Isa Porte had been orphaned when she was seven, and was brought up in Glasgow by a harsh uncle. A passionate member of the Young Communist League, she went to work in her home county of Fife when she was offered a job at the United Mineworkers office. A promising future, however, was blighted because of a night of bad luck.
I had to leave my job in the United Mineworkers at Dunfermline because unfortunately I met a young man at a dance. I discovered that he wasn’t from Fife, he had a Lanarkshire accent and he started to dance with me. I went out in the middle of the dance at the interval and it was more or less a case of – you would now call it rape. But they didnae call it that in those days. I had just got myself into a situation that I couldn’t get out of. And from that I became pregnant. When I went to the doctor he gave me a medical examination and he discovered what I was saying was true, and that I had been forced. And the doctor said, ‘It’s a difficult thing for you to tell your boss.’ He was Mrs Moffat’s [her boss’s wife] doctor. And he said he would tell them, to save me having to tell them myself. So I went to the UMS office trembling, waiting on Mr Moffat saying something. Then one morning he said, ‘Well, I’ve had very bad news about you. I’m very disappointed,’ you know. He said, ‘Because we liked having you here and you did your work to our satisfaction.’ Miss Morton, the bookkeeper, said to me, ‘I don’t care if you work till the day before you have your baby. It’s nobody’s business as long as you do your work.’ But Mr Moffat had to put it to the committee and they said, well, if I went home to my friends in Cambuslang and had the baby they were quite happy to have me return and get my job back.
And I left and came to Cambuslang. By that time I was about six months’ pregnant. And I was unemployed. Then of course when it became obvious, my money was stopped and I had to get what they called a Court of Referees. And that was no money till that happened. Well, I knew according to the regulations that I was considered fit for work till eight months of pregnancy. They asked all the details about me. They said, ‘Where was the young man?’ And ‘Why was I in Cambuslang when I had been living in Fife?’ I said I had only friends in Cambuslang. I had no other friends. Where was I born? And had I relatives? They made very intensive enquiries about relatives. I had no closer relatives than cousins, and I said I had no connection with them. And they said, ‘All right, then come back on Friday.’ When I went back on Friday, they said, ‘Sorry, we have no money for you. We can’t give you anything.’ So I got really very angry. I felt like pulling the man over the counter. I said, ‘Look, I’ve got no relatives. I have strangers to feed and clothe me.’ When I went home to my friends I was suggesting going to the workhouse, which was up in Hamilton, and asking to be taken in there. But my friends wouldn’t allow it in case something happened and the baby was born in the workhouse. So I stayed with my friends and they kept me till I got my money. I won my Court of Referees, got my few shillings a week back, and was able to repay them.
I had the baby. It was a little boy. When I had the baby I did odd days working. And at the time that I went to the Parish they suggested I take court proceedings against the father. Well, what I did, I did instigate proceedings with a lawyer. But I didn’t take it as far as the courts, because you were put on trial – it was the girl who was put on trial, not the father. You were put on trial. All your morals and everything else was examined in court, and I didn’t want to go that far.
But the young man was in Lochgelly and my landlady who I had lived with in Lochgelly told me about him, gave me his address, and I wrote. He came through to Cambuslang to see me. By that time I was about eight month pregnant. He came through and said he would marry me after the baby was born. And I said, ‘Now or not at all. If you can’t marry me before I have the child it’s not on.’ And he went off and I never saw him again. So I didn’t take the proceedings as far as court.
When the child was born I had to go to the registrar and he suggested that I postpone registering till I got the father. I said, ‘No, just carry on.’ So the boy got my name. And, well, you’re classified of course as illegitimate. I had to support him myself. I managed to get odd days’ typing. … While I was working my friend looked after him. She was married and would have adopted him because she had no children by that time. But I didn’t fancy the idea of looking on and seeing my own child with somebody else and being at so close quarters. So I decided against that and I worked to support him. The money that I got – I got fifteen shillings for myself, and three shillings for the baby. Three shillings then didn’t even buy the child’s milk when he was a baby getting bottles of milk. But the few shillings I earned helped to supplement that. I made application for what you would now call a one-off payment to Social Security, to get clothes so that I could be decently dressed to apply for a job, because looking for a job in an office they expect you to be tidy. And I made an application for help. First of all I asked for an extra allowance for the child. They said if I got a certificate that he was malnourished I would get something. And I was turned down. And then of course I applied for help with clothing. One of the gentlemen in the office in Rutherglen where I applied was considerate, and when I was applying for that and getting the small allowance he got me a job. He put me in touch with someone and I got a job, which helped a lot. That was one kind person.