Betty Ladenson - My Life

A Jewish Girl Growing Up In London's East End in the 1920s

My Infancy - 1925

I opened my eyes and saw the red insects crawling on the walls. Being three and a half years old, the sight of those horrible things fascinated me and I used to imagine they were people racing each other to reach their goal, the ceiling. My cot stood about three inches from the wall. The room which I shared with my parents was an East End tenement.

I remember it so vividly, the wash-stand in one corner, with a marble top that looked like a tombstone, a cracked china bowl painted with a red rose on it, and a jug to match stood on it taking pride of place. Cramped under the tiny window which overlooked a dirty back yard stood a dressing-table. Next to my cot was my parents’ bed. The far side reached the other wall, so now one can picture how small the room really was. Leading out of this tiny room was the kitchen, which to me was Heaven on earth. The brown sink, the black cooker next to it, the small table and four wooden chairs, that was my home. My mother was a slim dark good looking woman, who always had neighbours in to sit with her, and when she had a couple of pennies to spare she used to say to me,

“Betty, run down to the shop and buy some chocolate biscuits.”

All I ever remember of my father was that he was never at work, always hunting for a job, more on the dole than off it, and having no food during that trying time, when Mother used to lay for hours on the bed, resting, to avoid getting hunger pangs. My ‘Booba’ and ‘Zeida’ (Grandma and Grandpa) lived on the same landing and I was forever running in and out of their living room to pull at Booba’s skirt until she gave me some of her home-made biscuits and bread, so I was never hungry.

My booba (grandma)

Saturday was a great day for me. Mother used to bath me in the old brown sink, then dress me in clean clothes and shoes and told me to go out and play, “but not to get dirty and be a good girl because it’s Shabbas” (the Sabbath day).

Down the dark evil-looking stairs I used to run and dash next door to the Katz family. Mr and Mrs Katz had a house full of children and it was always lively and lots of fun to watch them all chattering away and I used to play with Sybil Katz who was about my age. Being an only child I loved going to that house. Mrs Katz was a massive woman who always had a child suckling at her breast and I stood watching until my eyes watered. It used to fascinate me. She was a wonderful cook and the smell of her food used to permeate the house. Further up the street was a tin-kettle factory, and when the men used to load up their lorries with tin-kettles we used to sneak in and pick up all the pieces of tin which scattered the floor. They were round and shiny and bright, as big as new sixpences, and we played shops for hours, where I was shopkeeper and all the other kids were my customers. Further along there was a lemonade factory owned by the father of one of my playmates, Hilda Cohen, so when we grew tired of playing shops, we watched the men making lemonade and waited until Mr Cohen gave us a sample, then we ran away.

So I was happy, until one weekday Mother dressed me in my Shabbas clothes and said it was time for me to go to Infants’ school. I started to cry and Mother said, “Go downstairs like a good girl because you are nearly four, and a little lady, so go down and wait for me.” I did so, and Mother came down and took me to Buckle Street School. I have since visited this school before it was destroyed by a bomb during the war, and so many happy memories flooded back to me. I imagined it to be huge and the playground enormous. But it was a tiny place, with a hall as big as a lounge in mansion flat today. The playground looked like a glorified back yard, but in those days to me it was an impressive building. Eventually I grew to love it, along with the teachers, Miss Winer, Miss Pyser, the children, the caretaker who used to ring the bell each playtime, even the truant teacher, Miss de Haas who was a tall gaunt woman who wore glasses.

When I stayed away from school I used to hear her speak to Mother and I was cowed under the bedclothes trembling with fear. But my fears vanished once she saw me face to face and I watched her suddenly break into a smile.

“You must be at school Betty if you want to be a clever girl,” she’d say. So away I used to skip back to Buckle Street with the halfpenny Booba gave me safely tucked inside the corner of my hankie which was pinned to my dress. The money bought me sweets and a bun. Once again I had no cares in the world and I was happy.

When I was seven years old I left Buckle Street School and went to a Junior school called Fairclough Street which was further away. The girls and I used to walk home each night and knock on all the street doors of the houses we passed, run away and giggle and whisper, then before reaching home we would pool our meagre pocket-money and buy chips and drown them with vinegar and each pick a chip from the dirty newspaper in which they were wrapped. I don’t ever remember chips ever tasting so wonderful since those days.

