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Air Raids & Bombings
I'm no longer sure exactly when the air raids took place. I remember that we had air raid drill at school and at home, when at the sound the siren each person had a designated place to run for cover. At school, I, with two other children had to go to the head Mistreses deak and remain there until the All Clear siren. To this day the sound of a siren will make the hackles on my neck stand up. If we were on the road, we had to head for an air raid shelter. These were concrete re-enforced block built shelters on the corners of most streets. Homes were supplied with Anderson shelters. You dug a 8' x 5' approx: hole in your garden, put down floor boards and wooden benches and then folded this corrugated tin curved roof over it. Then covered with turf. Pretty flimsy but better than having the house collapse on you.
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We often slept half dressed and at the sound of the siren, would grab clothes and head for the air raid shelter in the back garden and finish dressing there. We had flasks of tea and blankets. I remember listening to the whine of bombs falling and then the period of silence until the explosion; the jolts and flashes and the smell of smoke and burning. We alwaysassumed that as we lived near a railway line, and the Air Ministry buildings the bombs were meant for those. I doubt it. The youngest amongst us children used to drive Granpa crazy during raids at night. As the bombs were falling,he took to imitating the whistling whine (pretty good actually) and Grandpa's nerves would snap. He would stop for a while, only to start it again soon after. Only now do I appreciate the tension the adults must have felt listening and feeling the blasts when the bombs fell near.. As we surfaced after each raid, houses would be destroyed, windows blown out and buildings burning. Roads would be impassable for fire engines and bomb craters for exploded and unexploded bombs were everywhere. All utility services were cut off, water gas, electric and I suppose sewage although I don't recall problems in that department.
There was a huge water catchment tank taking up the whole of the central crescent gardens with railings around which was intended to pump water in the case of fire. Many animals drowned in it but I never heard of a child drowning, which was a miracle. The only use it had was for residents to chain gang with buckets and basins to try and help the air raid wardens put out fires.
In the end, apparently we were all getting so haggard from lack of a proper nights sleep, that when the raids began and if we slept through, my Mum would lie alongside us on the bed, fully dressed and let us sleep on. I imagine with the view that if there was a direct hit, even the shelter would n't protect us, and we'd all be together. It takes a certain kind of courage or desperation to take a stance like that.
I remember my brother and myself being sent to collect a huge turkey for Christmas at a house which I would say was perhaps 1.5 miles away but still in Exeter city. We were only a short way back when the air raid Alert siren went. With this huge turkey, over 20lb in a bag between us, we continued to walk and struggle all the way home through the bombing. The bombs fell on the city. We could see them falling and the explosions. Our mother went mad when we arrived at the door with the raid still on, realising we had walked through it. She assumed we were sheltering with the people.
There was strict blackout conditions at night fall, with the Air Raid Wardens (those who were not fit for service or exempt due to age or disability) enforcing and knocking on the door if any chink of light showed. Dad's Army as portrayed on TV is probably a fairly accurate take off of how things were.
An aunt had to do air raid duty three nights a week, on the roof of the store she worked in and also work during the day. On one of the biggest and longest raids on Exeter when the whole city and particularly the centre of the city was on fire,this aunt and her lady work colleague, pushed unexploded incendiary bombs off the roof of the building they were manning. The doors and windows of the building were on fire and they only just escaped out the back. At perhaps 3 o/c in the morning when the raid was over this aunt made her way alone across Northanhaye gardens, making her way around bomb craters. A walk of about 1.5 miles or more. Only later when Northanhaye gardens were closed for 6 months because of so many unexploded bombs did we appreciate just how lucky she had been.
My mother had just come out of hospital after a partial hysterectomy and two days later chain ganged buckets of water for fire fighting. She suffered for that ever after.
After several raids there was no gas, electric or water. On one occasion my Mum cooked for all of us - between 10 -13, over a hole in the ground in the back garden with a wood fire and some kind of trivet we had fixed up. It had to have been summertime.
On occasions all the children were sent upto the woods at night on our own. I don't know if there had been expectations of a big raid. The woods were probably 2miles or more out of the city. We took blankets and would listen and watch the woodpeckers. We would have been between 5 and 11 or so years old. I don't remember anyone telling us what to do if the parents were not there on our return in the morning, but it was exciting, although we did n't sleep much. I remember coming home with arms full of bluebells so on that occasion it must have been Spring.
I remember after each raid, people wandering the streets in shock and confusion talking to themselves and the adults of the family watching the postman come down the road with the dreaded "We regret to inform you" government letters to advise that someone in the family had been killed at the front. Every family lost someone, usually some menfolk. Some families lost a husband, brother and sons.
