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This story appears courtesy of and with thanks to The Liverpool Diocesan Care and Repair Association and James Taylor.

Janet Langley, born in 1916, recalls the harrowing events that occurred when the war broke out :

We had the black-outs, then we had the air raid shelters, then I started having my second son. I was in Sefton General with him. My husband as was then, was in the Navy, he used to be away for very long periods, then he鈥檇 come home and I鈥檇 fall for another kiddie. I had a brother, he was only about one year younger than me. He joined up, just as the war started, he had been a brick layer and he went down to Hertfordshire and he wasn鈥檛 there very long. He didn鈥檛 have to join up, but he volunteered for the Royal Marines and of course, he went over on a ship called Lancastria, it was a big liner and he got to Dunkirk, but unfortunately when the Germans started to advance they loaded all the boys back onto the ship, he got put down in the bowels of the ship and it took a direct hit. I think there were only three people saved off that big liner. When Vera Lyn used to come on the radio singing, 鈥榃e鈥檒l meet again鈥� and 鈥楾here鈥檒l be blue birds over鈥�, I used to cry. I missed him dreadfully, he was only twenty.

Can you tell me about the bombing in Liverpool itself?

Yes, Wellington Avenue took a direct hit, Smithdown Road, then Oxford Street Hospital, Wellington Avenue coming towards Gainsborough Road, there was a direct hit there. A gentleman who lived by me was an A.R.P Air Raid Precaution or something like that and he went to Wellington Avenue and he saw these two legs sticking out of the rubble of one of the houses, he tried to dig the person out, but it was only a pair of legs, no body, no head, nothing just a pair of legs. Do you know, that man had a nervous breakdown, he died soon after, he must have been so upset. It was amazing how people survived, now I think we are in better conditions health-wise that is. Food what there was, was good food, not fatty or sweet. I don鈥檛 know whether it was your spirit or not, but we survived it all, it could have been because you had to stay well for your kiddies.
One particular time my son wasn鈥檛 well so I trotted pushing the pram. During the war, you didn鈥檛 know whether there was going to be an air raid, whether you鈥檇 got to where you were going or not. When I was coming out of the Children鈥檚 Infirmary and air raid started, so the sister said, 鈥淵ou must leave that pram here, you can鈥檛 take him home in a pram, you must get the tram home,鈥� so I got this number eight. When it reached the Sefton General stop the driver shouted. 鈥淎ll out, I鈥檓 not going any further.鈥� Well there I was, I had no bottle no dummy, nothing, running trying to get him home, this air raid warden shouted, 鈥淲here you going, where you going?鈥�. The shrapnel was falling around us by this time. I said, 鈥淚鈥檓 going home鈥�, he said, 鈥淵ou can鈥檛 go home, where do you live?鈥� I said 鈥淚鈥檓 going to my aunts in Blyth Street.鈥� 鈥淥h, I鈥檒l get you in somewhere, you can鈥檛 go any further鈥�. He eventually got Alan and I, Alan at this time, was crying his little heart out, he got us in with the vicar and his daughter. There we all were, sitting under the stairs on a big boxed-spring mattress. It was funny you know, thinking about getting to my destination and getting Alan home. You never know the minute really and although you were in an air raid shelter you鈥檇 hear this bang and used to think, right you鈥檙e next. You really thought that you were going to be the next ones to be killed. You used to get fed up, you鈥檇 go off to sleep in the house, off would go the siren, you got yourselves into the shelter, they鈥檇 stop and you鈥檇 come out , sometimes it would go on all night so sometimes you鈥檇 fall asleep in the shelter and wake up in the morning cold. These shelters would only protect you from so much, if it got a direct hit, well that was it, you were dead. They had concrete tops on, this kind, they were supposed to be ever so safe.
I remember hearing on the radio, a list of places that the Germans were going to be bombing that night, it was read out by that fella, they called him Lord Haw Haw (William Joyce). The railway got hit in Wavertree, quite a number of places did there, I had one aunt who lived in Edge Hill, well she was bombed out. Her husband used to do this plane spotting, he used to stand on roof tops of big buildings. The docks were hit very badly, I remember the night the town centre went on fire (with the bombing), all the shops Lewis鈥檚, Blacklers, oh God, I cried all the ruins, Lewis鈥檚 managed to re-open in a tiny little space, they had every department.

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