Olga - A Daughter's Tale (17 page)

We then moved on to the father of the child. At this point she refused to talk about him and no amount of encouragement on my part would make her. I decided not to press the matter.

I then asked her what plans she had for supporting the baby once it was born. When I explained that she could put the baby up for adoption, for the first time in the interview Miss B raised her head and said she would keep the baby. As gently as I could I explained to her that she may have no choice in the matter especially since she was not prepared to take the baby home to her family in Jamaica. I asked Miss B, how, if she kept the baby and stayed in England, she planned to manage, support and care for herself and the child. Miss B said she would find a job and work.

It is quite obvious that Miss B feels she has brought shame on her family by her predicament, but I am concerned about her decision not to return home and have tried to persuade her to change her mind.

I am at a loss to understand why the fear of confronting her family with an illegitimate child is greater than choosing to remain in a country at war, without the support of friends or family and treats unmarried mothers with contempt, not to mention the problem that her colour may bring.

Fortunately, there is time to persuade Miss B to place the child for adoption.

Geraldine Franks

Superintendent

*****

Dear Diary

I never knew places like this existed. Matron said I was lucky to be here because this is a Catholic refuge and other girls in my state end up in the workhouse which she says, are very unpleasant places and the treatment of the women in them is often cruel and harsh.

“
Here”, she said, “they will treat you well and take care of you until you have your baby”.

My room is cold and bare with an iron bed, a table, a chest of drawers, a large white enamel jug and bowl. On the wall is a big crucifix of Jesus on the cross. I like the cross being there. It makes me feel I’m not so alone.

There are eight other women here, all waiting to have their babies. I spend my days cleaning the refuge or peeling vegetables in the kitchen. When I’m not working I stay in my room and say my rosary. We are forbidden to speak to each other during the day but can talk for one hour in the evening after prayers. But I don’t want to talk to anyone. I feel ashamed. I keep myself to myself.

Why do I dream of the things I can’t have.

Last night it was Cissie’s wedding. I saw everything so clearly.

Father Baker performed her wedding ceremony at the Holy Trinity Cathedral and there were flowers everywhere. Cissie walked down the aisle on Sydney’s arm to the music of the wedding hymn, looking beautiful in a simple white silk dress with a long tulle veil and a spray of orange blossom in her hair. The tots and I were the bridesmaids and we wore pale blue dresses with broad hats trimmed with blue lace and chiffon. Over sixty people attended the service, as well as Dyke’s family and friends and including three of Cissie and Dyke’s children.

After the ceremony everyone went back to Mission House. In the back garden Mammie had arranged for a large booth made of bamboo and coconut leaves to be built and decorated with lignum vitae and pink bougainvillea. This was where all the wedding presents were put before they were unwrapped. There was a table in the garden covered with a white linen table cloth and on it stood the wedding cake with a net over it and pinned in several places.

After the bride, the wedding cake was the centre of interest and the guests had to bid money to uncover the cake. They would try and outbid each other and by the time the cake was uncovered Cissie and Dyke would have several pounds, as well as lots of lovely presents.

It was such a happy, noisy day with so much laughter. I thought about Michael Sales and the pretty earrings he’d given me at my leaving party in Kingston and how he said he’d wait for my return so I could be his girlfriend. Not now Michael, you wont want me to be your girl friend now.

******

Olga’s Diary

Dear Diary

Marie
: So many people were in the labour room of St Mary’s Hospital, Paddington, three medical students watching as part of their training, two nurses, Sister and a doctor. After eighteen painful hours it was nearly over.

“
One good heave now Olga. I can feel the head” the doctor said and then finally the baby slipped out.

Before the mouth and nasal passages were cleared Sister had slapped the baby on its bottom and it cried immediately. Then it was weighed, washed and wrapped in a blanket and given to me – I had a baby girl. I was frightened holding her because she was so small and I thought I would hurt her.

“
Babies are tough, Olga. Give your daughter a cuddle” Sister said kindly. I wish Mammie could see my tiny, perfect little daughter.

******

Dear Diary

I’ve christened my daughter, Marie-Thérèse, after my favourite nun at Alpha Academy and I’ve had to register her birth. When the Registrar asked me the father’s name, I just shook my head. I felt ashamed, but he was a kind man and patted my hand and gave me a little smile, but his act of kindness made me cry. I have no idea how I am going to look after my baby. I have no home, no money and no job.

Then the problem was solved for me. Miss Franks came to me and said that because of my circumstances, my baby would be taken from me and put in an orphanage to give me time to think about whether placing Marie for adoption was best for her. She also told me that Matron from St Giles had said I could work at the hospital, as a maid, for a short time, which would give me some money, and I could stay in the refuge for a while until I came to some kind of decision about Marie.

I’ve asked Miss Franks if she could arrange for Marie to be baptized at St James’s Roman Catholic Church in Spanish Place and Moores said she would be Marie’s godmother. Immediately after Marie was baptized I handed her over to a complete stranger to be taken to an orphanage in a place I’d never heard of, Gloucester. If Moores hadn’t been with me I think I would have ended my life then.

“
In Jamaica we have Obeah men who can work evil against people who hurt you, you know, Moores. They can make bad things happen to that person. I only have to ask someone back home and it will be done.”

“
That’s voodoo, Olga”

“
Maybe it is, but I want to hurt him for what he did to me”.

“
Would it help if I pop into John Lewis and bought a little doll and some pins, then you can pretend the doll is John Edward and stick the pins in it.”

