# Tempus Fugit - Consumation



## Divus (Nov 18, 2012)

Herewith a very different genre for me - away from horses and dogs.      But does the story  have appeal? - there could be more to come.

* Tempus Fugit  -     The Dirty Deed was Done - Consummation. *

I suppose Mother was once seen to be as  a dark haired beauty.     Mothers are not usually viewed as being attractive, beautiful or sexy by their sons.   Such thinking would be deemed to be unhealthy.       From snippets I remember from the past, Irene had gone up from Brighton to live in London where she has found a lowly job working in a tobacco kiosk.       Those were the days in 1938 when even a small  shop could make a living by selling packets of fags to passers by, one of which  happened to be my Father.    He was at the time a young twenty year old junior police constable; affectionately known by the inhabitants of London as a ‘copper’ or ‘rozzer’.   All he wore to defend himself was a uniform, a badge and a number on his collar.    His only weapon was a truncheon, a sort of Irish shillelagh without the knob on the end.   He would have been trained to be a dab hand at walloping the drunk, the outrageous and the unruly.    He too was a handsome impressionable young chap who had attended, alongside a future Prime Minister of England, a minor public school in Margate.  For the rest of his life he lived in London and only went back from time to time to make a fleeting visit to his doting Mum and Dad.   He never made a habit of the trip and I often wondered why.

In those times, coppers walked everywhere.    They were issued with tough strong black leather boots to ease the aching feet and all Dad had to do in payment was to keep them polished.     Dad was also issued with a helmet, the design of which is still in use today although by a very different type of British policeman.    I cannot visualize my father thumping anyone.    He was a gentle man.    If he wanted to bring someone down to size he was very capable of doing it with words.     Anyway, there was always another copper just down the street and all he had to do to summon up help was to blow his whistle.       In those days  the chances were that a passer by might help in times of severe strife whereas  nowadays decent onlooking citizens  merely look on.

Dad would have met Mum when he was doing his beat, that is  a regular walk about a section of the patch managed by his local police station.        Dad came to know the area around the Elephant and Castle like the back of his hand.       Decades  later, I found out that he knew all the villains on the patch as well.    To many of the citizens he would be instantly recognised as their local beat copper.    Dad would have been addressed by them as ‘Officer’ because that is what he was ie: a Police Officer  with a warrant card.     Some citizens, mostly  those who invited him indoors on cold wet nights for a cup of tea or  piece if cake might have known him as Frank, for that was his policeman’s name.     Mother probably called him: “Darling”  because although Dad bought  from her the  ciggies which were eventually to be the death of him, he was probably more interested in the fact that she was a shapely, lonely, young woman recently up from the sticks.   Albert Frank had a winsome smile which I suspect he made full use of.

My guess looking back on the dates was that Dad was still a probationer when he met Irene, which was Mum’s name.   That meant that he lived in the Section House namely a small building situated close by the Police Station in which  each of the young policeman had a room of his own.   The facilities would have been shared.     In other words the section house was a sort of barracks similar to those one still finds today  housing the Gendarmerie in France.  When the riots occurred, the police would always be on hand even if they were not officially on duty.      One wonders how the Old Man got on for private and personal entertainment.   Irene certainly would not have been allowed back in Dad’s room, unless he smuggled her in.     I also doubt whether her landlady would have let her bring a fella back to the house and that is assuming she had her own room.    Irene probably shared with another young single woman and the idea of threesomes  was just not thinkable back in those days.       No, I have sometimes wondered just how I came to be.   But I did, so they must have found a secluded gooseberry bush somewhere.       Some sixteen years later, if I had not found an abandoned shed on the edge of the common I would have been a very frustrated young man.    It was not until twenty years on that the automobile came into common use and from then onwards  pursuing the delights of nature became easier.      Back seats in cars weren’t designed solely for carrying passengers there was a lot of other carrying on.     

One day Irene must have gone to Albert and said : “I’m late”.       Dad most likely replied : “Oh” and thought :  ‘Oh Gawd.    My sergeant won’t like that piece of  news‘.     Most likely the thought must have crossed his mind as to whether he was or was not the perpetrator of the dastardly deed.        He would have known, of course, that he might well have been.    But he worked in a world where guilt had to be proved.     I strongly suspect that is exactly why in the first place  he had moved up from sleepy coastal Kent to the denizens of vice around inner London.  He was not the sort to  wait until police college to sow his wild oats.      Dad knew that if he wanted to get laid then the best place would be where the cookies were displayed  in the shop window  or should I say kiosk.            

