What happened to Chilblanes and Whitlowes?

[Mad Dilys]

Inspired by LLL's post about hand warmers my thoughts turned to The Old Days and things I'm glad to have seen the back of.

I thought of the awful chilblanes we suffered as children. Most of my friends had slightly swollen, red itchy patches on their fingers and toes, some had them on their ears and my sister had them from her feet to almost her knees. They became increasingly painful and could dry out and split the skin. Apparently they are caused by exposure to cold and damp. Carpets and central heating seem to have saved the "working classes" from this annual problem.

Whitlowes which were small abcesses on the tip of a finger, usually beside the nail, were horrible looking, undoubtedly very painful and extremely common. My family thankfully missed getting them, I think probably because of our family's strict hand washing routine, which was not universal by any means.

Weekly bath, in a tin tub in the kitchen. Youngest children in first, followed in sequence by the older ones. I was lucky there were only two of us and I was the youngest.

Outside toilet and before bronco toilet paper, (which was a hard, slippery upgrade) we saved the tissue wrapping from loaves of bread or pieces of newspaper cut into useable squares and hung from a loop of string.

Unheated bed rooms in winter, where the frost made beautiful patterns on the windows. We heaped our overcoats onto the bed for extra warmth.

In winter, hands, feet ears and noses were usually cold unless you were sitting in front of a fire and scorching your legs.

We weren't poor, thank God. We were never hungry and my father was a wildfowler so we had adequate meat even though it seldom came from a butcher.

Strangely, people in our area at least shared more and complained less than today. You knew your neighbours well, so popping in and out of neighbouring houses was the norm. Children were watched, protected and disciplined by the community at large so that we had the freedom to play, wander, explore and develop our independence without realising the circle of care that surrounded us. Not everything was bad in those days.

[Horus]

Do you know MD, I could not agree more with what you have written above, apart from the Whitlowes everything you wrote applied to me. The sore legs from our 'Welly' marks during the winter because believe it or not we still wore short trousers in all weathers. The tin bath and outside loo, the hard winters when the water pipes would freeze up and your tap would not work, putting the ashes from the coal fire on paths and pavements to disolve the ice and snow. The Binman who actually came down the path and carried it up to the 'ashcart' as we called it, you always tipped them at Christmas, if not your bin was often thrown down after being emptied. The frozen bedroom windows with ice on the inside it was so cold at times and not forgetting we used round shaped 5 Amp and 15 Amp plugs for electrical appliances (not that you had many) and that red chequered pattern on Granny's legs as she hogged the open fire.

[Grandad]

OMG, blasts from the past MD and Horus.

We too had an outside 'lavvie' with paper as you describe MD. The tin bath that hung on the wall outside the kitchen door came in on Mondays 'washday' so that the lovely warm soapy water from the 'copper' could be used as you describe, for the whole family. My dad was away in the army most of the war so times were hard BUT we never went without adequate food and coal for the fire.
Yes I remember those ice patterns Horus on the INSIDE of bedroom windows. And I certainly wore short trousers all year at least until grammar school at 11 years.
I certainly remember chilblains and the rubbing from the top of wellies. I don't personally remember whitloes but they came to mind so we must have been aware of them.
Floor coverings were just lino (Linoleum) and beds were sheet, blanket, eiderdown, and if necessary coats as you describe H.
But I agree entirely with you MD about the discipline and freedon we had as kids. Even in the war years we would go out scrumping apples, making bows and arrows up the woods, go swimming in the local river, and, dare I say birds nesting.
But still happy memories....

[Horus]

Sledgeing downhill whilst wearing short trousers

[Mad Dilys]

Oh Crikey! You've reminded me of the chapped legs inside the knees, as well as at the top of the wellies.

My Dad was village policeman, so I it never occurred to me to scrump. I went fruit and hop picking with my Mum every year though. Mostly black and white currants and hops, which in those days were picked by hand. I remember the time I had my first hop bin to myself and I got 9d a bushel. That was actually quite a good rate as the price varied according to the size of the actual hops. Those in question were very small, almost round and it took ages to pick a bushel, which had to be entirely free of leaves and other foreign bodies. The long hops filled the bins quickly and raised our spirits though the return was less. I can smell those hop flowers now..............

