Our attic was a ghoulish place. We children always begged to go along whenever Mum headed up to the storeroom. If it was a rainy day, perhaps we could persuade her to stay and help us explore a while.
The adventure started on the upstairs landing where the attic stairs were hidden behind a door in the black oak panelling. Gingerly, we lifted the door latch and climbed the steep dark staircase which was completely built of black oak. Since no carpet covered the stair treads as they curved upwards, our footsteps created an eerie echoing clunk, clunk. The only illumination came from a single light bulb which dangled from the ceiling on the landing above.
Immediately to the left at the top of the stairs on the large ‘landing’ were two large glass cases of stuffed birds. The pheasants with their gorgeous plumage and beady glass eyes stared down on at me malevolently as I shrank past as quickly as possible. The little partridge tried to peck the glass floor, frozen for ever in a hopeless search for seeds. My brother laughed at my fears. “They are only dead birds,” he said. But I still feared and hated them. Did they blame me that their destiny was to stand petrified in a glass case in our attic? Someone must have loved them so much a long time ago.
Beyond lay the big leather cabin trunk which my Dad once told me had been all the way to India and back. I knew he meant the same India as that named on our penny where it said ‘George VI Rex, Emperor of India’. It was a very long way away. When people retired from service with the Indian Army they always seemed to have browny yellow skins and carved elephants for doorstops. This cabin trunk was fastened with leather straps and buckles far too strong for my small fingers to release. But if only Mum could be persuaded to open it, what a treasure-trove lay beneath that domed lid.
Two men’s masquerade costumes lay on top. My favourite was the Mad Hatter’s Suit from Alice in Wonderland. The big black bowler hat, with the legend “IN THIS HAT 10/6” blazoned across the front, fell to my shoulders when my brother dropped it over my head. ‘10/6’ is the way we wrote ‘ten shillings and sixpence’ in the days when twelve pennies made one shilling and twenty shillings made one pound.
The brown Tobacco Man suit was not half so impressive and it was made for quite a tall and large person. Beneath lay several flapper dresses all fringes and beads in black, white and beige. The nineteen twenties styles looked very strange and somehow not quite respectable at the end of the thirties!
We lifted out the top tray together to reveal all my Uncle James’ Royal Navy Dress uniforms. How uncomfortable the harsh bleached calico material looked. It was strange to think that I would never see Uncle Jamie for he had died many years before I was born. He was the James Yates whose name I listened for at the end of the long list of men from Wenlock killed in the Great War when their names were read in church every November 11, Armistice Day. Jamie’s ship had been sunk in the North Atlantic. Jamie had survived and was sent home suffering from tuberculosis. He died a few weeks later of the pleurisy he developed during the long and gruelling train ride from Dover.
Below the uniforms lay a beautiful tapestry blanket all red and gold. Every attic visit I begged to wrap this blanket around myself just for a minute and longed to have it over my bed! Eventually I was allowed to claim it as my bedspread and it remained my favourite through all our moves and changes, something constant and beautiful and never changing. I never learned its source and knowledge of previous owners was limited to those created in my imagination and dreams.
The smaller bedroom held apple storage racks. Each apple lay wrapped in its own newspaper blanket. Now, in late spring, very few were left. Many of them had begun to rot and all had developed a wrinkly skin. Carefully we helped Mum to check each one picking out those with brown patches to be used for today’s apple pie. The good ones were re-wrapped and left for next time.
Although the wrinkles made the apples harder to peel they still made good apple sauce or apple pie and supplied our needs right through to the fresh fruit season in June.
Half hidden behind the Apple racks was a barrel style butter churn. Each of us took turns at the handle as Mum told how, when she was a little girl, she would run fast home from school on Wednesday lunch time in case the butter had not ‘come’. If so, the children had to take turns to keep the churn going while Grandma made them a quick sandwich for lunch. Grandma made very good butter.
Mum told us that on Thursdays Grandma took the horse and trap to market to sell her butter and eggs. Granddad loved spirited Morgan horses, real high steppers. Grandma was always rather nervous driving them and Granddad teased her all through breakfast each market day. So on Thursday mornings it was best for Mum and her sisters and brother to be as quiet and well behaved as possible.
Beyond the butter churn was a large bath with claw feet and a geyser to heat the water fastened to the wall above. Beneath the geyser was a small space to insert the spill to light the gas flame whenever hot water was required. I had never been in this bath. A new bathroom had been built on the floor below in the ‘Story’, our name for the small room off the upstairs Drawing Room.
When I was finally promoted from my cot in Mum and Dad’s room to sharing a bed with my sister, this attic room was turned into a bedroom for my older brother. The apple racks were moved to the landing, I’m not sure what happened to the bath. I thought Bryan was very brave to sleep up there in the attic with the birds in their glass cases standing outside his door watching him all night long!
The second bedroom had a black cast iron bedstead with a marble topped washstand, a chest of drawers and a rag rug beside the bed. This had been the maid’s room. However, Mary, our current maid, lived out and the rest of the room was filled with all the flotsam of a hundred and twenty years. Here were things that, in 1939, only inhabited the pictures in our Nursery Rhyme Book.
