大象传媒

Gabrielle Deanes
This story is taken from an interview with Gabrielle Deanes, and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions. The interview was by Deirdre Donnelly, transcribed by Bruce Logan.
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This is a story that I鈥檝e heard most of my life, through my own family. It鈥檚 about a young couple named Tom and Dorothy, and about what happened to them during the war. They lived just down in St Patrick鈥檚 terrace, in the middle of the row there on St Patrick鈥檚 Terrace, just past the chapel. They鈥檇 had a tough enough time, because they鈥檇 had a stillbirth first, before they got this much-cherished daughter in February 1941.
You can imagine, it was quite a hard time for them.

The baby was about 6 weeks old, and of course, being Derry during the war air raid sirens were going off all the time, because they were also quite close to the docks. Just at the bottom of the Buncrana road, what鈥檚 the junction now, that roundabout. That would have been the docks then. There would have been a lot of warships there, the visiting navies would have been in regularly. So the air-raid sirens were going off if there was any sign of a plane at all anywhere near the area.

So the baby鈥檚 about 6 weeks old, and 1 night the siren went off, as usual. It sounded, it seemed to be 鈥� a bit more urgent sounding than usual, it went on a little bit longer or something. Tom didn鈥檛 know just quite what, but something made him worried. They鈥檇 just settled the baby into its cot, and Tom says 鈥渨e鈥檇 better get the baby and go downstairs鈥�. Dorothy says 鈥淚鈥檓 tired, Tom. I鈥檝e only just got into bed. That baby鈥檚 only just settled. Don鈥檛 ask me to get up again.鈥�
He says 鈥淚鈥檓 getting back up, I just have this feeling there鈥檚 something not right.鈥�
So he gets up, picks the baby up out of the cot, and took her downstairs. Now these old terraced houses, there was what they called the cubby-hole under the stairs. The opening under the stairs. And that was where they would have, they鈥檇 gone a couple of times before. Dorothy didn鈥檛 like it, didn鈥檛 like going in there. But once he鈥檇 gone down the stairs with the baby, she wasn鈥檛 long after him.
And just after she was in the cubby hole and no more, there was the most unmerciful crashing sound. They thought the whole house had been torn apart. They didn鈥檛 know what it was. They just 鈥� they assumed it was a bomb, even though they had been assured that this would never happen in Derry.
Anyway, after calming Dorothy down and stopping her hysterical screaming, Tom went out and went out of the door and looked down to the docks. There was nothing.
But when he turned to his right and looked up the road, THAT鈥檚 where all the noise and smoke was coming from. Because up the road 鈥� Messines park, Messines terrace 鈥� that鈥檚 where the bomb had hit. So he went back in again and told Dorothy what had happened. And she was sitting, holding onto the baby which was crying with all the noise and excitement going on around her. And after he had calmed her down, got Dorothy a cup of tea and all, he went out to see if he could help. The emergency services and all the local people were there, and he decided he was better off staying with Dorothy and keeping her calm, because if left on her own she would not have been very happy.
So they went back upstairs, and when they went back upstairs he just looked at Dorothy and said 鈥淲ell, I wanted to move鈥�.
The baby鈥檚 cot was full of glass. The 2 front windows of the house had blown in, the cot which was sitting between the 2 windows had just taken most of the glass into it.
If he hadn鈥檛 lifted that baby, if he hadn鈥檛 gone down the stairs with that child in his arms, and stayed in the cubby-hole until that bomb went off, I wouldn鈥檛 be able to tell you this story now. Because that baby was me.

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