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These are some of the memories I have of World War 2.

I was 12 years old when war was declared. I lived with my Dad, stepmother, brother and sister in Enfield Highway, which was outside London in Middlesex. It was 3rd of September and everyone knew that the Prime Minister was going to broadcast a message at 11 o’clock on that day and we would know if we were at war with Germany.

A neighbour came in with us; she wanted to be with somebody as her husband was working, when the news came that we were at war. Everybody was very nervous and sad. After about 10 minutes we had another shock: the air-raid warning went. It was a horrible wailing sound and our neighbour fainted. There was general panic. Within 10 minutes the all-clear sounded; it had been a false alarm.

Everybody was offered an air-raid shelter to put in the garden so that we had somewhere to go during an air-raid. It was called an Anderson shelter and made of very strong corrugated iron. We all helped my Dad to dig a hole so that he could make a safe place for us to go if needed. We were very lucky we lived outside London; we did have air-raids and a few bombs were dropped, but nothing like the centre of London.

There was a very funny thing that happened (although it was not funny at the time); it had been raining for many days and it was late evening when the air-raid warning went; off we trotted into the shelter to wait for the all-clear to sound. Because of all the rain, the little porch over the front entrance, which my Dad had made to keep some of the cold out, collapsed and we were trapped inside. But everybody was told always to keep a spade in the shelter in case of an emergency and we had one, so we got out with no problems. After that night my Dad removed the shelter from the garden and put it in our front room where it stayed till the end of the war. My dad, stepmother and sister slept in it and I slept under the stairs. If there was an air-raid during the night, I would join them in the shelter. My brother was in the Army.

We were very lucky. There were bombs dropped near where we lived. We did have a few Buzz Bombs (they were the ones that looked like a plane, but did not have a pilot and when their droning stopped they just fell to the ground and exploded). We lost some windows and a few tiles off our roof, but we survived the War. Many people lost everything they had, including their families. My brother came home safely.

During the war I worked in an aircraft factory that built parts of the Lancaster Bomber; they were the tailplane and the middle section of the wing. The parts were assembled on very large structures called gigs and I was in the inspection department; when a part was completed I went with a senior inspector to check all the work had been done to the very high standard expected, as lives would have been at risk if there were any faults in that section of the plane. After a very thorough inspection, it was stamped with a number and if any fault was found at a later date, it could be traced back by that number to who was responsible.

When the parts were completed they were taken to a secret destination where they were put with all the other sections of the plane and built into the Lancaster Bomber. The men and women who worked in these factories did not know where these planes were assembled for security reasons. When the war was over, the factory went back to making Pickfords removal vans.

One of the saddest memories of the war for me was when I went to the East End of London to find out if some friends who lived there were safe. There had been many nights of bombing and there was no way of contacting them as nobody had telephones then — but all the lines were down anyway. When I arrived I was stunned at what I saw: streets had been flattened, there were the odd houses still standing, just two or maybe three, and as far as you could see — just rubble, streets and streets of rubble. You could see people looking at where their houses used to be, trying to save some of their possessions. Our friends were safe but they had lost their home. Most of the people went to emergency centres; some went to relatives while they waited to be re-housed. That was when they started building pre-fabs (pre-fabricated houses); they were like bungalows but not made of brick. Our friends had one; they were very pleased with it and lived there for many years.

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