大象传媒

Strangely my most vivid memories of the blackout are moonlit nights. My mum and dad were caretakers of a large chapel and from my bed I could see the various rooftops silhouetted against the night sky. It was in some way beautiful but also very uncanny. Then suddenly searchlights would sweep across the sky and a plane, very small, would be trapped in the cross-cross of lights. One night I overhead my dad tell mum that if a German incendary bomb landed on the chapel roof - only yards from our bedroom - and rolled into the gutter we wouldn't stand a chance. I spent a very sleepless night looking out for the bomb.
As far as our house was concerned this was a back-to-back and we only had one large window downstairs which needed blackout. I remember dad making a large shutter for outside. We either went to bed by candlelight or in the dark so there were not any problems upstairs. One night we were all woken up by banging on the door. 'Wake up Bert, all the chapel lights are on!' If was our neighbour who lived opposite. The chapel was a blaze of light in the middle of the blackout. It is a good job there wasn't an air raid on or German bombers were going over. Dad and Mr. Elliott had to go into the building and turn off the lights at the main. The old fashioned wiring had short circuited and dad said afterwards this was very dangerous.
When we came home from school on Monday dinner times(this would now be lunch) we were given the job of going into the still dark chapel to pull back their heavy blackout curtains. We would then have a pretend service - organised by my brother. He would play the organ (he was a good musician) I would 'preach' and our evacuee would be the congregation. In later years my brother was in fact a well loved local preacher but sadly he died when still quite young.

Eventually as the war ended the street lights came back on. By today's standards this would be merely a glimmer but to us children it was wonderful - and we were allowed to play outside. I think all the children were out - just dancing around the street lamps. It was not very long before all the local shops had wonderful illuminated displays - it was like fairland. The dark long nights had gone.

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