St Ninian's Chatterbox

On the 15th February,  P7 went to Devil’s Porridge in Gretna. My favourite thing was when Mrs Anderson made me dress up as a nurse from WW1. We got to handle ww1 antiques  such as British helmets, German helmet, stick bombs (not real ), rifle, revolver, (not real).  Our guide was called Susan. She was really nice and cheerful. She showed us around the museum explaining to us about every single WW1. Over 10,000 Irish navvies were forced  to come  and build a munition factory in 1916. Over 12,000 girls over the age of sixteen forced to work with coordinate. Coordinate makes their skin turn yellow and they can become infected with all kinds of diseases. Girls  had an amazing experience  staying in the hostels. They had their own little room that nobody but them were allowed in . That meant that if u wanted to meet up with your friends you would have to meet up at the sitting room. Every hostel was owned by a matron that made sure that the girls were well feed and everything. When we were finished we got to play around the top floor. Me and Jasmine were playing in the kitchen and tried being like a WW1 widow looking after their children. It was defiantly the best trip I’ve ever been on.

Yours sincerely  S. Black

On Thursday P7 went to Devil’s Porridge a WW1/2  museum in Eastriggs to continue our WW1 topic. When we got there, we went inside and up to a learning room where we watched a power point before going of in three groups. One group went downstairs to a factory learning section, where we learned about what girls did when men were away fighting. We learned that they made cordite ()the stuff inside a bullet and if they drop anything in, it could blow up! While one group did that another group learned about the jobs girls did  in WW1 like be police, nurses and  factory workers. When they finished work, they liked to go to the cinema, go on a train to Carlisle and socialise. The other group did object handling – they got to hold guns, try on helmets, put on outfits and got to hold a sword. When we were leaving we got to take a picture on SIR JAMES (a train). It was really fun at Devil’s Porridge I would love to go back.

by Milan

On Thursday 15th we went to Devil’s Porridge. We had an amazing time learning about WW1. We learned all about the Gretna girls and their homes. We also learned about Devil’s Porridge. But my favourite thing to learn about was the trenches. I really liked learning about the trenches in class as well. I find having interactive learning really helps engage the learning it into our minds. It was an amazing day and I would definitely go back (because we found out they were building a virtual reality machine all about WW1/2).

                                                                                                                                                                        Thank you Katie Irving

We went to Devil’s Porridge in Gretna yesterday. It is a museum all about World War 1 and 2. We learnt why the museum is where it is. It is there because it was a factory that made cordite for shells that were  used in the war. It was also the biggest cordite factory in the world. We also learnt how it affected the workers (also know as the Gretna  girls).

We learnt that their  teeth fell out, their hair went red and their skin went yellow, so after that they got a new nick name – the canary girls! I had an amazing time going to Devils’ Porridge. I would definitely go again.

by Amy Jardine