Harkness – MacGillivray Stories

Here are three more letters between my parents during World War II: one written by my mother and the reply by my father. Both letters shed light on their relationship. This scenario in particular talks about my unwashed father.

In some of the letters written my mother complains that our father was ‘unwashed’ and ‘unkempt’ when he turned up in Edinburgh. On one occasion he infects the house with ‘bugs’, which have travelled with him from his ‘bug-ridden’ ship in the Holy Loch when he had visited my mother in Edinburgh. All the letters (70-80 letters) and commentaries will be published separately (see the footnote). 

However, I will include three of the letters here that refer to ‘bugs’ as they make up a kind of continuous narrative.

Two odd pages from Chesser Loan September 1943?

“Bugs letter no 1”: written from Ardnadam around September 1943

This letter reports that Sandy is 15 or 16 months old, so it must have been written around August, September 1943. It’s probably September, because he mentions it’s getting darker (8 ‘o’ clock) (p.3).

He mentions he’s coming on Friday and that he went to the pictures and saw “a lousy cowboys and Indians”, and said he should have listened (instead) to the “Air Force Review” on the wireless – I couldn’t find this on the Internet – perhaps he meant: “BBC Forces Programme.”

Page 2:

He talks about having the ‘ship’ “fumigated”:

“We had the ship fumigated and I think all the bugs have died from want of breath – anyway I haven’t seen any since.” 

In other words, this is the first letter that refers to bugs – which end up at Chesser Loan in Edinburgh. In other words, the topic of ‘bugs’ can be found in three of the letters. 

He talks about making a table lamp, and buying carpets; so my mother is probably quite concerned with making the house / maisonette in Edinburgh look nice. 

Page 3:

He talks about Sandy:

“How’s that son of mine – the wee mischief-maker. I think he’s getting worse instead of better. I think the way his going on at the age of fifteen months – or is it sixteen – when he grows up he’ll be a regular lady killer. He has his mother wrapped round his little finger as it is. I can even hear him coming home at three in the morning and his mother getting up to let him in and telling him to come in quietly so as not to wake up his old man an so avoid a scene which will waken up the neighbours.”

He mentions he comes home for a couple of days every fortnight, and says, “I sometimes wonder if it is all worth it.”

The last page seems to be missing?

My comment

My father was somewhat prescient here! About 20 years later, my mother wrote her “1962 Diary”. I have written a novella based on this diary, Rhoda’s 1962 Diary: a Semi-Documentary Novella, which I will later post on: https://macgillivray-culloden.com/ . In this Diary, my mother is doing exactly what my father predicts – waiting up at nights for her son “coming home at three in the morning” (because of some infatuation with a girl). However, on many occasions, my mother also had to sit up late at night waiting for my father to come home!

Sandy’s Photos

He also mentions that Sandy is about 15 or 16 months old, so I will include two photos here from this period.

One is when Sandy is 10 months old. The photo states: “Sandy 10 months, when we lived at Dunoon.” In other words, around April 1943. This adds to the confusion, as I have stated elsewhere that my mother did not live in Dunoon around this time. On the other hand, it seems that the first letter my mother wrote from Edinburgh was dated July 1943. So, it is quite possible my mother did live at 85 Queen Street between June 1942, and July 1943.

The other photo shows Sandy when he was about 18 months old (11 Nov. 1944); at this time, they were living in Edinburgh.

“Bugs letter no 2” from Chesser Loan

This is a letter written by mother to my father. She is pregnant with her second child, and living at 2 Chesser Loan, Edinburgh. Thus, it is late 1943 or early 1944, as Stuart was born 15 March 1944. My father was stationed at Ardnadam Pier, Sandbank, Holy Loch. He was in charge of one or two ships, “Girl Ethel” and “Young John”.  It is certainly different from my mother’s earlier letters. The first sentence sets the tone.

“I received your terrible letter. I very nearly returned it to you to translate it into English.”

This might seem to be a joke, but my mother, unlike my father (in the letters), does not seem to have much of a sense of humour. So the sentence is partly humorous and partly serious. The letter certainly becomes serious in the second paragraph when my mother writes:

“Well Alex, I killed my fifth bug today. I must say it is a rotten feeling after getting our house into perfect order. I blame you entirely. The last time you came home was the second time without changing yourself – not much of a complement to me. You are getting very careless about your appearance. It is not as if you hadn’t got the clean clothes.”

