Pig Clubs during WW2

[Daven]

Many years ago my lovely Mum told me that during WW2 her parents ( my Grandma and Grandad ) had been part of a syndicate which bought piglets and they were housed in a nearby small holding. The piglets were fed with household leftovers and when they were big enough they were slaughtered to supplement the members meat rations.

Does anyone have memories or information about these syndicates specifically in the Sheffield area ?

[old tup]

In World War 11 we had two purpose built pig styes on our smallholding on Liversey Street positioned behind where the Sheffield College is now!.My adopted Grandpa Hollis {no relation} kept pigs to supplement our food needs at that time and later too,I was born in 1943 February so it was an early memory!.He used to take me to the Rag and Tag market at the bottom of Dixon Lane,past the big brass weighing scales into a huge old building full of livestock,piglets,baby poultry,puppies, kittens and such!.He would buy a large litter of piglets usually over 12 in number and bring them back home,they were split into two even numbers and bedded in their new home!.At one end of our cottage was a built in copper in a brick surround with fireplace beneath and a chimney going through the roof,it was filled with grain, old bread,cabbage and cauliflower stalks old potatoes and water then boiled up into a porridge type concoction,pig swill by name!.In no time the pigs began to grow you could virtually see it day by day,when the time came for slaughter a farmer from Bradfield way came to do it,it was gruesome to see nowadays it is not allowed!.He had a gun similar to "Dirty Harrys",it had a long sharp bolt at the front that he placed a cartridge behind placed it to the pigs head and fired!.Down the pig went stunned,a sharp stick placed in the hole into the brain,the dead pig was dragged over a large tin bath and the throat was cut the blood used for making black pudding!.In the next room beams in the ceiling had hooks in them to which the pig was suspended and then butchered,I witnessed this as a toddler and it must have affected me because I cannot stand any form of cruelty to this day!.But it was different in those days nobody had enough to eat so we were lucky on that score,down one of our cellars was a marble table covered in rough salt that I had to rub into pork and bacon joints!.We had no fridges then so everything was salted and kept in meat cupboards kept in the coolest place possible,they say the only thing you can,t eat on a pig is its squeal!.

[Daven]

Thanks for that old tup.

I'm surprised to not find more documentation about the Pig Clubs in Sheffield. Maybe you should publish your memories........

[old tup]

Thanks Daven maybe I should but I wouldn,t know where to start or that anyone would be interested anyway!Cheers.

[Daven]

I can't help you with where to start but I certainly would be interested !

I wonder if the Sheffield Archives would be able to help ?

[sweetdexter]

My uncle kept pigs,I remember them about 1946.

He lived on Marlcliffe Rd,I don't know if he was part of a club

[*Wallace*]

They were talking about this on the further back in time program this week.

[Kidorry]

There were quite a few pig styes on Skye edge near the dog track.My uncle had one but I do not think he was in any club. We collected a lot of the swill from the local schools and boiled it in his stye,smelled vile.

[old tup]

Since my last post I have been thinking about something my old man told me once about Grandad in trouble with the authorities for slaughtering a pig without a licence in wartime!.Also I remember a vet performing a post mortem on a piglet that had died for no apparent reason,so I conclude we must have been in one of the pig clubs!.As a youngster that sort of thing went over my head,all I wanted to do was play with the various animals around the place!.

[Kidorry]

I think if you kept pigs you were allowed to slaughter one for your own consumption and I think the others were supposed to go to the abattoir.The thing was one xmas my uncle got pulled by the police with some pork in the boot of his car. he told them he had slaughtered one for the family.To which the policeman replied is it a speciality of yours to rear pigs with 3 back legs. He let us go.