In one corner stood an old-fashioned ‘Hip’ bath with a high back. It was brown on the outside and had been cream on the inside. After a careful check for spiders and daddy longlegs we would all climb (or be lifted) inside to play ‘The Owl and Pussy Cat went to sea in a beautiful pea green boat” or “Rub a Dub Dub, three men in a tub”.
Alongside the bath was a spinning wheel just like the one given the miller’s daughter when Rumpelstiltskin helped her spin the straw into gold. The small potter’s wheel was an enigma. It consisted of two flat wooden wheels which were connected with a drive belt around their circumference. The smaller wheel had an upright ‘handle’ protruding from its surface which was about ten centimetres high. We could never figure how a person could use the handle to turn the wheel and shape the pot at the same time! Thinking back I believe that there must have been some sort of treadle attachment which was probably lying about unnoticed. Alternatively it is possible that a small child was employed to turn the handle at whatever speed was required!
An old wireless or gramophone with a big trumpet shaped speaker as tall as me stood on the marble washstand. What fun it was to put our faces in and talk to the others in a voice that sounded more like that of a giant than our own. We had to climb on a rickety old chair and be very careful not to move the wireless for squeezed alongside was the usual washstand kit, a large china bowl, a matching water jug and a soap dish. These were covered in a floral pattern and of course there was a chamber pot to match in the cupboard beneath.
In later years, I was so surprised to find a picture of a similar wireless or gramophone being used as the company logo for records made by HMV!
The far corner was stacked with old stone preserving jars just like the ones used by Mum to store a year’s supply of lard when the pig was killed or to preserve eggs in ‘Waterglass’ or salt down kidney beans for winter. ‘Waterglass’ was purchased at the Hardware store. The packet of white powder was mixed with water and stirred well. This mixture preserved the eggs for up to a year. In spring, when eggs were cheap and plentiful, several dozen were carefully spooned into the liquid one layer each day or two. Later in the year they were used to make cakes or scrambled eggs. This meant that more of our eggs could be sold when they would fetch a better price.
Each large pot was shaped rather like a plant pot, slightly flared at the top. They stood about thirty-five Centimeters high and were about thirty centimetres diameter at the top and about twenty centimetres at the base. There were a few smaller straight sided ones and several boxes of empty jam jars and kilner jars.
Beyond the stone jars dismantled cast iron beds were propped against the wall along with some rickety old chairs with broken straw seats. We often wondered who was actually sitting on them when the straw weaving gave way and were very careful to sit lightly whenever we were directed to such a chair when out visiting!
One wall had a wide low door which was securely latched. Through its planks came the groans, grunts and gurgles of an imprisoned dragon. Would he snatch and eat us if we lifted the latch and peeked in? Mum might laugh and declare it was only the water cistern but we knew better!
A rough black oak chest with triangular legs held only musty old blankets and feather pillows smelling of moth balls. Its lid was piled with pretty round hat boxes now empty and forlorn, their richly patterned exteriors shrouded in dust so old and hard that even spring-cleaning could not bring back their full beauty.
The door to the small storeroom lay between the Bird cases and the trunk. Since only a small amount of daylight entered through the tiny dusty window, it was necessary to switch on the light. This consisted of yet another naked bulb swinging from the centre of the ceiling. As in the bedrooms and on the landing this light-bulb was always accompanied by the ubiquitous fly paper with the usual scattering of petrified and broken flies.
Fly papers were about thirty inches long and two inches wide and were purchased rolled up into a small canister. Each side was covered with an extremely sticky substance which seemed to retain its stickiness for months. The scent attracted the flies and there they stuck! How glad I was that they swung way above my head especially when I heard a muffled curse if some tall person caught it on their hair!
Boxes of soap, candles, toilet paper and matches attracted Mum’s attention. We bought many such household needs in bulk from the Bibby salesman. Bibby’s had a big factory in Liverpool. They supplied much of our animal food and produced the famous Fairy Soap.
Meanwhile I was busy at my favourite wooden box. It was half full of rows of small brown tuppenny cream jugs packed in sawdust. Each carried the legend, “ Dairy Supply Co. London” on their base. I loved the little jugs with their tiny spouts and handles. As I caressed each one Mum told me once again that a long time ago the farm used to fill these jugs with cream and sell them at the door. Now their only use was to hold our gifts of wild flowers.
Mum was hurrying us along by now. Mary would be waiting for a fresh large bar of green Fairy soap or perhaps some Stork margarine. But,if we were really lucky Mum needed to refill the syrup jar! This job was always left till last as a trip to the bathroom for hand washing and face wiping was essential before we touched anything else! Lyle’s syrup is very thick, quite unlike maple or corn syrup. We bought ours in a square tin by the gallon. It was quite dark, almost like molasses. When the jar kept in the kitchen needed refilling Mum had to refill the jar from this large container. It was not unlike pouring emulsion paint. Even though the flow was cut off with an old tin cooking spoon some bits had to be cleaned from around the edge. Small fingers were ideal for this and very enthusiastic! Both fingers and spoon would be very thoroughly sucked clean.We children loved to explore behind the door where there lay a treasure-trove of toys which had belonged to a previous generation of children. Most were damaged or broken but the magic of discovery allowed us to ignore such minor details.
Alas it was time to go, further explorations would have to wait for the next visit. Following each other carefully down the ancient gloomy staircase Mum closed the high latch on the secret world above us until the next exciting expedition aloft was necessary!