The History of Ruddington Depot
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Three of the buildings without mains electricity had been used originally to store empty bomb and shell cases before they were filled. After standing empty since 1945 they came into use in the mid-sixties. Tim Bloodworth’s mother worked there:
“When I was about 10 there was a job vacant on the Depot so she went what they called ‘fee-ing’. Empty ammunition boxes were brought in and emptied out, to make sure there were no live rounds left in them. Then the letters FFE (free from explosives) were painted on them. After that she went into the office.”
Roslyn Wilson did the same job, and also went later into an office job on the site.
“We emptied out all the packing from the various sized boxes and sorted it into bins for recycling. There was no heating in the buildings, because of the danger of live ammunition, which had sometimes been left inside. We stacked the empty boxes outside in long lines in all weathers, even in the snow, but in summer during the mid-day break we sun-bathed on the blast banks.”
Married women were increasingly returning to work. Some used low-level, often part-time work as the first step back onto the career ladder.
Times of full employment often bring about labour shortages, and in the 1960’s some vacancies for staff at the Depot remained unfilled. The shortage of groundsmen was relieved by teams of prisoners from Nottingham Gaol who were being prepared for release. Harold Lowe watched them working from his house:
“That 10ft. high security fence was right in front of us. We used to have prisoners coming by every day. Some used to take their shirts off and sunbathe. There would be three or four of them, and we used to talk to them after they cut the grass, and pass them some food over. They were quite harmless. Some of them were very nice.”
Such tolerance and acceptance was appreciated and sometimes repaid. When Roslyn Wilson’s daughter was a toddler one of the prisoners who cut the grass along the Avenue and round the bungalows, gave her a Christmas present. It was a large cuddly toy rabbit he had made in the prison workshop.
The Story > Chapter 8 > Section 8.04