped it into a paper bag and when we presented bag and bird to my mother and asked her to carry it home on the bus in her shopping basket she was most indignant but complied.
    I was born in 1929. I cannot put a date to many early memories, but I do remember sitting on a wall to watch King George V andQueen Mary go past on their way to open the Mersey Tunnel. That, I find, took place on 18 July 1934. I then have a very clear memory of the Silver Jubilee in 1935. We were all in bed with measles and every few minutes, or so it seemed, God Save the King was played, and every few minutes we leapt out of bed and stood to attention. Before the abdication in 1936 I remember being taught some rude rhymes about Mrs Simpson and, on the day of the coronation in 1937, I planted a tree to mark the occasion.
    When five I went to Sunnybank School in Manchester Road. We were taken there each morning by my father and usually we were late. Martyn Noble, who started at Sunnybank at the same time, used to help me do up my shoe laces but otherwise I was well ahead of the other children, having been taught by my sisters to read, write and do some arithmetic.
    One day on arriving at school I took off my mackintosh in the cloakroom and was horrified to find that before leaving home I had failed to put on my jacket. The Headmistress, Miss Farrer, was disgusted to see me displaying my braces and rang up my mother to tell her I was improperly dressed. Rhona, our maid, came to the rescue and sped to Burnley on her Francis Barnett motorbike carrying the missing jacket.
    I was never allowed to forget this event, any more than I was ever allowed to forget the time when we were out for the day in the car and I lost my purse with all my pocket money in it. My father stopped the car to allow it to be searched, but of the purse there was no trace. Bitter tears were shed. And then a mile or two down the road I took off my school cap and, lo and behold, my purse was sitting on my head where I had very sensibly placed it for safekeeping.
    At Sunnybank there were brass studs on the bannisters to stop us sliding down them and Miss Farrer had a bad-tempered Scottish terrier which took a big piece out of Cynthia Forsyth’s face. In timethe scar disappeared and all that was left was a pretty dimple but it was a very bloody business.
    My father’s office was above Barclays Bank in Burnley, and if he wanted to see the manager, Mr Shutt, he walked down the stairs and straight in by the inside door. Once I was with him and he stormed in saying that he wanted to borrow quite a big sum of money and that he had not the slightest intention of providing any security. Mr Shutt replied: ‘Calm yourself, Mr Charles. Of course I don’t need security.’ Banking seems to have changed a bit since those days, and