Going to town was a special occasion in our family and the prospect filled us with such excitement, we could hardly eat the ‘tater-ash’ which Mam had cooked in the fireside oven. She had to keep threatening us with, ‘If you don’t eat up your dinner, there’ll be no trip into town or anywhere else.’ We didn’t believe her but we did as we were told and cleaned our plates with rounds of bread. After that, our attention was on the business of getting ready. Washing us lot in cold water was a major operation as Ancoats seemed to rain specks of soot, morning, noon and night.
At two o’clock, the grown-ups gave us the final onceover. Young Danny was dressed in his Whit Friday serge trousers held up by colourful braces, a white shirt with St Michael’s School tie, grey stockings and gleaming black boots. Cissie and I both wore dresses in bright pink taffeta with silk sashes in red, white and blue. For Lizzie, they had chosen a gold satin dress with a matching ribbon in her hair. Young Eddie in his bassinet wore his usual blue.
‘Well, what do you think?’ Mam asked of Dad and Auntie Gladys. ‘Do they pass?’
‘With flying colours,’ replied Auntie Gladys.
‘As beautiful as their mothers,’ Dad gushed. ‘Though a
bit too much of the red, white and blue and not enough of the green.’
‘Away with you and your blarney,’ Mam said, giving him a playful dig in the ribs.
‘You’ll pay for that,’ he laughed. ‘Wait until I get you alone.’
The adults, too, looked smart. Dad wore his best black shoes, blue suit, silk white shirt, a smart green tie and his straw boater tilted at a jaunty angle; he had a watch and chain in his waistcoat pocket, and he carried a silverheaded cane. Like a toff.
The ladies wore their ‘special occasion’ rig-outs which meant large hats and long woollen coats as a change from their workaday shawls.
It was clouding over when we set off and we wondered whether we should’ve taken the large umbrella that Dad had bought at Lewis’s for the Whit walks. We decided to take a chance. Mam pushed the bassinet and Dad carried Cissie high up on his shoulders. The streets leading to town had been blocked off and so there were no trams or horses to worry about. We walked along Oldham Road to New Cross where there was a Salvation Army band with choir singing ‘Rock of Ages’. A woman in the army uniform rattled a tin box at Dad and he put in a few pennies. ‘You never know when you might need the Sally Army,’ he said. In Tib Street Dad bought us paper Union Jacks from a hawker’s barrow. Even baby Eddie had one tied to his pram.
‘I don’t know what my Irish friends at the glassworks would say if they could see me buying flags of England, the country which has oppressed us for the last seven hundred years.’
Hundreds of people streamed towards Piccadilly and as we got nearer, the throngs got thicker. Market Street was a
sight to behold. Bright bunting was festooned from lamppost to lamppost, and banners and flags fluttered from every building; there were flowers and plants everywhere. Office clerks hung from upstairs windows and kids clung to the lampposts. Thousands of people lined the route of the procession and the crowd was six deep on the pavement.They waved their flags and joked with the police. ‘Watch out for pickpockets,’ one copper said.
‘They’ll be wasting their time here,’ Dad replied. ‘For indeed the ladies have no pockets and I have nothing worth stealing except maybe my watch and chain and I’ll break the face of the owner of any hand that tries to take ’em.’
Dad elbowed his way though the mob and pushed us kids to the front to give us a better view. A brass band playing ‘Soldiers of the Queen’ was approaching; we could hear it faintly but not see it. A cheer began and it rippled along the street like a wave until those around us joined in the patriotic chorus. Even the birds in the trees seemed to be whistling it.
. . . when we say we’ve ALWAYS won ,
And when they ask us how it’s done ,
We’ll proudly point to every one Of England’s Soldiers of the Queen!
‘That song was written by Leslie Stuart, organist at the Holy Name Church on Oxford Road,’ Dad told us. ‘Did you know that?’ He was always giving us titbits of information like that. Anyroad, nobody did know that. And I don’t think we cared either.
Then came the shire horses - beautifully decorated with their manes and tails plaited in red, white and blue braid and even their hooves polished black - stamping and snorting, leading the floats at the front of the procession.
