大象传媒

HOMELESS
After we were bombed by the errant V1, we were homeless.
At the Rest Centre, I was allotted a bunk in a large room whose walls were lined with three-tier bunks. The Rest Centre was quite thickly populated, and I suppose there were between fifty and a hundred in the women's dormitory slotted into the bunks. I was provided with a rough grey blanket, and lay there sleepless, homeless and hurt and worried about Mother and her unknown injuries.
The night dragged on, enlivened by occasional snores, grunts, remarks made suddenly from the unconscious, tossings and turnings. So many unhappy and distressed people! About 3 a.m. a Rest Centre helper came in bringing our local warden to see me. It appeared that an elderly couple who lived in the house next door but one to ours were unaccounted for. The Heavy Rescue Service had explored the remains of the house without result, but, before spending a long time clearing the site, they were trying to find someone who could tell them whether the couple had indeed been in the house when the bomb fell. It was always understood that people would let the Air Raid Warden know if they were away from home, and here was a case of trouble and waste of time being caused by carelessness. The missing couple had only been living in the house a short time while the owners were away. In the end it turned out that they were away for a few days, and hadn't bothered to let the warden know!
Soon it was light, and people began to get up, to wash and to dress. As for me, having nothing with me, all I could do was to get up! What a filthy state I was in! Later investigation showed that my hair was standing out bushily, full of grit and dirt, as though thickly powdered. With the now developed black eye I was a sight to behold! When later I got to a bath in Audrey's flat I discovered that the pores of my skin were like tiny blackheads where the dirt had been blasted in through my clothing. It was some time and many baths later before I reverted to normal.
Breakfast was served at the long wooden tables the school had used for dinners. Everything, of course, was very basic. Tea, bread, a scraping of margarine and marmalade again! I found I was crying, and could not eat much. I suppose it was the shock of the night before. It feels very strange suddenly to lose your whole background - house, furniture, garden, clothes - the lot. Poor Dad remained remarkably quiet and calm, not his usual talkative self.
After breakfast Dad and I went to Denham Court, and from there with Audrey we went to the Hospital to find out what damage had been done to Mother. We found her wonderfully calm and cheerful, but much concerned about what would happen to Dad. Fortunately, her arm was not broken, but she had multiple light injuries here, there and everywhere, with a particularly nasty cut across one eye which had just missed blinding her, and many glass splinters. It had been arranged for all the casualties from our bomb to be sent to Leatherhead, so we bade her farewell and good luck.
Audrey lent me something to wear, so, cleaned up a bit, we got by 'bus to Catford where we had to queue in a large, shabby church hall to be allotted clothing coupons and an emergency war damage payment. Poor Dad was still in the suit he had been bombed in, and had not even a change of underwear. We took him to a nearby shop and bought him some spare pants and a vest and shirt.
Later, we went back to the house to see by daylight how things were, also, if possible, to find the cat. At first, we couldn't get inside the ruin, as the front of the house was unsafe. They were just lassoing the upstairs what was left of bay with a rope, and we watched while it tightened and, with a hefty pull, what was left of the upper part of the house fell into the front garden. After a little we made our way into what was still there. We called Micky, but it seemed hopeless to look for him, and we could not get far over big chunks of walling, broken rafters and so on. Bit by bit we extracted some forks, knives and many small, unbreakable belongings of that kind, but, of course, there was no china or glass left whole. The dresser in the kitchen was quite gone. The blast had drawn shelves and other woodwork from their moorings.
The groundsman from the adjoining Tennis Club appeared. He had already made a cursory survey of the damaged houses, and seemed confident he would be able to salvage some of the furniture if we wanted him to, and to this I readily agreed. Our house was the end one of a group of five which had been built in 1925, and were all damaged beyond repair. Later, the site was cleared, and the houses were rebuilt in 1947. In addition to these five, a row of cottages in a twitten leading westwards from Perry Rise was destroyed, and the Tennis Club buildings and flat over were no more.
