大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Gillian Ridley (Nee Wood) for Three Counties Action on behalf of Mr John Wood and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

My Father was killed on his pushbike just before the August Bank holiday of 1939 on his way home from work - War broke out in the September we were evacuated in the October or November and I was five in the December.
We were among the first lot of evacuees to leave London (Finsbury). I was evacuated to Dunstable we arrived late at night and hungry, I remember not liking the custard I was given for my first meal.
My next memory was having a ride in a grey Vauxhall car that had flutes down the bonnet.

I must have been in Dunstable a little while when Mum and my little sister who was two and half were evacuated to Bury Park. Not long after Nan and Grandad (mums parents) started renting a place in Sundon Park as soon as they moved in we all moved in with them. Grandad had retired from his job in London as a Printer Compositor. But then he took on several jobs in Luton, as there was a shortage of labour.

That winter they started to build the School. I remember Grandad taking me up the road saying that that would be my school when it was built that was Sundon Park Primary school now Lealands High school. So we had no school for a little while, we used to play in the countryside. I remember taking Grandad over to the woods (Primrose) and fields and showing him the cattle the wild strawberries and where to pick the hazelnuts.

Grandad really took to gardening it was the first garden he had ever had coming from London. He was delighted with it. The dig for victory campaign was what got him started and then he became very enthusiastic. He bought a daily express gardening book for half a crown I think (maybe cheaper) so we grew all sorts of vegetables then. We also had a small lawn in the back garden that we started cutting with a pair for scissors until he got a pair of shears. He used to make me collect the horse manure from the bakers and coal mans horses, I remember being very embarrassed.

We had an Air Raid Precautions warden (ARP) called Mr Cheek- 鈥渢urn that light out鈥� he used to shout - the least chink of light and he would shout out. We got told off for playing football outside during an air raid once 鈥済o indoors鈥� he shouted at us.

When they had built the school they decided that we needed air raid shelters at the school, a lot more evacuees were arriving and the school quickly became over crowded, we had to have some classes in the cricket pavilion across the road (belonging to SKFCo)

So while they were building the shelters we had half days at school and then another spell of half days while they added an annex (another three classrooms) to the school.

The first winter after they built the air raid shelter, which were two brick buildings in front of the classrooms to act as a blast wall in front of the school, it snowed very heavily and there was a snowdrift at the end of the shelters across a little path. Before school had started the kids were all climbing onto the air raid shelters and then running along the top and jumping off into the snowdrift. When the Headmaster came arrived at school he lined us all up along the corridor to give us all the cane. Tall ones at the beginning when he got to me the smallest of he lot he laughed he gave me the cane anyway, I can鈥檛 remember it hurting though.

Another problem with this half day schooling was we used to get there ok in the mornings but the afternoon sessions we had no idea what the time was as we would have been over the woods playing all morning and would often arrive too late for school. I seemed to avoid getting the cane for that.

Each class was split up into pairs and we had our own little gardening patch supporting the dig for victory campaign. As we got older we were released form school to do potato and pea picking in the local farms. One farmer who used to chase us in his Humber car when we were being a nuisance on his farm land, was now employing us and so when he came to pay us, he would pay us from the back of a farm cart, we used to hide our faces and look the other way so he didn鈥檛 recognise us. He was the brother to J W Green who owned the brewery that was later bought out by Flowers the local Luton Brewery. I suppose he got his own back when he gave us the job of Charlock picking a yellow flower with steams and leaves like sand paper, you could only do it for half an hour or so, it used to grow in the corn fields amongst the wheat.

While Mum was working at SKFCo she met one of the soldiers who was working on the anti aircraft guns (ackack gun) on the roof of the SKFCo factory, it was made up to look like a park from the air with camouflage. He came from Derby and we all went up to visit his family (me my sister and Mum) so we had a little holiday in a back-to-back terraced house, he had lots of kids, he must have been a widower too. We all had a wonderful time with all the kids, here seemed to hundreds of them. That didn鈥檛 work out but later in 1942 she met and married my stepfather.

He was a great Dad. He was from Lancashire and had been a collier. He was as strong as an ox and very placid and good-natured. We kept chickens and Ducks in the back garden as well as a vegetable plot. I would help him build new hen houses and sheds. I remember dismantling the old structure, saving all the rusty nails and straightening them. We wasted nothing in those days.
Keeping chickens meant a walk to Aubrey Browns the seed merchant to buy feed, spices and grit. I used to think the grit made the eggshell but the spices certainly made the eggs taste good.

Dad was a 鈥橣irst Aider鈥� in the Home Guard and also did Fire watching duty at Sundon SKF.
With a bigger family and so more ration books, chickens and eggs we seemed to eat quite well, although I can鈥檛 ever remember going hungry.
While out in the playground at school doing P.T. one morning we heard a loud explosion in the direction of Luton. We later heard that it was a V2 Rocket, which hit Commer Cars factory 3 1/2 miles away.

The Victory celebrations were marked with a fancy dress parade and a street party, with bonfires in the evening.
As a child growing up in the war I don鈥檛 think we felt deprived.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.