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"Dirty Women"


mazer

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Does this book title ring any bells for anyone? It's about women bargees in the Midlands in WW2. We met a couple trying to trace it (they owned a copy about 10 years ago) and it has to be this one as it mentions the butcher in Atherstone who used to help the women with extra rations. I've tried all the obvious routes and Mick Vedmore of the canalbookcollector blog has checked the other titles for mention of Atherstone - nothing there. Does anyone remember it?

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I suspect a lot of people are going to be leaving this thread very disappointed. biggrin.png

 

Edit, I also strongly recommend anyone considering Googling it turns safe search "on," but then again, it could ease that aforementioned disappointment...

Edited by Starcoaster
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Does this book title ring any bells for anyone? It's about women bargees in the Midlands in WW2. We met a couple trying to trace it (they owned a copy about 10 years ago) and it has to be this one as it mentions the butcher in Atherstone who used to help the women with extra rations. I've tried all the obvious routes and Mick Vedmore of the canalbookcollector blog has checked the other titles for mention of Atherstone - nothing there. Does anyone remember it?

Surely you mean IDLE WOMEN by Susan Woolfitt, a name that modern enthusiasts have adopted for the wartime female 'trainees'.

 

edit - for punctuation

Edited by pete harrison
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Does this book title ring any bells for anyone? It's about women bargees in the Midlands in WW2. We met a couple trying to trace it (they owned a copy about 10 years ago) and it has to be this one as it mentions the butcher in Atherstone who used to help the women with extra rations. I've tried all the obvious routes and Mick Vedmore of the canalbookcollector blog has checked the other titles for mention of Atherstone - nothing there. Does anyone remember it?

Idle in it?

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I suspect a lot of people are going to be leaving this thread very disappointed. biggrin.png

 

Edit, I also strongly recommend anyone considering Googling it turns safe search "on," but then again, it could ease that aforementioned disappointment...

 

 

not really. Unless we have a lot of perverts brouwsing. Or, are you saying that the average male (or even female...wink.png ) boater on here, is a pervert? I would like to think, that most of us here, are more sophisticated than that. At least untill after proper introductions... biggrin.png

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Must admit...I thought it sounded like the book...'Idle Women'

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Idle-Women-Working-Waterways-by-Susan-Woolfitt-/251305281336?pt=Non_Fiction&hash=item3a82f64738

 

 

Synopsis

This work deals graphically with the difficulties, discomforts and dangers faced by inexperienced trainee boatwomen during the "war effort" in World War II. The author was one of the women operating cargo-carrying narrow boats on the canals of the Midlands. The women sought to match the inherited skills of the working boat families. The book also reveals the pleasures of country landscapes and the satisfaction of achievement when things went well. The everyday life on "the cut" is described, working in what was predominantly a man's world. Also described is enrolment, first impressions of the boats and crews, a bombing raid on the Regent's Canal, loading at Regent's Canal Dock, being frozen in, and trips to Birmingham and Oxford. The title of the text refers to the badge that trainees were awarded bearing the letters "IW" (for Inland Waterways). The wearers were dubbed "Idle Women". This text was first published in 1947 and re-published in 1986. This edition comprises the whole of the original text.

Edited by Bobbybass
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The real "Dirty women" were known as "Cut side Sally's" and were prossies who worked the canal between Wolverhampton and Birmingham, "Favours" were available for cash or coal or whatever was useful. I have never seen this written about in any canal article so theres something bawdy for a researcher to get hooked on although the subject you may find a bit hard.

 

There are boatmen still around who will give you first hand tales of these goings on............. cue anyone?

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Many thanks for suggestions but no, it's not Idle Women, they've read that one too. Yes, research on google and amazon threw up some interesting ideas but no mention of this book. I'm guessing it's been out of print a long time, they must have stumbled upon an old copy.

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Hi

 

Tom Foxon refers to these ladies in one of his trilogy of 50s boating with the phrase. " Coal for hole, slack for arsehole".... I spent time on boats in the 60s in Gas Street, when Broad Street tunnel was longer than it is today and I was told that it's dark recesses was a common place for nocturnal activities with these women. Never saw it myself, you understand.......

 

Sorry, can't shed any light on the book.

 

Cheers

 

Dave

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I was curious where Tom got his saying from. I asked him at the Waterways Conference yesterday, at Birmingham University. Tom said it was in common usage within the Black Country.

 

Ray Shill

 

Its one I heard a couple of times, not when my nan was in earshot though. judge.gif

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