大象传媒

This contribution to People鈥檚 War was received by the Action Desk at 大象传媒 Radio Norfolk and submitted to the website with the permission and on behalf of Dennis Warman.

I apologise for the delay in writing this story of the London Blitz, I was having some difficulty in remembering the date of the air raid, having an idea that it was New Years Night 1940. By sheer coincidence I happened to see that there is to be a televised re-construction of the fire blitz on London and the date is given as 29.12.40, so I was not far out.
This incident took place on that night, at the peak of the blitz on London.
I was aged 17 and had joined the Home Guard, a very junior member of 鈥淒ads Army鈥�, I was a P.O. Telephone Engineer working at Wood Street Building in the City. This particular night I was on sentry duty at the entrance, armed with a rifle, five rounds of ammunition and we were required to check the passes of all who entered. Two of us covered the night, taking it in turns to hold the rifle.
By nine in the evening the customary air raid was under way, but this one was concentrated and quite alarming. The building contained 5 automatic telephone exchanges, each on separate floors. There was also a manual suite manned by women operators in daytime and by men at nigh. By about 10.30 the action was so heavy that about 30 men and 6 women (plus 2 Home Guards) were trapped. The top floor was soon ablaze and the fire watchers could do little except watch. The fire progressed down through the 鈥渁utomatic鈥� floors destroying the exchanges one by one. By one o鈥� clock it was obvious that nothing whatsoever could be saved. Through the emergency board in the basement we were told to evacuate the building. Easier said than done, we appeared to be ringed by an inferno. A cemetery which lay alongside the building gave promise of broken ground and we were advised to escape that way.

So the evacuation began, clambering over the cemetery wall and disappearing into the brilliant night. Two women insisted in staying on to work the manual board. There was no break in the ring of fire and buildings ahead were collapsing, no-one had returned to report progress and it was suggested that the cable chambers might be a better route of escape (subterranean tunnels carrying thousands of telephone circuits to other centres; they mostly followed the streets鈥︹��
The chamber door was opened and someone entered with a torch, he came back to report little water and also that the air seemed clear. The rest of joined him, carrying as many torches as we could find, the girls in the middle of the line and so we set off.
The water underfoot varied in depth and at times rose above wading level. After what seemed an interminable time we reached Faraday Buildings, the International Exchange for London. Within two days I was back at Wood Street Building, which had not, after all, burnt to the ground though all the exchange floors had been gutted. The entire area between Cheapside and the Barbican was rubble. When the ground cooled the Home Guard returned to use the area as a mock battleground.

Two images stand out after 62 years. Firstly, the faces of the two women who made the trek, the other was above the ground when at about 9.30 the following morning the roads were partly flooded with water covered by a thick film of black ash, so that the curbs were invisible. I remember seeing a typical City 鈥済ent鈥� of the time, in bowler hat, black pin-stripe trousers and grey spats emerge from a Tube Station, walk across the pavement and totter down into ankle-deep, filth and mud.
We spent the next two weeks or so diverting thousands of circuits to other communication centres. Emergency food supplies were drafted in from Government stores to keep us fed and we were introduced to the joys of American dried milk, dried eggs, mashed potato powder AND Spam.
I believe the part played by civilians in WW2 has tended to be understated. Later on I left the Post Office for the comparative safety of the RAF, there I learnt to fly and finished the War as a Pilot.

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