Tony Cunnane's Early Years 1935-53

In my later years at St James', I became a dedicated fan of Lord Peter Wimsey. One of Dorothy L Sayers' detective stories featuring that nobleman had been serialised on the BBC Home Service and I enjoyed it so much that I borrowed Wimsey books from the adult library on Drury Lane near Westgate railway station at the rate of one per week until I’d read them all. They were not an easy read, not for an 11-year old anyway, and the settings were worlds different from my home life. I was fascinated by the wealth of detail in the stories. I used to re-read some paragraphs slowly, over and over again, savouring the facts and admiring the writer's skill.

During my Wimsey period, when asked to write another composition for homework on a subject of our own choice, I filled an entire school exercise book with another piece of fiction set in Wakefield called 'Murder in the Cathedral' – a title suggested by a book that I had just read and enhanced with facts I had picked up from my Dad's occupation as a prison officer. I wrote my story straight off at one sitting without any planning whatsoever. I remember deciding, even before I put pen to paper, that I would fill all 64 pages of the new exercise book with my story. What I cannot remember, however, is why I wanted to fill the entire book at one go. My use of phrases such as “rigor mortis had not yet set in” and “powder burns on the body suggest that he was shot at point-blank range”, remembered from the book I had just read, clearly startled the teachers at school.

My parents were summoned to explain to the Head Master, nice portly Mr Ronnie Paterson who walked with a limp, why I apparently had a morbid interest in murders and post mortems. Perhaps Dad had been telling me lurid stories about goings-on in Wakefield prison? Not so! Dad never talked about his work at home – not in my hearing anyway. “I've had to sign the Official Secrets Act,” Dad used to tell my sister and me, mysteriously. Mum and Dad were able to convince Mr Paterson that I was just a normal child who read a lot and had a vivid imagination. The Head Master then turned to me and sternly told me that the exercise book was meant to last the whole term because of the severe paper shortage. “There is a war on, you know,” he added, a phrase much used in the war years to explain deficiencies of all kinds. How could anyone not know there was a war on, I often wondered, being unable to imagine what life would be like when there was not a war on. The only compensation for there being no war would be, as far as I could tell, that sweets would no longer be on the ration – but it turned out I was wrong about that. And what would the BBC put on the 9 pm news on the Home Service if there were no war stories? Mr Paterson gave me a new exercise book but retained the one containing my story. I do wish I’d been allowed to keep it.

Above:
The library on Drury Lane, Wakefield, that I used to visit at least once per week in the 1940s. The Children's Library entrance was at the far end; the Adult entrance was the main one in the centre but the libraries were interlinked inside and separated only by a glass door. Behind the windows on the right was the reference library where, when I was in my teens, I spent a lot of time learning about the history of Wakefield. There used to be a complete archive of every issue of the Wakefield Express stored in that room but that has long since moved to another location. I took this image in 2007 but the outside of the building is virtually unchanged since the 1940s. Click on the image to pop up a larger version.

The road down the right hand side of the library used to pass through a short tunnel underneath the Wakefield Westgate railway station approach. Since April 2010 the road through the tunnel is permanently closed as part of the Merchant Way bypass project.