Budgies and canaries, linnets and lovebirds were definitely not for all who lived in working class communities such as Gravesend and Northfleet. In fact it would be true to say that they appealed to women rather than men and the male members of linnet owning households were definitely not as conspicuous in their enthusiasm for them as their wives. Old Nan thought that as far as birds were concerned you couldn’t go past a parrot because they were a different matter, spending as much time out of their cages as within and having the gift of speech. But she thought you had to think carefully before becoming an owner because for one thing the cage itself would set you back a bob or two and in any case you never knew with parrots with them prone to being delicate. You might spend a lot only to have the bugger drop dead on you. However, should you be lucky enough to be blessed with one of a sturdy constitution it might even see you out. Her Edgar’s Uncle Snowball had inherited one before the turn of the century that had already seen its previous owner out and lived on for years after Snowball had succumbed to the perils of navigating that steep flight of stairs outside The Empire Tavern one Friday evening. In general when it came to birds you couldn’t beat a pigeon or two for a man she thought.
Aunt Mag later pointed out to my mother that Snowball had been well and truly in his cups at the time of his demise. My mother said anyhow bugger how long they lived because what was more concerning was the language they could come out with and it wasn’t natural. Because I had yet to make the acquaintance of a parrot I thought she meant that they were multi-lingual which to my mind would be an asset in case you happened to come across someone needing help in the High Street who only spoke French or German. You could then take them home for a quick translation and become known locally as extremely helpful to foreigners. It might even be more convenient for all concerned to take your parrot with you when shopping. None of the adults in our community seemed all that kindly disposed towards foreigners of course, my mother and her sisters in particular.
It was to be some time before I would discover that the language of parrots had little to do with translation and anyway by then I had already turned my attention to pigeons, birds that every child in the area was familiar with because Old Nan was right and if there was a household pet that men were keen on it was definitely the pigeon, both homing and racing not that I understood the difference. Mr Bassant next door had built what he said was a Pigeon Cree at the end of his allotment bordering The Old Rec, alongside Northfleet cemetery and he was always very keen to explain that his birds were Racing Homers and they could cover nearly a thousand miles in one sweep if necessary. The Cree looked very much like a garden shed to me and indeed he had reserved a space inside for his gardening tools and the wheelbarrow that he pushed laboriously up Springhead Hill twice a week full of vegetables. There was a big open window like space along one side and above it was a special platform with little holes where the birds took off and landed again to enter their nesting spaces. All his birds had names and when he spoke them he did so softly and lovingly, caressing the birds like babies. His favourites were Donald and Ridley because they could take off vertically rising from the wooden platform with no hesitation and soaring up to meet the currents and eddies above before twirling atop of the whirlpools of air. Then they looked for all the world like miniature aerial fighters, the Spitfires we all recalled so vividly from a few years before, tipping their wings and twisting triumphantly one to another. His girls, Betsy and Bella, Florence and Freda were more hesitant which he told us was female behaviour and sometimes they needed encouragement to follow their brothers and venture into the wide arc of sky above the marshland of the Estuary. Then he held them one after another close to his face and whispered to each and almost seemed to kiss each beak before the bird though initially unwilling, suddenly fluffed up her breast feathers and decided to fly.
Sometimes after school Molly and I, at times accompanied by Pat Turner who lived in a cottage very close to the Old Rec Allotments, visited Old Mr Bassant, taking with us a replacement lemonade bottle of cold tea and instructions from his wife as to when she expected him home for his liver and bacon. Then he told us about how clever his birds were and how when he sometimes took them all the way to Dover to visit another Pigeon Fancier, and released them there, by the time he got back to Northfleet in the evening all of them would have found their way home. We wanted to know how they knew their address and why they didn’t get muddled up and perhaps end up in Swanscombe or Greenhithe and Mr Bassant said they used the position of the sun to determine the proper direction for flight. But he didn’t know how they fared if it was a rainy day not that it deterred them because they never once went to the wrong allotment and he knew for a fact there were allotments in Swanscombe. On the way home Molly said that to a bird Swanscombe must look much the same as Northfleet from the air and she for one was impressed. She was going to ask Mr Will Clarke about it the next day at school.
