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Memories of Wartime

By Leonard Earnest Clark
(18/08/2005)

The Second World War broke out in September 1939. I was 12 years old and living in a village near Chelmsford, in a bungalow that Dad rented, with my Mum and brother, Bill. We had listened to Mr. (Neville) Chamberlain’s speech on the radio and Mother broke down in tears. Our parents had bitter memories of world war one, and Dad still bore the wounds of shell shock, shrapnel in his body, and a missing right-hand index finger.

As nobody knew the path the war was going to take it was sensible to arrange some simple precautions against the possibility of bombing. Sticky paper tape was stuck on the windows in a diamond pattern, and a slit trench was dug in our back garden ‘just in case’. Also we had to arrange to black out the windows. Everywhere, volunteers were filling sand-bags for the police station and other important buildings. Gas masks were issued to all and fitted at the village hall. Even babies had their own gas masks with a box like a cellophane window. Later other filters were added.

In the first few months, nothing seemed to happen and the first bombs that did fall (according the newspaper) just killed a blackbird in a field.

Unfortunately, the French government soon capitulated in June 1940 and left much of the British army and RAF marooned in France. And although some aircraft were flown home, the army lost thousands of vehicles and equipment.

Historically speaking the Maginot was quite useless. It was a heavily fortified defence position of bunkers and big guns (400 miles long) in Europe, but the advancing Germans simply ignored it, and walked around the ends. (I think that this defence system must have been invented by a child.) However, the history of the war was well recorded. I think what you will be interested to read is a résumé of how we, as a family, coped. As I recall, nobody had the least expectation of defeat and people became close and neighbourly. (This soon dropped off after the war.) Urged by pamphlets, press, and radio we were told and cajoled into doing many things, for example:

1.) Dig for victory. All available gardens and spare land was to be used for food growth.
2.) We should all keep chickens and rabbits, and an issue of balancer meal (a special meal for poultry made up from cereal and oat cakes and potato peelings) was made to help.
3.) Shelters should be built. Often people would put in Anderson shelters. These were dug into the garden and covered with soil. For protection inside the house Morrison cages (These were strong cages that occupants could climb inside to protect themselves from falling masonry) would be built to go under the table indoors. Other approaches included reinforced concrete structures in the grounds of houses, schools etc. These all later saved countless lives.
4.) People were asked to collect all aluminium pots and pans not in use, and we had a large pile of these on the village green. They were for the aircraft industry, being turned into the vital materials to make war planes. Also, railings were cut down and taken for salvage to build tanks and battleships. Nothing was imported because of the loss of ships at sea bringing it.

An excellent ration system was implemented for food, sweets, clothing etc by Frederick Marquis, the minister for food. There was tinned powdered milk, orange or hip juice for children. It was realised after the war that the nation was fitter that ever before.

After a few months had passed, things began to hit us in a more serious way. The bombing of London had begun in earnest, and air-raids were happening by day and night. Because our village was in line between Holland and The Low Countries and London, planes were constantly passing. The siren would sound and during the daylight raids, quite high-flying armadas or German bombers, Heinkels, Dorniers and Junkers would pass overhead towards London. I recall groups from about 45 to 75 with their distinctive engine noise would pass overhead and frequently set upon by a handful of Spitfires and Hurricanes, where upon fighting took place. We could hear the machine guns firing and spend cartridge cases and clips fell like rain by day and night. During these raids anti aircraft gun fire was thundering away and searchlights criss-crossed at night. If a plane was held in the lights, it would be a victim of gunfire, but only, I think, with occasional success. But it made us feel better. (What goes up must come down hence, take cover was essential and tin-hats were worn)

Just across the road from our bungalow was a buffer depot, which contained emergency food, etc. It also contained the fire trailer pump. On one occasion, the depot was on fire and the pump inside. (Such is life!)

We moved from our rented bungalow to Glennellyn that year. Glennellyn was a house 150 yards from the church.