In that era, innocent young constables were not allowed to marry without special dispensation but the Commissioner of Police would have been well aware that his young recruits were not chosen for their shy  nature.    The role of Hendon Police College would have been to feed them up  and to turn  ex-school prefects into lusty bold young men.        The Police in those days did not ever employ women who were in that era frowned upon for even wearing trousers let alone a  helmet.    There was no such thing as an  office romance in the Constabulary.     So unless the boys were of a different persuasion, which would have been illegal, it was expected  that the cadets would  assuage their  testosteronic desires by other means, even at the risk of  making them blind.         For young coppers to put a young innocent maiden in the family way could not have been unusual.       Pills in those days were made of aspirin.    

Inevitably Dad’s Sergeant would have given the Old Man a lecture.   He would have told him the facts of life, as if Albert did not know them.     He would have also asked Albert if he were being deceived, bearing in mind he was a handsome, upstanding  young chap with a promising future.     Poor Albert must have been devastated.     Even if the Police Force gave him a dispensation, he would have a black mark on his record for ever more.       On the other hand there would have been Irene and she could be very persuasive if she tried.         She would have blackmailed Albert into doing the right thing by her if necessary.   She knew that to be an unmarried mother was no sinecure and that social security payments were a benefit  of a future age.    She would have to go back to live with her mother,  whom I later found to be a very disagreeable person.     For sure I would not have fancied living with her and I was destined to be  her grandson even if I was not to be Dad’s son.           

Many years later there was a whisper about Dad having taken up with another doxie.   Mother would have  had to turn up on the doorstep, big belly and all.    I can well imagine the scene filled with strident voices and pointing fingers.     Inevitably Mother got her way with Albert just as he had had his way with her.    Somehow by fair means or foul the date was set for the nuptials.    

There are no photographs of the big even but  there is  a marriage certificate.   It was in the sunny month of  August 1938.      My birth date is just a few months after the registry office ceremony, so I must have held the prime position at the wedding.       Did I hear Albert say in muffled tones the words: ‘I do”.     I do not remember.  All I would have known was that he ‘must have done’.     For sure the ceremony  was no grand affair and I don’t think ether the groom’s or bride‘s parents were present.     In those days you could not buy white wedding dresses with expanded waistlines.       Anyway the vicar decreed that only pure young ladies who had saved themselves were fit for white weddings in churches.   Then there would have been the expense which neither bride nor groom could have afforded.       The big advantage of the registry office was that the dress worn for the ceremony could be any colour you wanted it to be, except perhaps white.    Dad probably wore his Copper’s black uniform - very smart with the buttons polished.   His helmet would have gone under his right arm.  Irene would have clutched at his other arm because no doubt she was wearing high heels.   She would have made her own dress and allowed for the need for alterations in the future.      Dad’s truncheon would have been tucked away after all there would be no immediate use for his tool.      As it was,  I was never ever told about the reception, nor about any  witnesses.      Mother rarely drank, not even Mother’s Ruin, so it must have been a very sober affair. 

I do know that the young, not  so innocent, couple  came to  live in one of the side streets of a grotty part of south London, just a few miles  from Dad’s Nick.    He would have caught the bus to work.     Even before the War,  it was  not a salubrious area  and nowadays the area is best known for its high quality ganga.      These days Dad would not be  permitted to walk the beat alone  thereabouts and certainly not  without wearing an armoured vest and a steel helmet.        But no doubt then  it would have been an exciting new venture for the newly married couple who had been brought together by the lusting of my father and the unwelcome prospect of me.    To be fair to her,  I never ever saw Mother as an eager seductress.     What I got out of the arrangement, apart from life itself, was a surname beginning with ‘G’ instead of ‘B‘.         

I have never been convinced that either Mum or Dad was that excited at the thought of my  imminent arrival.   Although somewhere up in the attic  there is one early coloured photograph, now faded and crumpled, which  must have been taken in 1939.     It shows me sitting on my Father’s lap alongside Mother.    