“
Don’t laugh, Moores, believe me Obeah works, I know, I’ve seen it working” I told her. I looked at her and there was a little smile on her face.

“
Forget all that rubbish Olga” she said putting her arm around me.

“
You need to concentrate on finding a way to get your baby back.”

******

Dear Diary

Miss Franks wanted to see me. She showed me an advert from a newspaper. A toddler and baby nursery in Wimbledon wants help in its nursery and she thinks that with my nursing training I should apply for the job particularly as no school leaving certificate is asked for.

It is a private nursery in a very big posh house at the end of a long drive in Victoria Drive, Wimbledon. I was interviewed by the two trained nurses who ran it. They were called Sister Warner and Sister Pateman. The Sisters told me that the mothers of the babies at the nursery are in the navy or army and when they have finished their tour of duty, or the war is over, they will take their babies back again. I told them I had a little baby, Marie, and asked if she could come with me and unbelievably they said I could bring Marie with me. Oh what joy.

Then they took me round the building and explained how the baby nursery takes babies from six months up to two years old. The baby room is on the top floor of the house and there is a play room next to it which is full of soft and wooden toys made by the local people living in the area and my bedroom is on the same floor.

Then they showed me around the toddler nursery which takes day children from two to five years of age. The day children are able to come to the nursery any time after 7.30 in the morning and have to be picked up by 6 in the evening. The nursery is on the first floor and also has a playroom as well as a sleeping room for the children to rest in during the day. Each toddler has their own overall, towel and flannel, which is kept on their own peg. Sister Pateman and Sister Warner’s bedrooms are on that floor.

On the ground floor are two bathrooms each with electric fires over the bath and the staff dining room. Next to the air raid shelter in the basement is the laundry room where there is a big sink with a wringer.

Each baby has its own cot and bedding and every day nappies have to be boiled as well as washing the cot sheets and towels. When I saw the amount of washing that had to be done I thought I can’t do this job, I won’t cope, but Sister must have seen my face, because she said I would not be doing the washing. A local girl comes in each day and does it and another woman comes in two afternoons a week to do the ironing.

“
They were desperate for some help and you were a godsend to them Olga”, Miss Franks said later.

For the first time in a very long time I felt happy, it meant free board and food for Marie and me and I got paid as well. I’d have done the job just for the board and food.

Six months after Marie was taken away from me I’ve got her back and I will never, never, never, EVER give her up again to anyone.

I miss my family.

******

Dear Diary

The baby room is painted in pretty pale colours, yellow, pink and blue with pictures of bunny rabbits, kittens and puppies stuck on the walls. There are ten cots in a row, each one containing a precious baby, and now the sisters have put another cot at the end of the row, for Marie. Now all I have to do is look after all of them.

Thank goodness the babies have a timetable. With one of the Sisters help, I bath the babies every other morning. I’m only allowed to make up enough baby food for one feed at a time and although it’s against the rules, the only way I can feed so many babies who are crying for their milk at the same time, is to prop up a bottle in the first baby’s mouth and then move on to the next baby.

After the babies have been fed I change their nappies and then it seems as if I have to start all over again. It’s an endless round of feeding, changing nappies and giving the babies a little cuddle. In the afternoon I put them either in a cot or, if the weather is good, in a pram outside.

When it’s quiet, I have to write up the babies’ reports. It’s the noisiest place to work in because there is always two or three babies crying at once. But I don’t mind. I have Marie with me. She is beautiful and so good, she rarely cries. I try to be fair and not pay her more attention than the other babies. Thank God I’m always busy I don’t have time to think about Mammie and home. I’m so tired by the end of the day. Sister Pateman and Sister Warner are very, very kind to me.

******

Dear Diary

My good friend Moores wrote to me and told me she’s decided nursing is not for her so she’s going home to live with her parents. She wanted to come and see me before she left, but I wrote and told her I was too busy but I promised to keep in touch. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see her, I did, but I just couldn’t bear saying goodbye to her. I’m such a coward.

It’s been a long time since any bombs were dropped on London and just when everyone thought the war was nearly over that horrible Hitler has sent over a new type of bomb. It’s called a “doodlebug”, It makes a low buzzing noise like a motorbike then there is silence, which is its engine cutting out and it glides without a sound for a few seconds, then explodes.

Last night I sat on the stairs and in the distance I heard a doodlebug. It got louder and louder until it seemed like it was overhead when suddenly it stopped and there was silence. I counted to ten and waited for the explosion, but it landed in the distance. We were safe, but maybe somebody else wasn’t so lucky. Whenever the sirens went off we are supposed to take the babies downstairs into the basement but by the time we’ve moved the cots down there, the all clear sounds and it’s all over. Wimbledon has been hit a few times during these raids but has not suffered as much as some other parts of London where the devastation has been huge. Even during the Blitz moral in the capital wasn’t as low as it is now.

******

Dear Diary

A few nights ago I heard a strange sound coming from one of the cots. As I went down the row checking each baby, I realised the sound was coming from the end cot where Marie was. The sound was her struggling to breathe. Sister Pateman examined her and said Marie was ill. She had pneumonia. She told me to go and look after the other babies and she and Sister Warner would see to her.

They put her into one of the bathrooms, put on the electric fire, turned the hot water on and filled up the bath so the bathroom was full of steam. I was desperate to help my baby and told them that back home when I had scarlet fever, Mammie boiled some onions and put them in muslin cloth and tied them round my ankles, and that helped bring down my temperature.