VT Coughtrey - The Knifegrinder

NOTES	The Church Army hostel in Ashleigh Road, Leicester was my first experience of dormitory life but, more importantly, it was my first encounter with the dossing fraternity. I say fraternity, because practically all dossers were men. I was taken in for the night on the recommendation of the CAB girl and told that if I wanted to stay longer I would have to pay rent. The Church Army captain explained that this needn't be a problem. Provided my conduct was satisfactory he would give me a letter next morning for the National Assitance Board. (Welfare has gone through a ridiculous number of name changes since then, as successive governments have attempted to change the philosophy and image of state handouts). They would then give me a voucher for a week's full board. This process could be repeated every week if necessary.
	To my surprise, I found the company congenial enough - decidedly interesting, in fact. Although it is not done in such circles to ask questions, this rule is more than compensated for by a general readiness to volunteer information. I found the personal stories of my fellow dossers fascinating and their conspiratorially subversive attitude to conformist society invigorating. But these dossers were all middle aged or old and paradoxically conservative and easily shockable in many matters. I recognized that circumstances or weakness of nature rather than true rebelliousness had forced them into opposition to respectability. Many, in fact, had never recovered from active service in the War. Nevertheless I quickly warmed to them, not least because they accepted me unquestioningly as one of them, despite my youth. These were not real tramps, the romantic and sturdily independent loners of literary fiction. In fact, I have never met anyone I would describe as a tramp. These men were can't‑copers, no‑hopers and a sprinkling of men such as gamblers and wide-boys who swung regularly between wealth and destitution. I was to learn that there were many levels in the dossing world, from fairly stable hostel residents at the top to meths drinkers on bomb-sites near the bottom. However, even at the top level into which I had stumbled, no-one stayed around for more than a few months and most dropped a level or two now and again. For that reason, they knew the road well enough and were a rich source of useful information and tips for survival.
	The next day I went as instructed to the National Assistance Board (NAB) only to be informed that I must first go to the Labour Exchange, apply for at least one green card job (see chapter 23) and return with a note either of acceptance or rejection from the employer, in order to apply for a form B1. That was the form for people who were destitute but genuinely looking for work, or who had just been given a job. The B1 had then to be taken back to the NAB. At the Labour Exchange, I was told that nothing could be done without a National Insurance Card. I could, however get an emergency one from the National Insurance Office. I eventually located the National Insurance Office, got an emergency card, took it to the Labour Exchange and was given the inevitable Green Card for a job. The factory was miles away, in Thurmaston, but I trudged over there. Despite my best efforts, the employer accepted me (labour shortage was even worse in the Midlands than in London), but at least I eventually got the B1 when I returned to the Labour Exchange. The trouble was, by the time I eventually got back to the NAB with the form, it was closed. I had thus learned two things. One was the complicated routine and exhausting day's work necessary, when hitting a new town, in order to score cash or hostel vouchers from the NAB; the other was that you had better embark on it all as early as possible in the morning and sort out where all your offices were before the first port of call, the National Insurance Office. Why not use the same emergency NI card in each town? This will become apparent in subsequent chapters !
Sharpening a jigsaw knife to a high degree of accuracy by hand with a little file was no job for a beginner with a useless instructor !	The Captain was understanding about the lack of a voucher and said any time during the next few days would do. The job I had been given must have been due to start a few days later, probably on a Monday. When I finally got the voucher, it was for two weeks because my new employer would be keeping the usual week-in-hand. There was a also a generous cash hand-out, to cover fares to and from work. Initially, I had no intention of starting the job. I was just going to move on when the vouchers ran out. But I found that I actually felt like staying put at the hostel for a bit longer than two weeks and the only way I was going to manage that was to turn up for the job ! It was as a trainee blade sharpener at Carlton Press Knives. Each 'knife' (actually a complex set of blades designed to stamp out things such as jigsaw puzzles) had to be slowly sharpened by hand. Only two or three could be done in a day. The highly trained eye could see, under a bright lamp, whether the blades had been sharpened evenly. My trainer was an irascible man who left me in no doubt that he considered it a terrible imposition that he should have to be lumbered with a clueless trainee. In fact he attempted very little tuition, just yelled in exasperation as I kept ruining the blades.
	Eventually he persuaded the foreman that I was a hopeless case and I was relegated to the bandsaw. This was actually the easiest part of the whole process. All you had to do was to cut pieces of steel roughly into the shape of the blades. They didn’t have to be at all accurate at this stage. It was one of those tasks that could be mastered in five minutes, leaving you free to plough on mechanically thereafter, feeling no pressure of responsibility. It was my kind of job. But it didn’t last. To the despair of the foreman, the immense anger of the man delegated to train me and my own horror, the production manager decided that I’d been taken on as a trainee blade sharpener and that was what I was going to be. After a few more days of destroying blades and getting yelled at, I set out one morning for work but never arrived and was never seen or heard of there again. I’d been there for nearly a month, but on account of the week-in-hand and the fact that I had left just before the fourth pay-day, I'd only had two weeks’ pay, which had gone on board & lodgings at the hostel, and an exploration of the city’s pubs. It was time to hit the road again.