Once the system of paying soldier's wives was established and the money started to flow in, although less than their men had been earning in the mills, life became more normal but there were changes to be accommodated. On October 28th 1914 the Calf Hall Shed Company directors resolved 'that Standing Brothers [printers] be allowed to fix a bill posting board in Calf Hall Yard at a rental of 20/- per annum'. We have to remember that in 1914 the only way news could get to Barlick was by word of mouth or the newspapers. Standing Brothers used to print war news notices and casualty lists and post them on boards around the town. That's what this bill posting board was for. There was another and much more serious way of getting news, the arrival of the dreaded telegram from the War Office informing a woman that her man was injured, missing or killed. The sight of a Telegraph Boy on his cycle coming down the street caused instant dread, who was he going to deliver to? People of my generation still have the fear of that small brown envelope. Telegrams are long gone now but the memory lingers on, they were almost always the worst news possible. My picture this week is poor quality but is a copy of the telegram my Grandma Challenger received in 1917.
Apart from the constant worry about family and friends serving in France, there was the day to day struggle to find food and other essential supplies. I've talked to old people who were alive at the time and their main memory is of the jungle telegraph by which they heard that a shop had something they wanted and the rush to join the queue. Mind you, many of them also told me that they could usually get hold of many scarce items from the market gardens in the town, friends who were gardeners and farmers in the countryside round about. Many people kept hens and eggs, while sometimes scarce, were usually available. It paid to have friends and contacts! Bear in mind that this wasn't the dreaded 'black market' of WW2, it was private enterprise filling some of the gaps and perfectly legal. Fred Inman told me that his father kept hens up Stoneybank in Earby and sold eggs by the bucketful for preserving with isinglass and anyone killing a pig was very popular!
In many parts of the country one of the biggest changes was women going into industry to make up for the manpower shortage. This wasn't common in Barlick because women had always been part of the workforce in the mills. However, as food and coal became dearer wages in industry, including the mills, rose. An average 4 loom weaver in 1914 on a good week got 25/-, by 1918 this was closer to 35/- which meant they kept pace with the increased prices. Despite this, the constant bad news in the casualty lists depressed the whole town.
The telegram that Margaret Challenger received in 1917. (This was my Grandfather.)