Great Gale of 1953, and the 6 year old me.
The great Gale of 1953, and the 6 year old me.
I wish I could conjure up the name of the book my mother was reading to us, that afternoon of 31st January 1952. I can feel the slightly rough paper, surely black and white illustrations, the linen feel hard book covers that you could scratch so satisfyingly. But I can’t. Which was unusual as being read to was one of the best childhood memories. It also became the most memorable day of my short life.
Sitting in our caravan near the main farmhouse at Glensaugh Farm, near Fettercairn was myself, aged six, sister aged 8 ish and my mother between us. She was wearing a brown check skirt, we were sitting on the cushion covers she had made from ex-Gordon Highlander kilts, the material rough and itchy, bought now doubt from the army surplus store in Aberdeen. We were squashed very close together on a bench next to the window, and visible was the main farmhouse. A mere 50 yards away. On and on she read, seemingly to me almost oblivious to the unfolding devastation outside, the wind of such high frequency that even today I can summon up the shrill wind.
I know she acknowledged the crashing around us. Once she repeated a page twice. The caravan felt, and no doubt was, very flimsy. We could feel the tremors and shuddering of our little home. Occasionally she paused momentarily. But as befitting a woman who had held a pilots licence in wartime, many years later describing how she once climbed higher and higher to escape a dog fight beneath her, and who had cycled to work wending her way through incendiary devices, she just kept reading.
The trees were falling randomly all around us. Piling up, splintering branches everywhere, and on she read. This was 70 years ago, so we didn’t question her, apart from glancing outside in awe and catching her eye. Occasionally, she gave us a reassuring hug.
Suddenly the door flew open, and there was my father and another man, rushing back from in eventually realised was saving sheep. There as a lull in the storm and they grabbed us, carrying me as they staggered over the fallen trees, and within minutes we had reached then safe haven of the stone farmhouse.
Small incidents punctuated the following days. The views from the farmhouse of miles of trees untidily lying around like giant scruffy Jenga, a timber mesh thrown together by giants. The surrounding ground, our play area, wasn’t flat any more. It was raised as high as myself. Our caravan, astonishingly unscathed, sitting amid this tangle of vegetation. My father summoning dormant sporting skills by accurately lobbing dog bones over and into the fenced dog run, the kennels for the dogs mercifully unscathed but marooned. The solid fuel stove within which was baked aromatic cakes, and our neighbour laughing as they didn’t rise, but extolling us to tuck in as ‘the goodness is in them’. A now, never to be forgotten family ode to a failed flat sponge cake.
Months later we moved over to Deeside, and one drive to our abode had been cleared, but was now edged by high walls of disorderly timber. It was wonderfully scented and we would often stop and sniff, my sister and I on our way to school, as to which was the most fragrant. The waft of resin masked the raw onion sandwiches of the squads of Irish foresters who battled in what I now realise was back breaking and hazardous work, armed with two men hand saws and very little else. How we loved their accents, their cheery greetings, and their occasional singing which we could hear some distance off, because of course no raucous noise of any labour saving machinery. A mere couple of generations ago!
Ann Lindsay