In 1942, Britons were begging GIs to spend their Christmas with them – and not just for chocolate rations. Juliet Gardiner reports. Seventy years ago, an urgent plea went out to the US troops stationed in Britain. Would more men please come forward to accept invitations from British families to spend Christmas Day with them? “At present, the ratio is estimated to be 50 invitations for every one soldier available,” claimed a US camp commander in December 1942. The first GIs (Government Issue) had arrived the previous February as part of Operation Bolero, the build-up of US troops prior to the invasion of Europe. It was so-called because, like the dance, the operation escalated slowly. By the time of D-Day in June 1944, they would number a million and a half. Most of the 60,000 GIs who had arrived in time for Christmas 1942 were stationed in Suffolk and Norfolk, to build airfields that could be used by the arriving US warplanes. Their B-17 Flying Fortresses and Liberator bombers would have been stranded on Britain’s grassy airstrips. This was the Americans’ first winter away from home – and the first time that British families would have the opportunity to share Christmas with their allies. However, the festive spirit was decidedly lacking on both sides. The British tended to regard the GIs as Johnny-come-latelies to the war, ignorant of how much Britain had already suffered in the Blitz. They saw them as slovenly soldiers, loud-mouthed show-offs who were, famously, overpaid (a GI private earned five times as much as his British counterpart) and over-sexed. The desire of many British girls to “have a Yank”, with their smart uniforms, generous ways and supply of hard-to-come-by goods, infuriated the average khaki-clad Tommy. Their presence had also sent rates of venereal disease rocketing. The GIs, meanwhile, found Britain to be a slow, shabby, backward country, addicted to tea breaks and stifled by class deference. Concerted campaigns to integrate GIs into the “right” sort of British society were already under way. The American Red Cross had set up Friendship Clubs, where the two nations could mix. With the assistance of the church, the Women’s Voluntary Service and local worthies also vetted lists of “nice” girls who were deemed suitable to be invited to the dances held regularly at GI camps and bases. But it was decided that the best way for the British to get to know their American visitors was to invite GIs into their homes for lunch or tea or, in exceptional circumstances, to stay for their furlough (leave). Which is why in 1942 GIs were encouraged to accept invitations for Christmas “to fill the chairs left empty by British fighting men”. They made particularly welcome Christmas guests, not least because they arrived bearing gifts and stayed just a few hours (they returned to base after lunch). Aware that British rations would not stretch to feed a handful of young soldiers with hearty appetites, every GI was provided with special rations from the PX (Post Exchange, the equivalent of the British NAAFI) for each day of their stay. One GI is recorded as having been invited to spend Christmas Day at the home of the family of a Land Girl he had met. He turned up at their small stone Norfolk cottage (“no plumbing but gorgeous fireplaces”) on a bicycle, “laden with legal rations of spam and powdered coffee, chocolate, cookies and cake, tins of soup and sliced peaches and other items from the camp stores. We all sat down to a Christmas dinner and scene that might have made Charles Dickens the only true recorder. I don’t recall what we had for dinner, but at long last the plum pudding was served – and I gained the silver sixpence.” It wasn’t just rations and treats such as chocolates, soap, nylons, cigars and a bottle of whisky that GIs brought into British homes. Connie Stanton, whose parents invited several GIs to their Bedfordshire farmhouse for Christmas, recalls: “They taught us about advent calendars and burning advent candles, and hanging gingerbread biscuits on the Christmas tree. We showed them Christmas crackers, which they had never seen before and were greatly taken with.” While most of the GIs were young and single, some were older married men and, perhaps in an effort to compensate for missing their own families, they organised treats for British children. The usual currency of exchange was chewing gum and comics, but at Christmas GIs would make or renovate toys for local children. “Bombs or no bombs, there was always a Christmas party for the kids,” recalls Jean Lancaster Rennie, who worked for the American Red Cross in Norwich. A Hertfordshire man, who as a boy was evacuated to Middlesbrough, remembers how “the Americans threw a superb party for the local schoolchildren in the town hall. It was one of those grim public buildings at the time, with sandbags all around. The GIs had decorated the interior with lots of Allied flags, together with tinsel and paper chains. They served an immense amount of food, not only cakes, jellies and blancmange but many sweet dishes that we hadn’t seen for ages due to rationing. We were all given a present from ‘Santa’, who had an American accent. I had a box of cardboard infantrymen. They had stars-and-stripes stickers and my hosts had to reassure me they were on our side.” In Norfolk, children were invited to their own wartime Christmas party at Shipdham USAAF base, called Operation Reindeer. One attendee recalls: “Coming into the aircraft hangar was like coming into Aladdin’s cave… with coloured lights, streamers, silver bells,” and a Christmas tree “reaching up to the skies” that had been festooned with chaff, the thin strips of metallic foil thrown out of aircraft to confuse German pilots during a raid. “There were sacks and sacks of sweets everywhere, and every now and then a great shower of sweets would be thrown into the air and children were scrambling and screaming with delight for a fistful of this treasure” – this at a time when the sweet ration was as low as eight ounces a fortnight. The arrival of Santa Claus was the high point of the Shipdham party: “A droning sound was heard in the sky. Nearer and nearer it came. It was silver and snow-covered – a Piper Cub plane straight from Santa Claus-land. The propeller slowed and stopped, and sure enough, there was Father Christmas, with a red robe and white beard and bulging sack, stepping out of the plane.” The task of welding the GIs and the British soldiers into a powerful fighting force would be a long and often fraught one. But the hospitality of that first Christmas of the “friendly occupation” started Anglo-American friendships that were to last long after the war. Source: Britain’s first Yankee Christmas - Telegraph
Gardiner actually wrote a book, over here...Gi's in Britain..That article seems to be taken in lumps from the book...I'd recomment this book to all both yank and Brit...an exceptionally good read..with lots of surprises inside. A book I have quoted from a few times on this site. Some flaming good pics too...cartoons will appeal to both nations sense of humour..Apparantly the Yanks do have one...Slip told me they do...I'm joking Pzjgr... Over Here: GI's in Britain During the Second World War: Amazon.co.uk: Juliet Gardiner: Books