In this context, it seems appropriate to include here a photo of one of the war vessels docked at Ardnadam Pier, Dunoon, Holy Loch, Argyllshire. I don’t have any photos of “Girl Ethel” or “Young John”; my mother had a photo of the Norwegian ‘Shetland Bus’² ship, “Fiskergutten” that was docked at Ardnadam Pier.

My comment

My mother is pretty blunt here. She implies that my father is an illiterate who is too lazy to wash himself. In other words, he is like an unkempt unruly kid!

Laundry, repairing clothes, looking after clothes, polish (page 3)

She carries on writing in the ‘mother mode’, writing about laundry, repairing clothes and looking after clothes. Of course, this was in the days before electric washing machines. The household appliances revolution didn’t arrive in the UK until the 1950s; and this is 1943, when production was mainly focused on war materials. Thus, being a housewife was a full-time unpaid job. Housewives were more like slaves. But my mother was no submissive slave! In fact, I think after a period of time, she also took control of the household finances, which also emerges in the letters in the talk about mortgages, banks and cheque books. However, early in the marriage, she seems to be dependent on my father’s handouts. 

Confinement

My mother must be several months pregnant with my second eldest brother Stuart, as she talks about seeing Dr. King. Stuart was born 15 March 1944, so this letter must have been written some time around autumn 1943. 

Jubilee nurse

My mother mentions a ‘jubilee nurse’. I’m not sure what this is, but in Ireland this was a nurse who:

“… visited households in rural and urban areas bringing her skills, care and compassion to families, (…), long before there was an organised public health service. (…) The Jubilee Nurse was a reassuring sight as she pedalled her bicycle, her blue uniform cape flapping in the wind, on her itinerary of house calls.”³

Castor oil

She also mentions giving baby Sandy castor oil (p. 6). Babies of one year or less sometimes get constipated. Thus, this also suggest that this letter was written around autumn 1943.

Other things mentioned in the letter:

• gloves
• kissing daddy’s picture

Bugs letter no. 3 from Ardnadam

Transcription of my father’s reply

Page 1

“I received your very ‘interesting’ letter with no envelope as requested. I will endeavour to have a good bath in sulphuric acid, have a powder bath in ‘Keatings’, and dry myself off with disinfectant.

But seriously, Darling, I’m very sorry about the bugs, and I hope there won’t be any recurrence of it and that you exterminated them.

I suppose you’re quite sure they are bugs – little brown round things with a lot of legs!
They’ve all been exterminated out of the ship.”

Page 2:

Well darling I quite appreciate the fact that one should keep oneself in a **** clean state and I’m trying to carry out all your instructions. You didn’t send very many collars, but I’m saving a clean one to come home with.

The only redeeming factor about your letter is the postscript at the end. That’s two nasty letters I’ve had. Anymore and I’ll get an annulment.

Well Darling will see you Friday night early.

Yours Always
Alex xxxxx
xxx for Sonny Boy
I’m the only one who goes about with letters in my pocket.

My comment:

Sonny Boy was my eldest brother Sandy who is about 18 months old.

My father is not very perturbed by my mother’s accusations about his ‘uncleanliness’. He treats it as a joke, and promises to carry out her “instructions” and bathe in sulphuric acid. At the end of the letter, he jokingly comments that he will ask for an annulment if he receives any more “nasty” letters!

It was probably no easy matter keeping clean and smart when you were living on an old bug-ridden ex-fishing boat that had been requisitioned by the navy. Washroom and laundry facilities were probably extremely limited. Moreover, this was the days when ‘men were men’. Too much attention to personal care was probably considered effeminate. There were also very few perfumes and cosmetics for men at this time.

Moreover, the suits and uniforms of men were not ‘washed’ but dry-cleaned – this was expensive, and not done frequently. Men didn’t use ‘perfume’ like today’s ‘men’. If anything they wore aftershave. These lotions stung your skin to remind you of the fact that you were a man, and that you weren’t using perfume. There were only one or two products on the market, such as Old Spice. 

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¹ “SWALK: Love Letters from World War 2 written by Alex and Rhoda.” A semi-documentary novella by Hugh Campbell. macgillivray-culloden.com (forthcoming 2023)

² https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shetland_bus

³ https://kildare.ie/ehistory/index.php/jubilee-nurse-the-forgotten-heroine-of-irelands-public-health-service/