My WW1 Garden by Juliet Greenwood

This year, I’ve loved seeing the gardens commemorating WW1 at the Chelsea Flower show.

Having read newspaper reports from the time, and lived so long in a WW1 kitchen garden in my head, it was touching to see them in all their Chelsea glory. I loved the whistles that became fountains, and the stories of the men interned in Germany creating flower gardens, with even their own strictly-judged show.

My favourite of all was the potter’s garden.

With its cottage garden flowers and path of discarded pots, it caught a real sense of the potter having left everything to volunteer, as so many men did in the first year of the war, unable to imagine the unprecedented horrors they would soon be facing, and many never to return. It had the same atmosphere as the Lost Gardens of Heligan, that first sparked my fascination with the gardens of WW1, abandoned at the moment the intricate hierarchy of gardeners left for the front, and generations of expertise were lost forever.

But, as I learnt in my research, that was not the whole story. Many gardens were abandoned, but many new were created. Before WW1, the Edwardians had lived in a brave new world of luxurious imports and the novelty of canned foods. As imports were threatened by the dangers of new-fangled submarines, necessity sent the population at home growing once more. Land girls took over the roles of agricultural workers, and schoolchildren grew vegetables wherever they could. Like today (and in the 1970s of the BBC’s ‘The Good Life’), the expense of fresh food led to a huge upsurge in allotments and self-sufficiency.  Tips appeared in the newspapers for the best ways to preserve tomatoes and beetroot for the winter ahead, and arguments ranged over the best way to grow, and where allotments should be placed.

So much was learnt in WW1 that was taken on to the organisation that swung into place in WW2, and beyond. Some of my earliest memories are of the gardens of aunts and uncles, who had no doubt absorbed memories of the First World War from their parents, and then lived themselves through the Second World War. Their gardens were full of flowers, but there was always a vegetable garden at the back, filled with peas and beans and raspberry canes. They still preserved what they could, even though this was the 1960s and another brave new world of seemingly endless plenty.

I also remember those WW1 allotments in my own garden, which originally was a long strip, like many of the quarrymen’s gardens in this part of Wales. Amongst the thin, rocky soil, I’ve a patch that is rich from generations of vegetables being grown to supplement subsistence wages. Unlike those previous generations, I’ve the luxury of a polytunnel for extra protection against the wind, and additional warmth halfway up a mountain. There’s a very strange thing about my polytunnel. It’s the only place I can grow red poppies. I’ve tried so many times in the garden, but only the yellow Welsh ones appear. Then last year, when I was trying to find poppies to photograph for the update of my website, there they were: a little patch in amongst the rocket. It gave me tingling feeling. I’m keeping my fingers crossed they reappear this year.

So this is my WW1 garden. Not a potter’s garden, but a quarryman’s garden. With it lie the memories of those who were lost, and those at home who kept the nation and the soldiers fed, and who, like the act of faith that is the essence of all gardening, found the strength to carry on amidst so much loss, and build the world anew.

Running Away with the Chauffeur by Juliet Greenwood

I first began using newspapers for research to find genuine recipes from WW1. It was a comment in one of my research books that recipes and advice began appearing in newspapers as shortages began to bite, that led me to the brilliant British Newspaper Archive.

The Archive is a partnership between the British Library and Find My Past to digitise up to 40 million newspaper pages from the British Library's collection over the next 10 years. It means that from a home computer you can search by keywords, name, location, date or title of the subject you are looking for, and the results appear in seconds.

What I loved most was seeing the actual digitised versions of newspapers, just as the original readers would have seen them. However focused I tried to be on recipes, and tips to make tasty meals out of vegetables and the odd cut of horsemeat, the eye strayed to the articles and the advertisements all around. This was when I discovered just how valuable these newspapers are to getting a real feel of the time.

It was eerie looking back with modern eyes at a passing reference to a place called Gallipoli, between advertisements for soap, tips for using the best from your allotment, and the scandal of a divorce. It was heart-breaking seeing the lists of the fallen and obituaries of local men, with a faded photograph of a man in uniform. I began to dread seeing them. How much worse to have been the first reader, waiting and dreading, or maybe already traumatised by grief.

The Mausoleum at Bodnant

What was also strange was the way life carried on, as it does, and how life really is stranger than fiction. Looking at divorce cases hinted at so many stories of both misery, and triumphant bids for freedom. There was the barmaid who didn’t take to running a household (wise girl) writing to tell her soon to be ex-husband in 1911 ‘Don’t be foolish over this, because if I returned I would only have to tell you what I am telling you here. I am not returning,” as she sailed off to America to train as a nurse – and maybe to serve in a field hospital like that of The Crimson Field during the war.

And if you thought Lady Sybil of Downton Abbey was reckless running off with the chauffeur, there is hint of a story of misery overcome by a woman who left a husband she claimed only gave her misery to elope with their chauffeur and finally find true love and companionship. Her husband’s divorce (women weren’t able to do the divorcing at the time) didn’t go through as he had left it too long, claiming he didn’t have the money. All the more cause, in my book, to root for the lady and the chauffeur to live a long and happy life together!