The old tabby cat I wanted to find was really a war refugee, as his family had left London, and-one of the C.D. staff had undertaken to find a home for him. As it seemed there was no future for him we had given him a home, and he proved to be the gentlest "soppiest" cat I have ever had dealings with. You could pick him up and carry him about paws and face upwards, tickle him, lift a paw, stroke his tail, and never did a claw emerge from his permanently paddy paws. He was large and handsome, except for being rather let down by his meagre tail, neatly striped like the rest of him, but narrow and unimpressive. He was at his best when he sat up with it curled round him, but he had an unfortunate habit of leaving it stretched out behind him in a straight line, thus drawing attention to it. I don't think he was really very bright, but he was very lovable. He had been difficult to feed. Scraps on the sides of people's plates in the canteen were few, and often Mother or I would queue perhaps as long as 戮 hour for fish in the market if they had had a delivery.
I hoped he had been killed quickly, as I had no home for him now, but wanted to know his end. Audrey and I had almost given up hope of finding him when he appeared from somewhere, but in such a sad way that I was not at first sure it was Micky. I think he may have been blown into the swimming pool. One eye was closed, and his fur was plastered and matted with dirt, leaves and twigs. Audrey nobly offered to take him to the vet for me, but I felt as he knew me, and had come back to me, I must help him myself, so I carried him, and we both walked to the vet's, and had him put down. This was terribly upsetting, but what else could I do? If I had not found him and had him put out of his pain, he might have remained half alive for a long time before dying. The vet was sympathetic and said there were many cats about that needed their lives ended.
We went back to our collecting, and Mr. Thornett, the owner of the Club, and our next-door neighbour, told us that Timmy had been found dead. Timmy was a remarkable cat, twenty-seven years old, his great age certified by the fact that he had come as a kitten to some neighbours when their son was three years old, and he was now a bomber pilot of thirty. There was no obvious injury to Timmy so that it was presumed he had been killed by blast.
Temporarily, Audrey and I arranged for Dad to go over to Purley to stay with Dorothy and Frank, but as they were having flying bombs there as well it soon had to be arranged for him to be evacuated, as there was a scheme to send every Londoner over seventy who was homeless to some safer area. This must have been very traumatic for poor Dad with his home gone, and wife in hospital, but in the circumstances of the time there was no alternative. He was billeted with a Welsh speaking family in South Wales. The husband was a miner. Dad felt like a fish out of water, though they were kind to him and did what they could. He kept writing asking when he could come back, and he must have felt very cut off and useless dawn there.
The next day I went back on duty, where my black eye caused some amusement. Frankie (Olive Leonard) suggested I should for the time being sleep in the street shelter outside her house in Sydenham Avenue, opposite St. Bartholomew's Church . This was a very quiet residential road, and, although anyone could use these little brick built shelters which had been erected at intervals along roads, this was not much used. So for a time I existed in a kind of no man' s land. I discharged myself from the Rest Centre with relief, and when off duty used Audrey's flat, but there was nowhere there to spend the nights.
Adrian had arranged for any furniture extracted from the house to be stored for a time at St. Magnus, the Heavy Rescue Centre in Dacres Road, and we found a retired cabinet maker who repaired several pieces, such as the old oak chest and gateleg table, at a modest charge. Sadly, most other items were beyond repair and the majority of the furniture and belongings were just smashed or disintegrated. The old piano had been very elegant and pre-dated 1826, a day in that year having been noted by a pianotuner in pencil somehwere inside. The keys were of ivory, rather yellowed with age, and they depressed so easily that I found it hard work to play a modern piano after learning on ours. It was the first kind of keyboard instrument to succeed the harpsichord, and would have been the kind that Schubert and Beethoven in his latter days would have been familiar with.
The next thing was to find a new home, and this meant more queueing in a bleak Church Hall with bare boards and flaking paint. By this time, after five years of war and neglect, everything everywhere was looking shabby. Once arrived at the action desk there was no difficulty in being allocated accommodation in the fairly near future; so many people who could do so had left London for other, quieter parts. Fairly, however, if a property was left vacant for longer than a specified time, it could be requisitioned by the Local Authority to provide a home for the bombed out, until such time as the war should be over and people's homes rebuilt. Thus I was offered a top flat in a very pleasant block in Lewisham Road called St. John's Court, on the edge of Blackheath. Being a top flat, it was not in much demand just then, but I decided to accept it.
