The Portsmouth Music Scene
Dancing with danger

DANCING THROUGH DANGER

About 20 years ago Mick Cooper and I contributed to a booklet produced by Portsmouth‘s Museum Service about the lives and experiences of local musicians over the previous half- century. Shortly after that, Mick and I met again, researching the same topic in the wonderful local history section of the city's main library and since then there have been a range of publications, exhibitions, broadcasts, live talks in what I call the ‘Pompey Pop’ Project plus the excellent PME Exhibition at the Guildhall curated by Nigel & Audrey Grundy.

Dancing through Dangeris my latest contribution to these projects and like the others intended as a celebration of the city and Pompey‘s people. It arrives because I was invited to give a talk to the Pompey Pensioners in early June 2024, just a few days before the 80"‘ anniversary of D-Day, so it was the obvious topic. Mick and I are always keen to record what we can of the years before we were involved in our music scene and here mostly days before we were born although Mick did arrive a few months before D-Day.

As a consequence we rely mostly on archival research and the library is again an excellent source, not least through its copies of the local Evening News - back then the newspaper was a major source of information about what was happening, when and where. The well- known national acts who came to the city, broadcast on radio and released (78 rpm) records and in many cases those have been reissued on CD, You Tube (etc) so we can still hear what they sounded like but that is dif?cult with the established local bands led by Wally Fry, Jimmy Harris, Billy Bennett and others — oh for a Time Machine!

Despite that, I hope this publication will give you some sense of what life was like in those tough wartime years - as a ‘Baby Boomer’ my gratitude to the folks back then, whether in uniform or keeping things going at home grows year-by-year and June 2024 is one more opportunity to say a very big Thank You and ensure we never forget.

Dave Allen (dave.allen@port.ac.uk) June 2024

British Newspaper Archive: https://www.britishnewspaperarchive,co,uk/ Burton L (1984) D-Day Our Great Enterprise, the Gosport Society, in Portsmouth Central Library Carter P (1999) Retrieval of Memory: Civilian Morale in Portsmouth During WW2, University of Portsmouth, in Portsmouth Central Library Colin S (1977) And the Bands Played On: An informal history of British dance bands, Elm Tree, Cooper M website https://www..michaelcooper.org.uk/C/pmsindex.htm#gsc.tab=0 Conlon N (n.d) Unselected Lives: The impact of the Blitz on a Provincial City, in Central Library Downing T (2022) 1942: Britain at the Brink Little, Brown Evening News, Portsmouth, Archive, Central Library, Guildhall Square Harper, S (2006) ‘Fragmentation & Crisis: 1940s Admission Figures at the Regent Cinema, Portsmouth UK in Historical Journal of Film, Radio, Television, 26:3, 361-394 Harris R (1960) Enjoying Jazz, Phoenix Lewis J ed. (2nd edition, 2014) Voices from D-Day: Eyewitness Accounts of the Battle for Normandy Robinson Melody Maker Archive https://wwwworldradiohistory.com/Melody Maker.htm Nicholson V, 2011, Millions Like Us: Womerfs Lives in War & P%r:e, Wong, London Stedman J (1995) Portsmouth Reborn: Destruction & Reconstruction 1939—1974, Portsmouth City Council Yates N (2002) Selling Southsea, Promoting Portsmouth 1920-2000, Portsmouth City Council All other “quotes” are from the Evening News

PEACE & WAR

On Monday 1 May 1939 - May Day - the Portsmouth Evening News offered a couple of significant and rather joyful items. The main story inside, covered Saturday’s triumph of the local football club after Portsmouth FC, ‘Pompey’, had beaten Wolverhampton Wanderers 4-1 in the Wembley Cup final — the club's first major trophy. Among the photographs of the match on that Monday were shots of the team returning the city on Saturday evening where they paraded the Cup in front of their delighted supporters in the Guildhall Square. No one knew then that for the worst of reasons they would retain the trophy until 1946.

In the sh/le of those times, the front page was devoted to adverts including one for the Hippodrome Theatre just a few steps south of the Guildhall Square, where Sainsbury’s now stands. The Hippodrome was offering its usual variety bill of British acts for the week plus the notable "first appearance of the World’s greatest Rhythm Pianist", Fats Waller who was probably the first black American jazz artist to appear in the city. Waller shared the bill all week with various other performers, and on Tuesday, not perhaps anticipating the historical and musical significance of the event at least locally, the Evening News review simply repeated the billing note (above) before adding a brief paragraph informing readers that he “included a number of swing classics as well as some of his own compositions” although the next paragraph implied that Waller had taken first place “honours” on the bill.

That Monday paper had a more lengthy review of the staging at South Parade Pier of ‘A Tale of Two Cities’, part of a local ‘Dickens’ Week‘ while the main review on the Entertainments page was another dramatization of a novel, the Hollywood film of Wuthering Heights which was considered “nearly a masterpiece", South Parade Pier had dancing to the Collegians on Wednesday (1/- or 5p today) and Saturday (1/3d) and the city was preparing for the following Saturday’s visit of the King and Queen in preparation for their trip to Canada in the liner Empress of Australia. But for all the celebrations, page nine’s headline warned “Poland and Germany make counter demands: Reich seeks strip of Corridor; New Threat Near’ and also reported “Hitler’s May Day Speech" and the “Conscription Bill before Cabinet”. By Friday, the paper revealed that the local National Service Committee had recruited 774 people to the city's Territorial Army, ARP and other organisations in just four days. It was a moment when good cheer mixed with fears.

The ‘small ads’ that week offered a number of Dancing Schools and there were matinee or evening Saturday events at the Clarence Pier Pavilion, dancing at the adjacent Esplanade and to the east of the city at the the Columbas Hall (Highland Road) and Cumberland Ballrooms, plus further north, the Transport Hall, the Trades Club (Cosham), and the Empress Ballroom (North End). On the first Saturday of July 1939 South Parade Pier offered the Revellers Radio's New Stars, followed by dancing nightly with ‘Gala’ nights on Wednesday and Saturday, while the Bandstand offered Waldini & his Gypsy band. Waldini was actually Welshman Wally Bishop and his band would spend much of the War entertaining troops but they were particularly popular at holiday seaside venues. The Pier also offered holiday-makers Steamer trips across the Solent to visit the Isle of Wight.

ln this last summer of peacetime there was a special event along the seafront at the Pavilion with two sessions on the Sunday from one of the UK’s leading dance bands, Henry Hall and his Orchestra. Post-war ‘Baby Boomers‘ might recognise them from their childhood days listening to the ‘Teddy Bears’ Picnic’, ‘Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf’ or perhaps seasonal specials like ‘The Santa Claus Express‘ and ‘The Fairy on the Christmas Tree’ but from 1932 Hall had led the BBC Dance Orchestra at a time when radio was the public medium for hearing the best of contemporary music. He remained in that position until 1937 after which he toured with his Orchestra while continuing to broadcast a weekly show ‘Henry Hall’s Guest Night’ which ran into the 1950s. Among his many other recordings were versions of ‘Blue Moon’, ‘lt‘s a Sin to Tell a Lie’, ‘April in Paris‘, ‘Anything Goes’ and ‘lt’s the Talk of the Town’. There was also a rather clever love-song ‘The Broken Record‘ which made good use of brief sound effects, tempo changes and repetition.

