Her new school was not the best. Every weekday morning they would march out two by two all the way to the Ilmington Girl’s School. It was a long walk, especially when the weather was bad. The best mornings were when Olive was her partner. The two girls talked about being life-long friends and that they would help each other find their families when they got away from the home. It made the walk go faster and it was less lonely having a close friend especially when being teased by the other children at this school. Some of the children at the school would call the home kids bad names, but there were enough children from the home so they could take care of themselves. What frustrated Marjorie the most though, was that no one, including her teacher, would believe that she was just ten and not eleven.
A school report from Ilmington Road Girl’s School, which Marjorie attended while at the Middlemore Emigration Home. Note the incorrect age at the top left side, which identified Marjorie as a year older than she was.
University of Liverpool Archives, Special Collections Branch, Fairbridge Archives, Arnison Family Records, D296.E1.
“Your records show that you are eleven, almost twelve, so you belong in this group,” her new teacher told her.
“But, ma’am, I’m not eleven! I am ten!” Marjorie stubbornly stated.
“Enough of this nonsense! Records do not lie but it appears to me that little girls do! To your desk please. Now!” Her teacher pointed to Marjorie’s desk, clearly expecting this to be the end of the conversation.
“But I really am ten.” Marjorie whispered under her breath as she walked to her desk. So much seemed unfair and confusing. Since they were living at the home, other kids treated them differently. A few times Marjorie overheard the girls in her class talking about having sleepovers and parties, but no one from the home was ever invited. She pretended not to care because she knew that children from the home would never be allowed to go even if they received an invitation.
Sundays were definitely the best days at the home in Marjorie’s mind, even if they had to go to church three times that day. Their mum hadn’t made them go to church in Whitley Bay because they didn’t have any Sunday clothes and she told them that she felt too embarrassed to walk into church with barefoot children. But she was proud that she had her children baptized, most of them at St. Paul’s in the heart of Whitley Bay. At the home they went to church first thing in the morning, then Sunday school in the afternoon, and then off to church again in the evening. It was a lot of church going for one day, however, they only had one chore for the whole day and that was to make their beds.
And Sundays were sweet days. Only the kids who had been really bad missed their sweets. After the morning service, they quickly changed to their play clothes, collected their treat, and ran out to the fields where they could play until the midday meal bell, and if the weather was nice they had free play again in the afternoon after church. Marjorie missed the beach though. Playing on the field was not the same as playing on the beach. She missed the sounds and the smell of the ocean.
A photograph of St. Mary’s Church in Selly Oak taken in 2010 and the church with the three sisters, Joyce, Marjorie, and Audrey, in the doorway in 2001. This was the church they attended while at the Middlemore Emigration Home.
Photo by Patricia Skidmore.
Marjorie tried to be good. Pulling her covers over her shoulders, she snuggled down and felt happier than she had in a long while. The home was okay for now, but she would never stop dreaming of finding her way back to her real home.
It was different for Joyce. She looked across the room, shouted goodnight to her younger sisters, and pulled her covers up. Like most of the older girls, she worked in the kitchen during the day and was used to it now, but when she watched the younger ones running out in the field she felt jealous. Joyce did not mind working in the kitchen instead of going to school, but working there now that it was summer break did not seem fair.
Joyce’s thoughts turned to Kenny. She had watched the boys having a race in the afternoon. Kenny was one of the fastest runners and definitely the fastest for his age. She was happy to see Marjorie jumping up and down, cheering him on, and wished she could be out there with them. There were only a few times when the boys and girls could play together and the playing fields were the only place they could really talk to each other.
Joyce loved her kitchen window. It was her portal to a bigger world where she could look past the playing fields and watch the horse and the donkey grazing on the far side of the fenced-in field. There were fences even beyond where they kept the animals. Joyce thought it was to keep the kids from running away, but if they were really determined to go, they needed more than these fences. What stopped most of them from going was having nowhere to go once they got beyond the fence. As Joyce peeled vegetables she schemed of ways to get them all back to their mum.
Joyce’s best friend had run away earlier in the summer. She wanted Joyce to go with her, but Joyce told her she had to stay because of her sisters and Kenny. Then her friend called her a chicken, a baby, and other names too, but Joyce stood her ground. As the girls readied for bed, Joyce noticed that her friend’s cot was empty. She casually walked over and lumped up her pillow under the blankets to make it look like she was sleeping, just as she had promised to do. No one said a word as the girls walked past the empty cot. There would be trouble the next day. After the lights went out, one of the girls whispered to Joyce, “Where is she? Did she really run away?” Joyce was too afraid to answer, so she pretended to be asleep.
Cook was everyone’s friend, but she made certain the chores were done on time. “Joyce! Stop yer daydreaming and get that peeler working. The meal will never be ready on time.” That was Cook’s favourite saying, and Joyce grinned to herself. Cook scolded everybody. She was nice though, and never really got mad at anyone.
Joyce could talk to Cook about most things. She asked her about the small groups of children who sometimes marched down the path, with a nurse or a master in the lead. She never saw any of the children return. She always got a funny answer. It was still hard to understand her accent. It sounded like she said Canada or Australia, but Joyce knew that was wrong. There were no places with those names in England. She had seen Canada and Australia on the huge wall map of the world in one of the schoolrooms and those places were clear around the world. The kids would not go there. Maybe they were getting to go home, but then they should have looked happier. The faces of some of these children reminded Joyce of her friend after they found her and brought her back — as if they were afraid about what was coming next.
Her friend had been back for a few days before Joyce had a chance to talk to her. “Where have you been? How far did you get? Why haven’t you been in our dorm at night?” Joyce’s questions came tumbling out. She admired her friend and wished she had some of her courage. Her friend’s troubled eyes glanced at Joyce and she walked away. Later that day, when Joyce tried to talk to her again, all she got was an angry retort: “Stop pestering me! Leave me alone! I hate you all!” Her friend’s words stunned her.
She pulled her covers up over her shoulders and closed her eyes. Would it have been any different if she had run away with her? Would they still be friends now? Friends were important here and losing one was hard.
The summer of 1937 moved along. The children in the home were kept busy with their daily chores. Marjorie looked forward to Sundays because of the little bit of freedom it afforded her, and she took the