大象传媒

This story has been written onto the 大象传媒 People's War site by CSV Storygatherer Ian Hollins on behalf of Kathleen Scarlett. The story has been added to the site with her permission. And Kathleeen Scarlett fully understands the terms and conditions of the site.

I lived with my mother in Plymouth as my husband was in the Army. I was pregnant in 1941 and carried my first child through the 鈥淏litz鈥�. I was due to go into the Military Nursing Home but it was bombed and it was a heap of rubble when I attended a pre-natal examination. In place of the hospital stood a small hut with a lady taking details and I was faced with two alternatives, evacuation to a hospital in North Devon or transferring to the naval nursing Home in Plymouth (The Alexandra Nursing Home). I opted for the latter.

On one occasion whilst I was on the way to the next pre-natal examination I saw a bombed out steam roller. A little boy was pointing to it saying 鈥渓ook Mum look鈥�, wearily she answered 鈥測es son if you can make it go you can have it鈥�. Such was the humour which stood us all in good stead during those dark days.

The birth was long and tiring on October 9th 1941 but there were retired ex-sailors living in the attics at the home ready to carry us 鈥榥ew mums鈥� down to the shelter if the air raids became too bad. I was lucky there were no raids but within the next few weeks the hospital was bombed and some babies were born on the edges of bomb craters.

In 1945 I was pregnant again. That birth, my daughter, took place in the same hospital which by this time, had been repaired of course. The thing that I remember most about that time was that a nurse went around the wards collecting all of the large gas masks that we would have had to put the little babies in while the mums pumped clean air into the masks. To me that was a symbol that the war was well and truly over in Europe.

I wrote the following poem in aid of the Shekinah Mission some years ago.

WHAT DID YOU DO IN THE WAR GRANDMA?

I had a child in forty one
Born with his fists clenched tight
As if he knew, even at his birth
That men were born to fight.

But in my mind a question mark,
Had I committed sin
To allow, in those dark days of war
A babe to enter in?

Now I am old, the child full grown
His term of service done
And I have learned that in dark days
Small hopes shine like the sun.

Kathleen Scarlett

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