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I was born, grew up and have lived in the same valley for the whole of my life, apart from my war service. During those years, I experienced a completely different lifestyle.

I was born at one of the houses at Steel End, Wythburn, in Cumbria — a very small place nestled amongst the hills in St-Johns-in-the-Vale. The house I grew up in was one of the surviving houses that had not been flooded when most of the village was submerged under Thirlmere.

I was used to a very quiet life living in such a tiny community — I was not used to mixing with lots of people.

When the war started I was working on the Manchester Corporation Waterworks. Although we never actually experienced any bombings where I lived, we would hear aeroplanes going over the valley. At night time, when we went out, we still had to dim our bicycle lights. But apart from that, we were not affected too much by the war here, apart from food rations.

We had young evacuee children from Newcastle staying with us - they had no experience of hills or mountains and to be surrounded by them was frightening to them. They thought that if they walked up them they would fall off.

I was called up in 1941. In contrast to the evacuee children who were used to city life being placed in an alien environment, I found my change in circumstances quite difficult in that, as I had been brought up in such a quiet community, I suddenly had to mix with hundreds of people. I found this a very strange experience and had to learn very fast how to live this new lifestyle surrounded by so many. This, to me, was the biggest shock of all.

I trained as an aircraft airframe fitter. This meant doing a fitters course for 6 months learning the job, then I was posted to an aerodrome. This was the first time I had ever been away from Cumbria, so it was quite an upheaval.

The job involved salvaging aircraft remnants - this could be in any part of the UK. We would be sent to an aircraft crash, and occasionally we would come across bits of bodies — arms, legs…. The first time I experienced the revulsion of this was at an aircraft crash in St Athens, South Wales. Luckily, the horror of finding body parts never seemed to worry me too much, but I remember some fellas who really couldn’t cope with this. I feel like I came out unscathed compared to others, as I was able to resume my life post-war without the nightmares.

I was then demobbed in 1946 and came straight back to my previous job in Wythburn and continued life as usual. I rented a house in the same place — I paid 4 shillings and 6 pence a week in about 1947. And I have remained in this valley until this day.

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