The Niespulver Shell
A bizarre episode took place at the battle of Neuve Chapelle in October 1914, it was in fact the first ‘gas’ attack of the war, but not the deadly ‘mustard’…
The Bentley Boys
The Bentley Boys were a group of gentlemen racers who drove Bentley sports cars to victory in the 1920s. In 1925, as the marque foundered, Bentley Boy Woolf Barnato bought…
The Telephone
The telephone in the thirties was a new invention. Mr. R. Cunningham recalls his childhood in Glasgow and his parents installing their new communication device. “In the early thirties a…
Going to the Commodore in Hammersmith
Denis Thompson remembers his childhood and the enjoyment he got from the variety of entertainment offered at the Cinema in the Thirties. “During the thirties the cinema really came into…
Pumping the Church Organ
Jessie Lintern was the daughter of a United Free Church minister in Scotland, in the 1930’s she was bought up to go to church and her brother was given an…
A Second Hand Morris Cowley
Hazel Rolf recalls her experience growing up when her father purchased a used Morris Cowley in 1931 “Dad bought a second hand Morris Cowley car for thirty pounds and we…
Air Raid Warning
Peggy Vanderkar was studying at Chelsea College of Physical Education when the Second World War was started. I was at 111, the Solkhorn family home, when war was declared on…
The Working Class Tea
For the Edwardian working-class meals were very different to their rich counterparts. J. Rey in ‘The Whole Art of Dinning’ published in 1914, enlightens us: The Working Class Tea “The…
The Traction Engine
One of my favourite books is ‘Before the lamps went out,’ by Esme Wingfield-Stratford, his account of growing up in Edwardian England. Here he recalls the advent of the Traction…
Night Flying
In his book ‘Tiger moths to Typhoons’ F/Lt Peter Watson lets us into the world of the Second World War night flying school. “There were one or two consolations about…