Hall‘s Band were perhaps representative of the British dance bands of the 1930s in that their sound was usually more gently melodic than many of the American Dance Bands of the period such as those of Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington, Glen Miller or Count Basie, with their closer links to mid-century jazz. To a large extent British audiences could only hear the latter on records or the radio because for more than 20 years from the mid-1930s the unions on either side of the Atlantic could not agree about tours, so after the visits of the bands of Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and others in the 1930s, almost the only visitors until 1956 were solo cabaret artists like Fats Waller, ‘folk’ musicians such as Big Bill Broonzy or occasional official Ministry of Labour approvals for post-war limited solo appearances by jazzmen Coleman Hawkins, Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman. But with little opportunity to see the best of the American bands in action many British dance bands developed a particular English style, catering for the waltz, foxtrot, quickstep and eventually more ‘exotic’ styles (Tango, Cha-Cha, Rhumba) and all taught in the dance schools.

When war was declared on the first Sunday in September 1939, the Government, fearful of bombing raids, ordered the closure of entertainment venues, although pubs remained open. But in a short time they rescinded the decision in the hope of boosting morale. Initially the local small ads for dancing and social functions were depleted, with just two offers of dancing tuition, while the Cosham Masonic Hall and the Pavilion (near Clarence Pier) advised they were closed “until further notice". By Wednesday 11 October 1939, however, during the ‘Phoney War’ the Social Functions adverts listed 11 venues or events all of them focused on dancing — as Burton (1984) in an account of D-Day in the region noted, “the unchallenged national craze at this time was dancing" (29). The events in Portsmouth that week were:

* Comrades Circle dance at the Co-operative Hall, Garnier Street, Fratton with Will Druce & his Band, 6.30-10pm * Pavilion, Popular Evening Dances, Monday — Friday 8-10pm (1/-), Saturdays 7-10 (1/6d). Corporation buses after dance * Collegians Band, Hampshire Dance Band Champions, Dancing Nightly, South Parade Pier (6d). A good time assured * City Hall Dance tonight, 7-10pm (1/-): the city‘s most popular, usual popular variety programmes. Also dance on Friday and Saturday — MC Robbie. * Matinee Fratton Hall Thursday 2-5pm (6d). Learners assisted; good programme. Usual dance, 7-10 (9d) * New Empress Ballroom, North End Junction - Tonight Grand Carnival Night 7-10pm (1/-). Militiamen reduced price. This will be a wonderful night, the new Profession (sic) Band rendering the Siegfried Line and war-time numbers and special prizes given to patrons. Matinee daily 2-5pm. * Matinee dances, Thursdays, Saturdays, Unity Hall, St John’s Road, variety programmes 2.30pm (6d) prizes, learners assisted, sociable, jolly. * Cumberland ballrooms Tonight, Wednesday dancing from 7-10pm with Muriel Norman & the All Star Band. Popular price 9d.

There were also adverts for dance tuition and the Hippodrome’s latest week offered (twice nightly) ‘Hutch’ (Leslie Hutchinson) and Max Wall, the only acts with a national reputation in the city at that time. The cinemas were open again including at the Rex, Dorothy Lamour in the musical St Louis Blues which also featured singer/composer Hoagy Carmichael and jazz singer Maxine Sullivan. Meanwhile, suggestions for radio listening for those staying at home included a rare ‘outside broadcast’ of a darts match, while Gracie fields was on the Home and Overseas Services singing with the Variety Orchestra and Revue Chorus, compere John Watt. Other highlights included a symphony concert by the BBC Orchestra and a programme by one of P0rtsmouth’s regular pre-war visitors Billy Cotton & his Band, while another popular act Jack Hylton & his Band were part of the Mid-Week Matinee.

In November, the newspaper reported “RAF Ready to Counter Any German Offensive” and the Nazis “unable to find any secret bases”. Portsmouth W0men’s Club was informed that a number of local venues “have thrown open their doors to men of the Services, who come in and spend their time dancing, reading, playing games or singing”. This initiative would soon be formalised at the city’s Savoy Buildings and Ballroom opposite South Parade Pier which became a British Sailors’ Society Hostel through the war, advertising “Clean and Comfortable Beds” exclusively for members of the Royal Navy, Merchant Navy and the Royal Marines stationed along the seafront at Eastney. There were social events, indoor sports, library, a cafeteria and restaurant but locals were not generally admitted. Similarly if more modestly, at Ashburton Hall, Ashburton Road, off Osborne Road, Southsea, servicemen paid 3d on entry and generally outnumbered the women and when dancing in what was not a regular ballroom, “dancing pumps” were distributed to the men to protect the floor “from suffering too severely under the strain of army boots".

The first war-time Christmas arrived with rationing not yet in force and the local paper reported that Portsmouth expected “Record Crowds" in the shops with "Plenty of Money’. On the Saturday, the last edition before Christmas the Evening News headlines concerned Russia's retreat from Finland and there were pictures of evacuated children returning to Portsmouth for the holidays and seasonal radio broadcasts including the King's message and songs from Gracie fields. Pompey’s footballers had a home match on Saturday 23 December beating Fulham 3-0 in the Division One Regional League South ‘B’ but on Christmas Day they lost 4-1 at Brentford and on Boxing Day went down 5-2 at Queens Park Rangers - the holiday crowds in London were around 5,000 but fewer than 2,000 had been at Fratton Park.

The Pavilion adjacent to Clarence Pier and “Southsea's Premier Ballroom", had a full programme of dances for Christmas Eve, Boxing Day and New Year’s Eve and South Parade Pier was also offering Gala Dances over the Holiday period, plus Macari & his Dutch Accordeon (sic) Serenaders, in two Sunday houses. There were other festive dances advertised around most parts of the city including the familiar venues plus the City Hall, Fratton Hall, Kingley Hall, two Co-op Halls in Fratton and Albert Roads, St Patrick's Hall Winter Road, and Wellington Hall, At the cinema that week, Gracie fields was in Shipyard Sally and Bing Crosby was with Joan Blondell in the musical East Side of Heaven while the King’s Theatre launched its Pantomime ‘Babes in the Wood‘. The editorial that day acknowledged the difficulties of the time but urged that “Peace and Goodwill are still our ideal”.

1940

it seemed a pattern was set for entertainment in Portsmouth during the early months of the war and to some extent beyond that but one special event was held for ten days in early March in the Café of the Landport Drapery Bazaar Commercial Road when Betty Taylor “BBC Radio Star” sang with one of the top pre-war acts from the region Bert Osborne & His Band every tea-time. In early May Billy Bennett’s Band was at the Ambassador, Cosham, Bunting‘s Band were at Fratton Hall, there was a Grand Carnival Dance at the Transport Hall, the Collegians were at South Parade Pier and there was dancing at Wellington Hall, the Empress and the Pavilion.

On 26 May 1940, the Guildhall Square was packed as it had been 13 months before, not to celebrate sporting success but as a Day of National Prayer, despite which Stedman (1995) records the first significant air attack on the city came in daylight on 11 July 1940, killing 19 people at Kingston Cross in the centre of Portsea island, followed by a worse attack on 24 August leaving the Princes Theatre, Lake Road destroyed with 125 dead, 300 wounded and 500 homeless.

By October 1940 a few months after the remarkable retreat from Dunkirk there was dancing at the Co-op Hall, Albert Road (still running today as the Wedgewood Rooms), the City Hall, South Parade Pier, Wellington Hall, Roseberry Hall (Duncan Road), Drayton Institute, Empress Ballroom North End, Trades Club Cosham and the Pavilion, which offered parking or buses from the Guildhall and the cinemas were still busy, including Disney's Pinocchio. Less cheerfully, on 29 October the paper told of plans to coordinate the occupation of empty houses by families that had been ‘bombed out’ of their homes. There was also a request for people to offer billets to those rendered temporarily homeless. In that first full year of war.

On Christmas Eve 1940 the Evening News headline reported the success of British fighter planes in “Dealing with Night Bombers” and there were reports of successes in the conflict with Italy, Naval aircraft bombing Tripoli and a prediction that the United States would enter the war by next summer. The editorial suggested that “in the midst of a stern trial” people must find a way to “keep our Christmas in a different way” with “fast rather than feats" and “vigil not jollification“ and a photo of an Anti- Aircraft crew on lookout brought home the point. Whatever the advice, some fun was to be had in the dancing, advertised in that reduced paper of six pages, at the usual venues including the doomed Pavilion. The Empress was presenting a professional seven-piece “Hot Swing Band” from London at just 1/6d (now 7.5p).

1941

On New Year’s Day 1941, the paper suggested “Britain’s Outlook for the New Year” was “Bells Silent: Guns Roar” as Portsmouth passed the New Year quietly with relatively little celebration and “no carefree revelry in the Guildhall Square”. Even the dance halls, mostly still running, had a 10pm curfew which prevented people from dancing in the New Year. ln mid-November 1940 a terrible bombing raid on the industrial city of Coventry had demolished the Cathedral and caused huge damage. By comparison Portsmouth had to that point avoided serious damage but on the night of 10/11 January 1941 the city centre including both the Guildhall and Hippodrome close by were heavily bombed —- for the Hippodrome it was the end and the Guildhall would take 18 years to recover while on the western end of the seafront close to the Harbour Mouth, Clarence Pier, the Esplanade and Pavilion were also destroyed. The Evening News headline on Saturday 11 January ran “Concentrated Night Attack on Portsmouth: Cinemas, Stores and Six Churches Hit — German raiders come over in droves" but the front page nonetheless carried messages of support and encouragement from senior figures. The Lord Mayor‘s opened with:

At last the blow has fallen. Our proud City has been hit and hit very hard by the enemy. The Guildhall and many of our cherished buildings now lie in a heap of smoking ruins. To you all, however, l wish to pay tribute to the splendid manner in which you have stood up to this calamity and especially I should like to thank all those members of the public services who stood to their job as I knew they would ....

He added “we are not daunted", as Commander-in-Chief Wm. James noted “we now have to reorganise and show the world that we can face adversity bravely", and Regional Commissioner, Harold Butler visiting that morning, reported “Portsmouth is going strong in spite of the Blitz with the fine spirit of the population, Portsmouth will be all right A separate front page article itemised much of the damages to buildings but for security reasons very few were actually named.

Shortly after the raid, the Governments representative Lord Rushcliffe visited the city to report on the bomb damage, then Prime Minister Winston Churchill came at the end of January followed on 6 February by King George Vl and Queen Elizabeth. Despite the impact of the bombing, the cinemas remained open with Bing Crosby and Mary Martin starring in the musical Rhythm of the River, while at South Parade Pier, Wally Fry & his Collegians continued their nightly performances. They were also appearing on Saturdays at the Oddfellows Hall but in the aftermath of the raid just these two venues plus North End‘s Empress Ballroom were advertised as open for business. Portsmouth’s footballers played just one match through January, albeit a 10-2 victory over Bournemouth but in the cold, brutal days of January 1941 there was little fun on offer.

Stedman (1995) describes the bombing on 10/11 January as “the most destructive that Portsmouth suffered”, although the sustained raids continued on 28 January and early March, before the second major raid on 10 March leaving 93 dead and much damage around Portsea adjacent to the Harbour and Dockyard. On 27 April the third major raid left 102 dead and two-thirds of the city affected. There were other smaller raids through to July when the Nazis switched their principal target to the Russians although there were occasional incidents in 1942 and 1944. Overall nearly a thousand of its civilian inhabitants were killed, almost 10% of homes were destroyed and a further 8.4% badly damaged (Stedman 1995). Harper (2006) in a journal article about Portsmouth’s cinemas and social life in the 1930s & 1940s observed:

Wartime Portsmouth suffered a major change in its social fabric. Only Plymouth was similarly affected. A large number of hostels opened for the armed forces billeted on the city, the city’s children were evacuated twice, and the huge population shifts disrupted domestic life to the extent that Portsmouth had more ‘British Restaurants“ per capita than any other city ...

Despite the physical and psychological impact of the bombing in the first months of 1941 dancing remained popular in Portsmouth and elsewhere through the war years and for the most part it was dancing to familiar songs and tunes in the usual tempos, and familiar styles. Beyond dancing, often to instrumental tunes, many of the most popular British wartime songs are of a sentimental or nostalgic kind including many of Vera Lynn’s popular songs, Anne She|ton’s “|’ll be Seeing You", Flanagan & Allen singing of their “Home Town", many of Al Bowlly‘s popular songs (“Goodnight Sweetheart", “Love is the Sweetest Thing", “The Very Thought of You” etc.) or the new Christmas songs; some like “White Christmas" or “Have Yourself a Merry Christmas” heard in feature films, others such as “l‘ll be Home for Christmas” on the radio. Most days the BBC broadcast ‘Music While You Work’3 with its theme tune “Calling All Workers" — with much shift work needed for the war effort it was often broadcast two or even three times every day.

One of the major contributors to the melodic British output was the composer Noel Gay whose songs make an interesting contrast with the main writers of the ‘Great American Songbook’ — Berlin, Gershwin, Kern, Porter etc. Gay’s output included ‘The Sun has got his Hat On’, ‘Leaning on the Lamp-post’, ‘Love Makes the World Go Round’, ‘Run Rabbit Run‘, ‘The Melody Maker’ and perhaps for Portsmouth ‘The Fleet’s in Port Again’? His most successful musical Me & My Girl included the famous dance song ‘The Lambeth Walk‘ sung by Lupino Lane and his songs came out of the British traditions of Music Hall and Variety rather than with any discernible American swing or jazz influence. They were performed and recorded by most of the leading British bands including those of Ambrose, Geraldo, Billy Cotton, Jack Hylton, Jack Payne, Victor Silvester, and Ray Noble, plus singers Al Bowlly, George Formby, Sam Browne, Evelyn Laye, Alan Breeze, Flanagan & Allen and Leslie Hutchinson — many of whom appeared in Portsmouth.

Steadman drew upon Mass Observation reports which had suggested “superficially” the morale in the city was “good” and where it was less so “it was attributed especially to inadequate social sen/ices immediately after the raid” including poor feeding arrangements, a “striking lack of information” and the “deep psychological effect” of the bombing of shopping centres. The conclusion was more positive, noting the “splendid” morale, considering what Portsmouth has suffered" (their emphasis), while Conlon’s “social history of the Blitz” in Portsmouth” (1988) opened with a

vivid picture of a tenacious and adaptable people who found for themselves the support and succour that an inappropriate plan for Civil Defence could not provide.

In addition, Carter (1999) interviewed local people who lived through the war in Portsmouth and reported that they mostly kept going “with their own network supports” including families, despite the failure of the systems “put in place to help them”. If Portsmouth people struggled with morale at time in 1941 it is hardly surprising and Carter identified an additional explanation when one of her respondents revealed the particular local dismay at the national tragedy of the sinking of the Battlecruiser HMS Hood in the Battle of the Denmark Strait on 24 May 1941. More than 1,400 men died that day, just three survived and VF (male) whose family owned local shops was sure that it had “a tremendous effect because a lot of the men came from here, friends of ours were on there While Portsmouth was not the most heavily bombed city, it shared with Plymouth in particular the additional tragedy of losing ships and men with strong local connections.

That additional naval element should not be ignored in comparing the Portsmouth experience with that of other major towns and cities subjected to heavy bombing. In 1939 72% of the population of circa 250,000 in the greater city of Portsmouth lived on the 9.5 square miles of Portsea Island and 20,000 of them were the workforce in the Dockyard - plus their immediate families or the local businesses dependent on that institution. ln the harbour at the start of the war Conlon records there were 15 battleships and Battlecruisers; 58 Cruisers; six Aircraft Carriers; 158 Destroyers and 59 Submarines, plus various other naval craft. That is an almost unimaginable collection of warships in comparison with today and Portsmouth Dockyard was the major repair and refit facility for the Royal Navy as well as providing onshore barracks for sailors, Royal Marines and Wrens.

One final point on this matter of morale; Downing notes that until the mid-1960s the dominant view in Britain was that people had faced life with fortitude, resolution and cheerfulness" then a revisionist interpretation began to challenge this comforting view", until “more recently the barometer has swung back again to a more nuanced view that accepts the bravery of the few and the determination of the many recognising that the morale of the people was “severely shaken but never completely broken”. (16).

in June 1941 the ukulele and singing star George Formby and his wife Beryl appeared at the Odeon Cinema North End while just a mile to the south in Lake Road the Olympia Rink was open for skating and also the city's “newest Palais de Danse" featuring the Treble Clefs Swing Band. By July 1941 many of the Nazi bombers were being sent east rather than to Britain. At the start of August, and the Bank Holiday weekend, the Evening News was advertising Judy Garland & Mickey Rooney (directed by Busby Berkeley) in Strike Up the Band featuring many songs, quite a few from the 19"‘ century but also New Orleans jazz numbers like ‘Limehouse Blues‘ and the very popular ‘Tiger Rag‘. Meanwhile the Marx Brothers were going West and Greyhounds were racing at Tipner on Saturday evening.

There was also still dancing with Wally Fry's Collegians at South Parade Pier, plus the nine-piece band at the Empress Ballroom, Robbie's band every night at the Conservative Club, Billy Bennett at Cosham's Trades Club and Jimmy Harris, poignantly recorded as “late of the Pavilion, Clarence Pier’ now up in the city at the Oddfellows Hall - 20+ years later the Rendezvous R&B Club and 20 years after that the Hornpipe Arts Centre‘. There was not yet a full complement of the venues of a year earlier but there was at least some fun to be found and Tuesday’s edition reported no bombers over the country on Bank Holiday Monday with the front page showing a large, smiling crowd at the R.A.O.C fete at Hilsea watching the ‘pig- sticking contest’. ln the evening there were queues for the cinema and a good attendance at South Parade Pier's dance but overall the paper suggested that Bank Holiday Monday was “a disappointment” with many cutting short their day out and rural pubs in particular running out of beer.

in the first week of September 1941 the advertised dance venues remained the four running north-south up the spine of the city: South Parade Pier, the Conservative Club, Fratton Road, Oddfellows Hall, Kingston Road, and the Empress North End. By October in North End the Angerstein Hall, offered a “well-known military band" while at the movies the Savoy, Apollo and Carlton were showing Gone with the Wind for a “second great week” while the King‘s Theatre had ‘Monsewer’ Eddie Gray heading a week-long variety show.

On ‘Guy Fawkes Night’ 1941 there was probably little enthusiasm for bonfires or the bangs of fireworks but a new name at the Oddfellows was Jack Darvill & his Serenaders, while the Rathgar Hall in North End was starting a new club hoping to attract “Lonely Servicemen". Kimbell’s Southsea Ballroom was also back in action. Still it seemed no major national names were visiting the city. By Christmas, two weeks after the Japanese attacked USA ships at Pearl Harbour, the four-page paper led with “Premier & Roosevelt Plan to Smash Hitler" using a combined army of 20 million men and there was also a report that the Battle of the Atlantic was “going pretty well" but once again the only advertised entertainment apart from the cinemas were the same local bands in the same dance halls - as was the case with a number of local events to mark the end of this terrible year.

By 1960 the Evening News was covering jazz in a weekly column called ‘Bandbox’ by ‘Perdido’ and in December of that year they looked back with a view of Jazz 1940-1945 which described how when America entered the war (December 1941) some of their musical "top talent" came to England “and Portsmouth" including “leading negroes" Jimmy Simpson (trumpet), Nat Harber (guitar) plus USAF drummer Bob Woltz. We know that Black American servicemen were stationed in Portsmouth at least in the approach to D-Day and in April 1944 the Ambassador (Odeon) Cinema, Cosham held a church service when the first 30 minutes were devoted to BBC organist Charles Smart and a “Coloured American Choir‘. These same men often sang in services at Cosham's Baptist Church.

1942

On the first day of January 1942 the paper carried a surprising advert alongside the usual fare at South Parade Pier, Oddfellows Hall, the Empress and others. The Angerstein Hall was advertising that every Saturday night they would feature Ken “Snakehips” Johnson‘s Band “from Café de Paris, London" adding, “dance to this famous band of radio and stage fame"; admission with a buffet 2/- (10p), or 1/6d for those in the Forces. The problem was that while Johnson's band of West Indian musicians had a reputation as one of the finest swing bands in the country Johnson had been killed in a London bombing raid 11 months earlier on 8 March 1941, after which it is said the band split up. It is perhaps a mystery that cannot now be solved.5 Meanwhile there was one new act listed in the ballrooms with the Leslie Douglas Swing Flight Band at the Oddfellows.

In early February a group of German warships dodged a botched British plan and escaped through the English Channel then in mid-February the British in Singapore surrendered to the Japanese; Prime Minister Winston Churchill described it as “the worst disaster and the largest capitulation in British history”. There had also been the tragic report of the loss of two more naval warships, HMS Repulse and HMS Prince of Wales in an attack by the Japanese two months earlier. Downing (2022) drawing on Mass Observation and newspaper reports records dismay and sudden, serious doubts about Churchill‘s ability to do the job.

On Thursday 26 March 1942 the BBC hosted a half-hour ‘Close Up’ debate between band leader Jack Hylton and the classical conductor Dr (later Sir) Malcolm Sargent. The report in the following week’s Melody Maker revealed much about the growing arguments around dance music, ‘swing’ and jazz (3.4.1942). The review suggested the two men “chatted amicably” but with “staggeringly ill-informed views on jazz". Hylton suggested “dance music is still in its infancy” but the Melody Maker’s view was that dance music “not only grew up but died years ago suffocated by a public which had no more understanding of it than to go crazy over its deformed off-spring, swing”. Hylton it claimed missed a “golden opportunity to tell the public at large something about real jazz”. It was a debate that would intensify over the next 15/20 years but it hardly amounted to much against a backdrop of the war and what Downing described as a “run of calamities that marked the first six months of 1942”.

The Easter weekend of early April 1942 was quiet generally although dancing continued. Robbie's Band were at the Conservative Club, there were matinee and evening dances at the Empress, Jimmy Harris was back at Oddfellows plus on Tuesdays and Thursdays the RAOC Broadcasting Band, Billy Bennett was at the Trades Club and the RE Drill Hall had dances on Friday and Saturday. South Parade Pier was still offering “dancing nightly” but with no major acts advertised for the quiet summer season and the later Bank Holiday weekend editorial was entitled “A Stay- at-Home Holiday” with weekend travel “discouraged”. Big name entertainers were most easily found at the cinema with films this weekend starring Bing Crosby, Ginger Rogers, George Formby, Bob Hope and others. For those venturing outdoors over the weekend “the authorities have arranged concerts and entertainments in the

parks” and sea bathing was possible “on part of the seafront which had been opened for that purpose". On Sunday 2 August, South Parade Pier did host a special Bank Holiday event with an afternoon and evening (seated) concert by George Scott- Wood and his Broadcasting Orchestra plus three singers. Scott-Wood was a very successful performer, arranger and recording artist who made many recordings and is reputed to have introduced the piano accordion to Britain. With growing numbers of overseas troops, Fratton Park hosted a Canadian Softball match and boxing.

Late 1942 brought decisive uplifting events in the war: victory at El Alamein, the German army in Russia “falling back rapidly", further “blows at Rommel” with attacks on his shipping in North Africa and “Air attacks on Japs in Burma". ln mid-November President Roosevelt noted the “good news", believing “the turning point has at last been reached" (Downing, 2022). On Tuesday 1 December the Evening News front page headline was for once not about the war but read “Beveridge Plan to Abolish Want: £2 Pensions: Free Drs. & Hospitals; All-in Social insurance; Big increases for Workers”. it was of course the beginning of what is known as the Welfare State, including the new National Health Service.

Christmas Day on the BBC‘s Home Service began at 7am with the News followed by 15 minutes of gramophone records, before Derek McCullough presented ‘Christmas day in the Morning‘. In just a few years, McCullough would be known as ‘Uncle Mac’, presenting ‘Children's Favourites’. The following programmes included following a London postman delivering the post on Christmas morning, a practice that continued until 1960. At 9.30am came a broadcast from Bethlehem of a Christmas Day Troops’ Service and ‘Music While You Work’ was one of a number of mainly musical programmes featuring live performances. Children had two programmes around tea- time, one from the USA and Canada calling fathers serving in Britain. At 6.45pm a Christmas Party at the Freedom Club featured people who “escaped from occupied Europe” and were “holding their first Christmas Day party" in Britain. At 8pm was the very popular variety comedy show l.T.M.A. (‘lt’s That Man Again’) and later Carols, and 50 minutes of Henry Hall and his Orchestra. The Forces Programme shared some items with the Home Service but also offered Sidney Torch at the organ with the Hit Parade of 1942, Carol Gibbons and Band at 11.30am, Geraldo at 1.15pm and the Squadronaires in early evening, followed by ‘Vera Lynn’s Christmas Card’

1943

By New Year’s Day, Sir Stafford Cripps, Leader of the House of Commons and member of the war cabinet, claimed that while the war was not yet over, “our enemies know their doom is sealed”. At the King's Theatre, ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ had opened on Boxing Day and there were around a dozen dance events advertised at different venues over the holiday period. The Oddfellows had a new band, five Swings and a Miss at an ‘Aid-for-Russia’ event and on New Year’s Day, Kimbells Southsea held a charity dance to contribute to the Merchant Navy Comforts Fund.

ln the first week of 1943, dancing in Portsmouth was still to local bands in various venues. Robbie's Dance Band were at the Conservative Club Fratton Road, Billy Bennett's Brilliant Band at Cosham Trades Club, Jimmy Harris and his Band, then Alan Green at the Ambassador, Cosham, the Collegians at South Parade Pier, the Melody Makers’ Quartet at Rathgar Hall, and the Rafeteers at the Oddfellows Hall.

Things remained much like this, except on Thursday 21 January and again on Thursday 25 March 1943 when South Parade Pier presented “by request of hundreds of patrons” Lew Stone & his Band in the Pavilion ~ tickets 4/-, dancing from 7-11pm. Stone began his career in the 1920s playing with bands like the Savoy Orpheans and then with Ambrose, Jack Payne, Jack Hylton and Roy Fox. He was a major British dance leader and arranger in Britain through the 1930s and broadcast frequently, also working among others with Nat Gonella and the very popular vocalist Al Bowlly. in the war years Stone also had a jazz group the Stonecrackers.

South Parade Pier's Easter weekend 1943 was interesting with two houses (3 & 6pm) for concerts by Harry Fryer's Broadcasting Orchestra on Good Friday; Fryer brought with him a number of vocalists including a promising 10-year-old girl, Petula Clark. This was followed on Easter Sunday (25 April) by another national favourite Joe Loss & his Orchestra with four vocalists and again, prices ranged from 4/- to 2/6d (reserved) or 2/— to 1/- (unreserved). The Portsmouth scene was beginning to open itself up again to bigger national names.