Dear Mum had died in 1942, I think, with a brain tumour. I was 15 by then, and working in the local post office, since there was no place for me in Maldon grammar school, where I had won a place at 13 plus. There were few teachers and many school rooms were closed. So it must have been one evening in 1941 when we had our closest shave. Dad had been on warden duty in the little shed used by the W.I. etc. At 11pm Dad had just come off duty, and gone to bed with Mum. The hut was on the church green. A stick of bombs was dropped (doubtless jettisoned) by a returning enemy plane straight onto the village. The first one landed near the Bell public house, the next near the corner of the church in the cemetery, no more than 30 yard from Dad’s post. A third bomb fell in Mill Lane etc. In our house, Bill and I were asleep in bed in the front of the house, Dad and Mum in the back. The bomb exploded in the cemetery and set the church alight smashing the lovely windows and organ, and seriously damaging it. People were gathering up the disinterred folk. They were all put back in the bomb crater, which was later refilled, and made into a circular rose bed. The rose bed is still occupying that space.

All our windows were blown in; all the plaster ceilings came down. The house was full of dust. Dad scrunched into our room in his wellies, and asked if we were OK. We were, so we all made our way downstairs and stood in the part of the house that we thought would be the safest. Then we all had a nice cup of tea. This was not so easy, as we had no light. Brother Bill, who volunteered to find the tea things walked into a line of wet washing that had been strung out to dry in the lounge (with a strangled ‘aargh’ noise.). The war damage caused the house to be declared unsafe in the 1980’s and it was demolished to make way for new properties.

Much of our village was taken over by soldiers for accommodation in the larger houses, and behind us were troops in the scout’s hut. At different times we had the 74th Highland Light Infantry and before that, the Devonshire regiment, complete with band, and Bren gun carriers, and motor-cycles, making musical mayhem in their spare time. These troops were also used for ceremonial and church parade duties, complete with home guard, cadets, scouts and anyone who would make a parade. I understand that many of these later perished in Norway.

To deter low-flying aircraft attacking Chelmsford which was only 5 miles away barrage balloons on long wire cables were used. These protected the town to some extent as Chelmsford had several factories on war work including Crompton Parkinson, Marconi, and Hoffman Bearings. Even so, sometimes the streets were strafed by aircraft gunners. (They used to fly over and shoot up the streets.) And in bad weather, the balloons could be struck by lightening and go down in flames.

At an earlier stage of the war, evacuees from London arrived by bus and train. On arrival, they were assembled and disbursed to homes that would take them and quite a number of new faces appeared in our school. Some of these kids had never seen a cow before, and they found country life rather strange and lonely.

The first Americans arrived after Pearl Harbour (which the Japanese had bombed in late 1941) and manned the many Essex airfields. We saw coloured people for the first time, in their little jeeps, and soon there were thousands of them. By this time, the Yanks were bombing Germany by day and the RAF was bombing by night. And from our vantage point on the hill, we could watch the loaded B17 marauders of the American 9th Air Force bumbling off from Boreham airfield (7 miles across the valley from our village), on their bombing mission, and sometimes counting a rather smaller number back.

My brother and I were air cadets (he, of course was an NCO). I think this was a useful pre-training for the RAF. On several occasions, we were able to have a week’s experience on an American or British RAF active service station, living with the RAF. The American air force people were well treated and went short of nothing. And we all enjoyed lovely coffee and cakes and lashings of food. We would watch the take off’s and feel involved in the war effort. We were also able to fly in military aircraft, and I once too the controls on an Airspeed Oxford, twin engine aircraft.

As the war took its noisy course, I, not being called to take my place at Maldon grammar school, started working in the local post office, first as a telegram boy, and then trained for counter work, where I remained until call up in 1945 for my national service. I was first an RAF Volunteer Reserve and then signed up by 17 ½. I knew already the very last thing after a RAF service was to ever go back to the post office.

