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My name is Ruth Crouch, born Groves. I was born and raised in Birmingham and was 9 when WW2 started, so I only have snippets of memories. The war largely passed me by.

There were seven children in my family — Frederick, (Ted), June, Doris, (Dolly), Anne, myself, Brenda, and Shirley. Dad, Frederick Charles George Groves, was a Sergeant in the army, so I barely remember him during this time. Mum, Doris, (Dolly), Groves, worked in a munitions factory.

By the end of the war all those old enough were involved in the war effort. My sister Dolly worked in a munitions factory, June and Anne were in the Land army and Ted was in the Navy as a batman because he was colour blind. I remember being sent a load of forms about what I might want to do, but the war ended before I had to make a decision.

Apple Tree story

All the family was in the Anderson shelter at the bottom of the garden. The door was open and we could hear the German planes going overhead. I remember the sound very clearly, a kind of ‘er, er, er’. We heard a bomb drop and watched an apple tree from down the road fly over a house. Afterwards we went to see where it had landed. We were amazed to find it at the bottom of a hedge in someone’s front garden.

Shrapnel

When the all clear was given after air raids I remember going out with my brother and sisters looking for shrapnel. Ted kept the shrapnel. I don’t remember this bit, but Anne told me that one day the Rag and Bone man had come and Mum gave all of the shrapnel to him. Ted was furious, as he had been told he could have sold it.

Evacuation

Four of us were evacuated to Blan Clydach, near Tonypandy in Wales. There was June, Brenda, Annie and myself. I remember the train being packed solid with lots of other children. When we arrived, I remember a room that was also packed solid with lots of children. We were the last children left. Nobody wanted to take four children, so we were split up — June and Brenda were together and me and Annie. June was the eldest and was treated as a skivvy at the first house she stayed at. The second was better. Brenda was the youngest. She couldn’t settle so Mum took her back home after 2/3 months.

We were sent to different schools to the local Welsh children. They didn’t like us and we didn’t like them. I remember a group of English kids and a group of Welsh kids sitting on a mountainside and we were singing and shouting at each other. We were singing the war songs. I don’t know what they sang — it being in Welsh.

One day we decided we were going to walk home by following the railway track all the way back to Birmingham. June, Brenda and me set off one night. Annie didn’t want to come with us, but when asked where we were, she wouldn’t say where we had gone. In the end though, she had to tell them what we were doing.

We had walked the 7 miles to Tonypandy and were in the town centre, sitting down and trying to decide which way Birmingham was, when a policeman found us and took us back to where we were staying.

After nine months Mum came and took us all back home. When we got back we were quite a novelty. All the local kids kept asking us to talk because, unknown to us, we had picked up a Welsh accent. It didn’t last long though. We were soon back to our Brummy way of speaking.

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