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This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Roland Gardner from Sidley I.T. Centre, and has been added to the website on behalf of Ruth Gasson with her permission, and she fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

A WARTIME PADDLE.

I was born in 1938 in Hastings.
After the fall of France in June 1940, Hastings was designated by the War Office as a probable landing site for the expected German invasion forces. My father was in the Fire Service stationed in Bulverhythe, but my mother, grandmother and myself were evacuated to Glastonbury in Somerset. We were very lucky, and were billeted on an elderly widow, who owned a very large and comfortable house. By May, 1941, the war had receded somewhat in Hastings, and although the danger of invasion was still considered probable, my mother and father decided that the family should be reunited, so we returned to the family home. Whilst we were away, my grandfather and grandmother had been bombed out of their house near Ore Station and had rented a cottage in Brede. I was allowed to stay with them sometimes, and I remember that Granny and I picked up strips of tinfoil in the surrounding fields, which we used to make Christmas decorations. I now realise that the foil was dropped by German aircraft to confuse our radar.

On June 13th, 1944, my mother was taking me, as usual, to school at St Mary’s, Baldslow. A loud clattering noise in the sky made us look up. There was a small, black aircraft flying north and emitting this very strange sound. I don’t know how my mother knew that it was dangerous, but she must have, for we took cover in a ditch. Two more passed over before we reached my school. I was one of only three pupils who got to school that day, and I was quite proud of myself. This, of course, was the start of Hitler’s V1 campaign. As the intensity of the ‘Doodlebug’ barrage increased, with various groups declaring that these weapons portended the ‘end of the world,’ the decision was taken to re-evacuate us back to Somerset. Fortunately, we were assigned to the same people who had looked after us in 1940, so the move was much less traumatic than it might have been. On a day’s outing, I was taken to Burnham-on-Sea. The beaches in Hastings, had, as far as I knew, always been covered in barbed wire and the promenade lined with ‘dragon’s teeth’ anti-tank blocks. Burnham beach had no such impediments and, joy of joys, I was able to have my first paddle!

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