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This story was submitted to the People's War site by Simon Harris and has been added to the website on behalf of Terence Chedgey with his permission and they fully understand the site's terms and conditions.

By 1940 Ashford was subjected to regular air raids. The evacuees who had been sent down from London had already been sent on again and in due course we Ashford children also got our chance to get away from the danger zone.

Early one morning my mother, three of my sisters and me went to the station where we would be taken to an as yet unknown destination. As we travelled we constantly delayed because the track ahead was being bombed and had to be repaired to allow the train to proceed. It took from 9am till 6pm to make the journey from Ashford to Oxford where we were met by a fleet of buses waiting to take us onwards. We were taken to a village called Bedbroke and slept on the floor of the village hall with other mothers and children. The next morning I remember hearing music loud and clear: ‘There will always be an England.’ Someone must have wanted to cheer us all up. My mother’s attempts to keep us all together were thwarted by a lack of suitable accommodation. I ended up in Bedbroke while my mother and sisters found rooms in another village called Kidlington.

While at Bedbroke I remember that the sky at night was very red in the south easterly direction. I was told that this glow was from the bombing of London. Some time later we were kept awake by the sound of planes flying over all night as the Luftwaffe were bombing Coventry.

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