One of the few advantages of the war years was that, being little petrol, the roads were empty of civilian traffic and us kids road our bicycles everywhere. I had also built myself a canoe which I towed on pram wheels and sailed on the canal, or the main river at Maldon, and on the Park Lake.

In the later years of the war (1943-1945), Dad was approached by MI6 as he was a skilled signaller and was up to speed with Morse. Our small bedroom at Glennellyn became a listening post filled with admiralty equipment and Dad did his listening watch on travel and shipping and sent coded results to his boss in South end.

It is a strange sight to see wherever you go, so many people in uniform. Army, Navy and RAF men and women seemed to be travelling constantly. And every railway station was full of hundreds of service people, with the ever present military police to keep an eye on them, looking for deserters.

People during the war came from all over the world, particularly lots of Australians and Canadians. The countries also took personnel for training. The fastest liners, like the Queen Mary, were employed to constantly transport troops round the world.

Just as the war was ending, I was in the RAF. I did my basic training first at Padgate basic training centre, for square bashing, rifle and grenade training, then Cardington (the home of RAF selection and recruitment). Next, it was on to trade training where I did a 12 week motor engineering school. I qualified with sufficient points to be the sole motor mechanic at RAF Police Bangalore- a provost and security flight. I thoroughly enjoyed the trip to Bombay, on the troop ship, Orontes (21 days at sea) before departure; we had been issued with tropical kit and big bush hat, shoes shorts, and rifle. We travelled via Suez Canal and Aden. Most of the voyage was take up playing cards and smoking. Cigarettes at sea were very cheap and plentiful, 50 free a week. There was chocolate to be had, if one cared to queue round the ship for it, and in the tropics, it was soggy and quite unmanageable. Twice a day we had to muster at our lifeboat stations and made to drink salt water and lime juice to keep fit in the heat.

The declining years of the war and Goerings’s Luftwaffe had been defeated. The Germans weren’t giving up and found another weapon; this was the V1 doodlebug, which was a flying bomb, launched from a ramp, and with a controlling fuel limit, which stopped the motor when it ran out leaving the bomb to glide to the ground in a random way. The crater that was made was shallow, and the blast seriously destructive.

We sometimes stood on the hill and watched them pass the village, sometimes several at a time. After a while, the RAF got the hang of them, and flew beside them until they put a wing tip under them, and flipped them over. Better to fall among the fields of Essex than to reach London. British bombing raids on the launching ramps were ultimately successful, so the Germans came up with another idea. Rockets. The V2 rockets were faster than sound. One afternoon, I was standing by my window in my house, and observed one landing. First the rocket, then the sound sometime after. This one fell behind a house in Little Baddow in the chicken run of a friend’s house. The house was undamaged, but plucked and cooked chickens were hanging in the trees.

We as young people were totally optimistic about the outcome of the war, and followed the to-ings and fro-ings of the maps printed by the daily newspapers. I think that in the light of the events, our optimism was barely justified, but never-the-less proved to be OK as the outcome was satisfactory.

From the perspective of a 15 year old, everyday life was exciting with so much to see and to participate in, although by the end of the Japanese phase of the war, almost everybody was very weary. The VE and the VJ day celebrations, particularly the VE day celebrations were spontaneous, and a joy to behold. Incidentally, on VE day, bells were ringing, since they had been silent during the war, for they were used only for warnings for gas.

In a strange way I think that in my lifetime, these were the most memorable days bearing in mind that I wasn’t where the action was. Subsequent service time was something of an anticlimax, and the return to normality was protracted. Everyone knew dear friends lost from school, and a particular friend from school days was lost in a tank in Bremen. His Dad came into work that day feeling that there was something wrong. Then he was told.

Everything from sadness interest, excitement and uncertainty had thankfully closed with the termination of the war.

Rationing and shortages continued for a long time after the war had ended in 1945.

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