Memories of the Home Front from people with Stibbington connections

Mr George Wingrove, Wansford

I left school at the age of 14, in the  early days of the war  and helped in my father’s butcher shop until I was called up for Active Service in December, 1943.  I trained as a wireless operator, and as well as postings in England and Northern Ireland, I spent some time in Iraq and Egypt.  In my mind I can still see those magnificent pyramids, although in those days we were a bunch of young lads, and probably didn’t view them with the degree of awe and wonder that we would now.  Queenie Waller, who would later become my wife, lived at Sacrewell and worked there on the farm as a Land Girl during the war.

We had three soldiers billeted on us, and my uncle took in two evacuees.  Food rationing meant that the customers in our shop were restricted to eight pennyworth of meat and two ounces of corned beef every week.  This wasn’t too much of a hardship because most of the people kept a pig and would bring it to us for killing and salting.  We also grew our own fruit and vegetables.  The only problem as far as I was concerned was the shortage of sugar, and having to use saccharin instead. The foods I remember best from that time were bread and dripping, suet apple pudding, spotted dick, and, my favourite, breast of lamb with Yorkshire pudding.