A Place to Call Home Read online

  ABOUT THE BOOK

  Ellen thought she’d always live in the remote, pretty coastal village where she grew up. After all, her husband, Harry, works on a farm where he’s guaranteed a job and home for life.

  But when the old landowner dies and the couple and their young children are forced from their cottage, the future is suddenly bleak. Rather than stay – and starve – in the countryside they love, Harry sets out to find a job in the factories and mills of nearby Hull, and Ellen must leave behind everything she’s ever known to follow him and build a new life for her family on the unfamiliar city streets.

  The road ahead is full of hardships and challenges. But with love and determination they make the best of things, forging friendships with other newcomers and refugees; even helping them to succeed in their new surroundings.

  Then tragedy threatens Ellen’s fragile happiness. How much more can she sacrifice before they find a place to call home?

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Preface

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Ending

  Acknowledgements

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Also by Val Wood

  Copyright

  For my family with love, and for Peter as always.

  PREFACE

  There were some who arrived in the town hungry and weary, with muddy cracked boots and threadbare clothing, having travelled on foot from other towns that were not so industrious as this one was. Or so it was said, for many of these travellers were unable to read, and had made the journey on the basis of rumours passed on by their fellow unemployed workers that this town had work to offer in industry and commerce.

  Others were loyal agricultural labourers who, not having taken heed of the uprising in the countryside a decade earlier when angry young men took fiery revenge on their masters for poor wages, stayed faithful to their employers only to be dismissed because of the falling price of grain. They too set out to find work on the hard town streets rather than sleep under hedges while they starved in the countryside they loved, which had failed them so badly.

  Then there were some who had travelled from afar, from Russia, Poland and Prussia, by foot and rail and ship, to find safety, but this town was not to be their final destination; they rested in the accommodation that had been prepared for them, bathed and ate, then shouldered their bags and crossed the station concourse to board a train to Liverpool. From there they embarked on vessels that took them away to another, larger country, where, so they had heard, there were even richer opportunities.

  And then there were those who washed themselves and their clothes, ate the food that was offered them, slept peacefully, gave thanks for the kindness offered in friendship and then moved on to other burgeoning northern towns, such as Leeds and Manchester, in the hope of finding friends or relatives who had made the same journey and advised them of the prospects that were attainable.

  But some, traumatized by their fear of what might have happened if they had remained in homelands that had rejected them, exhausted by their flight and their travel into the unknown, decided to stay in this town that had welcomed them to its shores, and put down roots of their own.

  CHAPTER ONE

  1854

  It was a late afternoon in August. The sun was losing its heat, but it was still warm enough for Ellen to put her face up to the golden rays and know that her nose would freckle. She had made her monthly visit to her mother and father in Holmpton and shared Sunday dinner with them and her brother Billy, and was on her way to call on her friend Polly, one of six sisters, before she returned to the large farmstead a few miles away where she worked as a general maid.

  She was humming softly to herself and gently swinging the basket containing a cake from her mother when she turned in at the Randells’ gate and there was Harry, Polly’s older brother, with a foot on a spade, digging over a patch of earth. She stopped and he looked up.

  He had always lived in this remote part of Holderness close to the sea, as she had too until starting work for Mrs Hodges. She’d often seen him when she was growing up, for this was a small population of less than one hundred souls and everyone knew everyone else, but they’d never had a proper conversation; just a quick nod and a greeting, which was the usual thing for the lads in the village, who were mainly tongue-tied in front of girls. Since he had started work as a farm labourer she had seen less of him, but she recognized him at once.

  ‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Is Polly at home?’

  He’d taken his foot off the spade to look at her and with a quickened breath she thought that she hadn’t realized how fair he was, his long hair bleached blond by the summer sun and tied at the back of his neck by a bootlace, and his eyes as blue as the sky.

  ‘Erm, yeh, I think so.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Just go on in.’ He indicated the house door, which was wide open. ‘I think they’re all there.’ He chuckled and she saw how his eyes danced. ‘Sometimes I lose count.’ He came towards her, carrying the spade. ‘I know you,’ he said hesitantly, and with what she thought was a shy smile, ‘but I forget your name.’

  ‘Ellen,’ she said. ‘Ellen Snowden.’

  ‘Not Billy Snowden’s little sister? No, you can’t be – not that young bairn!’

  She wasn’t sure whether or not he was teasing, or if he had her mixed up with one of her sisters. She had often been with Billy when he and Harry had hailed each other, or met at harvest time when the whole village turned out to bring it home, the girls and women wearing their bonnets to keep the sun off their heads, and the men with their shirt sleeves rolled up to their elbows.

  She fingered the end of the thick brown braid which hung over one shoulder, and told him, ‘I’m not a bairn any more. I was fifteen in May. I finished school in July and work at ’Hodges’ farm.’

