Annie Lynch - Childhood memories

I went to St Ann’s School in the Cowgate, but you could go in from Chapel Close. You had to pay for your books.. I would be in about the fourth standard before we got the books through the corporation. We had to buy all our books, the penny book, the threepenny book, the sixpenny book and then the first standard that was a hard back. I can always remember the first book was a jotter and it had a brown cover.

Ma dad played the accordion. At that time it would be a ten key accordion and gradually when he came back from the army, he gradually got something better. I can remember when he came back from the army he always wanted a better accordion and I chummed him fae the High Street to a music shop called Kolyer. It was just when you came up through the low Calton into Leith Street that was where he bought his 18 key accordion…

He was awfie musical and he made a one string fiddle wi a cigar box and I can remember sitting watching him makin this fiddle… It was a sort of deep box and he glued the lid on, made the wee hole at the end wi a pen knife and I chummed him to Kolyers and he bought the bow and he bought a length o balsa wood and that was where the one string went and he had a thing to tighten the string and he used to sit with the cigar box between his knees and that’s how he played the fiddle. We used to listen to him play it.

My first house was on the High Street. John Knox went up an outside stair. My house went up a stair in the street.. There was only a bed closet led off the living room area and I had no windows. There were skylights. I had running water, no hot water and a wee range. My oldest Laddie was born there. Pat.

My husband was a labourer. He came back frae the army and there wisnae jobs to be gottin. He used to go oot in the morning wi’ a piece in his pocket so that if he got a start, he could get started straight away.

He learned tailoring and he made his own suit wi long trousers. At that time you could go to McNab’s and get a half crown parcel or a five bob parcel and you got a piece of material and I got an awfie nice piece of blue material and made me a lovely dress to go to he socials in. He made me a grey coat out of a blanket.. He made the laddie’s trousers.. I did their jerseys and school socks.

I remember one time he was idle and I was sittin’ in ma mothers. He came in later on in the afternoon and he was rattlin’ money in his pocket and I says to him “You got money, did you get a job?”, “No, but I got money.” He’d went home, took his guid suit an went and pawned it. He says “Well we cannae eat clathes”. That’s the kind of man I had.

The washhouse was halfway doon Chapel Close. Rosie (sister) and I, when we got married used to take my mother’s washing along with our ain and dae the washin, and if the weather was nice she used to say “Dinnae put the washing on horses, bring them hame and I’ll hang them oot the windae”. Ma mother had a window stick that used to go oot the windae and she used to pin them wi a wee bit rag and pin the article onto it and the sheets would be at the far end.