1940s: How we tackled the coughs and sneezes that spread diseases

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Chicken pox, mumps, measles, boils, nits, polio, dental gas, coughs and colds were just some of the more unpleasant aspects of life facing children in the 1940s. Eric Swales, of Sunnyhill, looks back at his own childhood and the measures taken by parents to protect youngsters against the health hazards of the time.

I have no recollections of my health before the age of five. Then I went to school and seemed to catch everything that was going – all the childhood diseases – chicken pox, mumps, measles, scarlet fever and coughs and colds.

If I was ill in those days, there was no question about it, I was confined to bed and the doctor was called.

My doctor was a religious man and, upon leaving, would present me with a piece of paper with a religious tract printed on it. I never knew whether this was intended to inspire me to regain good health or was a portent of some impending doom.

Eric on his trike in the 1940s

Prescriptions were sometimes taken to the pharmacist at the surgery, a Mr Killer by name. This again did not bode well for the future, but survive I did.

I can remember the itchy spots of chicken pox and having to desist from scratching to avoid later scars. The treatment was to be dabbed all over, from head to toe, with calamine lotion which seemed to be very successful. For measles, a darkened room appeared to be a necessity, having some connection with problems to the eyes.

With these diseases, it was not unknown for mothers to take unaffected children round to visit infected ones in order to catch whatever it was so as to have it over and done with.

When I was suffering and friends came round to visit, I would be at the top of the stairs and they at the bottom. I managed to steer clear of things like polio, TB, whooping cough, diptheria and influenza. These could kill and, in many cases, did.

The finer point of what illnesses were infectious and contagious was a complete waste on me. I used to suffer from boils and tonsillitis until my teenage years.

I remember the agony of a hot kaolin poultice being applied to draw out the core of the boils and the far nicer ice-cream, jelly or blancmange I was given for tonsillitis.

I loved the taste of Key Bells cough mixture and was always asking if it was time for more medicine. I could have drunk it by the bottleful. When I was a little older, there was something called Liquafruta. It was the most evil-tasting concoction possible. I don’t remember what it was for.

Some of the stranger remedies were a mixture of butter, sugar and lemon for sore throats; treacle and brimstone for cleaning the blood to prevent spots; and, for bad chests, goose grease and brown paper were applied. The latter was to keep the grease off the clothes. I don’t think it had any medicinal purpose.

To start the day, the essentials were a breakfast of Scott’s Porridge Oats or Welgar’s Shredded Wheat, followed by a spoonful of cod liver oil, a glass of diluted orange juice concentrate and a malt extract. I remember Virol, which did not taste too bad.

Later in the morning, at school, I would receive a third of a pint of milk, which in winter would freeze and push up the cardboard top of the bottle some two or three inches, making it look like an ice lolly.

Cleanliness was regarded as most important but, if left to his own devices, washing was nowhere near the top of a boy’s priorities. A quick circular movement round the face with a damp flannel would suffice, so my mam ensured I was properly turned out.

I also had an aunt who occasionally took it upon herself to give me a wash. The force she used to rub my face was akin to removing graffiti from a brick wall. Turning to my ears she would twist the corner of the towel in my ear and screw it round and round – the object was, I think, to see daylight through to the other ear.

About once a week, I used to have a bath in the living room in front of the fire during the winter, or in the kitchen. We used a large tin bath which used to spend most of its time hanging on a hook in the back yard.

Children at Hastings Street School c1948. Eric’s sister, Heather Swales, is on the right, rocking the pram

Some of the toilet soaps of the time were Palmolive, Lux, Lifebuoy, Knight’s Castille, Co-op Carbolic and Wright’s Coal Tar.

Clothes were not always changed every day due to lack of launderettes and the hard work involved in washing.

Monday was always washday. Some hand-washing would be done in the large stone sink. Washing was a labour intensive and time-consuming procedure in those days. Water was boiled up in a copper and poured into a dolly tub.

Soap powder was added and the clothing, towels, sheets and blankets etc were in turn pounded and rotated with a wooden three-legged ponch. Something called a “blue” bag was dropped in during the rinse for whites and starch was added to some clothes to stiffen them and help them repel dirt and creasing for longer.

The washing was then squeezed between the big wooden rollers of the mangle to remove as much water as possible and hung out on the clothes line to dry.

However, in winter the weather was often not conducive to drying outside so the washing was hung over one or more clothes horses, which stood in front of the fire, making the other side of the room freezing cold.

Then there was the airing and ironing. The whole process was repeated, depending on the size of the wash and took up the best part of the week. Some of the washing powders of the day were Omo, Persil, Dreft, Lux, Ozxdol and Rinso.

At school, we would regularly be lined up, by class, in the playground while a teacher would walk round examining both sides of our hands, faces, necks, ears and knees for cleanliness.

They also looked at shoes. This created a lot of standing on one leg and frantic polishing of toe caps on the back of stockings.

Once a year, I think, a doctor and/or nurse would visit the school to give everyone a medical examination.

I believe my mam had to be with me on these occasions. For boys, one of the things it entailed was dropping your trousers round your ankles while the doctor got hold of your unmentionables and ask you to cough. I could never see how this practice helped in any way to prevent coughs!

Who could ever forget the nit nurse. She would rummage around in my hair before announcing, to my embarrassment, that I had nits. This blow to my pride was somewhat softened when I found out that everyone else had them too.

At home that night, my mam produced a dark brown tablet of soap, Derbac, and vigorously shampooed my hair. I then had to kneel in front of her over a piece of white sheet while she combed my hair, or should I say scraped my scalp, with a fine-toothed metal comb to see how many of the pesky little critters we had got rid of.

Any runners that appeared on the sheet were instantly dispatched under a thumbnail. Constant, thorough combing and washing was then required until the epidemic was cleared.

A trip from school to the dentist at Mill Hill Clinic was for me an experience I hated.

There was no anaesthetic for fillings, just the slow grinding of a low speed drill. For extractions, a clip was placed in my mouth to keep the teeth apart and then a smelly gas mask was put over my face until I drifted off into some horrendous nightmare.

Afterwards, I was led into another room to see several other children sitting there with a large ball of bloodied cotton wool stuck in their mouth, the same as myself.

For cleaning my teeth I used the favourite for children, Gibb’s Dentifrice, which came as a pink compact block in an aluminium tin.

Other toothpastes were Colgate, Gibbs, McCleans, Pepsodent and Kolynos.

To end the day, supper would be a slice of toast with a supposedly healthy, sleep giving drink such as a mug of hot milk, Ovaltine, Horlicks, Cocoa or Bournvita.

Due to food shortages and rationing during the war, the government would extol the virtues of vitamins gained from vegetables, but that was another story.

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