[Grandad]

Oh yes, and 'hopping'. We used to get extra school holiday in September for the hop picking. I also remember the smell of the hop flowers but, at the bottom of our road we had the Oast and we would go there because a friends' dad worked in there at hopping time.
I remember the overwhelming smell of sulphur used in the drying process to kill any bugs, and those enormous hesian hop sacks into which the dried hops were pressed.
The baskets used in the hop fields MD, were the small ones Bushels? I can't remember the name of the large one at the end of each row but they either held 5 or was it 10 bushels.
And the 'tallyman' would come round to check that you had picked full measure before marking your book with the number to be paid for. I also have recollections of 6p or 9p for a bushel. It seemed endless to fill that basket.
Sandwiches and lemonade (made with lemonade powder) for lunch......

[Kiya]

I must have just past the time of tin baths in front of the fire.

The house where I was born was a new build to my mother & father, a 3 bedroom with inside bathroom thank heavens, sitting room & kitchen but, only 1 coal fire to heat the whole house, geezzz it was cold in winter & remember all the little paraffin heaters my mother used for upstairs, the house stinked with them.

Sometimes it was fun to find the biggest icicle hanging from the windows & the frosted patterns.

Though we had a coal fire I don't remember my mother/father throwing ashes down on the paths but, they did use salt.

When they had a roaring fire going behind it in another room was the tank, sometimes it would over boil & mother would run the hot water tap till it settled & sometimes our chimney would go on fire flames tearing out at the top, that was good old days when anyone passing walking or in a car would stop to tell you the chimney is on fire & my father would dampen the fire.

I don't ever remember having chilblains or any bother with our toppers ( wellies ) but in them days we loved the snow & plenty of it, we would be out for hours just having fun

[Grandad]

You mention burst pipes Horus. We lived in this end of terrace house through the war years. Its cold water supply was by lead pipe. Any leak was repaired with a 'wiped' lead joint.


The house to the left is detached and was a doctors house. Between them and us is a very narrow alley. As kids we would shimmy up quite far up the wall. No fear in those days

[LovelyLadyLux]

The outhouse was down by the barn and we had the same paper squares hung on a wire. I used to suffer terribly from cracked hands as a kid but I was also always outside hand milking goats twice a day, feeding all the livestock, carrying in water and firewood. I had lots of hand knit mittens but they always quickly soaked down and probably made my hands worse. Probably why I have arthritis in my hands now. I slept under mega blankets and recall being cold often but that didn't seem to slow me down much.

We had the bathtub tin and weekly scrubbings on the kitchen floor. My brother, the youngest, always went first followed by me. We were in seventh heaven when my father built a lean to on the back of the house with a toilet. Not a flushing toilet - just a toilet to sit on with a straight drop to the sewage hole. Always seemed to have ice wind blowing up so nobody sat there for too long but it was, at least, nice to sit on a proper toilet vs a board with a hole in it.

All our floors were hardwood and hand washing followed by applying wax and then hours of buffing to keep them shining was always a chore. I never minded using the electric floor polisher we had (can't remember what ever happened to it) as I always did love the shine of the floors once they were polished. I remember when my parents bought a huge wool rug from India for the living room floor. What I remember most is that this rug was gorgeous, predominately WHITE and I was denied the ability to walk on it! Their fear I'd get it dirty was justified but they bought a creamy white rug!

Most of our houses then had minimal insulation and so all the windows were decorated with frost patterns inside and out. I love them all and always thought the patterns beautiful.

Those were the days but I have to say I do appreciate insulation and furnaces of today

[Horus]

Kiya, if you had been wearing shorts and your Wellies were wet inside from being full of snow wilst sledgeing, then you too would have had chapped legs with 'Wellie rings' which were sore as anything around your little legs

Grandad, I know all about 'wiped' lead joints as I actually did one once in our first little terraced house that we bought just after we were married. In the full vigour of youth I decided to renovate the old kitchen and proceeded to install a new (modern) sink unit, so out came the old Berlfast sink (now quite valuable and much sought after) and everything was going well until it came to connecting my new copper pipe to the rising main. It was then I found out it was a lead pipe I had no idea what I was doing, but on the basis of if you dont try you wont get it done, I cut a piece off an old leather apron and cadghed some tallow off a mate after asking a guy how it was done. I jumped in with both feet armed only with my bit of leather, tallow and an old parrafin blowlamp that spluttered quite a lot and the most basic idea of what I should be doing. It took me about 4 hours to hollow out the lead pipe and 'wipe' the new stopcock into place, it was like trying to make a watertight joint with melting butter, it was nightmare. Anyway it never leaked and I reckon it was like that until the water board changed everyone over to plastic pipes and I also found out afterwards that I was supposed to have used a 'mole skin' to wipe the lead joint and not a bit of old leather.

