大象传媒

If people saw a queue outside a shop they all ran to join it. When you got up maybe there was a bill up on the door that said 鈥榥o cigarettes, no tobacco, no matches, no chocolate and no looting!鈥� One week鈥檚 rations was one egg, 2ozs of bacon, 2ozs of butter. My mother saved the cream off the bottles of milk and poured it into a bowl and we all took turns at whipping it until you got a tiny bowl of butter. That was for my father who was on 24 hrs leave; my father was the driver of the winch that put one of the barrage balloons up. He served at Sydenham at Sandown Road When I was a little girl we went over there with wee parcels my mother would have made up. That was out of bounds for me but she drew the directions out on paper, I followed them and went and seen my father.

On the 7th April 1941 when my father went away I took over the man鈥檚 role. If anybody knocked the door any hour of the night I answered. My mother was there but she was up the pole because my father was away. So on the 7th April 1941 we were all in bed and the streets were black with the blackout, no lights anywhere. You were not allowed to strike matches in the street. There was the most unmerciful bang you ever heard and it woke me out of my sleep. I was near the window and I remember saying to my mother 鈥淚t鈥檚 the end of the world鈥� and she said 鈥淥pen the blind a wee bit and see if there is anybody about鈥�. There were people all over the street and I knew there was big trouble, then the sirens went. The bombs were dropped and there were people killed in the shipyard, workmen and night duty men. My brother worked in there, but he was at home. When he went down the next day the yard was closed, he came back and told us about those friends of his that had died.

On Easter Tuesday we all went as a family to the zoo, as that鈥檚 my sister鈥檚 birthday. But this day she couldn鈥檛 play or run about as she was so taken with the barrage balloons. There were 32 balloons in the province and they were all at strategic points. If you saw 28 you were o.k, but if you saw 32 you were petrified. When they put them right up you saw them all and that meant trouble, but when there was no trouble they went down lower. My sister was running after me around the zoo shouting 鈥淢ay, May, there鈥檚 32 balloons up.鈥� I looked myself and I ran about like mad (full of war nerves, you know).

I forgot to tell you about the part where I got out onto the street, when the sirens went one night. My father was on a 24hr leave because he was stationed locally, the sirens went and he called me out to the front door. He treated me like a big girl (I was only a wee girl in school.) but I knew what was going on. I stood out at the door and we listened to the heavy drones of the German Luftwaffe over the town. It was pitch black, no stars or anything and he said 鈥淲atch, they鈥檙e here. Do you see the blue fleck, that鈥檚 the incendiaries dropping?鈥� The streets just lit up like pure daylight. They fell on a street which no longer exists called Beresford Street, a big long street off the Shankill Road. Well when you opened the door, that was my escape - I couldn鈥檛 stay in, I had to get out. Strangely enough my mother put all our good clothes on and good shoes; if you were going to get killed you had to have your good things on. We got out onto the street and the whole street was lit up. My idea was he鈥檚 not going to see where I live, and I was jumping on those bombs. My aunts came out they lived just a few doors up from where they had dropped and took me away from them. I鈥檝e an aunt, she鈥檚 88 and she鈥檚 still here and she said 鈥淚 remember you out jumping on those incendiary bombs.鈥� I was trying to extinguish them, but they were hard, they were actual bombs! The streets melted.

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