In the photo we were  each smiling but we did not know then what total  War was to  bring to us.

To be continued


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## Kevin (Nov 18, 2012)

A fascinating look at an era (and place) I know little or nothing about. I think your choice of genre worked out fine. It certainly seems to be a more likely success than an alternative such as _Not_ _exactly planned Equinine procreative Tales, _or _Doggies might've jumped the Gun._
 I was shocked to learn about people of that time actually engaging in _activities_, but upon further reflection realize that of course, logically it would follow (they must've produced, or re....... that is, somehow) and  I guess that they might've also actually been young. Ok, I could see that. It's too bad that the females apparently did not appreciate such _movements. _As an a aside, I wondered if the later car seats were covered in leather or some synthetic. Hmmm. I guess they were larger back then, too.

_Truncheon, gooseberry, doxie, shillelagh_- I love it. We don't know them words over here (for the most part) I have a shil-lay-lee. Made it myself. Awesome (over here that means good) 

Tough subject- Parents...doing things (yech) must be an American thing. We're so uptight, or so I'm told..
Smiling in old photos - Are you sure? (they never smile back then...do they? they always look like foriegners, or cardboard or something)

I'm sure there was some commas missing... I'll leave that. There was that one sentence near the end: "But no doubt then..."  I read it a few times, and I know what it means, but I thought it was..._awkward. _ In the meantime, I was entertained. Thank you.


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## Divus (Nov 18, 2012)

for Kevin
      truncheon - short one foot long polished stick made out of hardwood - probably yew.   Used as a cosh by the police.       
      gooseberry  - a fruit - or an awkward onlooker at a meeting.
      doxie  - an umcomplimentary word to describe a flashy tart - the female sort.
      shillelagh - read truncheon but with British spelling.

'awesome'   a word used by older generations and younger generation but with different meanings.     I use it to mean to be ' in a state of awe'.


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## Winston (Nov 19, 2012)

That was outstanding.  I chortled, then sighed with understanding.

Your piece was a detailed snapshot into a time and place that most of us normally see dimly.  Despite the era and local-specific terms, it read well and was very engaging.

I'm still waiting to write about my mother growing up in 1940's Hawaii.  I look forward to reading more of your work for inspiration.  And, the fact it's just plain good.


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## Divus (Nov 19, 2012)

Winston with yours and Kevin's encouragement, perhaps it is time for me to write the next episode.     Times have changed a loty since those days.

Dv


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## Divus (Nov 19, 2012)

*Part 2      Post War Blues*

How long Arthur and Maisie remained  living in the flat in South London is irrelevant.   Mother inherited  her mother's  acquisitive nature and she would have been working to save enough money to buy a house rather than to rent a part of one.      Father had yet  to prove his worth in the Police.         WW2 was around the corner and it was to break out  in  Sep 1939 when Chamberlain promised to liberate Poland and declared war on Germany.    At the time  I was not even one year old.   Dad was based in an area of South  London not far from the docks which was exactly the industry the bombers were supposed to destroy.   After the so called year long phoney war came to an end the bombs started to fall in quantity  on London during 1940.     The London Docks, upstream at the  Western end of the Thames Estuary,  was an easy enough  area to locate in daylight with or without sophisticated bomb aiming and navigation aids.       Without importing foodstuffs  Britain could not feed its population and the docks and the ships berthed therein were the  lifeline to the Empire.        Overcrowded Britain, located on the same latitudes as Labrador, was vulnerable in that it could be starved into defeat.        

During the bombing raids the civilians were ushered into the bomb shelters whilst the policemen  stayed out on the streets.      The first year of war, during which  the professional British army was being destroyed in France, was relatively quiet for the civilians at home but in 1940, when abruptly Britain became  the only country resisting  Germany, things started to hot up, literally.   The blitz , the wartime bombing of Southern England and particularly London, started and the Battle for Britain began.   That was when ‘The Few’ fighter pilots saved the Nation.      But whilst those men did a brave job in shooting down planes in daylight, they did not stop the bombs falling on the civilians in the cities.   Then the Germans played dirty and started to bomb at night and against night bombing there was very little the defenders could do especially once the fires had started.       Technology eventually made even night bombing costly for the Germans  but fireman still had to put out the  fires with pumped water.

