It’s In The Bag

It is, perhaps, a bit of a cruel title but facts are facts.  Sometimes we don’t like facts, this is when a little white lie comes in handy.

You will observe that I referred to a little ‘white’ lie as opposed to... what?  ‘White’ lies are OK but any other hue is, apparently, not.

Something like ‘red’ letter days and hitting a ‘purple’ patch are all good things but ‘black’ anything is not. ‘Black’ Friday, for example. Dad was born on a Friday the thirteenth in 1922.  He regarded any Friday the thirteenth as a ‘Lucky Day’.

I regard it, as I do any date, as ‘a day’.

The colour of any particular day, philosophy, metaphor, maxim, what-have-you, is entirely irrelevant to me because I am colour blind.  This is not a disease – although you could, reasonably, say that I could allow myself to be dis-eased by it!  One of the advantages of being colour-blind, for me, is that my wife likes to say that I have yet to realise that she is black.

Of course, I am not ‘shade’ blind.

Mum was blinded by her perceptions of her origins.  Perhaps I should explain that.

In 1916 a gentleman walking his dog in a London park, the park was called Barnes Common, heard noises emanating from a paper bag.  He examined the contents and discovered that the bag contained a baby.

In those days, during the First World War, abandoned babies were not uncommon.  This particular park was then a place where people ‘of quality’ might stroll; nowadays it is a place where junkies and muggers disport themselves.

The gentleman took the bag, plus baby, to the police station at Marylebone (pron: Marlybone, for those unfamiliar with London).  From thence she was checked by a certain Nurse Houghton and whisked off to the orphanage at Richmond on the banks of the River Thames, near Kew.

For eight years, Mum lived in the orphanage.  It was tough in there, there were no perks or frills unless you count being awarded the crackling from Matron’s Sunday pork joint for being especially good as a ‘perk’.

One of the senior girls used to take delight in trying to drown Mum in the bath when it was her turn to wash the junior girls.

All the girls had jobs to do – and woe betide them if there was any shirking!

Nurse Houghton was tasked, from time to time, to check the girls’ health.  There was a photograph, at one time, of baby Mum being held by Nurse Houghton but a search of old newspapers in the British Library archives in North London turned nothing up and Mum’s old copy could not be found.

I would like you to close your eyes and imagine, if you will, that the first eight years of your life were in an all-girl environment governed by strict discipline.  There was very little light shining into their lives.  I have told, already, the story of the singing so I shall not repeat it here.

Their only contact with the outside world was a controlled walk in the park – Richmond had, and still does, a large deer park, and the ‘choosing’ day.

At pre-determined intervals people would come to the orphanage and choose a girl to take home with them.  There appeared to be very little control or legislation about this and the reason is very simple.

Towards the top of this ‘Blog’ I mentioned that discarded babies were quite de rigueur* at that time.

[*‘de rigueur’ = Required by the current fashion or custom; socially obligatory. From French: de, of + rigueur, rigor, strictness.  Just saying.]

Why should this be?  Well, there a couple of reasons that spring immediately to mind.

Firstly, World War One was raging on the Continent.  The Generals of both sides were busy organizing a war of attrition that was denuding several Nations of their men folk.  This means that there were lots of women ‘at home’ – some of whom were ‘with child’, as it were.

Young ladies with no means of support – and that means ‘no husband’ were at the mercy of the elements.  “Get out and never darken our doors again” would be quite a common instruction.  It would be far better, if her boyfriend had been terminated for the war effort, that she go ‘on holiday’ to some fictitious relative, give birth and heave the baby over a hedge somewhere dark and, preferably, remote.

Secondly, women were second-class citizens by a very long chalk.  Tendrils of this mindset still linger on in many backward places – like Newcastle, for example.  If a young girl were to actually get a job it would, very often, be ‘in service’ to some member of the gentry or a rich businessman. 

Members of the aristocracy and rich businessmen alike were not above a bit of ‘messing around with the help’.

When ‘the help’ started to become plump they would be offered a choice, “You can keep the job or you can keep the baby!”

Now what?  Keep the baby?  Where to go?  How to support yourself and the child?  There was always the ‘Workhouse’, of course but, well, hell...  A place for the homeless and destitute that was little better than death; the last one hung around until about 1948 with the abolition of the ‘Poor Law’.  Of course, they changed the name a few times.  As they do!

Alternative?  Find a dark and secluded spot, a paper bag...

Orphanages were expensive to run and were funded by public donation; possibly as a result of guilt complexes from the rich and famous.  Naturally disposing of as many children as possible to caring foster parent can only be a good thing.  Background checks were minimal and the foster parents were paid a small stipend to cover essential costs.

We will look at Mum’s progress in that direction later.

As a result of my Mother’s beginnings she was convinced that nobody, ever, wanted her.  She was abandoned at birth and therefore had no value.  This thought continued with her until her death in 2010, almost exactly 95 years after she was found.

I, on the other hand, am convinced that my, unknown, Grandfather was a person of note – very likely Royalty.  You will observe that I do have, not only aristocratic features, but also a noble, if not Royal, mien.

What does this have to do with writing?  Not much except that, very often truth is stranger than fiction.  Whatever story you try to make up somebody, somewhere, will have something to top it and it will be, moreover, fact.

You don’t think I’m Royalty?  You disprove it.

I’m happy to know that Kate just married into MY family.