大象传媒

Tin hats and toy guns chapter four
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Life carried on.
I was taking my gas mask everywhere I went and trying not to be noticed.
I did get taken to Wales during the school holidays quite a lot. Aunty Muriel stayed at the cottage with her new baby for some time.
The Japs attacked somewhere called 'Pearl Harbour'.
The Americans suddenly found that, they too were involved in our war.
I didn't know where Pearl Harbour was, but I saw on the newsreel, the blazing sunken wrecks of what had been a big part of America's navy.
Now, those kids I had seen in the drugstores drinking 'soda' were in it with
us !
It soon began to show. One day, we were playing in the school playground when a plane droned overhead.
I didn't bother to look up.
"hat's that ?". Douglas Allen pointed into the sky. I looked up and I might as well have seen an Angel !
I expected to see a camouflaged bomber droning across the sky.
NO.... it was a huge silver thing with four engines and a great big tail fin !
" It's the YANKS", I shouted.
It was a Flying Fortress.
It looked ( casual ) It didn't have the rigid look of the R.A.F.
I could imagine that, inside that monster were some chaps sitting relaxed in their leather jackets and chewing gum !
Americans chewed gum all the time.
I had never seen a real live one.
Perhaps, they glanced down and saw a lot of upturned little white faces in St John's schoolyard ?.
We watched until our Flying Fortress became a little dot in the distance.
We were to see many more !.
Soon, we saw the real thing.
I was shopping with my mother in the main street of our little Lancashire mill town.
Suddenly, a Jeep came slowly along the road.
It contained American soldiers !
Sitting , just as I would have expected them to . Draped over the seats dressed in khaki green overalls and wearing silly little pointed hats. And, they were all chewing gum !
They were obviously very interested in what they were seeing. I felt a bit embarrassed. Our little town, never very clean because of the mills, was looking very grey and scruffy because nothing ever got painted during the war and a lot of shops had boarded up windows to stop bomb blast.
What I was actually looking at, in those American kids faces, was sympathy and sorrow. They were face to face for the first time with what we had, over the years, come to accept.
They didn't know of course, neither did we, about the warehouses full of cardboard coffins for the bombing victims. They didn't know what we ate or about why we were not very well dressed !
I looked at them and I doubted the ability of those kids from America, with all their innocence and chewing gum.
They didn't look like very good soldiers !
As the war went on, I came to realise that they had vast mounts of equipment.
And as the war went on, I realised that they knew how to use it !
I apologize to those kids in the Jeep for doubting them.
Off to Wales... Now, I saw something different. Bobbing about in the Menai Straits, were some Catalina flying boats .
T0 be used, no doubt, to escort the convoys into Liverpool.
I was wrong. Actually, they were being fitted out or the R.A.F.
The American radio's and equipment was being taken out and replaced by British stuff.
America had lost so many of her young men at Pearl Harbour.
Uncle Adolf beware. The Yanks are coming !

I didn't have a vast amount of money in those days. I didn't need it.
I had my shrapnel trading ' The word was TRADING now' ( American influence ).
And I had my model planes.
All I needed was three pence to go to the 'Odeon' on Saturday mornings, to sit among all the other kids and watch ' The Lone Ranger' or 'Flash Gorden'.
Saturday mornings was @Mickey Mouse Club'.
for kids. When it rained, there was an aroma of damp kids in the 'Odeon' that I didn't like very much.
Our best bit was when the film broke, as it often did! We used to stamp our feet and make loud groaning sounds.
The poor lady who's job it was to keep us under control, used to rush up and down the isles, threatening to chuck us out
Nobody ever did get chucked out.
So, a few sweets on ration, my only real outlay was threepence.. About 1p in modern
money.
Grown ups ? well, I didn't know much about their finances. They worked hard and did a lot of things that were unpaid to help the war effort.
I think that my dad earned about 拢2.00 a week. But, they were expected to save !
National Savings were really encouraged.
They were going to get the money back at the end of the war. ( I think ).
But, there were many special money raising events such as ' War weapons week' and 'Dig for Victory' week. And , the big one for me,
'Buy a Spitfire' week. Th idea was, that each town should collect all the spare money from it's citizens during that week and it went to help the war effort.
Spitfire week was intended to actually raise enough money to buy a Spitfire !
I think that they cost about 拢35,000 each.
'I wonder how many millions, a modern fighter costs ?'.
To get back to my story.
The Government used to organise some sort of exhibition during the big money raising weeks.