At this busy time from the bombing point of view none of us Civil Defence personnel was taking a holiday. We were normally allowed one day off each week, but this was dependent on conditions, and, as far as I can remember, we also had a week's annual leave (or perhaps two?), but no Bank Holidays. However, in view of my recent experience I was granted a week off and went to a farm in Surrey where Audrey and Len were spending their summer holiday. (The coastal areas were inaccessible to visitors.) From this farm, we were able to get to Leatherhead by bicycle to see Mother in hospital there. I found our first visit initially upsetting, because I looked from bed to bed and couldn't recognise Mother. Then she saw us, and waved. Her poor face was so swollen and bruised, and she had a pad over one eye. Also her hair had not yet been thoroughly washed. Mine had been in a similar state until Bob had washed it for me three or four times, and still the grit rinsed out.
Mother's welcome was very cheerful, and she laughed to see my splendid black eye. We didn't tell her how she looked, and there weren't any looking glasses in the ward. All hospitalised A.R.C.s from "our" bomb had been brought into the same ward at Leatherhead, and it seemed strange to see neighbours, some only known by sight, filed away horizontally in a neat row. Next to Mother was an old woman from one of the little cottages in the twitten. She had been dug out from her collapsed cottage. Claiming to be a witch, she was now busy telling the fortunes of patients, nurses and doctors.
That week cycling about in the country, and being quite well fed at the farmhouse where we stayed, was a great help, though even there we were not entirely free from the doodle bugs, many of which overflew us on their way to London, but, though we heard them at times we felt we were no longer the target. As our forces progressed eastwards along the coast of France the launching pads were eliminated, so that the bombs still coming were mainly crossing England from a little farther east.
One afternoon as we were cycling along a lane through a wood I saw a large animal crossing a track through the wood about a hundred yards or less away. I jumped off the bike to investigate, but it had disappeared. We went into the wood to try to see it again, but it evaded us. I felt sure it had not been a large dog. It seemed like a cheetah, or something huge and catlike.
Soon I was back on duty again, and the defences were at last getting the flying bombs licked. The entire balloon barrage was moved to the south and east of London in the known path of the bombs, and, as they came over, the Ac Ac guns let rip at the appropriate range and bearing, raising a concentrated barrage of their own. Tiddles and I were on the A.W.A. one afternoon at the height of the infestation when no fewer than 108 doodles were shot down within an hour or two. It was an exciting and satisfying experience to hear the blessed words "Shot down," and to rub the plot from the map.
Mother was kept in the hospital for three weeks, and we arranged with Mildred (her younger sister) for her to go to stay with her at Leicester for a while, and then to her old friend Jean. An ambulance car brought her from Leatherhead to Marylebone Station where Audrey and I met her and put her on the train. She had been wonderfully brave throughout her ordeal, but I noticed how nervously she reacted when she came back to London to her new flat and we heard a V2 rocket explode. I had reacted nervously too a few days after "our" bomb when I was walking alone along a quiet road and heard a doodle cut out not far away and come tumbling down with that sinister wobbling sound. My knees turned to jelly and literally gave way so that I went down on the path in a most devout pose! It was several seconds before I could get them into working order again to rise!
Another day I was coming through the subway at Forest Hill Station when a train passed immediately overhead. This had always been a very noisy experience, but never before had I run with such speed and leapt up the stairs three at a time as though my heels had wings. I just didn't know what I was doing for a few seconds.
By the time we moved into the new flat the V1s were finished, but had been succeeded by the V2s. The latter were bigger, but far less numerous. Our Borough had had 117 flying bombs. Most unfortunately, a V2 fell on an empty school near St. John's Court soon after Mother's arrival, bringing down some of our plasterboard ceilings, but these were soon repaired. The worst V2 in Lewisham Borough was one which fell on Marks and Spencers on a Saturday morning killing 115 people, and injuring many more. The wife of our C.D. Officer was one of the casualties that morning. She was driving to work from Bromley through Lewisham and had a young soldier with her, having offered him a lift. He was killed too. All they could identify her from was a label from her coat and a piece of her handbag.
Rockets I found more frightening than the flying bombs. With the latter you had time to prepare, and usually to experience the relief of knowing they had gone over ("I'm all right, Jack") but with a rocket the bang comes first, and the whining noise of the approach afterwards. They were always such a surprise you weren't sure if you were too near or not! Only once did I see one - just a streak of smoke in the sky.
After all that, VE-Day on 8th May 1945 was very welcome.

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