大象传媒

Thsi story has been submitted personally to the People's War website by Edna Hastings and added to the site with her permission.

Husband was L.D.V Volunteer who policed the moors for potential spies and escaped prisoners of war. Used to watch the Parachute Regiment training on Holcombe Moor. Had to do fire watch at the cotton mill where we worked (night duty)

My earliest recollection of the war was seeing my brothers marching down the street in Ramsbottom on their way to the railway station, they were called up immediately because they were members of the Territorial Army, all three of them were in the Army.
My husband eventually joined the Merchant Navy and I lived then in a cottage in Edenfield. We had stone floors and stone stairs, underneath the stairs was my air raid shelter when the sirens sounded.
Every commodity was rationed and we were issued with clothing coupons, when we sent shopping to the grocers such things as butter, sugar, lard and eggs were only allowed in short quantities, not enough really but we managed to adjust.
The Government issued leaflets telling us to 鈥淒ig for Victory鈥�, so I started to grow potatoes in my small back garden and picked blackberries for fruit consumption. My friend鈥檚 father kept pigeons and gave me quite a few over a period (manna from heaven). We had pigeon pie, pigeon casserole and roast pigeon.
I well remember the day when my husband came home on leave for two days having sailed from Canada, and brought me a parcel given to him by the Canadian Red Cross people, in it was a box of chocolate bars, some clothes for my baby and a tin of butter. It was gratefully appreciated I can tell you.
At one point in time, Manchester was heavily bombed and I used to stand at my door at night listening to the planes going over and the bombardment going on with our guns retaliating. I could see the barrage balloons from here and, one night, I heard the putt putt of an engine which sounded like a motorbike, but it was one of those doodlebugs as we called them, flying over the roof tops and eventually dropping in Tottington causing a great deal of damage.
Our family lived in a small hamlet called Chatterton and, one particular night, I was staying at my mother鈥檚 house along with my two sisters. We were all in bed when mother called us downstairs, there was a huge bomber flying overhead and they dropped a landmine into the river demolishing a row of houses and a bungalow, most of the residents of Stubbins and Chatterton had windows blown out. I was thrown down the stairs as a result of the blast; fortunately no-one was hurt, but definitely shocked. Soon afterwards, people of Stubbins came up the lane I remember, with black faces, soot from the chimneys I think, they were all being accommodated in the Church Sunday School for a time. My mother invited some of them in and plied them with tea and biscuits for a time. We wondered why we had been singled out for the bombing but, rumour had it, that the pilot was making for Liverpool and mistook the River Irwell for the River Mersey. We shall never know.
Here is a little bit of humour to finish the narrative. One of the ladies who was drinking tea in our house, asked me if I would go to Stubbins and look in her house for her false teeth, she was very anxious to find them, I duly went and found them in the kitchen. They had survived the blast!

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