大象传媒

A CHILD'S WAR.

Down the Shelter.......

To me, the Second World War was a time of great excitement. Ordinary everyday life was interrupted, and although I loved school I was no different from any other seven year old when it came to having days off because bombs had been falling during the night and we could not get out into the street.

I used to go to bed in the shelter and get up and go to school from the shelter the next day. We must have been a stinky lot in those days. It was impossible to have a proper bath. For one thing, water was limited to four inches and you could bet your life if someone was in the bath the Air Raid Warning would go. Bad enough if a grown-up had to get out quick, but very difficult when dealing with wet children. I think mum thought it was better to go without baths and stay alive, than be bathed but dead! We used to get washed down in a bowl of water because that could be done down the Anderson shelter.

Every morning, after a night of bombs and explosions, we would emerge blinking from our underground shelter in the garden to search for bits of shrapnel or the silver strips of chaff dropped by the German planes to mess up the radar. Toys were in very short supply, so we invented our own toys with what we had. We took to collecting.....anything!

Coloured glass was one of my favourites at the time, and of course, the shrapnel, which everyone collected. In our street, one brass piece could be swapped for four or five silver bits. If there were markings of any kind on your shrapnel, you could have your own auction to secure the best price in other pieces to add to your collection.

I lived on the outskirts of London with my parents and my younger brother Johnny. Dad was called up and went into the Army, but he was never posted abroad. Instead he worked on the radar buried deep under the cliffs at Dover in Kent. We knew about the white cliffs of Dover long before Vera Lynne sang about them!

Running with the pack.......

Mum's sister, Nan,lived in Shoreham in Kent, and for a break, she would often take us down to stay with Nan for a few days, so I missed a lot of schooling then.

There was always a crowd of kids there. My mum was one of thirteen children, most of them still living in London at that time,so there was always a trail of aunts and cousins leaving London to go to Shoreham for a respite from the bombing and a crowd of children running loose like a pack of unruly dogs.

We ran wild on the rec often with the war going on over our very heads. The dog fights between the Spitfires and the Luftwaffe were all part of the same exciting game. We Ahhhhhh'ed when one of our planes came spiralling down, and cheered wildly if it was a German. A German made a forced landing once in a nearby field. We all surged across the field to watch the fun. We jeered and shouted at the poor unfortunate pilot who got out. He was the enemy and we let him know it. It was better entertainment than watching the village picture show!

Work and Play........

My aunt had bought a little white clapboard cottage and village shop with a tea-room, originally the village bakery. At the back was the old bakehouse. Grandad spent most of his time in there, peeling potatoes for chips. He had cataracts, and would hold the potato and the knife right up close to his better eye to see what he was doing. In return, my aunt paid him with tobacco from the shop.

At the top of the garden was the tea room. Most of the time the kids used it as a playroom. There was a stage at one end with a trap door in it. You could go down the trap door and out into the garden. We used the stage to put on "shows". The adults paid us a penny each to come and watch. We spent the pennies in the shop so my aunt actually made a profit out of our ventures!

All were welcome at Nan's. However, there was a sting in the tail! It was no holiday! Everyone had to work. They worked for the roof over their heads and the food in their bellies. The food, being wartime, was no great shakes, but it kept body and soul together, and here we were probably better off than many others.

Hundreds of soldiers were billeted in the village. Being a catering establishment, Nan received extra rations, and her smoky, dim little shop was filled to bursting every night. Tea and beans on toast were served until the last soldier left. The cooking went on until the early hours.

We did not escape the work either! Nan discovered that she could get home sewing for the forces. All the children had to sew hooks on "bandoliers". These were wide belts, made of khaki-coloured material. Six large brass hooks had to be stitched on each one. I think the soldiers hung some of their gear from the hooks.

Nan got something like six old pence a dozen. Those doing the sewing received nothing though. We would sit for hours round Granny's large table with this huge mound of bandoliers in the middle and another enormous pile of brass hooks waiting to be sewn on. As you got near to the last few, the pile would suddenly grow back up to its original size again! Nan used to say we were doing it for the War Effort. I was only about seven at the time, and I cringe now, thinking of the soldiers' lives hanging between the hands of a bunch of kids.

British Humour sees us through........

Bombing became more intense, and life in Shoreham more dangerous. The village was on the flight path from the coast to London, which was better protected by then, with barrage balloons, guns, and of course, the Spitfires in the sky keeping the enemy at bay. The German bombers could not always get through to their targets and the pilots often dumped their loads before heading home.

In the country people began making their own underground shelters. Dad arrived one day on a weekend's leave. Nan soon had him, and anyone else she could persuade to join in, working. A huge hole was dug in the garden. Into the hole went a large wooden garden shed. Soil was piled back on top. Inside went mattresses, chairs and a wooden crate to stand an oil lamp on. Children slept on the mattresses, squeezed in like sardines, top and tail. The adults slept in shifts, and took turns sitting on a wooden kitchen chair.

Every night grandad sat up on a hard chair near the doorway, an overcoat round his shoulders, and a bottle of water between his knees to give a drink and a comforting word to any of the children who might wake with the noise of the bombs dropping. One night a bomb dropped really close. The shed shook violently. Choking clouds of dust and soil filled the dimly lit shelter. "That's it!" cried grandad. "I'm finished! I've swallowed the blast!" Everyone became convulsed in fits of silent laughter, even with the noise of the explosion still echoing in the air.

Through all this I can honestly say I never once felt afraid, even when a stray bomb killed one of our mates and we narrowly missed being gunned down by stray machine gun bullets from the dogfights over our heads, but that is the resilience of youth I expect. It was only in later years that I realised what strain, stress and fear the grown-ups lived with day after day in those troubled times It is due to their bravery, stout-heartedness and stoic sense of humour, that all of us kids survived with no physical or mental scars.

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