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outside. There was no
television, of course, but the cinema was extremely popular
and provided great entertainment. Not only was there a
supporting picture before the main feature, but there were
also the newsreels, Pathé or Movietone, which dealt with the
main news of the day. Germany appeared to be extremely
dynamic and exciting, not suffering as we were from high
unemployment and poverty. They were building roads and
constructing Zeppelins that crossed the Atlantic. It didn't
seem to be the same country that had been so badly defeated
in the First World War, when many of the population were on
the verge of starvation.
    In the winter of 1936 a couple of hundred unemployed
shipyard workers set off fromJarrow on Tyneside to march
on Parliament, over 300 miles away in London. They wanted
to highlight the poverty and desperate circumstances of the
industrial cities and coal-mining areas of the north. In some
parts of England and Scotland, such as Clydeside, there was
70 per cent unemployment. But in the summer of the same
year we had seen newsreels in the cinema of the Berlin
Olympics, which appeared to show that Germany under
Hitler was booming, with plenty of jobs, holiday camps for
the workers and recreational activities for youngsters, all
organized by the state.
    Other news from overseas was more disquieting. Italy had
invaded Abyssinia, causing the Emperor Haile Selassie to flee
to safety in Britain. Under their dictator,Mussolini, the
Italians were seeking to expand their empire in Africa and
were enlarging their navy. Civil war had broken out in Spain,
and Italy and Germany had sent some of their forces to fight
on behalf of General Franco, who was trying to remove the
socialist government in Madrid. Of course, none of these
events stopped me getting up in the morning, having breakfast
and going to work; I was at least fortunate in having a job to
go to.
    The biggest event, however, and the most talked about, was
the abdication ofEdward VIII, forced to choose between the
crown and the woman he loved, Wallis Simpson. It was
the subject of considerable gossip the length and breadth of
the country, with expressions of great disapproval of affairs
with married women and of divorce in general. There was no
doubt a great deal of hypocrisy over the whole issue. I was not
a prude about sex, and never have been; in fact, I was
beginning to be extremely interested in women, young as I
was. It was at about the time of the abdication that I had the
first encounter with a woman that made me realize they knew
what they wanted and were quite capable of getting it. During
one of my rugby matches I injured my foot and the wound
became infected. I went into the local hospital to have a small
operation on my big toe and had to stay in for several days. I
was extremely well looked after by the night nurse, who was
a lovely woman. I won't go into details, but even now I can
remember the rustle of her starched aprons and the warm feel
of her breath as she leant over me. If we had ever been discovered
she would have been instantly dismissed, and
probably prevented from ever working as a nurse again. Why
she took the risk I don't know, but when it comes to romance
and sex, reason flies out of the window. It certainly made
Edward abdicate the crown and become the Duke of Windsor
instead.
    There were other incidents that relieved the soul-destroying
boredom of the office in the bus depot, and one in particular
stands out, though at the time it did not seem particularly out
of the ordinary. Southern Scotland was used to falls of snow
in the winter months, but in 1937 the weather was particularly
severe. I was in the bus office one day – I think it was
shortly after New Year – when we received a phone call late
in the afternoon. The scheduled bus service from Newcastle to
Edinburgh, which went via the town of Jedburgh, had not
arrived there. Clearly something had happened, but there had
been no news of an accident. The situation was worrying: