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November 11, 2004

Shared house with grandparents in Lewisham London as many people did in those days.
AA guns in local recreation ground manned by ‘Terriers’.Gasmasks and blackout — no lights - only very dim lights on vehicles and bikes. This was before war started!

Sept 3 1939 War declared. Chamberlain’s Speech, Ladies all crying.Rationing fairly soon afterwards, started with essential goods first.Went everywhere with gasmask over shoulder.
Evacuation of all my friends without me. (My younger brother was physically challenged and couldn’t go - my mother didn’t want me to go).
Closure of Schools. Very few kids left and no teachers.
My Dad became a Policeman.
Family evacuation to an Aunt in Petts Wood and return because nothing happened.
Went looking for an open school on my roller skates — and found one!
No Candies at all until 1945.
One of my old teachers came knocking on doors looking for kids as my old school was reopening.
Blitz during the day — four houses in next road completely destroyed with the families who lived in them.
Evacuation to Crewkerne alone Aged 9, stood in Church Hall for a long time until a woman said I could go with them as their eldest son was going into the RAF at the weekend and there was room. Bombing in London stopped for a while, so I went home! Statistics show that 3 out of every 4 kids went home when there were lulls in bombing.

Battle of Britain — came back to me as bad dreams in the 80s.Sheltered under the stairs during Air Raids, which often went on for hours.
Blitz at night — Incendiary bomb through roof, Mum and Grandad put it out, and bomb outside house.
Dad was injured by being blown down a long flight of stairs at the entry to an air raid shelter but went back to work right away — must have been bad — he was registered as disabled for the rest of his life.
Family (not dad because he was a policeman) - Evacuation to Otley for a couple of weeks. (Family kept coal in the tub and not nice because we were forced on them).
Return to London — stayed overnight (the most awful noise I have ever expirenced) and out again next morning.
Evacuation to Wisbech - Town full of kids, many schools evacuated there. Crossing the local Rec when a bomber came over and dropped bombs, we all went for cover— Canadian gunners reacted very slowly because they thought it was one of ours.
House back in London badly damaged — dad put furniture in store with a friend whose house was still undamaged.
Returned from Wisbech - went to live in Petts Wood, occasional bombing but life went on.
Flying bombs (Buzz Bombs) V1s started — Evacuated to Rothley alone Aged 13 — once again forced on a family who treated me OK.
V1 sites were overrun so I went home - to the first of the rockets V2s (these were frighting because you heard them coming after they had exploded.
My cousins and Aunt were killed by V2 (their dad was in Egypt in the RAF) Our nearest V2 explosion was about 4 blocks away and my Scout Leader’s Father on his way to work was never found.
Eventually the war ended after a lot of awful fighting in Europe and then more in the Far East .
Boy! What a tremendous street party we had. I was 14 years old.

For many years I went sick in my stomach when I heard an Air Raid siren in a radio or television program — and a few years ago picked up a book in a Bookshop in Calgary where I now live. ‘The day they took the children away’ by Ben Wicks. I couldn’t read the book and stood there with tears in my eyes and then walked away, every time I went back to the store the book was still there and after several weeks I plucked up enough courage to buy it
In case some of you didn’t count I went to 6 different Junior Schools with often long gaps between schools, I spent a lot of that spare time reading — libraries were still open and listening to the radio — no television in those days!

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