And what floats they were! All had as their theme ‘The Queen and her Glorious Empire’. First came the wagons from Sharp Street and Charter Street Ragged Schools with their scholars dressed up as flowers to make up a bouquet for the Queen. Next, the boys from Chetham’s Hospital in their cassocks and flat hats marching smartly in line and carrying and playing full-sized musical instruments. Such excitement everywhere that I couldn’t understand Fergus at the glasshouse saying he wouldn’t join in anything to do with the Queen. He must have been daft, that’s all I can say. There was no end to the boys and men in uniform - the Church Lads brigade, the fire brigade, the police, and the soldiers of the Manchester Regiment. Finally came the Lady Mayoress in an open carriage, waving her hand from side to side as if she was the Queen herself, surrounded by prancing horses and plumed helmets.
‘Where’s the Lord Mayor?’ somebody asked.
‘He’s down in London with the other mayors,’ another answered.
‘Yeah, feeding his face, smoking cigars and drinking whisky at our expense,’ said another.
When the last carriage had passed, Dad moved quickly.
‘Come on, everybody, we’ll make our way to Albert Square to hear the police band.’
He picked up Cissie and forced a way through the dense mob of people. We followed the end of the procession until we reached John Dalton Street. The roar of the people was even louder there. I looked about me and saw young men clinging dangerously to the balconies and railings around the square. Some of them must have been toffs for they were wearing striped blazers and whirled their flat straw hats over their heads. As the parade finally came to a halt, the band played ‘Rule Britannia’ and the vast crowd joined
in. I felt proud to be English even though Dad had told me a hundred times that I was Irish ’cos I had an Irish father and mother. But the music was so stirring, I didn’t feel Irish at all.
At half past three, a bugle call rang out to signal that faces were to turn towards the conductor on a raised platform outside the town hall steps. The band played the opening bars of the National Anthem and at a second bugle call everybody stood to attention and joined in singing ‘God Save the Queen’. Then miracle of miracles, as the band struck up, the sun came out from behind the clouds and shone in all its glory. ‘Queen’s weather!’ everyone said. There were three cheers for the Queen, the men took off their hats and the great crowd sang ‘All People That on Earth Do Dwell’ to the tune of ‘The Old Hundredth’. As it was a Protestant hymn, I knew it was a sin to join in but as everyone else seemed to be singing it, I took the risk of going to hell and let rip.
What a day it had been. Tired but happy, we made our way back to Butler Court where Mam gave us butties spread with dripping, pineapple chunks with custard and a big cake with eleven candles. I blew them out in one go. The day might have ended there but there was more to come.
Lizzie and me sided the table and Mam and Gladys washed the pots. Dad had us mesmerised with his card tricks and his magic. He told us to pick a card and hide it from him and then he told us what it was. He wouldn’t tell us how he did it.
‘You can tell the card from marks on the back,’ I said.
‘Is that so, my little clever madam?’ he answered. He opened a new pack, closed his eyes, and told me to take one card and hide it. He opened his eyes.
‘Jack of diamonds,’ he said immediately.
‘Come on, Dad, tell us how you did it,’ said Danny.
‘Easy,’ he said. ‘Take a look at the rest of the cards.’
We did. The whole pack was Jack of diamonds.
‘That’s cheating, Dad,’ I laughed. ‘You really are daft.’
He pulled a toffee out of Cissie’s ear, a penny from Lizzie’s golden hair, a whistle from Danny’s jersey, and a sixpence from my shoe. At the end we thought he was going to be sick when he started to make lots of gurgling and clucking noises, only to produce a boiled egg from his mouth. We couldn’t stop laughing at his antics.
He’s the best dad who ever lived, I thought.
Then he said, ‘The night is still young. What would you like to do? There’s going to be a big fire on Kersal Moor with lots of fireworks. Let’s go there.’
He was always teasing me, was Dad. He knew I wanted to go to the fair.
‘Aw, Dad,’ I said, ‘stop messing about. Kersal’s miles away and the fair’s just round the corner.’
He laughed. ‘Don’t be serious, Kate. Life’s too short. Since you’re eleven today, your wish is our command.’
As we stepped out of the front door, we could see the bright glow and hear the piped music from the fairground.
‘That’s called a calliope,’ Dad said, ‘and it’s driven by a steam engine.’
We didn’t care what it was driven by as long as we got across there. From the streets around, people - some wearing funny hats and red, white and blue rosettes - streamed towards the light like moths to a candle. The fair was a madhouse of stalls, barrows, sideshows, and merry- go-rounds, and people, people everywhere with the naptha flares throwing a funny, eerie light over their faces. Like everyone else, we jostled our way around, dazed by all that was going on around us. Mam used the pram she was
pushing like a battering ram, forcing a way through the crowd.