Mainland Western Europe collapsed against the might of Germany and many nations even collaborated with him - including the French and the Irish.      Luckily for the British after surviving for three years alone against the might of Germany and its allies, the Japanese made a mistake in Asia.    In 1942 Japan bombed Pearl Harbour, the Germans were beaten by the Russians  at Stalingrad and the USA finally declared and joined in on the war on Germany.    The tide of war was to turn from then onwards but it would be three more years before hostilities ended and during those three years the bombs just got bigger and so did the level of  destruction.     

The  police service  was a reserved occupation and Dad did not have to join the forces.  Indeed unless he was going to be an officer he was strictly forbidden from joining up.         He was doing his bit by risking his neck on the streets .    Dad’s job would have been  to pick up the pieces in the shattered remains of a house or bombed out shop.     He would  try to work out how many bodies mostly of women and children  were lying in the rubble.     Then no doubt he would sit down have a cup of tea and  write a report.     He never spoke about his experiences and for sure he must have witnessed some terrible events.   One major tragedy when hundreds of sheltering civilians were suffocated to death happened on his patch.      At some stage he must have decided to break away from London and he volunteered for the RAF.    At the time that was not a wise thing to do.  Aircrew did not survive for long especially as the war shifted over towards punishing Germany.    In retrospect I wonder why he made that choice.    Maybe he was shell shocked by what he had already seen.  After induction he sailed away to warm sunny Florida, the land of the free.    To him it must have seemed like paradise.   The only clue I have is that of a photo where Dad is there, all tarted up and sharp in his airforce cadet’s uniform.   He was standing in the back row with a grin on his face    He went to Florida and later onto Toronto to  learn to fly and navigate but strangely he was never commissioned and I never discovered the reason why.     He was undoubtedly an intelligent man and he was used to service discipline.    However he was no killer and he would have been well aware that the idea of dropping tons of  bombs on cities  was to kill.     Maybe he was clever enough to realize that passing out  might shorten his life.   So he fluffed the exams, perhaps deliberately.   I don’t know.     Then after failing he had to sail back across the Atlantic whilst  hoping to dodge the U Boats.       The war took six years and long  before the VE day, Dad was back in police  uniform on the shattered streets of London.      The Police were being demobbed early so as to maintain law and order amidst the ruins.    Despite being officer material for the air force, Dad was still ranked as a lowly constable in the Police and was to remain one for all of his career.  I still to this day wonder why.     Was it his choice or was there another reason?

The blitz by planes had ended by then.  The new scourge  was  the unmanned  V1 flying bomb.  The Germans aimed the launch pad  roughly in the direction of London, lit the fuse and off it flew.    The civilians could hear from a distance the distinctive note of its engine.  They listened  until the noise cut out.   Then they  waited in the  hope of hearing  where it had dropped otherwise it did not matter, they would be dead.       The second miracle weapon, Von Braun’s  V2, was in a way more humane.    It gave no warning.  No one heard it coming, one minute you were doing the washing up, next minute all was oblivion.      I suppose if you aren’t aware its coming, you can’t be frightened of it - or can you?

In the meantime Dad’s fellow trainee pilots were flying over Germany trying to obliterate the German cities.  Two, so called civilised, countries were try to send each other back to the Dark Ages and in the process of doing so,  both sides came to live in tunnels under the ground.        We, Brits did not lose the war quite as badly as the Germans did but neither should we ever have claimed to have won it.  Without the influx of fresh troops from the US and in the East the successes of the Russians in first  holding and then pushing back the Germans       Seemingly when the Bolsheviks deposed the Czar in 1917 they gave away  his rights to inherit parts of  Queen Victoria’s Empire.   Luckily Gt Britain is an island and even the Russians would not have fancied swimming The Channel to reclaim the Czar‘s inheritance. Nevertheless  when the war finished the Russians were only 600 miles away in Berlin.     Anyway  the Americans would not have lent them the landing craft to move  the tanks across the water.    The Russians, poor devils, had to be content to be ruled by the biggest monster created  since Ivan the Terrible - Stalin.   Both Churchill and General Patton seriously thought it to be an idea to invade Russia whilst the armies were still active, luckily no one listened to the idea.     However they might have prevented thereby the Cold War which was to follow in the 1950s.   With the  hindsight of sixty years  over the long run I have nothing to grumble about.   When standing up in Heaven in the queue for a birth certificate  I might have been issued with  one written in Gothic script instead of English.         