One day, on returning happily home from school my mother blurted out that we were going to move. It appeared that the landlord had sold the house and was going to rehouse us in a place in Seven Sister’s Road in north London. I was terrified and cried all night and all next morning. The thought of moving away from all my friends was terrifying. But we went.

To me, it was like living in the country with the East End thousands of miles away. It was an old rambling house which had a long gravel drive leading up to it. There were loads of fruit trees in the garden and French doors which led out to it. But once again we had nothing, just empty rooms with a few sticks of furniture brought from the old place. Mother took me to a nearby school in Blackstock Road and I hated every minute of it, and cried for my old friends.

One night, not long after we had settled in, my father told Mother and me that he was going to give me a treat and take me to the Holborn Empire, which in those days was as prestigious as the Palladium is today. Mother dressed me in my best clothes and I was jumping for joy. Father was a good-looking man, tall and rosy-cheeked. When I walked along with him I had the habit of stooping forward with my eyes down to count the paving-stones, and he would cry,

“Betty, eyes upwards, you’ll get round-shouldered if you keep on like that!”

We got on the bus and I chattered on, asking questions about this wonderful place we were going to in the West End, when suddenly my father looked at me and said, “We aren’t going to see the show, baby, we are going to see a new Aunty of yours, her name is Molly and she’s very nice. She’ll give you sweets and chocolates. But don’t tell Mummy that we aren’t going to see the show otherwise I shall be very cross with you.” Being a kid only nine years old I was thrilled to think that I was told to keep a secret and I was terribly excited.

We arrived at a dark-looking house and went down a few steps to the basement. Father rang the bell and a blond fat woman opened the door. She embraced my father and said,

“I’m glad you could make it, Mike.”

She looked at me and said, “So this is your daughter, eh? The image of you, Mike.” She hugged me to her breast and I thought how awful she smelled. My mother always had a fresh-air smell about her and this woman was so utterly different. I was taken into a musty-smelling room and given some sweets and fruit and was told to be “a good girl and wait for Daddy to fetch you.”

So I sat there and then became fidgety and started wandering around, touching the dark plush cloth that covered the table which stood in the centre of the room, going over to the bay window on which hung dark brown velvet curtains, fingering them. I gazed in awe at the Aspidistra which stood on the wide window-sill of the bay, my eyes roved over to the mantelpiece which was draped with a cloth that had bobbles hanging down along the edge. Over the mantle was a fly-blown mirror on which were pasted pictures of various types of men in battle-dress. I then sat down on a brown settee and hummed a tune feeling quite happy with myself.

Next to me stood a glass case on a little table. In the case was a moss-covered mound which had figures scattered on it. I stared and stared never before seeing anything so pretty and delicate like it. I got up and lifted the glass case and took one of the figures and held it in my hand, and fondled it lovingly. Suddenly it slipped out of my hand and smashed into tiny pieces and panicking I started to tremble not knowing what to do. I got down on my knees and pushed the fragments of china under the settee, then I rushed to the door and tried to open it. But the blonde woman had apparently locked it behind her. I kicked the door again and again and screamed,

“Daddy, daddy, take me home.” Nobody came and I sank exhausted to the floor. After a long time had passed I heard footsteps, then the door was unlocked and my father and the woman entered.

“What are you doing crying, darling? You poor kid, come to Aunty,” she said.

I ran to my father and pleaded with him to take me home.

“Lay her down on the settee Molly, and she’ll go to sleep.”

She picked me up and laid me on the settee and gave me a couple of sweets. I felt a bit better and was hoping she wouldn’t notice one of her china ornaments was missing. After a while I saw my father put his arm round Mollie and kiss her cheek. He put his hand down her blouse and I watched enquiringly.

“Pack it up Mike, the kid’s watching.”

“Ah, she’s alright Mollie. She doesn’t know what we’re doing.”

I wondered why he had never kissed my Mother like that, and once again I cried to go home. “Do us a favour Mike, take the bleeding kid home, she’s getting on my bloody nerves. I’ll see you next week.”

My father pulled my arm and put his coat over my shoulders.

“Don’t tell you mother that we came here otherwise I’ll murder you.”