[Mad Dilys]

Oh well done, Horus! My dad always said to run the water for drinking first thing in the morning as it had been lying in the lead pipe all night absorbing the metal. I still do it.

In the 70s our Potterton boiler stopped. I got the plumber out who said that unfortunately Potterton had been taken over and there were no longer parts for it. So I needed a new boiler.

I didn't believe him, as the boiler fired but the pump didn't seem to be working so it was might be worth while to get a new pump. After all it wasn't an integral part of the boiler. I had watched every tradesman very carefully as I am interested in any skill. Anyway I thought, how difficult can this be - off with the old and on with the new........... but the new one turned out to be metric fitting. I hadn't realised that it wasn't just money that had gone down that route

So I went back to the Plumber supplies shop and they introduced me to the glories of compression joints and supplied a part that would do the conversion. I think it cost less than £20 for the pump and new fittings. It took me about 15 minutes to change it over and I was hooked on plumbing.

[Kiya]

Horus Shorts on me , only in summer time

[Grandad]

MD, please stop disclosing us blokes' closely guarded secrets. Plumbing is supposed to be very technical and the other half would not understand Compression joints......one of the best and simplest plumbing inventions, but don't let 'er indoors know.

Something else that came to mind from those early days, Rag and Bone men. We used to have a chap with a horse and cart and he would take anything from a rabbits skin to an old cooker. Recycling is nothing new....

And we haven't mentioned Andersons and Morrisons. We had a Morrison in the front room to the left of the front door in the picture although the front door opened straight into the room, no hallway. Next door had an Anderson in their back garden that we shared until we got the Morrison.

[Horus]

Grandad I assume you are meaning the Andersons and Morrisons air raid shelters and not a supermarket group but thinking about it I can only remember the one at our school and not any local ones, although there must have been something I suppose.

[Grandad]

Sorry H, yes the two differnt styles of domestic air raid shelter. But that led my thoughts to our windows with the criss cross of sticky tape on the glass to reduce the amound of shards if the windows were blown in...

[Mad Dilys]

I remember being tucked up in the Morrison shelter, but had forgotten the name of it until I Googled just now. Neighbours mostly had Anderson shelters which became garden sheds after the war.

Good gracious, it's amazing what I can remember quite clearly and I was only 3 years old when the war ended.

[Grandad]

Good gracious, it's amazing what I can remember quite clearly and I was only 3 years old when the war ended.

Now that is letting the cat out of the bag MD

I was 5 at the START of the war so the following 6 years were through my junior and just into grammar school days. So I probably have more memories but what I do find is that when you reminisce memories come streaming back.

I have got many experiences written down with a plan to write them up but have not got round to it ....yet. I need Horus's way with words, I tend to be very short and sharp with my writings. Too many 'precis' exercises at school I suppose.

[Horus]

My 'way with words' Grandad are usually just described by others as babbling on.

[Kiya]

Morrison's & Anderson's I ask you......what are they & yes I was thinking of supermarkets but it did remind me of years ago when I was so little it was common for fisher folk here to make there front room into a grocer shop.

These were mainly down beside the harbour streets & many of them & they all managed an income out of it.

Did the same happen in your area over the border or was it just a fisher custom ?

[Mad Dilys]

Oh, the cat escaped many years ago - I don't care any more

Please write Grandad, an economical style of writing is as enjoyable to me where I use my imagination to complete the picture, as a style which paints all the picture so to speak. I think your family would love it too.

This thread has caught my interest and I'm going to write my "memoirs" and add sketch to it. I can so completely visualise my early life, the colours, the textures and often the smells.

Just a few weeks ago I drew a sketch of my early memory of watching my mother put out the washing, when I could just see over the back of the couch under the window and see Mum outside in the sunshine. The material under my hands wasn't soft - I know now that it was uncut moquette, I remember the pale blue colour. I don't remember ever seeing that fabric again, unless my Mum was fitting new loose covers. Always in that house the cover was Khaki. She was a great needlewoman so she used Army reject palliasse covers cut and sewn to fit. After rationing ended she used more conventional fabrics and colours of course.

I distinctly remember turning my pram over, more than once. It was a big coach built job, well sprung. So I would rock it forward and back unit I tipped up. On one occasion I wasn't in the harness and my father picked me up and soothed me, he wouldn't let my mother hold me .............. I wonder if he was cross that I hadn't been harnessed? Anyway that is my earliest memory of him. He picked me up and took me into the next room and sat down on the left side of the fireplace to cuddle me.

Sorry I got quite carried away there.