One day I was happy standing on a table (the best punishment ever), daydreaming out of the window, and the next day I didn’t have a school to go to. My grandmother had come to collect me with the big box of Black Magic – sadly not for me but my teacher, and then she didn’t walk me home to Talgarth Road, but took me on the tube to South Kensington, where we went to the flat (in Sussex Mansions) of our family doctor. Very confusing, but I was reassured when I found my mother there, together with her younger sister. This must have been 1959. We were all in quite a large room with I suppose two beds – I don’t remember the details. All I do remember is that one wall was lined with enormous mirrored wardrobes, so I spent a while pulling faces at myself, while watching the three women trying to unpack.

On the way there my grandmother had told me that I wouldn’t be going back to West Kensington for a while. I don’t suppose she explained that my mother had finally left my father, and had been enabled to do that by winning a small fortune on the football pools. That I only found out much much later. But she did eventually explain that living at our doctor’s was only a temporary arrangement.

Meanwhile I had to go to school. I remember my mother wanting me to go to the Lycee Francaise which was a few hundreds yards away. But I was already too old they said, to start, as I didn’t speak any French – I’d only just learnt English, or goodness sake! Then she took me to visit a private school in the vicinity, Glendower, I think which had horrible purple uniforms. Here I have a feeling that my mum felt uncomfortable, as the head was quite snooty and may have made my mother feel self conscious about her Polish accent. In the end they enrolled me in the local ILEA (inner London Education Authority) primary school: Marlborough Infants and and Junior school in Sloane Avenue.

Big victorian building with two playgrounds – one for girls and one for boys.

Outside toilets. Big high classrooms. Except that the “mixed infants” were in huts in the corner of the boys’ playground with gas lighting and I think a stove. Maybe I am imagining the stove.

Absolutely terrifying after Avonmore, which was small and low and very modern.

Anyway I started. Oh so many children, none of whom I knew. Warm milk at breaktime, which I hated. The lighting of the gas lamp in the morning was a regular and comforting ceremony, because no one bothered me, but otherwise I was lost. So I cried. I don’t remember crying at Avonmore. But I do remember being unconsolable here. Luckily for me the class teacher, Mrs Edwards was extremely kind. She was probably at a loss too, but somehow she discovered I could read, so whenever she had a spare moment she would sit me on her lap and let me read to her. At least she must have thought I was learning something. I barrelled through all the class readers very quickly and then alighted on something that would be absolute anathema now. And rightly so. Little Black Sambo. But at the time it was considered a charming book which had very brightly coloured pictures. And that is what I remember. Most printed matter in the 1950s was extremely dingy, and still based on wartime savings. Pages were thick, densely printed; illustrations were mainly monochrome – not necessarily black and white, but just one colour. And here was a book full of sunshine and pictures. I have no idea about the stories, themselves. But Mrs Edwards’ lap was comfortable and comforting and I think I spent several weeks on it.

I must have made some friends eventually because I can remember sitting at a square table with some children doing arithmetic work cards which I also enjoyed very much. But their topics of conversation bemused me. They would talk about tv programmes which I had never seen (we didn’t have a tv). I remember in particular the boys talking about something called Four Feathers Fall – quite hard to say at the time. And the Lone Ranger. I knew about Andy Pandy because I watched that at the house of my mother’s friend, very occasionally.

I still cried a lot, so I imagine some of the children avoided me – but really and truly I have no idea. I know that I found the school work easy. On the way home I occasionally walked a little of the way with some of the children in my class. I lived much further away than most, because the flat my mother eventually moved to was right opposite South Kensington Station. my grandmother’s English wasn’t very good but she would make the effort to talk to the mothers who came to collect their children and in the end she made friends with an Indian lady, whose daughter Shamsa was in my class. I think I remember going to her house once with my gran. They certainly must have felt some solidarity as both were refugees and very foreign.

There were over forty children in the class. That was the norm. I don’t remember any assistants, but there may have been. The day was long. We started at nine, with a milk break , ugh, at about 11, and then just after twelve there was a dinner break which I believe must have been well over an hour as many children went home for lunch. I was in quite an unusual situation, as my mother went out to work, quite a rare thing, I think. So I had to stay at school for the duration. The food was all right I think apart from the custard, but in late years my grandmother would laugh that I only ever said potatoes when asked what I had had for lunch. Eating in the hall was fine but then we had to go to he playground and play. Nightmare, for those first few months. And when it rained we all had to stand in a glorified shelter or shed which had no outside walls.

What I do remember is changing my name from Basia (pronounced Basher by my schoolmates) to Barbara. i didn’t like the sound of Barbara, and I still don’t, but it was better than the thoughtless teasing that accompanied it. Let’s bash ‘er!!!

One thing I do remember is having to pose for a school photo one day. I was normally a very good child, but my mother dressed me in a lovely blue dress that she had knitted herself and I remember I was fascinated by the texture of the stitches. so before we went to school I found a pair of scissors and gently snipped at the front of the dress and watched as the stitches bounced apart. I remember it being great fun until I was caught. Cross is an understatement. I shudder, even now. I don’t know if she actually knew I was going to have my photo taken but she left me in the dress. You can see some of the cut stitches if you look really carefully.

So- the photo tells me 1960, so this must be just before I went up the junior school. I remember most of these children, but not all. I don’t know who the little boys are right in the front, but the front row, left to right are Sheila, ??, Susan, Shamza, Susan, me, Beryl, ?? and my mind has gone blank.The teacher is Mrs Edwards.

I am in fact still in touch with quite a lot of these people. About twenty years ago – and she does not seem to be in this photo, one of the girls organised a reunion in Sloane Square.

She is in this photo together with a teacher called Mrs Brock. I don’t think she was particularly warm. But I love her handbag. Is this an earlier or later photo? I don’t know. I’m not in it, but there are some of the same children. So confusing.

That first reunion was one of the most exciting days of my life. So many memories- and so many new friends. Lots of people didnt actually remember one another – but we all got on so well. We were going to have another reunion last September, but it didnt work out. Maybe this year. For some reason classes were divided and amalgamated by the time we went up into the junior school, and I remember those days much better, of course.

In the summer of 1960 I was a rising seven. I should have stayed another year in the infants school I think, as I was still six when I went up into Big School. I am not sure now if infants school was meant to last two or three years in those days.

But I ended up as the youngest in the class for the rest of my school life. I will have more to say about the junior school in my next post.