Nine Wartime Lives: Mass Observation and the Making of the Modern Self

273 Pages·2010·1.91 MB·English

by  James Hinton

NINE WARTIME LIVES
This page intentionally left blank
NINE
WARTIME
LIVES
MASS-OBSERVATION
AND THE MAKING
OF THE MODERN SELF
JAMES HINTON
1
1
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide in
Oxford New York
Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi
Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi
New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto
With offices in
Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece
Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore
South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam
Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press
in the UK and in certain other countries
Published in the United States
by Oxford University Press Inc., New York
© James Hinton 2010
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
Database right Oxford University Press (maker)
First published 2010
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press,
or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate
reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction
outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department,
Oxford University Press, at the address above
You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover
and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Data available
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Data available
Typeset by Laserwords Private Limited, Chennai, India
Printed in Great Britain
on acid-free paper by
MPG Biddles Ltd, King’s Lynn, Norfolk
ISBN 978–0–19–957466–7
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Preface
I first visited the Mass-Observation archive at the University of Sussex
in 1979 when my research interests turned to the social history of the
Second World War. Like other historians of the period I found, and used,
much interesting material in the files accumulated by Mass-Observation
on particular wartime topics. But I was also aware of another huge body
of material, diaries sent in by hundreds of volunteers, millions of mainly
handwritten words. At intervals during the next twenty years I dipped into
the diaries, fascinated by the intimacy of their revelations, terrified by their
quantity, puzzled about what—if one ever had the time—one might be
able to do with such a treasure trove. Academic life being what it is, it
was not until I decided to escape into so-called retirement, that I dared to
engage seriously with the war diaries. This book is the result.
I have used a selection of the war diaries to write biographical essays
about nine of the diarists. Most of them wrote hurriedly, posting the
material off to Mass-Observation without any opportunity to revise the
text. In quoting from the diaries I have corrected grammar, spelling, and
punctuation where necessary to convey the sense. I have also added notes
with direct quotation from the diarists, but for the sources of assertions made
on the basis of the Mass-Observation material without direct quotation the
reader is referred to my notes, indexed and digitally searchable, available
from the Mass-Observation archive.
An earlier version of Chapter 9 was published as ‘Middle-class socialism:
Selfhood, democracy and distinction in wartime County Durham’, History
Workshop Journal, 62 (Autumn 2006).
Apart from the diarists themselves, my primary debt is to the Mass-
Observation trustees for permission to use this material and to the archivists:
Dorothy Sheridan, Fiona Courage, Jessica Scantlebury, and Karen Watson
who did so much to facilitate my research. Lucy Allright, a wonderfully
reliable research assistant, helped me with the reading of the diaries,
funded by a grant from the British Academy. Bob Malcolmson, Mathew
Thomson, and Dorothy Sheridan read drafts of the text and gave me
vi preface
invaluable feedback, as did OUP’s three anonymous readers. Others who
have contributed in various ways include Alison Hancock, Rita Lawson,
Jen Purcell, Ronald Sands, Laurie van Someren, and my colleagues in the
Warwick History Department with whom I learned how to reflect on the
historian’s craft. Finally, as always, my gratitude to Yvette Rocheron, not
only for her critical readings, but also for sharing with me a life of writing,
friendships, walks, and love.
JH
Rhyd-y-Sarn
February 2009
Contents
List of Illustrations ix
List of Abbreviations xi
1. Introduction 1
2. Nella Last: Nation before husband 23
3. Gertrude Glover: Moral guardian 51
4. Mary Clayton: Bombed out and keeping going 73
5. Eleanor Humphries: Serving genius 87
6. Lillian Rogers: Birmingham flaneuse 111
7. Ernest van Someren: The good life 137
8. Denis Argent: Between the acts 155
9. The Waltons: A democratic marriage 173
10. Conclusion 199
Notes 207
Bibliography 245
Index 255
This page intentionally left blank
List of Illustrations
1. Nella Last with her son Arthur, 1940 22
2. Gertrude Glover, 1911 50
3. Mary Clayton, circa 1937 72
4. Eleanor Humphries, 1939 86
5. Ernest van Someren, 1946 136
6. Denis Argent, circa 1941 154
7. Matthew Walton, circa 1925 172
8. Bertha Walton, circa 1923 172
Illustrations 1–4, courtesy of Mass-Observation Archive; illustration 5, ©
Laurie van Someren; illustration 6, courtesy of Alison Hancock; illustrations
7 and 8, courtesy of Rita Lawson.