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This story was submitted to the ´óÏó´«Ã½ People’s War site by ^{About links} on behalf of Peter Clarke and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

I was a schoolboy when war broke out. We lived at Bunwell and later on a farm at Hethersett. We had a lot of livestock — pigs, chickens, cattle — and we grew sugarbeet, mangolds, barley and wheat. We were on rations of course —everyone was. I liked sweets, and I remember wishing we could have more sugar. I was at Long Stratton school then.

When I was about twelve or thirteen I was taken out of school to help on the farm. I did odd jobs including cutting sugarbeet tops for cattle feed. I worked with a horse, harrowing and cultivating, and when I was old enough I drove a tractor

My dad used to take us out for a drive in the pony and trap on the weekends. We saw planes flying over, but I was never frightened.

I had two older brothers who also worked on the farm. Later my middle brother got a job as a lorry driver carting sugarbeet to the factory.

There were Land Army girls in the area, but none on our farm. German and Italian prisoners of war came from a POW camp at Long Stratton to work on the farm. A lorryload would be driven out — about thirty men I suppose — and they’d work on the farm all day and be driven back to camp at night.

They wore overalls. They were supervised by someone from the camp. They had breaks for tea and lunch. We gave them tea from the farmhouse, and they brought their own packed lunches from the camp.

I think some of them might have made friends with the local girls.

When I was a bit older I got a job at a POW camp in Hethersett. I forget why — more money than on the farm I suppose. I rubbed down calves to get them ready for sale. Eventually I joined my brother as a sugar-beet carter.

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