´óÏó´«Ã½

Sometimes it was very sad for some children because they would come to school and their daddies were missing or had been killed.

It was also not possible to buy new toys at Birthdays and Christmas and so you handed your toys on to younger brothers and sisters or cousins — I didn’t mind so much giving my toys away but I didn’t like having to wear clothes that my brother had grown out of.

By 1943 the war stared to go in our favour — Russia had been attacked by the Germans and although Italy had come into the war on the side of the Germans they had tried too much — they had ‘bitten off more than they could chew’ — and that Americans had joined in on our side.

We began to get more food to eat and we didn’t get so many Air raids. Then in 1944 we launched an attack on France to liberate al the occupied countries. By the spring of 1945 we knew that we were going to win the war and then on the night of May 7th we were told the Prime Minister would speak to us the next day so late at night on May 7th everybody went to the Town Square in Stamford and we all went around the streets singing and dancing — I went with my Mummy, Sister and brother, but my Daddy decided to go to bed!

The next day the Prime Minister — by now the Prime Minister was Winston Churchill, he told us the war was over — that was May 8th 1945. We were told we could have a holiday and we had parties and bonfires (burning all the curtains and boards we had put up for the blackout).

By this time I was a month from my 16th birthday and had left school. Our food and clothes were still rationed for several years but now we could move around the country, go to the seaside and what was quite wonderful was to be able to go out in the evenings and the street lights were shining. The war with Japan didn’t end until august 15th when the Americans dropped the Atom bombs.

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.