Wartime Farm - Page 5

Yes HFC they did indeed harrow the field, with horses, a couple of Percheron's, apparently there were lots of them around, well we had Cleveland's and Clydesdale's.
The cooler also had filters which were put in fresh each milking and we had to empty the machine churn into the filter so we could milk the next cow there was not one for each cow as they have today.
I watched them milking now with those raised stalls to make it easy for slipping the suckers on and think, well we got cow muck on our trousers they will get it head to foot from a great height.
They are getting a lot of marginal things into the programme and not concentrating on the gut busting hard work that went into every day farming, as we walked up to bring the cows down in summer we knew they all had to be milked and back in the fields before we had breakfast, plus of course hosing everything down and cleaning churns cooler and the milking harness, that was just the start to the day.

Frank.

The piece she did on the soapwort was surprising because she even said that it would have been very unusual for anyone to have used it - why include it then? I suppose they have a lot to fit in to a very short programme. I have loved all the 'Farm' series' but I guess people aren't around from the earlier ones so can't critique it so harsly. But having shot a hole in my own argument they could have asked people who still are. Damn!

Hi Muvs - there are just a few of us oldies round here who can remember quite a bit about how things used to be "once upon a time".  What the programme makers clearly haven't taken into account - for this series, as well as the previous ones - is that there are some practices which would have been much the same over several generations, as regards farming methods and livestock handling in general. So, they could have checked --  e.g.  by asking for some input via today's farming press - whose readers are likely to know about these things or would know someone who does.

My own Pa eventually had three farms each with a dairy herd - and had a retail milk business which began with twice-daily deliveries using a pony & float (milk ladled from a churn into the customers' own milk jugs), and went on to have a bottling plant on the middle farm which supplied milk to most of the local town.  The cattle were fed with our own home-grown cereals, hay, kale, mangolds, beet etc and we ground the cereals into meal ourselves.  Before the l950s sileage was a relatively new-fangled concept in the part of the country where we lived - and the stuff they fed to the cattle in last night's programme didn't look as if it was the product of what they'd sileaged in an earlier programme!  more like modern-day "haylage" to me.............. and as for that "cattle trough" they put it in.......well................   I was surprised that although they had the usual Alfa Laval milking machine, they didn't have that same company's little cup gadget which we used for checking for mastitis - looked like a half-pint mug which had a flat inset black "lid" with a hole on one edge.  Any mastitis-affected milk showed up clearly on the black surface & you tilted the cup slightly to let the milk drain down into the cup itself before testing the next teat.

Although some of our land was rather clayey, we did use horses for lots of the general farm work - including some ploughing, especially on the land where we grew new potatoes, as this was where the soil was much lighter.  The three farms meant that at one time Pa had over twenty men working for him - some of the older ones were those who looked after the horses, and others took care of the cattle.  A few years ago I was sad to say goodbye to the table which used to be in what we called "the bottom kitchen" - a big room which wasn't used much except for things like harvest suppers.  The table - when it had its extra pairs of legs & extra leaves put in - would seat 28.  One of my earliest memories is of being just about tall enough to see what was actually on the table for one of those occasions!

Am enjoying it. OH's Father was a farmer in Welsh/Shropshire borders during the war & it's a shame that he'd retired when OH was born, but OH still remembers some things that he talked about.

Grew up myself in a farming community, so the dairy scenes very nostalgic. Have memories of helping a friends' Mum in their dairy & then, when we were old enough to be trusted, doing it ourselves. J.

I watched Wartime Farm last night and was very interested in the Field Marshall tractor.They were manufactured at Marshall Britannia Works at Gainsborough Lincolnshire. The factory has been gone a number of years, like most of the heavy industry, but the actual buildings have been turned in to a shopping centre. They have incorporated a lot of the actual work space into the shops and some of the equipment has been left as a feature. It has been done quite sympathetically, and if you are in the area it is worth a look.

One more thing, I looked on several websites and saw that in fact the Field Marshall wasn't in production until 1945 as most of the company's output was geared towards the war effort.( at least that is how I understand it) I'm sure someone will know.

