Quote:
Originally Posted by MargaretR
I do not know whether my grandfathers served in WW1.
It was never mentioned in my childhood so I suspect they did not.
Cotton workers were usually deemed in 'reserved occupations' during WW2 and that is why my father didn't serve but his 2 brothers did.
I recollect being told that my grandfathers were cotton workers which may have been a 'reserved occupation' for that war also.
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In WW1 its a wonder there was any cloth, a heck of a lot of the early volunteers were from the cotton industry.
When you think about it, most of them had been on 1/2 time since they were 10 years old, the only time they had free was Sunday, when most of them could be out playing football. Then when the war broke out, it was going to be an adventure, to them at the time it was, considering what they had to look forward to intut mill, for the next 60 years, if they lived that long. For some it was the first time they'd had enough to eat, and a bed of their own to sleep in.
When you compare their pictures when they were called up, and then a year later, their parents couldn't recognise them.
I remember reading a mill owner complaining to Harwood, at one of his frequent tribunals, that he had 1800 spindles idle for want of men.
Retlaw.