How Each person Sees It
Memories are that of each individual and dependent on many things, age being one of them and the people and their bravery and attitude being another. I have heard people say that they did n't know which war so-and-so was in because what they described was nothing like the war they recollected. All I can say is that this account is I remember it as a child. Put together with information gleaned in the later years. As children we had a great childhood during the war years. More freedom and experiences and independence than we would ever have been allowed had it not happened.
An adopted Granpa & Family; farms & homes at Pinhoe and Rew
One of our greatest good fortunes was when the eldest aunt who worked at Home and Colonial Stores in Exeter (a grocery shop) met with a retired gentleman farmer. He had been commissioned with inspecting all the land and fields surrounding Exeter to ensure that every inch was planted for food for the country. The "Dig for Britain" campaign. He also brought fresh vegetables to the store to be sold. This led to our family receiving a generous free supply of vegetables for the remainder of the war.
The two families became friends. With hindsight, the generosity of granpa Carter and his family was amazing. But people did this sort of thing. Opened their homes to strangers. Gave them their clothes. Help everyone they could. It was definitely a time of banding together. We all in turn, but mainly this aunt, my mother, brother and self, spent many week-ends at his home a lovely bungalow on a hill looking over land to Exmouth. We also spent part of our summer holidays there. Ran around chasing rabbits when the corn was cut, turning up at the dairy and having the warm cream off the milk for our cornflakes. Picking and eating rasperberries, gooseberries and blackcurrants for the house but eating most. Picking peas and digging potatoes. Watching the land army girls help the farmers. Playing in the stooks of hay. Getting my legs badly scratched with the corn stubble. I remember overhearing remarks about the land army girls wearing trousers and just how awful it was! Women driving tractors and jeeps was a real shock to country folk.
I remember the Free Polish Air-Force men who were also invited to the bungalow. As photos show, they were young. It's also worth noting that at the end of the war they were treated extremely badly by the then British Government. Very very belatedly their war efforts and sacrifice was acknowledged.
Another sister, an aunt, living in South Africa spent the war years raising money for the Channel Islanders. We never saw any of that but she did send us £100 (a fortune in those days) which allowed us to settle up our outstanding bills and keep our heads above water.
Our freedom & Independence
As children, with our ages all within 4 years of each other and all living together in one house we formed a kind of mutual support group — a gang. We did most things together. We were told to look out for each other and to stay together. We had the freedom to go to the river Exe and spend the day there catching eels and swimming in the river. We built go-carts with a plank of wood and pram wheels and then link them altogether like a train. In these we used to collect horse manure from the streets and deliver it to whoever needed it for their gardens. The brakes were a piece of leather made into a hinge with a nail. I soared down a long hill near where we lived, the brake flopped off; I could n't slow it down and shot past a huge American lorry which was just pulling across the road by the bridge at the bottom of the hill. Definitely a cat with nine lives. I never told my mother. Lots of things we never told our parents.
After the air raids we scavenged the bombed buildings for whatever we could find. The lathe from the ceilings which we chopped up and sold as bundles of wood. The lead from the roofs we melted and made lead soldiers. This was a small business as someone had acquired two or three sets of moulds of various soldiers. We made soldiers and painted them and sold them for 6p each (now worth 3p). A lot of money in those days. Enough to get into the Saturday morning children's picture show for which there was n't usually enough money.
We ran a borrowing library from the attic and charged 1p until our parents could n't stand the thud of so many children's feet running up and down in our house. We built with broken bricks from the bombed buildings, the most fabulous dens. We put old carpet found on the bomb sites on the floor. These were big enough for four or five of us to get in. All made of loose bricks and I now realise highly dangerous and likely to collapse, but we survived. We stuffed ourselves with fruit from the gardens of bombed buildings. I remember the huge cherries in particular.
Again, it always seemed to be Spring or Summer.
I remember my mother saying I could ask a couple friends home for a birthday tea. I asked the whole class. I can't remember how she coped but we had our party. A friend who still writes now said she has never forgotten that party as people did n't have birthday parties - food was too short.
I had to look after my younger brother, the youngest of all of us children. Told not to let go of his hand etc etc. which I must have taken very seriously, because everywhere I went I had to take him with me. I also foughthis battles. My responsibility to my younger brother reached a climax when a German 'plane had been shot down and the airmen were parachuting out over the fields. All of us ran to arrest the Hun! But, my brother got stuck in his little red Wellington boots; stuck in the mud made by the cows trampling in a field gateway. I had to return to get him out and by the time we arrived on the scene the others and farmhands had arrived first and I missed my biggest moment. I never really forgave him for that.

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