While the able-bodied left villages all over England to fight in the forces, those left behind wasted no time in doing their bit, in myriad ways, to help the cause.

Apart from providing useful additional resources, home-front activities helped people to believe that they were doing something worthwhile. One such activity was knitting!

In July 1940 The Somerset Countryman, Official Organ of the Somerset Rural Community Council, reported on the work of the Somerset Comforts Fund.

“The knitting of comforts for men serving with the Forces has become a well-established rural industry. As in the case of other rural industries, it has been found that a distribution centre is necessary if the maximum use is to be made of the care and craftsmanship which have been exercised.”

To this end, and to supply other comforts, the Fund was established in November 1939, the County Territorial Army Association providing office accommodation and storage rooms to minimize overheads. Progress was rapid:

“ The Committee has kept in touch with the commanding officers of the units raised in the county. Requisition forms giving particulars of the articles available have been sent to each unit, and according to the information obtained from these returns such things as are really required have been issued. The satisfactory financial position of the Fund has enabled it to purchase comforts that cannot be made in the home and to supply indoor games that have been much appreciated during winter evenings. Latterly equipment for cricket, basket-ball, boxing, swimming, quoits etc. has been supplied, and special requests for wireless sets, gramophones and dartboards have also been met.”

In order to build up and maintain a flow of comforts, collecting centres were established throughout the county, to which groups of workers could take finished articles and from which they could obtain advice and information about the Fund’s more urgent requirements. In setting up these centres the Fund received much help from the chairmen of District Councils, whilst the W.V.S., the Women’s Institutes, Mothers’ Unions, women’s branches of the British Legion, and other voluntary organisations all assisted in the formation of groups and in publicising the Fund’s activities.

To conserve the supplies of wool, knitted comforts were collected from units when they no longer wanted them so that they could be cleaned, repaired and stored for re-issue in the autumn.

As a result of all this effort, by July 1941 over 74,000 articles had been forwarded to men in the Forces.

During the following winter, the fund was specially asked to help in the provision of books, musical instruments, records, indoor games, wireless sets, film projectors and in fact any comforts which would lend themselves to the encouragement of cultural pursuits among young soldiers.

In October 1943 the magazine reported that the appeal had obtained a mobile library, which was travelling over 200 miles per week throughout remote country areas. In addition they had acquired, amongst many other items, 40 wireless sets, eight pianos, 16 gramophones together with hundreds of records, and a loan of 20 ping-pong table tops. Donated musical instruments included violins, mandolins, an accordion and a drum.

Efforts were also made to develop simple hobbies and handicrafts, especially woodwork. The Fund purchased a supply of carpentry tools and fretsaws and during the long summer evenings the men spent hours making scale wooden model aeroplanes, which were most useful for identification practice. They also made toys, cut-out animals and small wooden articles like bread boards, fire screens etc., for the home. Other men built doll’s houses, complete with furniture, which they donated to various children’s hospitals in blitzed towns.

As for Wrington, during the first months of the war the tireless Mrs. Anson established a knitting depot in the village, where members beavered away making balaclava helmets, mittens, pullovers, gloves and socks. The Captain of one ship had put in an order for 150 helmets and Mrs. Anson’s group had undertaken to supply the demand. The committee arranged various activities to raise funds to buy the wool.

Throughout the war, all kinds of scrap materials were collected and recycled and the Parish Council was quickly involved in organising collections of waste paper and old iron. However, rather amusingly, before they could swing into action, the local Scouts beat them to it, with the establishment of paper and cardboard dumps in Yeomans and at the Post Office in Redhill, from where it was taken to Bristol for recycling. Despite the Parish Council Clerk organising a scrap iron dump in Mr.Kingcott’s yard in Silver Street, the public were slow to respond, but with a little publicity the campaign was soon meeting with a steady response. Within a few months of the appeal’s launch, an estimated 4 tons had been collected.

At Christmas 1940 members of the WI responsible for waste paper collections in Wrington and Major Long, the supervisor of scrap iron, were invited to discuss salvage proposals put forward by the RDC. It transpired that the proceeds were not reaching charities as they should in some areas, and centralised collection was proposed.

In March the following year, the Parish Council Chairman expressed dissatisfaction with the iron waste collections and insisted that in future scrap from Wrington would pass over a weighbridge before leaving the village. By May the Council were urging residents to save paper, bones, metal tins, rags and rubber and expedite collection by grouping these materials outside their premises on collection days.

Then, as now, ordinary citizens were able to give blood to the donor service as a means of helping others. The Weston Mercury carried an interesting story about the village:

“ Wrington family’s fine example. All blood volunteers. Four members of one Wrington family have become members of the panel of the Army Blood Transfusion Service. They are Mr.S.H. Collins of Court Farm, his wife, their son Mr. H.G. Collins and their daughter Miss E. Collins. Miss Collins told a reporter ‘We have all given blood and we do not feel any the worse for it. My sister Barbara, who is under 21, has had a test but has not yet given blood.’ Another member of the family, Lance Corporal N. Collins, is serving with the Royal Army Service Corps. Of the adult population of 1,200 in Wrington, over 200 have been listed for blood transfusion.”