大象传媒

Pam Younger

I was 4 years old when the war started and I remember quite a bit about it. One of my earliest memories is being lifted up in my dad's arms and going out to see some houses on fire at the end of our road and thinking it very exciting. I didn't appreciate what it was really like.

I remember starting school and spending quite a bit of time down in air-raid shelters. We had a basement in the school where I think the boiler-houses were, and we used to have to go down there. We had some sort of oval shaped rush mats to sit on and I remember the teacher hanging up things saying, 'The cat sat on the mat' and we all chanted this, so we had some sort of lessons there. This was in Ashford Common in Middlesex.

After that I don't remember so much until 1942 when my brother was born and we shared the Morrison shelter in the house of the lady next door. She had 5 children and my mum had my sister, who was 18 months older, and me and my baby brother. My sister and I were much more interested in running around the street, picking up lumps of shrapnel which were still warm. We used to swap them at school the next day which was good fun. I must have been coming up for 7 then but I still didn't appreciate how awful it must have been for my mum. Now, as a mother of 4, I realise how frantic she must have been. She would be shouting at us, and would have the baby and all his things, his bottles and all that, and his blanket, and all we would be doing would be running around in the street.

Then I remember, probably later in the war, when the doodlebugs came over. I was definitely older then because I do remember actually hoping and praying it would go over us and feeling really glad when it did. But I must have been developing a moral conscience as I also remember feeling guilty because if it had gone over the top of us, then somebody else was probably going to be killed.

The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company was quite near us and they used to be after that with their bombs. I remember one day the bombs were dropping when we were at school and we didn't have time to get to the shelter. We were running along the corridor and all the windows broke. All the mums came running up to the school to see if we were all right. I still feel emotional when I think of that.

I don't remember much after that except the excitement when it was all over and the street parties. Fantastic, absolutely fantastic!

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