May Day, a Saturday, reported the bloodiest fighting yet "of the whole Africa campaign", while British submarines had sunk ten enemy ships around the Mediterranean. The Evening News had a picture of schoolboys watching troops on a driver training course somewhere in southern England, while the editorial followed a tribute by a delegate at the National Union of Teachers’ conference in praising “the children of this country". ln the cinemas, the Savoy, Apollo and Carlton all offered the “Screen‘s Sensational Scoop", Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca. South Parade Pier confirmed that the Royal Air Force band known as the Squadronaires would perform on Sunday at 3pm and 6pm, while on the same day the Orchestra of HM Royal Marines would play at the King’s Theatre. ln addition to the recent regular venues, the Co-op Hall, Garnier Street, and the Trades Club, Fratton were back in action.

Most of the large dance bands from the Forces that were touring the country comprised some of the finest British musicians who had either joined up or been conscripted during the war. One of them, Sid Colin, had been a guitarist and singer with various leading bands in the 1930s including those of Ambrose, Lew Stone and Jack Jackson. During the war he joined the RAF and became a member of the Squadronaires and in 1977 he wrote “an informal history of British dance bands" including a chapter on this period of the Second World War. He described how the RAF formed a number of smaller bands to go out around the country, while this main band, called officially The Dance Band of the Royal Air Force, consisted of men all of whom had played in “big time West End bands". The plan initially was to send them to France until the successful invasion by the Germans so the Squadronaires "rehearsed, experimented, rehearsed some more”, becoming, Colin claimed “without a doubt the finest swing band ever to be heard outside London". Crucially they were free from the commercial pressures exerted by the demands of dancers, cautious record companies and greedy bandleaders.

Frequently, as with these Sundays on South Parade Pier, the Squadronaires and other top dance bands performed in concerts rather than dances. Sometimes they avoided dances in ‘remote’ venues because of a relative shortage of women but the notion of going out to listen to acts playing popular music was being established at some dance venues as it had always been in the music halls and variety venues. In addition to the Squadronaires, there were also a number of bands from the various branches of the armed services, the RAOC had the Blue Rockets, the Royal Navy had the Blue Mariners and there was a second RAF band called ‘The Skyrockets’.

As spring turned to summer, South Parade Pier was making something of its Sundays with these seated concerts and two houses, afternoon and evening. ln May 1943 Sydney Kyte brought his Broadcasting Band, then came the Maple Leafs a Canadian Broadcasting Orchestra and on 23 May it was the turn of Oscar Rabin and his Band. As May turned to June, in ‘Wings for Victory Week’ the music of the RAF had a prominent place in the city with the RAF Symphony Orchestra at the King's Theatre on Sunday 30 May and the RAF Bomber Command Band at the (Wesley) Central Hall, Fratton on the Wednesday. Meanwhile Sunday on the Pier offered “The Battle of the Bands” with Eric Winstone & his Swingtet plus “the famous" Cubanaires Band “from the Coconut Grove, London” — a band of the same name still performs Cuban music in the 215‘ century. On Sunday 6 June the the Skyrockets were on the Pier while Wally Fry & his Collegians continued for dancing there through the week.

On Saturday 12 June 1943, Whitsun weekend, Evening News readers were told the Allies “show their might" in Europe and the Mediterranean, while the next day on the pier saw the Duke of Wellington Dance Orchestra with special guest Carroll Gibbons, sandwiched between two nights of the Portsmouth City Police annual revue. On 19 June Maurice Winnick brought his Orchestra to the Pier and when Van Phillips and his Two Orchestras came to the Pier for their two performances at the end of June, they announced the receipt of over 50 songs from local composers, the best of which would be selected and performed as ‘Portsmouth Song of the Week’. It seems there was no report of the successful submission.

The Squadronaires were back at the Pier as we learned that the Allies had invaded Sicily. The next Sunday on the Pier saw the return of American country big band of Big Bill Campbell, the Rocky Mountaineers — possibly a British exponent of a form of Western swing? In mid-July Oscar Rabin returned and the following week it was Harry Parry and his Famous Radio Sextet. Over the August Bank Holiday weekend Jack Payne & his Orchestra were back at the Pier and this time it seemed people were ignoring official advice with “big crushes” at Waterloo of people planning to spend the weekend at the coast. Many were carrying extra luggage because rationing required them to take some food with them. Sunday 8 August brought an unusual act to the Pier with the Latvian (Nat) Younkman and his Czardas Bands, described as “colour and picturesque” with song, swing and melody.

British-based Trinidadian Carl Barriteau and his Orchestra had an August Sunday at the Pier, while in the local dance halls it was pretty much as it had been although the Angerstein Hall was back in action with a ‘Grand Dance’ at 1/6d each. As the end of August approached the South Parade Pier suddenly had no ‘special’ Sunday. events as the headlines announced German withdrawals from Russia and Allies‘ successes in Italy - “bombarded by sea and air”. Elsewhere the Empress, Conservative, Trades, Unity Hall and Oddfellows all held dances as did both Kimbell‘s venues - their Cafe just south of the Guildhall a less familiar dance venue than Southsea. ln Cosham,

the Ambassador Cinema had Bing Crosby and Fred MacMurray in Sing You Sinners and as usual also had dancing (7-10pm) in their Ballroom.

South Parade Pier went through a brief, quiet period before advertising the recommencement of nightly dancing with Portsmouth’s Collegians from Thursday 16 September but suddenly and again the bigger, national names in popular music were missing from the city - perhaps simply reflecting the end of summer. The Empress Ballroom had reduced ticket prices for “soldiers and sailors" to dance to an augmented nine-piece band, the Melody Makers were now at the Oddfellows Hall and charity events included Kimbells, Southsea for the Red Cross, Prisoner-of-War fund. While the dance bands were probably all playing similar selections in a similar style, the Angerstein Hall, North End offered.

Soft Lights, Sweet Music with perfect rhythm of Brian and his Beautiful Banjos from ‘Midnight Follies’ Carnival London and Florida Clubs etc. with his Gaiety Club Band. Tonight and every Monday (p 6).

Entry to dances was still around one or two shillings but on Friday 3 December 1943, South Parade Pier held another Prisoners-of-War charity dance at the considerable price of one guinea (one pound, one shilling). On Christmas Eve, the front page reported heavy bombing raids on Berlin with “large fires left burning” and “smoke rising to a great height". The crew of a destroyer in Portsmouth Command were pictured singing carols, while the Eighth Army enjoyed more successes in North Africa. The Editorial sent "Christmas Greetings and Best Wishes” to all the paper’s readers alongside an article about de-mobilisation and another declaring it had been a “Boom Christmas in Portsmouth District” with “a great rush to buy presents” and “record traffic” at the Post Office. On Monday (27 December) the King’s Theatre opened for four weeks of the pantomime ‘Cinderella’ and on the same day there was a local ‘derby’ at Fratton Park, ‘Pompey’ v ‘Saints’ (1/6d — services personnel in uniform 7d). Saints had won the game at the Dell on Christmas Day but Pompey had revenge on the 27"‘. Greyhound racing at Tipner was closed until New Year’s Day.