What had Mum been doing in the meantime?      Well at the beginning of the war, her and I were both shipped off up North to escape the bombing.  The worry was that the bombs would contain both explosives  and poisonous  gas.    But Mother did not like Yorkshire and as far as she was concerned there were only two towns to live in,  namely London and Brighton. As it was I doubt if ever in her life  she  visited North London beyond Baker Street.     I suspect she would have hitch hiked  the 150 miles back from Yorkshire to London  if necessary.             She would have worked the system  by fluttering her eye lashes and nagging to get herself back to London.  As soon as  she did get back, she made an arrangement for me to live with my Father’s parents    She would have claimed that it was not safe for me to live in London.  So I was packed off  to Ramsgate regardless of the geographical fact that it would be harder to find a closer place to German occupied Europe than the Kentish coast.       The German planes flew over the town on the way to dropping the bombs on London and back again down down the same corridor when the bombs had been dropped.       Luckily where Grandma lived there was nothing to bomb except houses and anyway very conveniently just up the road was  RAF Manston air base.    That would be where the German pilots dumped the unused munitions before they flew back over the channel.

No one knows where was  Mother living once she got back to her beloved London.     Where was Dad living, well he could always stay at the Section house.       One day Dad must have gone home and said Irene: ‘I have volunteered for the RAF‘.  I am sure she would have said :  ‘you are mad‘.      He knew he was as much a risk of dying in London as he was in a plane and to get to be allowed to fly  the plane he would first have to pass all  the tests.   My guess is that he had everything worked out.  The name of the game was survival - nothing more, nothing less.    So he was going  off and leaving her on her own in London at a time when all single women were being conscripted into the military.     She was married but had been left free from the encumbrances of marriage including little me.

The bombs were a constant worry but so were the service men.  Dad run the risk of losing his young pretty wife either way.    Even before the American troops arrived in London during 1942 there had been lots of servicemen from the Nazi occupied countries  cavorting around the hot spots before they went back to the war.  When the Yanks eventually arrived en masse it must have been one of the wildest cities in Europe.     Whisky is made from oats and there are several ways to get one’s oats. The Yanks had money whereas European troops were either willing volunteers or conscripts and neither  group  got paid more than a few pence.  The honour to them was in serving and dying for their country.     You don’t get rich that way and one always had to look on the bright side of life.        Young good looking , fancy free Mother Maisie  was in the middle of it all.       I wonder what she did with herself.   For some life would be short but it was up to the individual to make it fun and I am sure Mother did her bit.   After all, why not?  Dad may not be coming back - ever.  As it turned out Dad was  rated a  glorious failure  and he must have got back to the UK by 1944.   There are no known  records.      Victory in Europe day was in May 1945 and Ma and Pa probably went to the parties.    But did they go together I wonder?    

What was the state of  Mum and Dad’s personal relationship once the war was over?  Well who knows.     I suspect that probably they both had already agreed to go  their separate ways   Dad probably had a ball in the US and Canada.   Mother went to town from her doorstep  and  I went to school in Ramsgate and lived with Grandma and Grandpa.   

As it turned out eventually we all got back  together and lived in Streatham - a slightly upmarket suburb of London - but that is another chapter of the story.
Dv


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## Divus (Nov 19, 2012)

*Belated Intro*

Dear Reader
I started to write this pocket history of a family a year or so back.      I had some idea at the time of writing a book for publication but  doing a deal with a publisher these days is a fraught exercise.    Most of the traditional publishers are fighting for survival against the impact of the electronic book.  So unless I am prepared to finance myself  the book  it will not get to be printed with a nice shiney cover in either hard back or soft back form. 

So please enjoy the tale as written.    All writers, amateur or professionals and especially myself,  like to be read.     The tale  is all based on fact only some of the names have been changed to disguise the innocent.

Enjoy.
Dv

PS There are a few chapters awaiting to be written.


