How did Bearsden celebrate VE Day in 1945? I’ve used a photo from Glasgow at the front of this piece (note the casually held cigarettes!) but was it like that here as well? To try to find out I consulted the the Milngavie and Bearsden Herald, 12th May edition.
It’s in ‘broadsheet’ format and only four pages long. The front page was mainly advertising:
There is a notice of a church service offering thanksgiving and prayer.
Page 2 carries a column of items about Bearsden (three news items and a column called Bearsden Man’s Notes which I am not sure have stood the test of time). There are a lot more adverts but they are almost entirely for businesses in Milngavie – the only one in Barsden is for Park Dairy, 110 Drymen Road:
This is now Wright and Crawford, in between Vivi and the barbers.
Page 3 finally carries a little of the news I was seeking:
The first thing to note is that this is entirely about Milngavie – we can maybe infer the bunting and bonfires also happened in Bearsden as well.
The article describes a plaque at Milngavie Bowling Club, I wonder what happened to it?
Then we have the party at Douglaston Gardens North and again I imagine something similar happening in streets around our area.
Finally there is the church service (“well attended but there ought not to have been a vacant seat”) at St Pauls (the one at the junction of Station Road with Strathblane Road, opposite Andiamo’s). The newspaper reports the service including The Address by Reverend Robert Harvie verbatim. I haven’t reproduced it here, but his words reveal two interesting points.
First, while he talked about pride in what had been achieved he reminded his audience the war with Japan continued. With hindsight we know that war would end within four months, but on 8th May 1945 people could well have imagined there was another 2, 3 or even more years to go and ‘our boys’ who had finished fighting in Europe were about to be shipped to fight in south-east Asia.
Second, Reverend Harvie talked about the men who would not be coming home and the families who were mourning them. The Bearsden War Memorial lists 73 names and my limited research has identified another 29, so the chances are everyone knew someone who had been killed.
Apart from the human cost, Bearsden South Church had been bombed down on the first night of the Clydeside Blitz in 1941 and would not have been rebuilt at this point.
The final page of the newspaper carries more Milngavie news, including the 48th Annual Inspection of the Boys’ Brigade and the retiral of the captain which probably gets more space than VE Day itself.
There is an editorial, however, another sober, tired and thoughtful piece:
So that’s the only record I could find. Nothing about Bearsden and a very quiet and reflective mood in Milngavie (as captured in the newspaper). Do any readers know any more about what happened in Bearsden at this time?