大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Iain Fyfe of the CSV 大象传媒 Coventry and Warwickshire Action Desk on behalf of R.M. Saunders and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the sites terms and conditions.

My mother, Dorothy Payne, and my father Jack Payne, were both born in 1921, both attended Wheatey Street School in Coventry and both began working at the Daimler in Radford. Dad was in a reserved occupation as a draftsman at the Daimler and by the start of the war Mum was working at Lea Francis in Little Park Street. My dad was in the Home Guard based on the guns in the Memorial Park; he said he was never sure whether they had hit anything but the sound made the citizen feel better!

On the night of the November 1940 blitz my mother and her family and my fathers family were sleeping in Kenilworth. Apparantly at this particular critical point of the War many families had been outposted from the City although both were to return to their homes faily soon afterwards. It would appear that this evacuation was as much to do with giving the workers a good nights sleep as for saftey reasons. In this blitz neither of the their parents houses (in Sovereign Road and Bede Road suffered significant damage) although a part of the Lea Francis called Judges Court had been deestroyed. My mother visited their house the following day with her father but access was limited due to the fact there was still an unxploded bomb (or landmine as they called them)in the road. Damage to the house was limited to a few broken windows and tiles but the bell from Radford Church was found in their back garden. The Church, which was about 200 yards away, had been destroyed with the loss of several lives. The family returned from Kekilworth around Christmas time "on the basis that there was little left for Hitler to bomb".

In the following year however,the Germans specifically targetted the Daimler factory in Radford and my mother (together with her eleven year old brother, Gordon and her parents) were then back at Bead Road -about a quarter of a mile away the factory. My grandfather Walter Payne was an Air-Raid Warden and was on duty and the rest of the family were in a shelter in Bead Road. One house took a direct hit and the house on the road were extensivly damaged; there was at least one fatality- an ARP messenger boy.I have my mother's account of this night - they started the night under the dinning room table but as bombing got steadily worse they went into a cellar in a house opposite. Incendiary bombing began about 9 and continued for two hours by which time the Daimler was well alight. After this there was a lull and two young women in the shelter decided they would go to see the fire for themselves. However the planes returned with high explosive bombing which was then to last for most of the night. The two young women looking very shaken. At one point after the direct hit to the nearby house the door into the cellar caught light but was extinguished by theWardens above,including Walter. It was not until 6am that the all was sounded.

Dad arrived at the Daimler on the following day to discover that the the drawing office where he worked had disappeared and much of the factory was subsequently relocated to the shadow factory ay Browns Lane.

Shortly after this Walter decided to take the family away but my mother who was just 20 did not want to leave Jack and insisted on staying. Bravely, she therefore went and stayed in Kenilworth with the Neale family with whom they had stayed with earlier.

Walter and the rest of the family set off-apparantly aiming for Llandudno but somewhere en-route they changed their minds and instead went to Blackpool, where they stayed for the rest of their lives. Gordon too stayed there intil his death in 2003.

Jack and Dorothy were married in Coventry Registry Office in Little Park Street on 24th July 1943 (which coincedently was also the same day as my mother and father-in law were married) and for the next four years lived safely over a chemists shop on the corner of White Street and Wheatly Street. I came along 10 days after VE day.

Mick Sanders.

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