Would the milking cow that had to be culled due to her udders being damaged have gone into the food chain? There were a few questions left unanswered.

ChrisX

Yes, I noticed the Field Marshall (series 1) was a post-war modal....I posted earlier in this thread about the shotgun cartridge starter. The rabbits were hardly table meat breeds either......these would have been something like Flemish Giants, with a killing out weight of about 15lbs.

Having said that, I found it to be the most informative episode yet and I certainly got a feeling of the times.

Chris, the cow would not have gone into the human food chain although her bones would have been used in glue or ground up for fertiliser.
David 99% of the rabbits we ate were wild although saying that we did have a hutch of tame rabbits until the pigs ate them.
Welly Hill Farm had two warrens swarming with rabbits, Billy and I would go up with a shot gun I had a .22 and would get some for the pot, or slip the Ferret into a hole and net what we thought the exits not always right.
Dad had a heavy catapult and could bring down more rabbits with that than we could with the guns,
I would sit there with former pliers and a tub of molten lead, pour lead in the hole and quench in cold water file off the tail and one perfectly round shot for the catapult, he would come back with a couple of pairs hanging on the back of the cab, he said all the fleas dropped off on the way home. He could sell what we did not want, there was always a sale for meat.
The butchers with rabbits hung them outside with the skins on as the house wives would not buy them otherwise, we always said a cat with its skin off looks just like a rabbit.
It was war time after all.

Frank.

What was the problem with the cow, other than what looked like damaged udder ligaments?  If it was merely that, and not an infectious illness, I'd have thought that the slaughterhouse would have passed the carcase as suitable for human consumption - in the same way that they would have done if she'd broken a leg.

She was old HCF, they would recover fat bones and skin, a lot of fats went into soap along with Soda ash to make those huge solid blocks of Sunlight.
That is what I understood happened to old cattle, Probably why Uncle Arthur would not part with favourite old cows, they would go into a well padded byre stall as foster mothers.
It was the young male calves I always felt sorry for they had a very short life.

Frank.

nice to read the article on harrowing and the use of horses after seed were sown.as was stated first job was bringing cows in for milking.six am , milking machine was a manus and had a glass funnel connected from teat cup/liner this allowed you to see milk flowing as soon as the cluster was fitted.it was important that the four quarters were dry otherwise mastitis would affect the bag. milk had to be carried to the dairy and milk tipped into tank above a cooler which had filters to clean milk before running down cooler into milk kit or churn depending on which part of the country you farmed. dico 

like you chris x,the field marshal brought back memories. a contractor who served the area did the threshing , one of three and the were kept very busy. the rig could be heard long before you could see it as it travelled along  the country lanes towing thresher baler and fuel bowser. neighbouring farms would send men to help with the threshing,of course they would have to be fed.we would sit down to a large hotpot followed by a steamed pudding in most cases it would be a dozen men .the contractor would then move to a neighbour then it would all start again.

A preview of this week's episode (5 0f 8):

"The Wartime Farm team tackles the conditions faced by British farmers in 1942, when Hitler's U-boats continued to bombard British ships, slashing imports and inflicting massive shortages on the country.

Ruth finds out how Britain coped with shortages of the wood vital for the war effort in the building aircraft, ships and rifles, as well as pit props for crucial coal mining. With her daughter Eve, she travels to the New Forest and discovers how women known as 'Lumber Jills' were drafted in to fell trees in the Women's Timber Corps.  Meanwhile, Peter and Alex face up to the wartime petrol crisis. Peter embarks on an ambitious plan to convert a 1930's ambulance to run on coal gas. Alex experiences the conditions faced by the Bevin Boys - conscripts who were sent to coal mines instead of the armed forces because the need for coal was so great. Peter having converted the ambulance and collected the coal to run it, the question is will it work?

