大象传媒

Evacuation years 鈥� 1939-44

When the 1st World War started in 1939 I was evacuated with the rest of my school from Clapham in South West London where I lived above a Diary Produce shop that my Dad owned. I have recollections of going to Eastbourne to start with but the authorities probably realised the enemy bombers would come over the coast and decided that wasn鈥檛 a good idea. We were then put on a train to South Wales complete with a luggage label tied to our coats so that people knew who we were and a gasmask in a box hanging over our shoulder. Presumably somewhere we also had a suitcase with clothes in it. I don鈥檛 remember being upset about being sent away from home and all I can think is that I trusted my parents to do what was best for me.
We arrived in Kidwelly in South Wales and were gathered in a large hall. My older sister, Hilda, was at the same school in those days so we were together. The local people then came in and picked out the children that they wanted to look after. One family wanted Hilda and another family wanted me but we clung on to each other and wouldn鈥檛 be separated so we eventually were both taken by Mr and Mrs Charles. As they had no children of their own it must have been quite a shock for them to be lumbered with six and nine year old London kids who knew very little about the country let alone about Wales. So for a few years we lived in Kidwelly with Gwyn and Merlys Charles.
The school, as far as I can recall, was just like any other school. I do remember a girl wanting to kiss me and I didn鈥檛 let her and ran all the way home instead. Oh the innocence of youth!
Mrs Charles鈥� mother, Mrs Emmanuel, lived in the same house and spent most of her time in her sewing room upstairs where she had a sewing machine. I couldn鈥檛 understand why Mrs Charles called her 鈥淢um鈥� as, in my mind, only children had Mums and not grown ups as well.
At times, for some reason, we slept on bunk beds in the village hall although I never knew why this was. A friend of the family, Heather Maliphant, who was about 15 at the time, used to tell Hilda and me ghost stories. How we ever got to sleep after that I don鈥檛 know. Some nights a group of people held s茅ances round a table trying to contact the spirits of the dead 鈥� very spooky.
We both had a time when we had fleas in our hair. We used to sit with our heads over a piece of white paper on the table while someone combed our hair with a fine comb. As the fleas fell out they had to be quickly squashed before they jumped away. This was quite fascinating for someone of my tender years!
There was no indoor toilet or bathroom in the house. Baths were taken in a galvanised bath in the kitchen. The toilet was in a small brick building at the end of the garden and consisted of a plank with a hole in it with a bucket underneath. During the summer when the wasps were buzzing around life could be quite exciting sitting on the loo! I used to help Mr Charles bury the contents of the bucket in the garden from time to time. You had to remember where you had buried the previous bucket loads and be careful where you walked as the garden could be quite squelchy.
The kitchen had a large range at the end with an oven built in either side. Mrs Charles used to bake bread in these ovens and the smell was out of this world. Not so tasty were fried cockles and black pudding!
At the end of the garden there was a wall and, on the other side of the wall, was an orchard. Hilda and I found that we could climb up on top of a pile of earth in our garden and get on the top of the wall. Then we crawled round the top of the wall round the corner where there was a tree right next to the wall. We could then lower ourselves into the orchard by climbing down the tree. Why do apples that have been scrumped always taste better then those bought from the shop?
Along one side of the garden was a very low, disused building, presumably some sort of workshop at one time. It ran along the length of the garden and had a partially boarded up window in it. Hilda and I managed to get in the window and explore inside. It was very dusty and full of cobwebs but not much else although it was quite exciting especially as we knew we weren鈥檛 supposed to be in there.
Hilda and I had our secret camp in a field nearby, made up of pieces of timber and corrugated iron. I had my first cigarette in that field, provided by Hilda. I鈥檓 not sure where she got it from but I can鈥檛 remember liking it particularly.
Kidwelly has a well preserved castle and for children our age this was a great attraction. It was always open and no entrance fee in those days. We often used to play inside and I remember on one occasion crawling along a plank between two walls. It felt like it was miles up in the air but in reality probably wasn鈥檛. One day we were investigating one of the dungeons and it was so dark we couldn鈥檛 see in front of us. I found a stone somewhere which I threw and it seemed to take a long time before it hit the bottom; the stairs just ended half way down!
We always felt that the local people spoke in Welsh if they didn鈥檛 want us to understand what they were saying. In fact they probably alternated between English and Welsh in normal conversation. We did learn some Carols in Welsh and managed to do quite well going round the doors and singing at Christmas. The local people probably thought we were lovely, singing in their language.
My Mum and Dad used to visit from time to time and bring us sweets etc. These visits were always very welcome. Dad had a problem the first time he visited as there were no signposts as they were all removed in case of invasion. He didn鈥檛 know how to pronounce the Welsh double L as in Llanelli, which was the nearest large town to Kidwelly, so he was pronouncing it as Lanely. He was eventually put right by a local.

Return to London 鈥� 1943/4

For some reason we were brought back to London before the end of the war, probably late 1943 or early 1944 and I returned to Haselrigge Road School. We then lived in Briarwood Road in Clapham since my Dad鈥檚 shop had been destroyed during one of the air raids. It hadn鈥檛 received a direct hit but I believe a bomb fell on the tram depot opposite and the blast knocked our house down. Fortunately Mum and Dad were in a shelter in a neighbour鈥檚 house.
Dad then bought a stall in a market place in Wilcox Road, South Lambeth and sold dead rabbits for food. Meat was rationed but, for some reason, rabbits weren鈥檛 so when he had a supply of rabbits to sell the word soon spread round the district. He must have taught himself how to skin them unless he had instructions from a butcher. He used to tie their back legs together, hang them on a hook on the back of the kitchen door and skin them. Not a pretty sight for our young sensitive eyes, especially when he found a baby rabbit inside one of them and insisted on showing it to us children!
At that time there were still air raids most nights with bombs being dropped and also there were the V1 and V2 Rockets that were being directed onto London. We used to stand out in the garden and watch the V1 Rockets go over hoping they would keep going and, effectively, drop somewhere else.
Each morning on the way to school I used to pass newly bombed houses and holes in the road. The church in our road had a direct hit one night and that really shook the whole house. All the windows in the house had brown paper strips glued across them to stop the glass shattering too much.
We had an anti-aircraft gun unit on Clapham Common and, after an air raid, I used to go out in the garden the next day to pick up all the bits of shrapnel from the shells. I ended up with several cardboard boxes full of bits and I never knew what eventually happened to them.
The house had a cellar which had been reinforced so that, if the house collapsed, it would take the whole weight. At least that is what we were told, but, fortunately, we didn鈥檛 have to prove it. There were metal bunk beds down there that we sometimes used to sleep on even though the cellar was quite damp. Eventually we started sleeping in our own bedrooms and, if there was an air raid, Dad used to carry me downstairs to the cellar. I think Hilda was already sleeping in one of the downstairs rooms so didn鈥檛 have so far to go.
Dad was in the Home Guard and we had a lodger who was an Air Raid Warden. One night, while there was a raid on, my Dad and the lodger were patrolling the street when they heard a bomb coming down. The lodger came running into the house and flung himself down in the hallway. He was shortly followed by my Dad who told him off at great length and with great gusto for frightening the children by running indoors like that. I think I was more frightened by the bad mood my Dad was in rather than the lodger throwing himself on the floor.
We can count ourselves as being fortunate since all my family survived the war.

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