Testing our school masks was a gas!

WHEN I was nine, in 1940, my mother took me and my brothers to our local town hall to be fitted with our gas masks. We were told to take the masks to school, where training would be given. The mask came in a stout cardboard box and had a strong cord that slotted through holes on either side. At school, it was stressed we would be punished severely if we failed to bring the mask every day and hang it on the back of the chair. In the early days, we had to take them out at playtime. Hessle Junior School had mixed classes — the boys would split into boisterous gangs and play war games. (We were the British and the others were German!) One day I was caught on my own and set upon by an enemy gang. It was then I found out what a great asset the gas mask was. I whipped it off my back and swung it around my head, flooring several of the enemy. While the battle was raging, the whistle blew for the end of playtime. At that moment, the cord became detached and the box and mask separated, landing at a teacher’s feet. The next day, in front of the whole school, I received three strokes of the ruler and had ten house points deducted. A week later, an Army lorry and a removals van came to school to fit extra filters to our gas masks. Each class had to file out and hand in their masks for filter fitting, prior to being taken to the van. With an adult holding your hand, you were taken through a rubber curtain wearing your mask into a gas-filled interior and then out through a door. I thought this was great fun. A girl called Pat Brickleband became hysterical and kicked and screamed so much that, as a last resort, a volunteer was needed to test her mask. Being a show-off, my hand went up like a shot. The next day at assembly I was singled out for praise, given a round of applause and 20 house points. A net gain of ten points, but there was no way of rescinding the three strokes of the ruler! Jim parkinson, hessle, e. Yorks.