One day, I jumped off the bus at Radcliffe bus station and, there on the car park stood.....A Messerschmidt 109E fighter plane ! If Jesus had been standing there, I don't think I would have been more astonished !
It was guarded by several Home Guard.
I dashed over to the car park 'in case it disappeared suddenly', and I stood there totally fascinated !
My eyes eagerly devoured every detail of the sleek grey, powerful looking machine !
It looked totally threatening, even standing there, dead on the Odeon car park !
I walked slowly round it, noting the markings, the black and white crosses on the fuselage and wings and the black swastika on the tail. It had a bright yellow nose and ' it appeared to be undamaged '!. Then, I noticed a few bullet holes round the engine cowling.
Where had it come from ?
What had happened to the pilot?
A lot of questions crossed my mind, none of which I ever got answers to, of course.
I was surprised that there were so few people about.
Perhaps they had already looked over the plane? It looked very big to me.
Much bigger than I would have expected.
Carefully, I looked at every detail, I was trying to get an everlasting impression into my head.
After all those years, I can honestly say that a photographic picture has stayed in my memory.
Suddenly, a voice behind me said " Nasty looking thing, isn't it son ", I looked round. It was the sergeant of the Home guard unit.
" It's a 109e, isn't it " I whispered " WOW".
I think that he was amused by the absolute awe in my voice. He grinned.
" How would you like to sit in it ?". he said. " As long as you promise not to fly off ". he took me to the wing and lifted me onto it. " put your foot on there , and I'll give you a shove", he said.
I did as he said and I gripped the rim of the cockpit. Over I went, and I was sitting in the seat, surrounded by all the amazing and complicated controls. Dials, switches, buttons and all the other things that a second world war pilot needed to turn the plane into the killing machine that it was designed to be.
My thoughts were of disbelief, that I was actually allowed to sit in a Messerschmidt,
This, surely, was the ultimate of German toys !
But, then I thought of all the desperate battles that had happened in the skies of Britain between these planes and our Spitfires and Hurricanes.
For a moment I allowed myself the ' boy thing' of imagining that I was actually up there, fighting for my life in among the clouds .
Then, I remembered that I was sitting in a GERMAN plane. And, that it had some little bullet holes in it.
Surely, the young man who flew this plane was also a hero ?.
Even during the war, I could not believe that all Germans were bad people .
Now, they would be facing the lads who I had seen in the Jeep. Young fresh faced boys who always chewed gum !
It was , by now, about April 1942.
Only a few months after 'Pearl Harbour'.
One thing I HAD seen in the faces of those G.I.s in the Jeep. They didn't much look like the sort of kids who would take easily to seeing their country attacked, and want to sit around in their drug stores or grab baseballs out of the air with big gloves !
They had a lot to learn, but, even now, I could see that they were learning fast !
"Better come out now son", called the sergeant.
I couldn't see him over the rim of the cockpit. Reluctantly, I stood on the seat and climbed out.
As I stood on the seat, I remember hoping that my shoes were clean !
As 1942 drew on, I started to see signs that our army was becoming rapidly more organised.
I visited ' molineaux' the county house where we had lived briefly just before the war. I was surprised to see two old grey painted buses drawn up at the side of the lane ! It was an 'anti aircraft gun site !
It had been there for some time, but I hadn't known about it.
Once again, I found myself among friends .
The gun crew were very isolated down by the woods and were, I suppose, glad to talk to anyone who went down there. Few did,
I told them that we had lived in the cottage just before the war and only left because my parents knew that war was inevitable.
" Good job your not here now" , they grinned. " Bit noisy with the old Bofors gun popping away ".
"A Bofors gun", I said. " Don't the Germans use Bofors guns?". 2 Oh, yes", grinned the corporal, " We all do. Would you like to see it?".
Of course, I wanted to see it !
I was taken along a sort of trench into a big sandbag lined pit.
In the middle of the pit, barrel pointing to the sky, stood the Bofors gun.
I was invited to sit in one of the seats and turn the handle, The gun began to traverse to the left !
I was shown another, smaller pit that contained a listening device and a stand for a Lewis gun.
I visited the gun site and my new friends on numerous occasions and sometimes I helped the farmer ' who I knew from the pre war days', with his wheat harvest, He didn't have a tractor and the old threshing machine clattered along behind a couple of fine, docile old cart horses .
They soon became my friends too !
I had an idyllic summer of 1942.
Most of my spare time was spent either on the farm or at the gun site.
I used to sit in the little bus that was the living quarters of the gun crew and drink army tea out of an aluminium beaker.
Sometimes, I was given a huge chunk of bread with yellow wartime margarine and a smear of strawberry jam !
