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This story was submitted to the People's War site by the Dunstable At War Team on behalf of Mary Owen and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

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At the outbreak of war I was living in Tring Road, Dunstable, on the corner of Tottenhoe Road. My father was an air raid warden during the war, having retired from his business of whiting manufacturing; following on in the same profession as his father and grandfather. The factory was based on the corner of Green Lane and Tring Road in Dunstable. Only men worked there; it was very manual and very messy. They used to get hold of a lump of chalk, mix it together with water, put in a vat, stir regularly and then leave it to stand for about a fortnight, emerging as a sort of pasty, which was then rolled into balls or flat cakes in the men’s hands. It was left to dry overnight and sold to various manufacturers, one of whom was the Friars Chocolate factory. It was also used in the manufacture of domestic ware, baths I think, I’m not sure. After my father retired he sold his business to a gentleman, who continued to use the same system until about 1949 and then it was just closed down.

Compared to the present day Dunstable was sparsely inhabited. We had an acre of garden which father looked after, although I had to cut the grass. We grew all our own vegetables and kept chickens, guinea fowl and a donkey. I had a pony, cats and dogs; it was very much like a smallholding, very useful for mother in the kitchen. Meat was rationed of course but father somehow managed to obtain a little bit extra at that time, such as pheasants.

At the very beginning of the war we took in 2 children evacuees from London. I didn’t see very much of them as I was working full time in Luton. They only stayed for a matter of months as they wanted to go back home to London. Many evacuees stayed in Dunstable throughout the war but the majority soon went home. Later on we had a Polish Colonel; he was the Polish lawyer for the Polish Army in London and he used to come to Dunstable to get away from everything at weekends. He spent his time sleeping, reading and chatting to us. He was a very pleasant person and rather handsome. On the few occasions that I took a cup of tea up to his bedroom he often had a hairnet on!

I was working in Luton for the Phoenix Insurance Company when war broke out. I worked in a big sub-office with two other men who were both eventually called up into the services. I took over the office for them and worked there all the time throughout the war on my own. When German planes came over Luton during the day and dropped bombs on the Vauxhall works (then making tanks) and on the town in general, we had to go down into the cellar underneath my offices. We shared this with 2 or 3 other firms; we all met down there and sat looking at each other for an hour or two - not very thrilling! I did some fire watching in Luton in the big factories there. Sometimes it felt very ghostly when I went inside some of the empty old buildings.

I travelled to work by bus mainly, although if I was going to be late home at night (sometimes I would go to a dance or the cinema in Luton), I used to cycle as there were no buses after 9.00 pm. I was very nervous to begin with as I only had a tiny lamp to shine on the ground but I soon got used to it and found it quite exciting at times! Locally I went out a group of RAF people who were stationed at the Met office on Dunstable Downs. We spent our free time going to local dances and the cinema, things like that — a very happy crew.

Towards the end of the war a lot of tanks were moved here; lined up underneath the trees in West Street, Dunstable and throughout the countryside. They were there for months, waiting to be used after the D-Day landings. I saw a film star once, walking down the High Street in Dunstable, as I went to catch my bus!

I knew so many young men pre-war that were killed in Singapore, particularly in the Beds and Herts Regiment (the local Regiment). About half of them came back but they had changed a great deal after their experiences.

To mark VE day we had a big fete held at the back of Bagshaw’s grounds in the town, with stalls and fireworks — quite exciting really! There were also a lot of street parties. I went to one or two; it was very exciting seeing everybody sitting down at the long tables, eating nice food or better than it had been.

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