The first rumblings of war

         
The Cenotaph, London, on Armistice Day 1938 - featured in the front cover of the Woolworths House Magazine, the New Bond. No-one wanted to believe that there would soon be another war with Germany. In the late 1930s memories of The Great War of 1914-18 were still very strong.  Virtually every adult had lost a brother, sister or close friend - and no-one wanted it to happen again.

When Hitler invaded the Rhineland in 1936 the world held its breath.  News of the German Chancellor's policies to get Germany back to work, with major public works projects and investment in planes, tanks and re-armament, filled everyone with dread.  But they did not want to believe.

Then in 1938 when Neville Chamberlain stood on the tarmac at Croydon Aerodrome with his famous piece of paper, proclaiming peace in our time, but allowing Herr Hitler to "annex" the Sudetenland, everyone sighed with relief and for the most part got on with their lives.

         
But it was an uneasy calm.  Re-armament in Britain was accelerated, and although the frenzy of sandbag filling eased after the Munich crisis, the training for Air Raid Wardens and the issue of gas masks continued as before.

In many towns Woolies colleagues took the lead in civil defences.  Sometimes every ARP warden came from Woolworth, as well as auxiliary nurses and volunteers.

Staff from Woolworth's Metropolitan Regional Office put on a play about the ARP in 1937. Two years later they were doing it for real.
         
ARP Training in a Woolies store in 1937, One colleague is testing a gas-proof outfit, while the others look on. Correspondents to "The New Bond", the Woolworths colleague magazine, made light of it, but the gas mask training was scary and the prospect of air raids filled colleagues with dread.
         

The Germans used mustard gas in The Great War to devastating effect.  Some servicemen who survived the attacks in the trenches suffered chronic respiratory problems in later life, and many people knew someone who suffered.  In the late 1930s every man, woman and child was issued with a gas mask, and was trained in how to use it.  Many local authorities arranged mock gas attacks to drill local people and the air raid police, and these were very frightening.  Woolworth staff had to keep their gas masks under the counters and be ready to put them on if the warning sounded.
         

The Manager and Deputy Manager of Woolworths at Wolverhampton show staff how to wear their gas masks. A shocking sight from 1938.
         
The picture shows colleagues in the large store at Wolverhampton receiving their gas mask training from the Store Manager and Deputy Manager.  Colleagues in the background are looking on aghast, and all must be hoping that the worst would never happen.
         
Tin-toy tanks on Woolworths toy counters in 1938. Weeks later the factory was making the real thing. While the toy counters were filled with model tanks and planes, more and more factories were producing real armaments. Sixpenny aeroplanes on the toy counter in Woolworths in 1938. Weeks later the factory was making the real thing.
         

Fearing war, a Woolworths colleague predicts the next range of sixpenny products that the Buyers will be offering - anti-aircraft umbrellas, bullet-proof vests and gas masks in pastel shades!
         
One colleague drew a cartoon for "The New Bond" suggesting some new lines that the company would stock if war broke out.  Bullet-proof vests to be sold in sixpenny parts, anti-aircraft umbrellas for sixpence and gas masks in special shapes and shades for the ladies.  But another contribution in the same magazine shows a much more frightening picture - a colleague's vision of what another world war might be like.
         
This shocking prediction of what World War II would be like was drawn by a colleague at the F. W. Woolworth store in Pontypridd (No. 98) and appeared in The New Bond house magazine in 1938.
         
After war broke out such a picture would have been treated as sedition - and the artist might have been jailed.  But in 1938 it sat somewhat uncomfortably alongside a crossword and knitting pattern.  Fortunately only two of our stores were "invaded" - Jersey and Guernsey in the Channel Islands.  You can find out more about that in the 1940s Gallery in the Woolworths Virtual Museum.
         

1930s Gallery Home Page

Opening gambit - transforming the High Street   Flotation on the London Stock Exchange
Working for Woolies in the 30s - a day in the life   The first character merchandise hits the shelves
Amazing lengths to keep prices below sixpence   Buying ingenuity
Eclipse & Crown - the nation's favourite records   Our first Ladybird items
Royal events in the 1930s   Launch of "The New Bond" colleague magazine  Rumbling of war in the late 1930s
Price quiz - dateline 1939