大象传媒

Terry鈥檚 War

I lived with my parents in a little village to the west of Stafford. Dad was a copper and we moved round the county a lot. I was great pals with a little rascal who came from a large family and lived next door to us. He and I used to play in the surrounding fields and our 鈥渂est bobby鈥� was to collect the 鈥渃haff鈥� (metal strips which our planes used to drop to confuse the instruments of the enemy planes). On one momentous occasion we actually found a piece of an enemy plane which had been shot down on a return run from bombing Liverpool.

We had an evacuee billeted with us. He came from Coventry and loved living in the country. Well who wouldn鈥檛, having suffered all the bombing in Coventry.

I had a dog called Rex who lived in a large kennel by the back door. I used to climb on the kennel and suffered a double rupture as a consequence. I had to go into Stafford Infirmary and as it was a relatively progressive hospital Mum was actually allowed to stay in with me. I didn鈥檛 have any stitches in the wounds but a series of tiny metal clips a bit like miniature bulldog clips. I鈥檝e still got the scars today.

I had a steam train for one Christmas, but I wasn鈥檛 allowed to play with it. My dad and uncle Steve played with it until they tipped it over in the tunnel and it set the floor alight. It was soon sold after this little mishap.

We must have had more severe winters than we do today. I can remember one day in 1942 Neville and I were fishing in a local stream with our home made rods and string line with bent pins for a hook. Mind you I can鈥檛 remember catching anything other than weeds and maybe some frogspawn. Anyway we saw the district nurse riding on a cart horse, apparently on the top of the hedges to our village. The lanes were very deep with steep sides rather like the ones on Devon.

We moved from the village when I was 6 to a bigger one on the east of Stafford. This was a real kids paradise as it had a canal, a railway with a station (now closed) , two rivers and a lock in the canal. We kids had a wonderful life compared with the lives of youngsters today. The freedom was unlimited with no thought of weirdos or any other dangers out there.

There was a large American hospital in the grounds of Shugborough Hall which was very near to the village. Consequently there were a lot of Yanks in and around the village (and a lot of half Yankee kids after the war). They were very generous with their money, sweets for us kids, and 鈥渙ther things鈥� too. I鈥檓 told that the adults in the village got very fed up with what they considered the wastage of medicines etc. in the camp compared with the shortages in our local hospital. Dad even went into the American hospital for an operation on his stomach ulcer as the local hospital couldn鈥檛 cope with him. They also gave large parties to us local kids in their equivalent of the Naafi. We鈥檇 never seen anything like the sweets and candies they plied us with.

Mum and dad became very friendly with a Yank, inevitably named Hank of course, and even after he鈥檇 finished in the hospital and been posted up to the north, he came back to visit us. I can distinctly remember him arriving with his raincoat slung over his shoulder and absolutely bulging with sweets and candies. They covered the kitchen floor when he tipped them out.

We kids used to swim in the canal in the summer and dive off the lock gates into the lock. In the winter we used to skate and slide on the canal until the ice-breakers came through and spoiled all our fun. We also used to cultivate the ice on the hump-backed bridge to sledge on. Again the workmen came eventually and spoiled our fun. It wasn鈥檛 as if we were causing any dangers to the rest of the villagers as the bridge only led to another medieval, narrow one over the rivers with little vee-shaped passing places built into it and only leading to Shugborough Park. Mind you we went sledging on the steep land of Lordies which led down to the railway line at the bottom. The sledge which dad had built for me came into its own here and I often finished up on the railway lines. We used the railway lines to try and convert ha鈥檖ennies into pennies. They did end up larger but we certainly couldn鈥檛 have spent them in the shops.

On VE night, Mum and I cycled to the next village and on their green they鈥檇 built a huge bonfire with a large swastika on top. To the accompaniment of fireworks they were burnt. We cycled home across the Shugborough Hall land and over the bridges then into the village where we were confronted by hordes of, mainly men, drinking on the pavement outside the local pub. It was all very good natured and friendly and I wanted to stay and join in. Mum insisted that we got off home. I think she didn鈥檛 think it proper that the local coppers wife should desport herself with the 鈥渄runken鈥� goings on.

Dull as it is, that was my war.

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