大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a volunteer from 大象传媒 Radio Berkshire on behalf of Peter Gosling and has been added to the site with his permission. Peter Gosling fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

I was a wireless operator in the Royal Navy on the Empire Lance Mothership in 1945 when we liberated the Channel Islands. Our job was to bring back German prisoners of war to Southampton. Whilst in St. Peter鈥檚 Port, we went ashore and realised how the Islands had suffered. The things they missed were cigarettes and the ladies of course missed their make-up. So the next time we were in Southampton my mate and I scoured the shops for things like face cream, powder, lipstick, which we felt would be appreciated. During our trip back to Guernsey my mate and I rolled by hand 500 cigarettes each to give to the nicotine-starved men, who had been smoking dried seaweed.

This we did when we went ashore and we rationed them to ten cigarettes each, and of course you can imagine they didn鈥檛 last very long. Back on board there were quite a number of small rowing boats around. One in particular attached itself to a rope ladder over our stern. There was a mother and father on board and we began talking to them. Very soon we climbed down the ladder and decided to give some of our make-up booty to the ladies, for which they were delighted, not having seen anything like it for years. I must mention that the make-up was originally intended for my wife and when I explained the story to her she forgave me.

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