We left and got on a bus. I fell asleep and don’t remember anything until I woke up the next morning. Next day when Mother set the table for breakfast I nattered away about Aunt Mollie, forgetting about the secret I was to have kept. Father had done out early and therefore couldn’t check on me, and on and on I went.

“She’s not a bit like Aunt Etty, Mummy,” (her sister) “is she Daddy’s sister?”

Nothing was said after that and I was sent to school.

Meanwhile my Booba and Zeida had moved to Dalston, a short bus ride from us, and I loved visiting them. Mother and I would go there once a week. Zeida was a hand-made cigarette maker and I used to watch him work at the bench pulling the tobacco around until it was just right for the weight of the cigarette. It’s a craft that has long since died out with today’s machine made cigarettes.

My Zeida (grandpa)

They lived two huge rooms together with a single aunt of mine who was a cripple and feeble minded. She was a sweet soul and always grinned inanely at me, poor thing. I used to ape her behind her back, may I be forgiven for it, but I played all sorts of stupid tricks on her till she would call for Booba and I was smacked and dragged away. One day during these visits to my grandparents, Mother put her coat on, kissed me and said,

“I won’t be long darling, don’t upset Booba in any way because she’s an old woman and she can’t bear noise.”

I kissed her then carried on playing, running up and down the stairs, then walking slowly, pretending I was a princess greeting my public. The afternoon passed by rapidly and I wondered why my mother hadn’t come back for me. Booba started to undress me and I asked her why she was doing it.

“Be quiet Bettala, you are going to live with us now, if it wasn’t for us you’d be in an orphanage. Your mother and father don’t care tuppence for you and plonked you onto us, may the devil take them both.”

“Don’t you talk about them Booba,” I cried. “I want to go home, I don’t want to stay here. I want my mother.”

My grandfather looked at me pityingly, “Aah, an only child to be dragged around like this, put her to bed, but tomorrow she must go, we can’t have her here.”

And so I went to bed. Booba slept in one room with my Aunt, and Zeida slept in the living room, if you can call it living. I snuggled up to my Aunt Phoebe and kept patting my head,

“Don’t cry Betty, I’ll look after you, you’ll be my friend, eh?”

“Mother, mummy where are you,” I dreamed, “I’m being punished because I laugh and mock Aunty Phoebe, but I don’t mean it. Come back mummy, come back.”

I slept with Phoebe in a big bed with a feather tick for a covering and longed for morning to come. I was determined to run away and find my mother, so my mind began to wander and I began to wish for my mother to walk in - wake me up and say I was only dreaming.

So I slept...

Tomorrow’s Another Day

I woke up to the sound of Booba snoring. It must have been about 5am because it was just getting light and it was very quiet. Snore, snore, blow, I counted them, ten times, fifteen - I must run away, I must run away. I got out of my bed, and dressed, feeling my way around - I must run away, they hate me, they hate me. I crept down the stairs and opened the street-door, and ran like the wind until I was breathless. I sat down on one of the steps of a house, then walked along aimlessly. I had no idea where I was, being in a strange district, all roads looked alike to me. I was lost. By this time, people were pushing past me, hurrying to work and I was jostled from side to side.

Then something pierced my brain and I realised what I had to do. I walked on and on until I saw a policeman coming towards me. I went straight up to him.

“Mr Policeman, I’m lost. I want to go to an orphanage.”

“What’s your name, little girl?” He said.

“Betty. You must take me to an orphanage.”

And that’s how I ended up in a police station. I had a nice cup of tea and some sandwiches, and the policeman asked me all kinds of questions. By this time my grandmother had notified the police that I was missing. I travelled back in a black Maria. Booba made a fuss over me, cried a little, then smacked me soundly and threw a couple of curses at me for causing her so much trouble.

Netta (My Mother)

Next day the problem arose about me getting to school. I was nine years old and longed to see my mother. All the time I prayed to see her but she didn’t come. I hated those horrible two rooms, which were now my home, with the fly-blown glass covering the photos on the wall and a huge sideboard loaded with pieces of cheap glass which I wasn’t allowed to breathe on, let alone touch. My prayers didn’t work. Booba took me to Shacklewell Lane School, told the Headmistress all about me, kissed me, and then left me to get on with it.

The mistress took me into a classroom and I felt thirty pairs of eyes staring through me.

That’s where I met my dear friend, Marie.

Click here for Part 2 of my Story

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