- Contributed by听
- parkside-community
- People in story:听
- Jill boniface (my grandma) and her parents
- Location of story:听
- London- Kensington
- Background to story:听
- Civilian
- Article ID:听
- A6078602
- Contributed on:听
- 10 October 2005
I was only six when the war began in 1939. I lived with my mother and father in Kensington. We left our home when the bombing started and went to live in Cumberland. Very soon afterwards, our house in London was bombed, however nobody was killed. We had no home to go back to, all our belongings were demolished. We had to move from Cumberland so a friend offered us their home. I now had a new baby sister who was born at the end of 1939.
After a few months, we moved again, and again. I did not go to school until I was 9, we kept on moving. A lot of children only stayed at the school for a while, some were evacuees. The most important thing was to have somewhere to live, getting on at school was not so important. I only learnt to read when I was about 9.
We moved to our new home with very little furniture, my sister and I had new beds with war time itchy blankets.
We had only been at our new home in London and another school in London when we were bombed-out again. No one was killed but all of our belongings were completely destroyed. We found our cat Bimbo roaming about the garden looking for his home.
We had to find somewhere else to live. In 1944 we moved to our third house with only essential bits of utility furniture. It was a very cold house but we had a Valour paraffin lamp that leaked and one morning we were covered in black greasy smoke. It was very frightening.
The floors were bear and the windows had blackout curtains to stop any light showing outside. There was not much food; we had ration books to buy small pieces of meat, cheese and eggs each week. Everyone had their food rationed. I was eleven when the war ended; it had been a very frightening and sad time for our family.
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