大象传媒

If, today, you stand at the entrance of the Herbert Art Gallery on Jordan Well you won鈥檛 be too far away from where I was living on the night of 14 November, 1940. I shared small lodgings with my older sister and we lived within earshot of Coventry Cathedral鈥檚 bells which, at that time, played Moore鈥檚 Melodies. I remember listening to a tune called 鈥淭he Last Rose of Summer鈥� and others.

I was eighteen and worked at the BTH factory in Read Street. The night of the Blitz was a moonlit night, following a shower earlier. On the way home from work, we had seen droves of people making their way to the shelters. I remember we had had our dinner when at about 7.20 pm the sirens went and almost simultaneously it seemed, there were showers of incendiaries dropping out of the sky. The Cathedral was already alight when we went outside to deal with an incendiary which had landed in the small jetty running alongside our door. We threw some sand over it. It was nearly out and then it exploded, catching me in the leg just above my ankle. My sister said I kicked it 鈥� I can鈥檛 remember. I was wearing silk stockings which were very expensive and hard to come by at the time and these were my first concern. The stocking on the injured leg was ripped. 鈥淥h, look at my stockings,鈥� I said, full of disappointment. Quite quickly I realised the potential seriousness of what had happened when I was unable to walk. The impact of shrapnel through bone had caused a compound fracture.

An ambulance was called. In order to save time, a young soldier wearing a tartan hat picked me up in his arms and carried me out to the ambulance. The journey was difficult: the ambulance had to make several detours when roads were blocked as the raid progressed. Eventually we got to Gulson Road Hospital and I remember the doctors there wearing tin helmets. Conditions were difficult; I could hear bombs dropping and glass shattering. My leg was put in plaster. I remained in the hospital for a couple of days and was evacuated then to a hospital in Evesham along with several other patients from Gulson Road. I remember that injured soldiers from Dunkirk were also being treated at Evesham.

Eventually, my sister found me, and I returned to Coventry to recuperate.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.