Mr Clarke said he was pleased we were taking an interest in pigeons because the Romans had used them to carry messages more than two thousand years before and in fact Julius Caesar had found them invaluable during his conquest of Gaul. Then Billy Elliott who always seemed to know more than anyone else in the class added that The Greeks sometimes used them to carry the names of victors of various Olympic events to other cities. Mr Clarke said that yes, indeed, that was absolutely true and well done Billy. We were all impressed then especially when he added that he might speak to Mr Cook the headmaster about considering the idea of us having some school pigeons. We might find them more interesting than the cage full of mice in the corner of the infants’ room and we could have a roster for their care. In fact it never happened but it was a nice idea.
At the library in London Road the children’s librarian revealed that it might sound unbelievable but these astonishing birds had always been much more reliable than the postal service and carrier pigeons could accomplish in a few hours what freight services took more than a day to do. Some of them flew at more than sixty miles an hour and never, ever lost their way. Having learned all of this for a time Molly and I were full of enthusiasm for joining a Pigeon Fancier’s Club but it turned out that to become members you had to be sixteen years old and so then we began to lose interest especially since my mother said in her opinion they were Dirty Smelly Blighters and she wouldn’t want them in the back bedroom like some she wouldn’t name. She was referring to Aunt Elsie’s George from the Tooley Street sweet shop who had several birds living in their tiny attic room that he called his pigeon loft alongside extra cartons of cigarettes and tall bottles of Sherbet Lemons bought whilst the price was low. He wasn’t as friendly as Old Mr Bassant but he did tell us about a famous bird that saved the lives of dozens of French soldiers during The First World War. It was called Cher Ami which was French for Dear Friend and had carried a message across enemy lines during a battle. The bird was shot in the chest and lost most of the leg to which an important message was attached but it did not stop flying, continuing even through poison gas. Later Cher Ami was awarded a medal for heroism called The Croix de Guerre which was French for The Cross of War. I wondered if the injured leg ever healed but Aunt Elsie’s George didn’t know and in any case he was becoming tired of the conversation and I never found out and was never taken into the loft to view the birds. My grandmother said that was because he thought I might be light fingered as far as the stored sherbet lemons were concerned.
Typically, once he became aware of my now waning interest in pigeons my father came up with a great deal of information and this was one of the reasons that prevented me from asking his opinion on some matters. His explanations were generally of the lengthy and elaborate variety. But on this particular Sunday lunchtime, after carving up a piece of rather fatty lamb which I was eyeing suspiciously, he started to tell me about the Dickin Medal which he said was the equivalent of the Victoria Cross but for animals. I was cautiously more interested and so I listened. Apparently the first such award was given to a carrier pigeon. In February 1942 an RAF bomber was forced to ditch into the North Sea following a mission over Norway. The plane had been hit by enemy fire and now the crew of four had to try to survive in freezing waters. Luckily they had a secret weapon, a hen bird called Winkie and so they set her free hoping she could fly home to Dundee which was a place miles away in Scotland, and alert their colleagues at the base. Well Winkie flew a hundred and twenty miles and was found covered in oil and exhausted by her owner who informed the RAF in Fife which wasn’t Dundee but must have been nearby. The position of the downed plane was then able to be calculated using the time difference between it going down and the arrival of the bird in the place called Fife. A rescue mission was then launched and the four men were found within half an hour. They would certainly have died without the help of the pigeon so she became the toast of the base and a dinner was held in her honour. A few months later she became the first animal to receive the Dickin Medal `For valour under extreme circumstances’.
Not too long after this conversation I read of an American bird called GI Joe who saved more than a thousand lives in a village that was about to be bombed and another called Mary of Exeter who was used time and time again to send top secret messages. I learned that there is an inscription on the medals awarded that says `We Also Serve’ which seemed completely appropriate. And a few years ago whilst visiting Bletchley Park with my daughter I found myself paying particular attention to the displays, exhibits and information concerning the valiant feathered fighters of World War Two whose heroic deeds seem so sadly incongruous when placed alongside the myriad of communication choices we now have. Today as long as we have the right connection we can make mobile phone calls, send and receive text messages, send emails and contact all and sundry via Whatsapp and Facebook at the touch of a button. None of these choice options have quite the romantic appeal of the trusty carrier pigeon, however, fifty thousand of which were drafted into service in the 1940s to carry messages, deliver medicines and bring hope to situations that otherwise might have been hopeless.
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