大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Emma Hart from the AGC Museum on behalf of Mrs Mary Hennessy, and has been added to the site with her permission. Mary Hennessy fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

"At the start of the war I was 14 and a half years old.

I can remember clearly when the raids started on Southampton and Swaythling. Every night we had to go down to the Air Raid Shelters. My mum would grab everything including the dog and the tin box we kept our insurance documents in! Father used to stand outside the Air Raid Shelter yelling out instructions to the searchlights - "left a bit, not over there!'. Our next door neighbours had 2 girls, and they also stayed in our shelter. Father was told not to swear when they were around. He said " I'll swear in my own Bl**dy shelter if I want to"!

My brother was called up into the RAF to Titchfield in Sept 1940.

About that time, two of my friends and I decided to go blackberrying, as we had met two nice soldier boys, and they were manning the Ak Ak guns in a field with lots of blackberrries. We thought we were the bees knees, dressed up smartly to see these young soldiers! As we were heading to the field, the Air Raid Siren went in town. My friends suggested we went back to town, but I said 'no, we won't be in danger'. Just as we got near to the blackberries (near what is now the White Swan Pub at Mansbridge), the Ak Ak soldiers shouted at us to "Scram. Go to the White Swan!". We ran over the bridge and into the White Swan pub, which was locked except for the mens toilets. We couldn't stand the smell, so we ran out again. A man nearby yelled at us to get into a ditch, and we flung ourselves into a ditch, as a German plane came flying over. I was at the bottom of the ditch, with my 2 friends lying on top of me. We were terrified.

The German plane bombed Cunliffe Owens, who made Spitfires at Southampton Airport, then it turned around, dropped incediary bombs into the river and then machine gunned the ditch we were in. Mud flew everywhere. We waited for 10 minutes, then got out - we were spattered in mud. We ran home, and my mum and sister were at the door at home, they hadn't known where I was, and were really worried.

Looking at my leg, I could see blood, and we thought I had been machine gunned. My mother went to clean it up and we discovered that it wasn't a machine gun wound, but that my friend had been so terrifed when she was lying on top of me that she had bitten my leg, and made me bleed!! Whenever I used to annoy my sister after that, she woud always tell me to 'Show everyone your war wound, Mary'!

Mother and I used to go to the Savoy CInema in Swaythling during the War, which involved walking down Wessex Lane in the dark. One night we were walking back when we heard a terrible noise behind us. We thought we were being followed. The noise was so loud, but it was so dark we couln't see anything - so we ran home as fast as possible! We discovered later that a barrage balloon had come loose, and had been drifting along the lane behind us, banging into things!

At the end of 1942, I went to live with my sister and her baby, as her husband was away in the war. I lived with her in Leicester. I was 18 by then, and I was called up to work in a factory. My job was to use a soldering iron on condensors. I really wanted to go into the WAAF but didnt. My brother used to write letters begging me not to go into the WAAF, as he had seen all sorts of horrific things happen to WAAF women.

In 1945, I came back down South, and was given the choice of being a railway porter or a tram conductress. I decided to be a tram conductress, but the bus driver was horrible, and made me use the pole- At the junctions, we had to use a pole to change direction, but I was so slight, that it would take me up in the air with it! American soldiers who took the tram offered to help me! After 3 days of this I was utterly exhausted, so I left. I ended up working for the Employment Service on Switchboards for the rest of the war."

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