South Parade Pier with the Collegians, the Ambassador (Alan Green’s Band), the Empress and the other usual venues held Christmas dances with one new club the '33 Club’ at the Tramway hall with the Melody Makers. While dancing in Portsmouth was to local bands, the two Odeons and the Ambassador Cinema featured "48 stars in the biggest show to hit the screen”, Stage Door Canteen including performances j by the bands of Benny Goodman, Count Basie, Guy Lombardo, Xavier Cugat, Kay Kyser and Freddy Martin.

1944 & D-DAY

The Evening News editorial on New Year’s Day 1944, a Saturday, opened optimistically, “welcome 1944 — the year of deliverance and - we all hope and pray — the year of victory”. Pompey people had waved goodbye to the old year the previous evening at any one of a number dances, with North End’s Empress Ballroom with a “stupendous” dance from 7-12pm. South Parade Pier would soon be otherwise occupied with a more serious project but advertised its New Year’s Eve Dance for 3/6d to hear the New Year “piped in” by Canadian Pipers - Canadian soldiers would soon be among those embarking from Portsmouth for Normandy — plus dancing to Wally Fry and “his augmented dance band", Novelty Dances, Spot Prizes and “greetings” from Portsmouth Labour Party. Cosham‘s Trades Hall charged 2/6d for a Carnival night, the Co-op Hall in Garnier Street, Fratton promised prizes and “happy company”, Southsea’s Kimbells charged 3/6d plus a Tea Dance tomorrow afternoon. Elsewhere Chapman‘s Assembly Rooms presented the Woodpecker’s Band but (7- 11) ending before midnight; not so Unity Hall near Arundel Street’s Black Dog which would continue to midnight with a band and “lovely prizes".

With the first day of the year a Saturday, Portsmouth Jazz Club held a “Grand New Year Party-Dance and Session” with Spence Brown plus Bill Cole and the Clubmen (7-11). This was one of the earliest mentions of the Club and it was a busy weekend with a record recital in Southsea on the Sunday shared with members of the Southampton Rhythm Club. Rex Harris (1960) suggested that while in the 1930s “the general public had been led to think of any noisy dance band as a ‘jazz—band’ there was a “small core of real jazz-lovers” in Britain who began to meet in groups, beginning in 1933 with the first Rhythm Club, in London's West End and affiliated to the Melody Maker. At the cost of 3d, up to 200 members could listen to record recitals and sometimes recitals by “London‘s best semi-pro bands". Harris suggested these organisations, normally ‘dry’, were “preparing the ground for those of you today who like to hear jazz". By 1943, Portsmouth and Southampton were among those cities with their own Rhythm Club and in an edition of Melody Maker (23.1.1943) there were listings of such clubs in for example, Birmingham, Blackpool, Bournemouth, Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, Cheltenham, Clapham, Croydon, Derby, Doncaster, Harrow, Ilford, Lancaster, Luton, Oldham, Newcastle, North London, Northampton, Putney, Rochdale, West London, Wimbledon and Portsmouth, where on the following day Hector Stewart would present “Canned New Orleans and Then Some”. The name Rhythm Club perhaps offered some leeway around the focus on the kinds of music but Harris notes, “when the war ended, Rhythm Clubs gave way to Jazz Clubs” which became somewhat more open to dancing — or listening.

In Portsmouth live musical entertainment early in 1944 was provided mostly by the usual local dance bands but there were occasional bigger name acts in the city, for example Jack Payne and his Orchestra with vocalists Carroll Carr, Betty Webb and Peter Howard at the Police Ball on South Parade Pier. From 1928, Payne had been Henry Hall's predecessor with the BBC Dance Orchestra and then continued to lead his dance band until he ‘retired’ to the more leisurely role of a radio disc jockey. The Pier then seems to have been rather quiet - apart from the regular dance band Wally Fry & the Collegians and a Services Boxing Match - until April 1944 when they announced that "concerts" would begin again with Harry Fryer and his BBC Orchestra. Fryer‘s band was another that broadcast regularly on the BBC, perhaps most often on ‘Music While You Work’ with a generally lively, often romantic melodic style; April also saw appearances by recording bands led by Carroll Gibbons, Oscar Rabin and Lou Preager the latter with his Orchestra and vocalists Edna Kaye, Paul Rich. After that brief flourish, spring turned to summer, the highly secret D-Day approached and the Pier was quiet again -— even regulars Wally Fry & the Collegians left their residency and moved to the British Restaurant near the Strand, Southsea.

in the early May 1944, the Ambassador Ballroom (Cosham) presented Alan Green’s Band, while the Empress with a “new augmented 9-piece band" still claimed to be “Portsmouth‘s favourite ballroom” with dancing nightly including a matinee on Saturday (2.30-5pm) and entry cost 1/- (5p) but for soldiers and sailors, half-price: 6d. Elsewhere the Trades Hall, Cosham offered Billy Bennett’s Brilliant Band and Jimmy Harris was at the Oddfellows. Otherwise dancing was still happening at the Angerstein Hall, North End and there were dances at the Oddfellows Hall in Kingston Road, the Rathgar Hall in North End, the Co-op Ballroom in Garnier Street, Fratton, the Conservative Club in Fratton Rd, Unity Hall at the Black Dog, Arundel Street, and the Savoy‘s ‘sister’ ballroom Kimbells in Osborne Road (“Dance Every Night"). At the cinema the Regent and Plaza offered Swing Fever with Lena Home and bandleader Kaye Kyser while on Sunday 7 May, the piano duet of Rawicz & Landauer sold out the King’s Theatre at 6.30 (7/6d - 3/6d).

The main entertainment focus in the first few years of the 1940s was on cinemas and resident local dance bands in the various venues and it is surely no coincidence that after the bombing of Clarence Pier, none of them were particularly close to the city’s vulnerable south-western corner which housed the Dockyard and Naval Barracks. Apart from the South Parade Pier, about three miles east of the Dockyard and Harbour, only Kimbells, close to Southsea Common was on the southern side of the railway line that ran across the city from the Dockyard/Harbour, by the Guildhall and past Fratton Park before travelling north up the east side of the city.

There was little holiday trade in the summer of 1944 although there were still opportunities for dancing in the evenings. In late-May, however, the Evening News described the Whitsun Bank Holiday as a “Record for Quiet" (27.5.1944) with “deserted stations and empty trains"; there was no Holiday increase in road traffic and the “official verdict” was “dead calm" with most local events at, or just beyond the northern part of Portsea Island in Hilsea and Cosham. The seafront in particular was largely inaccessible as the preparations for D-Day embarkations intensified. In the city there were regular identity Card checks by the police and military police, magistrate court fines (between five and ten shillings) for failing to produce them and a reference to “the ban”, which restricted movements within ten-miles of the coast stretching from Land’s End Cornwall across southern England and up to East Anglia and the Wash. Lewis (2014) reports how.

ln late April military leave was cancelled and the Allied troops who would cross the channel were slowly moved into huge assembly camps along the south coast which were guarded by grim-faced ‘Snowdrops’ (American MPs) and ‘Red Caps (British MPs). Large signs dotted the perimeter of these camps warning: DO NOT LOITER. CIVILIANS MUST NOT TALK TO MILITARY PERSONNEL.