Also this episode, the boys revert to a Victorian solution to the shortage of animal feed - using traditional horsepower to operate a root slicer - whilst Ruth sets up an Emergency Feeding Centre. Subsidized by the government to provide cheap food off ration for air raid victims, these 'British Restaurants', as Churchill dubbed them, quickly caught on. Eating out had traditionally been the preserve of the upper class and most ordinary people had never eaten in public before - many even felt embarrassed at the prospect. The 'British Restaurants', envisaged as a short term response to food shortages, made a lasting change to the nation - introducing the concept of high street dining for the masses."

Root slicers in our neck of the woods had a big handle probably geared but it chopped the turnips easily.
Never saw a Lumber Jill, saw the handle of a cross cut saw though as we cut up wood the hard way.
British Restaurants were a godsend, when I started as an apprentice just before Christmas at a wage of 13/4 (thirteen shillings and four pence) the boss Arthur Brown told us lads we had to walk down to Alma Street and get a dinner in our one hour dinner break and gave us the money, four pence.
We would join the girls from the warehouse across the road and it was around seven minutes walk to St Johns Church Hall. The first time I went in was an eye opener being used to having school dinners I recognised the long tables and forms but the size of it took my breath away. A long counter with what seemed dozens of girl and women serving masses of workers from around the area. Twelve until one was workers only as most of the local firms did not have canteens and there were a lot of local firms on war work.
You would join a queue and in no time would be at the counter picking up a tray and cutlery, then it would be "Pie or Mince" Or Pie or Stew" you did get a choice but the pie would be either the mince or the stew with a crust on top then boiled potato's no time to mash, veg in season it was always fish on Fridays being on the coast had its advantages, and then the second choice, "Rice or steamed and custard" or "Pie and custard or Tapioca" there seemed to be no shortage of rice or tapioca, a pot of tea and you were off to a table. You were never asked what veg as it was just piled on and someone around would eat what you did not want, no problem with me I ate the lot. The noise was terrific as plates and cutlery rattled people talked music was played over the speaker system and it was all go, as fast as you cleared a plate the girls hovering whipped it away and then you were ushered out to let the next lot sit down. After the workers went then the public would be let in and although many closed some of those restaurants were still in business until the 1960's the one in the centre of Middlesbrough being one of them.
We handed over our fourpence being lads and the girls got to know us filling our plates, the men and women workers paid sixpence it was subsidised probably by the firms with no canteens. The food was plentifull and good and yes boiled onions or leeks were often served in winter although we did have plenty of cabbages and unlike today where the choice seems to be "white, Savoy, Red" we had a range of them and what we called winter greens so sprouts would figure a lot.
We had onions at home in the dark days of winter and Mother gave me strict instructions on cooking them. Peel skin off leaving top and tail, put in pan with water to cover bring to the boil leave a minute or so and empty out water, repeat this, now do it again but let onions simmer until soft, with a little bit of farmhouse butter they were delicious. Leeks went into puddings that were steamed or braised in stock, Dad would cut the head off a cabbage leaving the stalk and cut a cross on the top, that would grow our spring greens, same with sprouts.
We killed our own pigs on site and I never ever saw a policeman in attendance. We killed two a year and gave two to the Government, the pig club did the same. We had one local Bobby and a Sergeant would cycle in from Stockton a couple of times a week, they would both come and visit, a cup of tea some of mothers cake (we had butter and eggs so always had sugar from trading) and then leave with a bit of bacon in the pocket. That is how things were done in wartime and it seemed to run smoothly enough.
Norton was one big Market Garden serving the Towns around and I did see those big diggers they showed last night.