One one occasion ( with the sergeants approval ) the cook gave me a little tin of pineapple chunks !
Something I had not seen since before the war, and was not to see again until long after it.
One thing that the soldiers practiced ofter was @Aircraft recognition @.
I was allowed to sit in the corner, as long as I kept my mouth shut !
I knew as much about the different planes as they did.
One day, I was sitting quietly, when a model was held up by the sergeant that no one could recognise.
'Blenheim' someone shouted.
Finally, I could contain myself no longer.
'Albemarle' I said " How do you know that ?", the sergeant asked me.
" I saw the name under one of your little models yesterday" I said.
" Well, keep your mouth shut. It's still on the secret list" he muttered.
A few of the lads grinned
Another great adventure loomed .....
One day, I found a huge white cross made of canvas, pegged out in the bracken.
I knew that the soldiers had something to do with it.
Then, I heard the unmistakable sound of a Rolls Royce Merlin engine .
A Spitfire !
I looked round the cloudless sky. Yes, there he was . Coming in to circle slowly around my cross. Frantically, I jumped up and down and waved my arms. I could see the pilots head in the perspex dome.
I don't think that he saw me.
He pulled away into the distance. slowly, he banked round and opened his throttle.
He was heading right at me !
Then, he opened up with his machine guns!
I imagined that the ferns were being chopped up all round me ! . Very quickly, I disappeared into the woods.
The sergeant told me afterwards, that the big cross was put there as a target for the Spitfire to shoot at.
He would only have been firing blank bullets. I had not been in any danger.
The actual aiming was recorded by a camera mounted on the Spitfire.
I wonder if the chap who developed the film noticed a little boy jumping up and down in the middle of the target ?
A couple of weeks before, I had been sitting in a Messerschmidt !
I couldn't wish for a more exiting war.....
I didn't tell my parents about my encounter with the Spitfire.
Fewer and fewer Heinkels came to bomb us these days. Soon. they would be bombing the Russians.
So, school began to be boring and pride in our air raid shelters diminished.
Occasionally , Mr Bullock would still make his tour of inspection.
One day, we knew that he was coming and we made a special effort. By now, the shelters were getting older and the sandbags
were rotting and spilling sand round the entrances. And, they had a peculiar smell that was very unique to air aid shelters.
Funny how, many years after, its often a smell that brings back memories !
The shelter below mine was in the capable hands of Ronnie Arkwright. He was smaller than me and had an unfortunate habit of wiping his nose on his sleeve.
Mr Bullock arrived and looked rapidly round my smelly shelter.
" Well done Long". He dusted his coat and climbed back into his little Morris.
Off he went, in a puff of smoke.
I dashed to the top of the hill, from where I could see Ronnie's shelter.
Our Ronnie was
outside his shelter. He had even swept some of the sand aside, and now, he held his brush , just like the Home Guard, as he stood smartly to attention.
Mr Bullock appeared not to notice him as he went into the shelter.
He emerged swiftly and said something to Ronnie as he climbed back into his car.
Ronnie was always very enthusiastic about everything.
Suddenly, he dashed up to Mr Bullock's car window and gave him one of Churchill's victory salutes. 'Almost'.
Actually, he got it the wrong way round.
Even in those far off days of innocence the meaning was entirely different !
I watched in horror, as Mr Bullock stopped his little car and climbed back out .
Ronnie was standing to attention again, one sock draped over his sand covered shoe.
As soon as he saw Mr Bullock's face, he knew that something had gone badly wrong.
He dropped his brush and took off ' Fast'.
There was no escape.
We didn't have gas mask inspection by now.
Much to the relief of the more shy among the girls. but, After assembly, Ronnie was called to Mr Bullock's office,
Perhaps Mr Bullock had had time to see the funny side of it ?
He accepted Ronnie's apology and, as he threw him out of his office, a slight smile was seen on his face !
Very occasionally, we had air aid practice at school.
We ran out, at the blast of a whistle , and into the shelters.
Once, sitting in the dark, I received a big kiss on my right cheek!
The only kids on my right were, Ronnie Arkwright and Edith Lord, one of the schools much admired young ladies.
I hoped it had not been Ronnie !
The only clue was, the kiss was liquorice flavoured !
I was very relieved, when we emerged into the light , to see that Ronnie was not chewing and Edith was !
She gave me a big liquoricey grin !
I was in love !
of course, I was much too much of a gentleman to mention it. I gave her a big, happy smile back.
Oh, Edith... After all those years , I told.

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