大象传媒

I was born on 2nd May 1936 at Southmead Hosptial In Bristol. The 1st memory I have is my parents listening to the wireless on 3rd Spetember 1939. I was playing and chattering and was told to be quiet as this was important. The declaration of the war with Germany.
The next memory was being dressed in a siren suit. A brown all in one suit trimmed around the hood with brown velvet.I was taken to the Anderson shelter in the garden. The shelter was comfortable as my Father [Ted Thring]had put an electric light and bunk beds in there so we could try to sleep.One evening there was a loud explosion and in the morning there was a large hole in the field at the bottom of the garden and pieces of shrapnel on the path.
For a while my Father was in the Police War Reserve.Then he went into the Army and was away on and off for nearly 6 years.
My mother would not let me be evacuated and because she worked when I was not at school I was looked after by my Great Aunt and Grandmother.
On one occasion I told my Aunty I had heard the siren and that we should go to the shelter. I liked it because she used to read to me, There hadn't been a siren, I was being naughty and there was no tea ready when the men got home from work!
One Sunday my mother was preparing cabbage for lunch and asked me to take the outter leaves outside to the pig bin which was wired to the lampost outside.I took the wrong pieces of cabbage and threw away the part that should have been for lunch! I got smacked legs for that! We also had a pig bin which was kept in the kitchen.
We kept chickens in a big run and had a hen house in our garden.
We grew lots of vegetables and so were quite healthy. I would not take cod liver oil. It was horrible. My Mother [ Rose Thring] brought Vorol which ws like runny toffee and was much nicer.
There were always queues for items not on ration. Often people would join the queue and not know what they were queuing for!!
On ration we were allowed a small ammount of meat and bacon, an egg a week and 8oz sugar and 2oz butter. Everyone filled up on extra potatoes.
the windows had to be blacked out and no light could be seen from the outside or the Air Raid Warden would shout ' Put that light out'.
The milkman called twice a day with horse and cart and a lagre churn of milk which was then measured into your jug.
The baker called each day and the muffin lady called sevral evenings with hot muffins in a basket.
A vegetable van called once a week and always had free range eggs for sale.
Bread was not ratrioned ntil 1953 with a book of coupons per household,
Clothes were difficult to come by as you had to save up for large items.

Street parties wer eheld on VE day. Pianos were brought outside and everybody danced and sang. We had sandwiches and cakes and everyone clubbed togther with the food provision for the parties.

I have 2 young grandchildren and I have filled in extensive memories in much more detail in Grandparents books which were given to the grandparents when the were both born. These books go right through my life, my parents ,grandparents etc and then through life with prices, memories of important events and every possibel detail right up to present day! A time consuming book but hopefully another way of preserving these and many more memories.

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