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'This story was submitted to the People's War site by Rick Allden of the CSV ´óÏó´«Ã½ Coventry and Warwickshire Action Desk on behalf of Margaret Bowdler and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions'.

The narrow winding lane with high hedges on either side, leads up to an isolated farmhouse. Cows once grazed the surrounding pasture, while sheep wandered the rolling hills beyond. This rural retreat was a farm owned and worked by my two maiden great aunts from the early 1920s until 1944. During the war years my parents, brother and I paid them annual visits. Even as a small child I fell in love with the chocolate box landscape. Friends of my parents stayed with them too, as paying guests, seaside holidays being out of the question in wartime. Were these two ladies the first farmers to diversify? All visitors were charmed by this seemingly idyllic setting. No sirens, no tanks rumbling through the streets, no menacing aircraft overhead and, where sheep, pigs and chickens were reared, very little rationing!

This was a safe haven “away from it all“. Or was it?

On one of our visits shocked aunties showed us a neighbouring field in which there was a huge bomb crater. Alarmed by low flying aircraft, their worst fears had been realised. Rural Border Country had been bombed. What on earth was going on?

It transpired later that the enemy was looking for Haile Selassie, the Emperor of Ethiopia, who was in hiding in nearby Plowden. They didn’t find him. They didn’t find us either, although I don’t think the idea that they might occurred to me at the time!

This story was donated to the People’s War website by Margaret Bowdler, of the Leam Writers. If you would like to find out more about Leam Writers call 0845 900 5 300.

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