大象传媒

Remembering those years gone by. I was 5 when the 2nd world war broke out. We were given gas masks. I had just started school when they started to put up the barrage balloons. We didn,t know what was going on then. We had been told that Britain was at war with Germany. We sent home from school when the air raid sirens started. It was scary hearing the guns firing at night.

Some people could look over to Barrow and see the sky was red with all the firing. You could see the search lights sometimes and could also see the German planes. All the trains were stopped mostly because they were carrying ammunition. Sometimes near where we lived you could hear the air raid wardens shouting put those lights out. The sirens would go on for a while. We were always ready to go to the air raid shelters.

My father was working for the Naval Docks at the time repairing the war ships which were brought in. He said to see the wounded and the dead was a sorry sight. He even said they were brought in on German E boats with german prisoners on board. We all got red cross parcels which contained dried egg powder and other things because there was a food shortage. The WVS were putting out soup kitchens. Everything was on ration and every family had to have a ration book and there wasn,t a lot they could do about it. I remember one time when my mate and I were playing football in the field we could hear the planes and when we looked up at them we could see they were german planes. When the sirens started up agian we would run as fast as we could to get home.

Everyone in the street were running to the air raid shelters. It seemed to last forever when we were in the air raid shelters. Once we were given the all clear we all went back home. As it started to get dark it would start all over again. You can,t forget those days just remembering how things used to be. I used to run to the shops and back again. We even had to make our own fun and games or just read our comics. The price of the comics then were just 3 old pennies and the jigsaws was 6d.

My friend and I used to swap our comics with other children in our street. The name of the comics in them days were as follows, Film Fun, Knockout, and Comic cuts. My sisters and I could not wait for it to snow in the winter and when it did snow it would sometimes be up to 6 ft high and it would be right up to the window sills. We even had to make our own kites out of brown paper and stick them together with paste which was made from flour and water. We would swap our marbles and ciggy cards and our comics with ohter kids. It was fun in away because doing things like this meant we were not thinking of the war. I can still see the picture in my mind now.When V.E day came everyone was glad that the war was over . We all had street parties and everyone joined in. We put up flags and balloons up in every street. We had G.I.s and other troops joining in. We got to ride on the Bren Gun Carriers and even on the tanks. We saw what was called a dog fight which involved Spitfires and German planes.

Good times and Bad times
By Norman Sherman
Born 18th July 1935

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