大象传媒

I was only an infant (4 years old) when the war started. When gas masks were introduced I prayed that we would never have to use them as I hated having it on my face and felt I would not be able to breath properly. We were all given small cardboard boxes in which to carry the gas masks, but my mum managed to get me a special black case, which was roughly the shape of the gas mask, in which to keep mine. It was stronger and weatherproof.

One memory I have was that every so often we had to have the gas masks tested at School. I hated this exercise. There were two people testing them and we had to queue up in two rows. When we got to the front the tester yanked the gas mask over our heads, which quite often pulled my hair and hurt, as the gas mask was made of rubber and clung to your hair. They held a piece of cardboard underneath the gas mask and you had to breath in so that the cardboard would cling to the bottom of the mask. Then they would pull the mask off, which again hurt my head.

We had to take the gas masks with us everywhere, my mother took the attached photo of me with my gas mask on in Kelsey Park, Beckenham with her little Box Brownie camera as a memory of what it was like.

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