Frank

Sorry David, the gloves are off, there was either a massive North South divide in farming or else they are picking out the very odd happenings which probably did take place but not general events.
Straw Houses? the story went the two lads gave up their room for the rat catcher. They then built a straw house (I was expecting the three little pigs and the wolf at anytime) supposedly for two, roofing it with nettles after telling us straw was so plentiful it was almost a waste product!! so thatch with straw then.
They then moved in one narrow bed a table and chair complete with a naked flame lamp?? In a straw house? Those two either had strange sleeping habits or one found out the rat catcher was a woman and moved back, lusty lads those farmers.
We never poisoned rats where livestock abounded for obvious reason, we trapped them. On a Saturday afternoon you would see men walking into the Tan yard across the Green with wire cages and Terriers, us kids were barred, but knew that several rats were dropped into a concrete ring and a terrier dropped in then timed as to how long it took to kill the number of rats, big money would be laid and I suppose the men had a good afternoon of sport!! It certainly reduced the rat population.
Kids Camp? we had the usual two weeks potato picking and we went and picked potato's it was not a holiday. We would be picked up at school in open trucks boys and girls driven to a place of work and join with all the locals picking potato's in wire trugs and emptying the trugs into carts that came round as we picked. They would go to the yard be washed and or riddled then dried off for bagging. It was solid hard work and not all were up to it so they would be put to bagging under cover, the one time we were glad to get back to school.
No one has mentioned POW's yet we had them working around the village on all kinds of work from coal bag filling to small holdings, Italians who marched down the road under their own NCO's and a lone British soldier on a bike at the back rifle slung over his shoulder, and they sang, i never heard so much singing, they certainly boosted the choirs in all the local churches on a Sunday Morning.
We knew the Lindy Hop from films but here it was called the Jitter bug and brought initially by the Canadian Airmen stationed all around us RCAF, my mother worked at Goosepool as an electrician the largest of the bases. It became the Jive in my dancing years then changed name and form many times.
As to gingham flour or grain sacks? everything was rationed including animal feed so why did they need to advertise, sacks of all kinds were recycled until they fell apart.

Frank.

Hi Frank - I was wondering what you thought about last night's "offering".  As always you've told it like it REALLY was!   I thought the programme made a mess of trying to involve the children - gathering herbs etc maybe, but certainly not children using  pichforks (we call them pikels)  to rake the cut grass in that graveyard.  Even the "presenter" used one -   aaarrgh! - haven't they ever seen or heard of a wooden hay-rake?   We would set traps for rats too.  After the winter months - when the dairy cows were turned out to grass for the first time - a terrier or two (or sometimes a clonk with a shovel) was the way to get rid of those odd few rats which had managed to overwinter in the shippons.  There was always some hay & stuff which got left in that space in front of the actual stalls - we call it "the byng" - and when that was cleaned out the rats would emerge. I was really cross when they said that rats don't have a bladder.  WRONG.  They do - and they can climb.

They did get it right with Ruth's hairdo, however - my Ma was called Ruth and she had her hair done like that.  I remember those funny hair-clips, which were still in Ma's dressing-table drawer years after the war ended. Yes, they should by this stage have talked about the POWs who worked on farms.  It was mostly Germans who worked for us - the food they brought to work from their camp canteens was really awful, so my Ma and Aunt would give them whatever extra stuff was available from our own kitchen.   I can clearly remember two of them - one was called Walter and the other's name was Hans.  They were probably in their late 30s and - according to my Pa's reminiscences in later years - were thoroughly nice chaps who didn't seem at all "pro Nazi", as were the younger men.  They made toys and little presents for us - I remember one wooden toy which looked like a table tennis bat. Perched on the flat round surface were little carved & painted chickens which  nodded/pecked when you moved the bat in a sort of horizontal/gyratory fashion - the chickens's heads were connected by fine string to a weight beneath the bat.  Walter made a lovely wooden jewellery box for my Aunt - I still have that, and it still has the dedication/inscription  (inc. photo of a rather handsome man in uniform) inside the lid.

