Luton Branch of National Union of Women Workers Founded

Women munition workers at George Kent works, Luton 1916  [Z1306/75/17/19]

Thursday 2nd May 1918: A meeting of women workers was held this evening in the Council Chamber of Luton Town Hall and a local branch of the National Union of Women Workers of Great Britain and Ireland was formed. The meeting was first addressed by Mrs. Barbara Prothero, who is the honorary secretary of the Union, a leading member of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Society, and the wife of Rowland Prothero M.P., President of the Board of Agriculture. She told her audience that she had always wanted to start a branch at Luton as she knew that “when Luton people once put their hands to the plough they never looked back”. Mrs. Prothero emphasised the need for greater education for women now that they had been granted the Parliamentary franchise. The next speaker was Lady Cowan, one of the founders of the Women Relief Munition Workers' Organisation, who explained that the Union was non-party, and welcomed women of all shades of political opinion and none, and workers of all types, not just those in industry. The resolution to form a local branch of the Union was carried unanimously.

Source: Luton News, 9th May 1918

Bedford Waste Paper Collection

Tuesday 30th April 1918: Mrs. G. T. Willaume, Secretary of the Bedford Waste Paper Collection scheme has posted the following notice:

“In view of the Great National Need of Paper, Householders are begged to put aside all Waste Paper found during Spring Cleaning – Newspapers, Torn Letters and Bills, Books and Magazines, Brown Paper, Wall Paper and Cardboard – and on receipt of a postcard to “Waste Paper”, 39 Shakespeare Road, arrangements will be made to collect it. Profits to go to Bedford Charities.”

Source: Bedfordshire Times 3rd May 1918

News from Eaton Bray

High Street, Eaton Bray c.1905 [Z1306/39/2/2]

Saturday 27th April 1918: News has been received in Eaton Bray of two deaths, a prisoner and a wedding. Mr. Lewis Ruffett has been informed that his son, Private Fred Ruffett of the Bedfordshire Regiment was killed on 24th March, only two weeks after returning from leave. Private Ruffett had enlisted under the Derby Scheme in February 1916 and was sent to France in April 1917. His brother lost a leg in France eighteen months ago. Corporal Charley Chanin of the Lancers was killed in action a day earlier, on 23rd March. Corporal Chanin enlisted at the beginning of the war and served in Ireland during the 1916 rebellion. The mother of Lance-Corporal William Neville has received a card from her son telling her that he is now a prisoner of war at Cassel, in Germany. He was the first man from the village of Eaton Bray to join up, in September 1914.

Happier news comes from Canada, where Miss Annie Hebbes, the second daughter of Mr. J. A. Hebbes of Eaton Bray has marries Mr. H. G. Tice of Truax, Saskatchewan. The wedding took place at Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan on 22nd March. The bride’s brother, who has been farming in Alberta, Canada for some years was present. The new Mrs. Tice was formerly the assistant matron at Leighton Buzzard Workhouse.

Source: Leighton Buzzard Observer, 30th April 1918

A Missing Soldier and a Returned Prisoner-of-War

King George Hospital c.1915-18 [Wikimedia, from Wellcome Images under CreativeCommons Attribution 4.0 International license]

Thursday 25th April 1918: There is much sympathy for Mrs. W.A. Smith of 91 Church Street, Luton, who is undergoing a double ordeal of grief and anxiety. Her husband, Private W. A. Smith, has been serving with a machine gun corps in France and was last heard from on March 18th. Private Smith’s father, who lived at 47 Vandyke Road, Leighton Buzzard was then dangerously ill, and the police wired to Private Smith to try to get him leave. However he had still not arrived by April 12th, when his father died, and just a few hours later news arrived that Private Smith was wounded and missing. Nothing further has been heard, and Mrs. Smith would be grateful for any further information. Her husband has been serving in the army for two years.

Much better news has been received in Dunstable, where friends of Private  L. H. Durrington of Messrs Durrington and Sons, High Street North. Private Durrington, who was serving in the Royal Fusiliers, has been a prisoner of war in Germany for five months. It was known from letters and cards received that he had been wounded in the leg but there was nothing to suggest he was likely to be released. Last week the news arrived that he had been repatriated and was in King George’s Hospital, London.

Source: Luton News, 18th and 25th April 1918

Message Thrown from Train on a Spoon

Leighton Buzzard Station c.1915 [Z1306/74/1/4]

Tuesday 23rd April 1918: A Linslade woman heard yesterday that her husband had been buried alive inside a dug-out and had been reported as a casualty. Very shortly afterwards a neighbour arrived with a note from the soldier husband tied to a spoon; this had been dropped from a hospital train and found by a railway platelayer who was a near neighbour. Although he did not know his destination, realising that the train on which he was travelling would pass through Leighton Buzzard station the soldier had taken this unorthodox opportunity to send news to his wife. 

Source: Leighton Buzzard Observer 23rd April 1918

Newly Married and Decorated Bedford Soldier Killed

Ernest Fulford

Sunday 21st April 1918: With intense fighting continuing on the Western Front news of local casualties continues to arrive with terrible frequency. These include Bedford soldier Sergeant Ernest Walter Fulford of the Royal Engineers, who was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal on 28th December 1917. On 16th January while home on a short leave he married Miss Edith May Whitmore at St. Cuthbert’s Church, Bedford.  Sergeant Fulford was born in Bedford and educated at the Goldington Road Schools. Before the war he worked at the Goldington Road Steam Laundry as an assistant engineer. His parents live at 116 Bower Street and his wife at 6 Greenhill Street. Sergeant Fulford was killed by a shell. His commanding officer wrote to his mother that “I have always regarded him more as a friend rather than as my sergeant. He was a very fine character, keen, brave and conscientious. His death is a personal loss to all who knew him.”

Source: Bedfordshire Times, 19th April 1918

Overcrowded Classes at Leighton Buzzard Boys School

Beaudesert Boys’ Council School 1913 [Z50/72/21]

Friday 19th April 1918: Bedfordshire Education Committee has received a report that the number of scholars registered in the fourth and fifth classes at the Leighton Buzzard Boys’ Council School is more than sixty, the maximum permitted in a single class. The school managers, after discussion with the headteacher, have submitted that the class sizes are unavoidable and have been caused by the number of children who have arrived in the town from air raid areas. As these children had already been attending fourth and fifth classes in London they had to be put into the same classes in Leighton Buzzard. On 28th May last year there were 63 pupils in class four and 67 in class five, and on October 10th classes three, four and five all had more than sixty scholars. It was accepted by the Committee that the headmaster, Mr. Currie, had arranged things in the best way possible – to put pupils into classes for which they were not suited when the large numbers were only temporary would have been absurd, and the headmaster could not refuse admission without reasonable grounds. The Education Committee therefore decided to inform the Board of Education that they believed that in the circumstance this temporary breach of regulations was fully justified.  

Source: Leighton Buzzard Observer, 30th April 1918