Juliet Greenwood

Newspapers are so much about ordinary life, and ordinary interests, that they made a fascinating insight into lost world – one that isn’t really so very different from our own. I shall certainly keep referring back to the digitised newspapers of the British Newspaper Archive time and time again.

You can find out more about divorce cases here on Juliet’s blog.

You can find out more about the lady and the chauffeur here on Juliet’s blog.

Juliet's latest novel, We That are Left, is out now!

Maids of Honour (Recipe) by Juliet Greenwood

These are old-fashioned cakes that I found in a 1914 cookbook. I thought I’d never tried them before, but after I’d made them and look a bite they were strangely familiar. I think my mum or my aunts must have made them when I was a child. They are delicious and easy to make – especially with frozen pastry to cheat!

Just after I’d tried mine, I stumbled across Jamie Oliver attempting to revive them on ‘Jamie and Jimmy’s Friday Night Feast’. They had far more variety and tried more modern versions – ones I definitely want to have an attempt! I like the sound of chocolate, apricot, strawberry and brandy & vanilla. Yum!

I used to live near Richmond, but sadly I don’t think I ever discovered this wonderful bakery, ‘The Original Maids of Honour’ , where you can find out more about the history. (Henry VIII is supposed to have named them ‘Maids of Honour’ – they are THAT traditional) and even sample some of Jamie Oliver’s creations. I fancy Apricot myself …

Elin’s Maids of Honour from ‘We That are Left’

Ingredients

Eight teaspoonsful of sugar,

One egg

2 oz (60g) ground almonds

Pinch of baking powder

Packet of frozen puff pastry

Raspberry jam

Method

Beat the sugar and the egg together, then stir in the almonds. Put the baking powder last. Have some patty-pans/muffin tins lined with puff-paste (frozen is fine), lay a teaspoon of raspberry jam at the bottom of each, and cover with a teaspoon of the mixture. (I decorated them with toasted almond flakes, which worked well.)

Bake in a moderate oven - 200C (180C if fan assisted) Gas Mark 6 for about 20 minutes.

Enjoy!

A WWI Bake Off by Juliet Greenwood

When I began researching the lives of women in Britain in World War One, the last thing I thought I would find myself doing was to be trying out some delicious (and some weird and wonderful) recipes.

Bara Brith

Unlike in World War Two, there was no official rationing until towards the end of the war, but much of Britain’s food was imported and so there were soon shortages, and many things became expensive. It wasn’t just food, but medicines, too. During the war, women, especially those in the countryside, returned to the old ways. They grew and preserved as much as they could, and foraged for things like blackberries and rosehips, which are an excellent source of vitamin C and wonderful home remedies for coughs and colds.

It might not sound heroic, but without food and medicine no one can survive. Food was sent out to the soldiers at the front, and helped the wounded recover. It fuelled the workers who kept the country functioning – all those forgotten millions without whom the war could not have been fought and lives rebuilt afterwards. 



Maids of Honour

Many of these women were taking over the running of the family business or, like my heroine, Elin, the family estate, for the first time. In 1914 most women were destined to be wives and mothers. Their role was to support their men and follow their lead. When women first tried to help the war effort by setting up an ambulance service they were laughed at and told not to bother their pretty little heads, but they were soon setting up field hospitals, driving ambulances and looking after the dead and the dying. It was the time when we proved we could drive trams and trains, and be doctors, surgeons, mechanics and businesswomen. And we established that we don’t faint in a crisis but are intelligent, brave and resourceful.

What I found fascinating is the way in which this reflects the changes in attitudes to food that have been happening in the UK in the 21^st century due to the recession. Apart from the very poor, people before WW1 were used to huge meals packed full of cream, butter and meat and being able to get hold of anything they wanted. During the war they had to learn to exist on a much simpler diet – one that didn’t need a Downton Abbey style army of servants! Today, too, there is much more interest in growing your own and home baking and preserving rather than going out for meals or buying ready made.



Juliet's Kitchen

After the war, there was a new interest in cooking. This time it was from single women who worked in low paid jobs, or forged successful careers. What they wanted was to learn to cook cheaply and simply for themselves and their friends in their flats and bedsits after returning from a hard day’s work at the office, the hospital, the lab, the school, the university. With so many men lost, many women needed to find a new way of living, and of supporting themselves. And they were the pioneers who led the way to the choices we have today.

Juliet Greenwood

Over the past months I’ve been gathering recipes, some traditional and some from war time newspapers, which I’ve been trying out – and in some cases adjusting for modern tastes. Plus I’m vegetarian, something almost unheard of in 1914 (apart from cranks and socialists), so I’ve had to source vegetarian suet and rennet.

I’ve tried all the ones that appear in the book, and I now can’t wait to try the next on the list! Friends have been persuaded (okay, arms have been twisted) to try their own and send in photographs, or to come and taste the results. I’ve yet to find anyone brave enough to attempt rabbit pie. So any willing volunteers out there, just let me know. I have the recipe. But no rabbits.

Nettle and dandelion beer, anyone?

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