大象传媒

This story was gathered, written and submitted to the 大象传媒 Peoples War project by June Martin

2 THE AIR RAIDS
My father, who was 36 at the outbreak of war, was too old to join up. Instead he became an ARP warden. We lived at Knock, in East Belfast, and I remember him gong out at night with his steel helmet on. Even though I was not quite 3 years old at the time of the first Blitz in April 1941, I can recall him coming home to tell us that a bomb had struck a house in one of the avenues behind us. My mother had spent the night cuddling me and my brother on wooden chairs underneath the stairs of our house. She did this on many occasions and every evening before settling for the night she would prepare bread and milk in case of emergency. I used to ask if that was 鈥渇or Moore and me at night鈥�? Although the air raids on Belfast and other cities of the U.K. were horrendous and made me think as a tiny child that all Germans were evil and deserved the terrible retribution meted out in 1944-45 under Churchill, my mother would clutch me tight as she listened to the news and say: 鈥淕od have mercy on them! Those poor women and their wee children!鈥� Such compassion she had for the victims of even the enemy side.

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