‘The first thing we buy,’ Dad said, ‘is hokey-pokeys for everyone. 5
The seven of us must have looked a right sight as we wandered about licking our ice creams and gawping at everything. But I didn’t care what we looked like even when I saw sneaky Eve Ogboddy from my class at St Michael’s School. I felt proud of our little family.
‘Show-off,’ she hissed, as she went by, tossing her head.
We had a go at everything - well, nearly everything. Dad handed each of us threepence and that gave us a lot of things to choose from. And I had the extra money that’d been given to me. Danny spent most of his money on a helter-skelter slide called ‘Slipping the Slip’ and the ghost train, but us girls preferred the horses on the merry-go- round. I had to sit behind Cissie to make sure she didn’t fall off.
‘You look after your little sister, Kate,’ Dad called, looking at me steadily. The adults watched us go round several times, waving and laughing each time we went past. Next we switched to the boat swings, with Lizzie pulling the rope on one side and Cissie and me on the other. The adults spent most of their money trying to win prizes - the Hoop-La, the Roll a Ha’penny - but no one won anything as it seemed impossible to get your ha’penny exactly in the square. Dad had better luck on the darts, winning a kaleidoscope for Danny, a doll for me and a teddy bear for Cissie. When he saw that Lizzie had nothing, he had a shot at the ‘Test Your Strength’ stall by swinging a great big mallet and ringing the bell - which won a big furry dog for her. The only trouble was the effort started off his coughing again.
At half past nine, it was time to go home and it was a
happy little band that made its way along Oldham Road. We reached Bengal Street and as we were about to pass the Shamrock Club, Dad said, ‘How would you two ladies fancy rounding off the day with a glass of stout before we finally turn in?’
Mam and Auntie Gladys did fancy.
‘Take the children home, Kate, and put the kettle on for the cocoa. We’ll be home in half an hour.’
‘Yes, Mam.’
I didn’t mind them going to the Shamrock for a drink, not one bit. They were entitled to their bit of pleasure ’cos they worked so hard during the week. Mam, Dad and Auntie Gladys often went to the ceilidhe there on a Saturday night if Dad wasn’t working, and they always left me in charge. One thing I’d say for them was they didn’t go to the pub every night like some of the rough people of Ancoats. One or two girls from my class at school, like Fanny Butterworth or Florrie Moss, were left hanging around outside the pubs every night with their young snotty-nosed brothers and sisters, hoping to cadge a few coppers when the boozers shut.
I took over Eddie’s bassinet and we walked back to Butler Court. The adults kept their promise and were back in half an hour, though Dad had brought a few bottles back to keep up the celebrations. I noticed, too, the sweet smell of stout on their breath when they came through the door and they were in a happy, laughing mood as they always were after the Shamrock Club. Mam turned up the oil lamps and made us kids a mug of Van Houten cocoa - the best. We never went to bed without first saying night prayers and everyone knelt down in the living room while Dad led us in a decade of the rosary, counting off the prayers on our beads. I was always glad when we got to the Glory Be ’cos it meant we were coming to the end.
Auntie Gladys took Lizzie down to their furnished room in the cellar, and us three Lally kids went to our own bedroom - Danny to his iron bed in the corner, and Cissie and me to our big double bed with the patchwork quilt. Mam and Dad had their room at the front with Eddie in his cot.
Dad came in to give his goodnight hug and tell us one of his many Irish fairy tales - they were usually about fairies, fairy rings, giants, goblins and hunchbacked men but that night the story was about a little girl on her birthday and how she was visited by leprechauns who gave her all kinds of magic presents and magic spells.
‘Time to settle down,’ he said when he’d finished. ‘We’ve had a busy day.’
‘Ta for the teddy bear, Dad,’ said Cissie as she cuddled into it.
‘Yeah, and for the kaleidoscope as well, Dad,’ Danny called out.
‘Ta for everything, Dad,’ I said. ‘The swan, the parade, the fair, the doll, the story, the charades, for everything.’
‘Glad you enjoyed it, Kate,’ he said. ‘All birthdays are important but those with two ones at the end are the most important.’
‘I’ll remember that, Dad, when I’m a hundred and eleven. It’s been the happiest day of my life. I wish it could be today for ever. I wish time could stand still.’
‘That’s the one thing you can never wish for, Kate,’ he said with his serious face. ‘Time and tide wait for no man.’
He blew out the candle. ‘Goodnight, childer.’
‘Goodnight, Dad.’