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## IanMGSmith (Nov 22, 2012)

Hi Divus,

Interesting mix of historical and personal interest. 

My Aunt has lived in Braeside Road, Streatham since the war.

Ian


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## Divus (Nov 23, 2012)

Ian, Braeside Rd - sited on the other side of the railway line - almost a world apart from where my Mother and Father lived.   
Your aunt has seen a world of change in her lifetime.    Auntie's story might be worth telling.


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## IanMGSmith (Nov 25, 2012)

Divus said:


> Ian, Braeside Rd - sited on the other side of the railway line - almost a world apart from where my Mother and Father lived.
> Your aunt has seen a world of change in her lifetime.    Auntie's story might be worth telling.



...so right, now in her 90s and as you probably know, Braeside Road's no longer the area it used to be.

Ian


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## Divus (Nov 26, 2012)

Ian, My Father died early in the 198os and with his demise went my reason to visit SW London.

In the 1960s, the London County Council gave 100% mortgages to young couples with the proviso they  moved out of the London (LCC) area.     In this way almost two generations of Londoners moved to the outer London suburbs and further  beyond the Green Belt.    This made way for the waves of immigration which were to follow.          Back in my day one could recognise the area from which a Londoner came by his/her accent.       Nowadays London is the big multi cultural city in which virtually every major language in the world is spoken.     It is not the London into which I was born and hence my interest in recording life in the city as once it was.

Your Aunt has seen it all happen.   It would be interesting to hear her view on the changes.   My Father would today be 94, had he lived.   

Personally I moved out way beyond the Green Belt in 1963 and despite my working in central London I never ever thought to move back and neither did my brothers or or all but one of their offsprings.    Two of us no longer even live in England.

Dv

PS My brother has one son who does still live in London.  The son is married to a Canadian woman and they have adopted two American born children.


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## IanMGSmith (Nov 26, 2012)

One of my dear sisters, a clinical psychologist in South Africa, has many patients who are victims of the ever prevalent violence. Not long ago she counselled a patient who had been brutally attacked and stabbed 7 times, almost fatally. When she asked him where the attack took place, he answered, "Oh, you wouldn't know it." "Try me." she said. 

Yep, I'm sure you've guessed Dv. He was attacked and robbed in Streatham, London where he had been on holiday.  

Ian

PS: 

I personally do not know London at all. From Heathrow, when we arrived, it was a quick freshen up in the mandatory hotel before taking a taxi to Euston and a train out to the Midlands. Back twice to see my Aunt in my car driven by my cousin who knows the way because he grew up there. The air in London burns my throat and I detest crowds and big cities. Haven't even seen Trafalgar square. LOL

My Mum's father was from Northampton and ancestor William Carey (missionary) was from Piddington so now I'm back in one of the gene pools which created me. LOL Of course I could say the same in Newport on Tay, Scotland or County Cork in Ireland where many of my Sinn Fein ancestors were shot dead in the bogs by Brit. troops.

Guess I'm just a mongrel Dv, a British mongrel. LOL


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## Divus (Nov 27, 2012)

Ian, to me the story you tell is a sad one in several respects.    Last years inner city riots should have been treated as a serious warning about the level of social unrest in Britain.

Where I live the air is clean off the Atlantic, the grass is bright green, in the forests run the deer and the wild life and over head fly the raptors.   And in that one sentence lie the reasons why I have not visited Central London  since the London Eye was built.

Dv


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## Kevin (Nov 28, 2012)

Divus said:


> for Kevin
> truncheon - short one foot long polished stick made out of hardwood - probably yew.   Used as a cosh by the police.
> gooseberry  - a fruit - or an awkward onlooker at a meeting.
> doxie  - an umcomplimentary word to describe a flashy tart - the female sort.
> ...


Truncheon- I think I first read that word in _1984._ After looking it up, my high-school brain associated the sound of it with breaking bones. It  has the 'crunch' noise right in it. Much better word than our _nightstick _or _billy-club, _which was what our local 'constabulary' carried at the time. They've long since switched to the east-asian inspired "PR-24". I'm not impressed. You can jab with it, and block, but it's 'whacking' ability lacks something, perhaps density or weight; it's made of plastic.


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