  He continued to gaze at her and then suddenly blinked. ‘Fifteen, eh? Well, good luck with your life, Ellen. The Hodges’re good folk. So, are you planning on staying wi’ them? Not spreading your wings and going to fly from ’village, are you?’

  Elle n looked back at him and moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. Not now I’m not, she reflected thoughtfully, although I might have done before. She shook her head, and as she walked towards the door she heard him begin to whistle a tune that was vaguely familiar. She’d heard it on a penny whistle; Irish, she thought it was, though she couldn’t put a name to it.

  Harry had seen her soft brown eyes, her chestnut-coloured hair. The old song sprang immediately to mind. ‘Fifteen, eh?’ he’d said, tongue-tied himself for once. Fifteen, the same age as his youngest sister Polly, and sister of his best friend Billy. He’d seen the shyness and the signs of burgeoning womanhood. He’d wait.

  He was four years older than her, the same age as Billy, and he’d waited until she was old enough before he asked if they could walk out together; she’d just turned seventeen and she’d said shyly that he must ask her father and Mrs Hodges, and wondered if he had been counting the years. Mrs Hodges said that Ellen was a good worker and she’d be sorry to lose her, and that Cook was particularly put out, for she had said Ellen had good cool hands for bread-making. She guessed though that her parents would be relieved to have the last of their daughters courting, for she was one of eight girls and two boys.

  ‘Summat in ’water,’ her father had mumbled. ‘This village is awash wi’ daughters.’

  They had begun their courtship along the quiet lanes of Holmpton on Sundays when they both had time off, and on one of those days he’d turned up early, driving a two-seat trap pulled by a sturdy mare that his employer Mr Oswald had lent him.

  Her father had watched from their cottage window and asked Billy if she would be safe with him. Billy had looked out and nodded. ‘Every hair on her head, Da.’

  They’d driven down the long road to the peninsula of Spurn Point, where the sea lashed against the prominent finger of land and the estuary surged on the other side, and here it was that Harry told her about the tune he had whistled on that first day and again on this.

  ‘It’s an Irish folk song, I think,’ he said, when she asked him. ‘At least, I first heard it sung by a gang of Irish labourers who came to help with ’harvest one year.’

  He’d taken hold of her hand as they stood watching the seabirds soaring above them, the first physical contact they had had. ‘It’s a song about a girl with nut-brown hair.’

  ‘Nut-brown hair?’ She turned towards him.

  He nodded. ‘The colour of a chestnut,’ he’d said softly, and put her hand to his lips. ‘Just like yours.’

  She’d seen the love in his eyes and she gently moved her hand and reached on tiptoe to kiss him on the mouth. It was the first time she had kissed a boy and she knew she would kiss no other.

  They married the following spring, walking in procession to Hollym, for Holmpton church, as ancient as the nearby crumbling cliffs, was unfit for weddings or funerals in case its medieval walls collapsed on the congregation. All of her sisters and Harry’s were attendants, dressed in their Sunday best with flowers in their hair, and Billy was best man.

  Mr Oswald had offered them a tied cottage on his land near the hamlet of Rysome and said that when the present foreman retired Harry would take his place. ‘It’s a job for life, Harry,’ he’d told him. ‘You’re a good lad. I wish I’d had a son like you.’

  He had no sons at all, but three squabbling daughters and a mean-spirited wife, which didn’t seem right for such a generous and kind man.

  ‘So there you are, my lovely,’ Harry said, coming in on a cold March afternoon. ‘Why aren’t you working your fingers to ’bone instead of sitting there with your feet up all comfy by a warm fire?’

  ‘Because,’ she said, lifting her cheek to take his kiss, ‘I’m feeding your daughter who won’t wait a second when she’s hungry.’

  With a gentle finger he stroked her breast and bent and kissed the top of the baby’s head. ‘What’s she having?’

  ‘Yesterday’s roast beef and Yorkshire pudding,’ she said, laughing, and patted her daughter’s cheek as she gave her father a milky toothless smile.

  ‘Shall I burp her?’ Harry asked, and she lifted Sarah, named after Ellen’s mother, into his arms.

  ‘Where are you off to?’ Ellen fastened her blouse. ‘Have you time for a cup of tea?’

  ‘Mm, no,’ he said, putting Sarah to his shoulder and gently rubbing her back until she gave a satisfying belch. ‘I was passing on my way to ’farrier so thought I’d just check up on you both, see what mischief you were up to. I’m just getting this hoss shod, and when I’ve tekken him back to ’farm I’ll be home. Be glad to get indoors; ’weather’s worsening.’

  He handed the baby back to her. ‘I’ll be about an hour, but don’t rush to get a meal ready; I’ll have leftovers if it’s easier. Just like Sarah.’

  ‘Get away with you,’ she said, and walked to the door with him, looking in satisfaction at the cotton nappies blowing in the east wind and thinking she’d bring them in before it began to rain, and then stood watching him as he walked the carthorse away down the track.

