Memories - Gordon Griffin Davis

Gordon Griffin Davis lives in Australia, he went to KEFW between 1939 and 1946 and these memories of Monmouth were published in the FWOE Association Newsletter No.58, December 2004:

' In recently describing my life to a group I now belong to, I remarked on a number of idyllic periods and the 1939-44 slice in Monmouth was pretty prominent. In 1939 I joined the school in form 1A on September 1st, to march down Broad Street with my gas mask and "iron rations" to the train trip among total strangers ending in Monmouth. I was allocated a billet with the Lawis's in Glendower Street; a wonderful family in a great house (and garden backing on to the Chippenham). My new proxy father was Charlie Lewis, one of Monmouth's best-known butchers ("Go to L&C Lewis") who made controller of the slaughterhouse at the outbreak of war. On September 2nd, I had my 12th birthday and of course on the 3rd, we were at war. Mts. Lewis was a wonderful woman who coped with homesickness and tears, and I settled down with her children, John and Barbara, and got to know my fellow pupils. We used a variety of church halls as classrooms, also the famous room behind the 'Geoffrey of Monmouth' window in the old school above the slaughterhouses. I was soon initiated into the process of sticking a pig and bleeding a cow in those subterranean arches alongside the river Monnow. That river had very good eels feeding on the butchered debris.

We learned to swim in the Monmouth School pool. ELO turned up and got us all diving and being athletic. We messed about in the Wye and Monnow, climbed the Kymin and behaved abominably to the poor refugee teachers who joined us from Europe. Mike Forman, John Davies and the Cummings twins, who were at your reunion will recall what I am telling.

As the war progressed, we followed the battles in North Africa on wall maps, putting in little pins. We got used to the sight of British, Indian and finally American troops marching about and joining us on church parades. Cycling around the back roads we would find American ration packs tossed behind the hedgerows, still rich in chewing gum and cigarettes.

And of course there were the girls of the High School, the cinema and that upstairs cafe in Church Street where we chatted them up and spent hours on the crossroads. At some stage, probably 1942, I was hauled up before a "Prefects Court" accused of, I quote, "Walking along the railway with girls". I pleaded ignorance and think I got three whacks. We were well taught by the old hands; Joe Fulford, Tom Bailey, Strago Greaves and a range of new guns like ELO, the blonde who taught us French (?) and a number of other young ones we could relate to. Dobinson was a great leader and led one of the few really successful evacuations. I still recall gargling all the way down the corridor whenever I smell Dettol; it was a prophyylactic against colds and sore throats - no wonder I ended up doing research in Microbiology!! '