大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Jane Cave for Three Counties Action on behalf of Peter Stevens and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

It was midsummer 1944 when at about 9 o'clock in the evening we heart the sound of a flying bomb approaching at a low altitude. We, Mum, Dad, and I, went immediately into an air raid shelter in the garden. The noise became deafening then there was a sudden silence, then an almighty bang. Father rushed out of the shelter and found himself amidst falling debris. When it cleared we went into the house and saw the front door had been blown off, ceilings were down, all windows were broken and we discovered that the bomb had landed about 300 feet from the house causing much damage to a number of neighbouring houses. Unfortunately two people whe were cycling down Mountview Road and who had been warned by a policeman to take cover ignored the warning, were killed. Interestingly, a local doctor, Dr Hayes, was motoring along the road in his Lanchester motor car - the car was a write off but fortunately the doctor only suffered from shock.

Strangely enough, my future wife's mother was sheltering under the stairs of one of the houses that received substantial damage and her daughter, my future wife, was a patient of the doctor. It wasn't until many years later that I realised how closely we were involved in this incident.

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