  But he didn’t come home in an hour as he’d said, and it was another hour after that before she heard his tread and then the scrape of his boots on the iron bar fixed to the wall and the rattle of the latch as he pushed the door open. She did not hear the usual cheery greeting and she paused in what she was doing, sensing that something wasn’t right as he came into the room.

  ‘It’s Ozzie,’ he said, with a break in his voice. ‘He’s dead. I found him in ’yard when I got back from ’farrier. Cold he was; no chance of saving him. When I hammered on ’door his wife and daughters were all in ’parlour singing hymns, while Ozzie was lying out there on his own. I went to fetch ’doctor but it was too late.’ Tears flooded his eyes. ‘Best man I ever knew,’ he said. ‘Better even than my own da; would allus listen to what anybody had to say.’

  He swallowed hard and shook his head. ‘They’ve took it bad,’ he said. ‘All wailin’ and weepin’ and cryin’ what’ll they do now without a man in ’house. It’s not lookin’ good, Ellen. I’ve got a bad feeling about this, as well as being devastated over his going so quick and unexpected. Not good at all.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  During the following eighteen months, as Harry helped the foreman to run the farm for Mrs Oswald, Ellen gave birth to another daughter whom they named Maria, but everyone called Mary. It had been a good farming year: the dairy cattle had yielded more milk than usual, and they sold the glut to local cheesemakers; they’d traded some of the young bullocks at a profit; and the harvest had been brought in on time and fetched a reasonable price. Although he hadn’t previously had any experience of keeping accounts, Harry had helped Mrs Oswald as much as he could.

  Then one of the Oswald daughters, Dora, began courting a man from Hedon and he had a different way of doing things; he began looking after the books, and although Harry was relieved to relinquish what he thought of as a chore he was also rather suspicious of the man’s motives, especially when he and Dora announced their wedding date, in what in Harry’s opinion was undue haste.

  Another twelve months went by and Dora’s new husband, Andrew Charlesworth, gave up his work as an accountant’s clerk and took over the running of the farm for Mrs Oswald and her daughters. He gave the foreman, Aaron Jackson, his notice to quit, and told Harry that in future he would be answerable to him.

  ‘Know about farming matters, do you, Mr Charlesworth?’ Harry asked him. ‘About growing grain and fattening up bullocks?’

  ‘I’ve read up about it,’ he countered, ‘I know how to read,’ and looked at Harry as if implying that he didn’t. ‘I’ve also read that American wheat is far superior to English and that it’s hardly worth our while growing it. I’m going to rethink our options.’

  ‘We don’t grow a lot of wheat,’ Harry told him. ‘Though we’ve got good land for arable crops, barley, rape, oats and rye, and root crops o’ course; and Mr Oswald allus did well wi’ cattle and pigs. We’ve allus been a mixed farm, a safer option if one crop fails. But we can’t leave that amount of acreage fallow, so what would we grow in its place? More barley mebbe?’

  ‘That’s up to me to decide, not you,’ Charlesworth answered sharply. ‘We’ve no sheep, so I might diversify.’

  ‘Sheep!’ Harry looked askance. ‘But our land here isn’t suitable for sheep rearing. Up on ’Wolds with all their grassland, that’s sheep country. Dairy, mebbe; I’ve often thought we could sell more milk to Hull dairies for mekkin’ cheese.’

  It wasn’t like Harry to argue, but as he said to Ellen later, he couldn’t bear to think that Ozzie’s farm, which had been in his family for generations, could be swept away by sheer ignorance and arrogance.

  ‘But surely Mrs Oswald should have some idea?’ Ellen protested. ‘She’s been a farmer’s wife; she would know about such things. I do, and I was onny a farm labourer’s daughter.’

  ‘She’s not a countrywoman; Ozzie told me that some years ago,’ Harry said. ‘He said he was attracted by her pretty ankles!’

  Ellen rolled her eyes. ‘Men!’ she exclaimed. ‘I thought it was because of their cooking – or the colour of their hair,’ she added mischievously.

  Harry grabbed her round the waist and nuzzled into her neck until she shrieked for him to put her down and told him that she was expecting again. ‘So you’d better treat me carefully.’

  He kissed her and said he thought he did, and that she’d better provide a son this time to help him earn some money, for he didn’t think that Mr Charlesworth would give him an increase. Charlesworth didn’t, and he told Harry a few days later that he was going to breed sheep as he’d previously said. ‘My wife fancies seeing lambs frolicking in the fields,’ he smirked, and then glanced suspiciously at Harry, who asked mildly if they’d be breeding them for their fleece or the meat.

  ‘For the fleece, of course. She wouldn’t want to have them slaughtered.’

  Harry sighed as he told Ellen about their conversation. ‘I’m going to have to look for another farm,’ he said. ‘At least, I’m going to ask around.’ He took a breath. ‘I won’t be hasty, but I can’t think that this job will last; it’s not the job for life that Ozzie predicted.’