Shaped by War

As I tried to learn a little about my father and my father’s background I came to understand it must have been a somewhat hard upbringing. Yes, there had been the war, and his parents had been through it. However, as I understood it, New Zealand was never a ‘war zone’. Most of the country was involved in ‘supplying’ the mother country (England) with soldiers, sailors and air men, not to forget, factory manufacturing and of course food supplies. The Allies used the country as a base on occasion, but the Second World War was never actually fought on New Zealand shores (Unlike my mothers childhood and suffering in England). There were internment camps (Matiu / Somes Island in Wellington Harbour) where Italians, Germans and Japanese were held during the war, and a serious incident at Featherston Prisoner of War camp (North East of the Capital City Wellington), which through cultural and language problems had resulted in the death of 31 prisoners (with a further 17 dying of their injuries later) and over 74 injured, on 25^th of February 1943.

However, although New Zealand was somewhat isolated from much of the ‘horror’ of the war, it was definitely affected by it. There was the tragic loss of life in all the various ‘theatres’ of the war (Don’t you think that is a terrible use of the word? I have always associated the word theatre with entertainment, and there can be nothing entertaining about war.) Rationing however, was a major part of the wars impact on the country, and I understood from this, it was obviously a part of the forming of my father’s parents and thus, in turn my father. The saying I often heard about my father’s mother for example (from my mother) was, “She could put half a pound of butter on a slice of bread, and scrape off a pound”. ‘Frugal’, was another word that was thrown about a lot. The idea of going without was a major part of my fathers upbringing, by, what it appears were very staid parents. I spent limited time with them when we were younger, and obviously my mother, and my father’s parents, did not like each other much.

On the few occasions we visited (that I recall, I could count them on one hand), We seldom ever spent longer than a few days at our grandparents (our only grandparents unfortunately due to my mother’s being killed, in a bombing of her house in England). Apart from one period, where our father’s job required a transfer, and we had to stay with them for nearly two weeks (or at least eight days… it just seemed like two weeks) They were not friendly people. They were strict and very reserved. I never saw a lot of emotion from them. So I could imagine this impacting on the development of any child. We had several Uncles and a few others we called Aunts, but I couldn’t tell you who was actually directly in line as a relative.

 (continued tomorrow)