Bombardier ‘Dickie’ Thomas remembered being “marched” into a field “surrounded by barbed wire to make sure we didn’t get out” while Alan Melville an RAF war correspondent was in an assembly camp near Hambledon, the legendary home of early English cricket, about ten miles north of Portsmouth and probably just inside the banned perimeter. He thought it was “a very pleasant place” but “by May it had been completely engulfed by preparations for the invasion" ((Lewis, 2014). A short while later Melville’s convoy began to move towards the coast but “then sat down for seven hours on the outskirts of Portsmouth" and he suggests that People didn‘t pay much attention to us on the way; they were fairly blasé about convoys by that time. But Portsmouth had sensed that this wasn’t just another exercise and the population turned out en masse. There were no bands and flags: it was a very different farewell to the last war but there was great friendliness.

The troops had been told not to mix with locals but Melville added

It is impossible not to fraternise with people who insist on bringing you cups of tea every hour, who shower their sugar rations on you, who ask you into their homes for a wash and a brush up.

John Sweetman, a boy in 1944 (2019) recalled how “on the eve of the invasion, troop-carrying vessels set out from anchorages and improvised piers between Stokes Bay and Hayling Island”. Central to that stretch was Portsmouth and Southsea seafront and Yates (2002) describes how Southsea’s beach was “barricaded with barbed wire” and was “frequently placed out of bounds to civilians and other restrictions were placed on resort activity".

Melville and his convoy joined their ships and they were then at anchor in the Solent for three days as that “part of the invasion fleet mustered”. He recalled that as more ships arrived “the whole great stretch of water was a mass of grey ships". There were a few tales of music alleviating the feelings of anxiety and boredom - Donald Burgett of the US 1015‘ Airborne Division remembered their Captain asking a colleague ‘Speedy’ to sing and play on his guitar “San Antonio Rose”. He recalled that it “sounded good" but the Captain kept requesting it until someone yelled that maybe the Captain might “like to hear something else?". The captain “replied he was from San Antonio” and his plane also had that name so he wanted to hear it “until it was time to go”. Lewis records that on the late afternoon of 5 June the first of the 5,000 Allied ships “weighed anchor and began leaving their south-coast ports" accompanied by cheers and “the sound of bagpipes (if they were British) and swing music (if they were American)” — he suggests that for the latter the Andrews Sisters ‘Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B’ “was much played that day. The ships made for an assembly point off the Isle of Wight and then divided into the convoys heading for the five Normandy beaches. Captain Eric Bush remembered “a sight never to be forgotten" with “thousands and thousands of ships of all classes stretched from horizon to horizon". The ‘Extra Special’ edition of the Evening News on Tuesday 6 June 1944 carried a headline “British and Canadians Secure Beach Heads at Two Points" but the caption to the front page photograph was still cautious about locations with, “this most interesting picture just released shows a flotilla of invasion craft at sea”. Back on Southsea beach during these weeks, South Parade Pier was out-of-bounds to revellers but that was for a relatively short period in the mid-summer of 1944.

Perhaps unsurprisingly the evening of 6 June was quiet locally although pianist Bill Cole & his Clubmen were at the Tramways Hall, North End and a few days later they came third in South of England Swing Band Championship, sponsored by Kodak, with their bass player Nelson Peters winning first prize on his instrument. As D-Day passed the Evening News front-page focus shifted to the fighting in Europe and July arrived with not yet any dancing at the seafront venues although most of the bands and locations further into the city were still active. ln addition, in Southsea, the Co-op in Albert Road, now the Wedgewood Rooms, was “re-opening" for dancing, while Frank Sinatra was at the Odeon Southsea in the musical Higher and Higher.

By Friday 4 August the headlines told us that the “Americans Sweep on in Normandy” and a photograph showed Winston Churchill, having returned from Italy, re-united with the King and members of his cabinet,. There was a long list of dances around the city including the Angerstein, Empress, Hilsea Lido Cafe, the British Restaurant, the Ambassador, the Conservative, Trades, Oddfellows and Co-op (Southsea) Halls, while Brian — late of the notable bands of Jack Hylton and Jack Payne — was offering one of his bands at the Unity Hall every Friday; either his Carnival Club Band or his famous Gaiety Club Band.

In early September at the cinemas Laurence Olivier and Greer Garson were starring in Pride and Prejudice;, Kay Kyser & his Orchestra were in Swing Fever while James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart were at the Curzon in The Oklahoma Kid. Alongside the small ads for dancing across the city was one about vacancies for memberships of Youth Clubs run by the Co-operative for “young people (both sexes) 14-20" with activities including talks, debates, rambles, dancing, billiards, cycling, choir, cricket, net-ball, football etc and “training for Democracy".

On Saturday 9 September 1944, Pompey’s footballers beat Charlton Athletic 5-1 at Fratton Park with a crowd of 12,705. Later that evening, Wally Fry & the Collegians finally left the British Restaurant and almost exactly three months after D-Day came ‘back home’ to South Parade Pier. A year later, the Evening News noted that “the summer of 1944 was well-advanced before the military authorities handed back the pier" and the Savoy would wait a little longer but by early autumn some things began to return to ‘normal’ with weekday dancing at the pier from 7-10pm. More broadly of course ‘normality’ was still some way off but at terrible cost, the tide had turned.

POSTSCRIPT

Sixty-five years ago, on 8 June 1959, HM Queen Elizabeth came to the city to open the rebuilt Guildhall. The opening event that evening was a concert by Sir Arthur Bliss, with George Thalben-Ball (organ) & the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.

The following evening's sell-out concert featured the Chris Barber Jazz Band with Ottillie Patterson, followed soon by evening concerts with Humphrey Lyttleton‘s Band, Buck Clayton, Dizzy Gillespie, the Dave Brubeck Quartet, Gracie fields, Frankie Vaughan, Cliff Richard & the Shadows, the Modern Jazz Quartet, the Platters, and Sarah Vaughan.

In the spring of 1939, Pompey‘s footballers won the FA Cup for the first time and the American jazz pianist Fats Waller spent a week in variety at the city's Hippodrome Theatre. It was a brief moment of fun and celebration but storm clouds were gathering; four months later Britain declared war on Germany. ln January 1941 Nazi bombers destroyed much of the Guildhall and all of the Hippodrome but gradually Britain and the Allies turned the tide - with D-Day 1944, centred on Portsmouth and the south coast of England, a key event in the eventual victory. This booklet tells some of the tales of Portsmouth across those five years from the perspective of the civilians and those in uniform as they found some fun wherever they could — sometimes at the ‘movies’, principally through dancing to wonderful bands and musicians in the ballrooms and clubs of the city. (below) the Skyrockets.