Hello Ma, I was prepared to give them the benefit of working from old documents, they are now well off what it was really like. As you said when I saw the pitchforks I nealy yelled, "not for kids" where is H&S when you need it.
Labour shortage? when the farmers wanted some help the word went round like wild fire and the village turned out, grandma's to children would be stooking or raking, the men would be stacking and thatching the ricks we knew the ropes so needed no telling and always the impromptu party after it was done.
Ask people when we won the first land battle and they say Alamein Oct 1942, wrong it was the recapture of Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in late 1940 early 41, all us kids knew about it as troops pushed down from the Sudan and up from what is now Kenya but was East Africa and many of those Italians ended up within a mile of us and working for us quite happily too.
They moved to Canada and we got Germans, I think they were graded from Nazi down and our lot were the lowest risk. They too marched down the road under their own NCO's with the Soldier on his bike bringing up the rear, rifle across his shoulders, they broke off in groups into the market gardens farms and many other jobs, a couple worked in the Blacksmiths on the Green, one married the Daughter and stayed.
My friends Dad had a coal business and he had four Germans for bagging the coal and helping, they came up from the rail staithes at lunch time and ate with the family and me, with mother and dad on war work I spent a lot of time in his home.
We got to see them as normal men and would spend time writing English words for them to say and write, they would wash up after lunch then all go back to work then to camp at the end of day.
When they marched down to church on Sunday's there would be a flock of girls watching, there was a shortage of young fit men in our area. We still hated Germans who were fighting us and thought our Bombing was what they deserved, we had been bombed but those Germans just seemed different.

Frank.

Hi everyone.

I watched the programme this week and wondered why they hadn't got any " German Prisoners" working on the farm. I was told by my mother that my Grandparents had then working for them, and Gran would feed them although as you say Germans were hated, she always used to say they were someones sons and husbands. My Mother never agreed with that sentiments as my Father was in the army fighting them in France.- D-day and was at the liberation of Bergen-Belsen. To this day she still hates Germans and she has just had her 99th birthday.

The pitchforks were not a thing to be handled by todays children,or any other day for that matter, it was a very silly thing for the BBC to allow.

I also wondered why they didn't have a Jack Russell on the farm, they wouldn't have had many rats with one of those about, but I suppose they were trying to incorporate everything that might have happened. I agree Frank, with so much straw why would you get yourself stung, and why didn't they put some form of waterproofing over the roof before they put on the nettles. As my OH said, he wouldn't have like to have spent a night in the straw house. Am I being too picky, or completely missing the point,but I think they have tried to cover too many aspects, and as for the salmon/potato/sauce sandwich, but the children seemed to like it, maybe it tasted better than it looked.

Good to read everyone's views,

ChrisX

Hi Chris - I don't think you're being too picky at all!   As you'll have read, my own comments are usually somewhat derogatory - it annoys me so much when the programme makers say and do things which I know are incorrect, because I think it's utterly wrong to make "historical" programmes with so many errors and then try to pass them off as a factual re-creation.

I thought I'd send off for the booklet which accompanies the series - I have a small collection of books about farming - but found that the Open University/BBC website doesn't seem to work when you try to place your order.  I got no further than being able to entering my postcode - then.....................nothing.   Must admit I wasn't too surprised - just a bit disappointed - as it's yet another let-down, which is what this series has turned out to be for me.  Whilst looking at the website I saw some comments which were along the same or similar lines to Frank's & mine, so I decided to watch the last episode again on i-player to see whether or not I still felt the same. I do! 

Ma. 

As one with a bit of history himself, I'm also finding the content less credible each week too.

The Victorian Farm series was excellent because it was filmed at a farm (Acton Scott) where it was already a working  museum farm, farmed by the owners who had owned the farm during the Victorian era.

Then came The Edwardian Farm series, which was full of errors. Unfortunately this Wartime Farm series has gone downhill since the second episode. 

Chris, My Mother also hated anything German until the day she died, she had seen two wars and had uncles and cousins killed in the first and Nephews killed in the second so for her there was no going back.
The night the Church bells rang which was the warning for invasion she was out of the shelter into the stable and back with two pitchforks and a very determined look on her face, holding the fork she said "let the B####### try landing here" and believe me with her Irish temper she would have chased them, luckily it was a false alarm.
I looked down on those prisoners unaccompanied working away, to me brought up on Sergeants three, Beau geste,  Clive of India, Gunga Din, prisoners were honour bound to escape, this lot seemed content to be away from it all and that puzzled me until much later, we all live and learn.
They have definitely lost their way with this one after starting reasonably well.

Frank.