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This story was submitted to the People’s War Site by Katie Holyoak, for Three Counties Action, on behalf of Brian Gurney, and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

I was 9 years old when the war started and I lived in Watford. A number of air raid shelters were built around the town for anyone who was out during a raid to dive into. These were big underground caverns that could hold hundreds of people, and in London, people used to go down the underground stations and many would sleep down there every night when the raids were bad. Each family was issued with their own home air raid shelter which was made of corrugated metal sections bolted together to form an arched shape. A hole, 4ft 6in wide by 6ft 6in long and about 3ft deep had to be dug in the back garden, then the sections were assembled in the hole so the arched roof was 4ft above ground. The whole lot was then covered with earth from the garden and some people would plant grass or flowers on top. Inside were bunk beds; one over the other on each side, and although the shelter would not withstand a direct hit it offered good protection and many people felt safe in them. Luckily I lived in Watford which was a medium sized town some 20 miles north of London without any really important targets so we did not suffer so intently from air raids as people in larger cities, especially London.
My mother was very nervous and would often go down the shelter when the air raid siren sounded (which was usually at dusk) and perhaps stay there all night. My dad and I usually stayed in the house and slept in our own beds although I was also quite frightened, but I didn’t wish to show it. It was not very pleasant lying in bed, hearing the sirens; then the throbbing sound of the German bombers which in those days were propeller powered — they seemed to make a different engine noise to that of our own aircraft — then the bang, bang, bang of the guns trying to hit the bombers; then if things were bad we would hear the bombs exploding nearer and nearer and nearer, perhaps hearing the whistle as they dropped. However, we never really suffered from the bombing, although one night when we were in the shelter the blast from the nearby bombs smashed the windows in my bedroom leaving a lot of broken glass on my bed.
On another occasion there was an intensive raid on some factory premises which were sited along the railway which was about 100yds from our back garden. The raiders dropped hundreds of incendiary bombs causing a tremendous fire which lit up the whole area and from which we could feel the heat in our back garden. We were told to prepare to evacuate as it was thought that the raiders would come back because the fires were making it easy for them to see the surrounding area. The didn’t come back, and in any case they hit the wrong target because Lord Haw Haw claimed that they had flattened another large factory near us called Odhams, which they didn’t hit at all. After this raid my mother took me to stay with my grandad in the country where it would be more safe and we stayed there for about six months. I was about ten at the time and went to school there in Biggleswade.

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