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….. the bombing starting to get uncomfortably close in Ashford. After vast family discussion, it was decided that I should join the section of the school which was evacuated. After a while, my mother and sister also came to Witney: then, after a few months we all three returned and rejoined my father, rather than let him carry on alone.

We arrived in Witney to find no immediate accommodation, so we all slept in the local cinema with our luggage: some across the seats...some on the floor. We awoke early and walked around Witney. I recall a strong smell of what I thought was burning tea: It was the brewery. Soon after our arrival, two bombs fell in the middle of Witney (rumoured to be compressed-air bombs)...one of which (I believe) fell on the said brewery. This made some of us wonder why we'd been evacuated in the first place!

It was far easier to get into the country than it had been back home, although Ashford was a country town. We used to cycle out to the air-fields just outside Witney and watch the Harvards, Oxfords and Ansons ...all training planes, painted yellow. The sound of them (especially the Harvards) was the sound I recall most, as it seemed always to be with us.

The friends who hadn't come and who stayed in Ashford. Certainly my own room, as I had to share with another of my classmates: a not-altogether satisfactory arrangement.

The sharing, mainly. I used to be besotted with making models - something which was treated quite scornfully by my classmate. So I ended up by persuading my host couple to let me make them in the glorious peace and quiet of their attic!

Nothing, really, except making fireworks - and generating a great deal of smoke and acrid smell - with the help of sulphur, which we "borrowed" from the blanket mills.

Cycling a great deal, after my bike arrived by train from home. Walking, playing sport just out of town, going to the Youth Club...and belonging to the Army Cadets. Oh, and catching crayfish in the river: none big enough to eat!

I only stayed in Witney a short while; I went back to Ashford with my mother and sister, who came up to join me, but didn’t like the idea of dad coping on his own. My memory of the few months I spent there is not all that good … my memory that is, not the stay!

I do recall that on the first night we had to sleep in the local cinema, on the floor and between the seats, prior to being billeted. The name of the very hospitable and long-suffering couple who took me in was Mr and Mrs M… and they lived in (I think) Mill Street. It was fairly near one of the blanket mills and I won't ever forget the overwhelming smell of sulphur as one passed by...used, I think, to treat the said blankets. I vaguely recall joining a fairly active youth club, but little else about it. We all went to Witney Grammar School and indulged in a fair amount of sport, played in a field well outside the village. Oh, yes...and I have the distinct recollection of a couple of bombs (compressed-air bombs was the rumour:) being dropped on Witney - on or near the brewery - right at the start of our stay. And that was the other overriding fragrance...the brewery!

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