大象传媒

My father served in the army in France in the First World War- he was demobbed in 1919 and joined the navy at Portsmouth where I was born. He finished his navy service in 1937 and we moved to near Rochester in Kent when he joined the Naval Dockyard Police Service which was reserved for ex Navy and Marine personnel

I well remember September 1939 and the feeling of despair felt by many - remember it was only 20 years since the end of the First War with all its bloody butchery - there wasn鈥檛 a street in the Kingdom without its casualties - widows, orphans, left to get by as best they could - men without limbs - blind men - men left coughing their lungs out from poison gas, and the thousands of what were known as 鈥渕aiden ladies鈥�, women who would never marry because the men they would have married lay rotting in Flanders, so the war was not met with the jingoistic fervour that greeted the start of the First War. The great depression still affected much of the country - paradoxically it was only rearmament that led the way out of it and as for what was happening on the Continent - it was all so far away for most people. There was none of the instant mass information systems of today. All we had were Cinema newsreels, the Wireless and the Newspapers, all of which were pretty bland, and who was this Hitler anyway? All most people knew of him was that he was a funny little man who made speeches but that he had ended unemployment in Germany while our politicians had just rung their hands and waited for something to turn up. The horrors of the Holocaust were in the future and beyond anyone鈥檚 imagination. People here were too busy just trying to live to give much thought to what was going on elsewhere - even those in work just got by with what was no more than a subsistence wage - my mother鈥檚 proud boast that her children had Co-Op shoes had real meaning even in the relatively affluent South. It was a time, for example, where every man wore a hat of some sort and his place in society could be instantly determined by cap, trilby or homburg and, as for a women smoking, or wearing trousers or jeans in public, heaven forbid !

Mr Chamberlain鈥檚 sombre words on the 3rd September were heard with, at best, resignation

It was assumed that the war would be a continuation of the first - each army basically static, facing each other - the only difference being instead of watery trenches the Maginot Line would face the Siegfried Line in a band of concrete, each impenetrable, awaiting something but not quite sure what.

The first 6 months of the war passed very quietly. It became known as the phoney war and gave a feeling of false security so the German Blitzkrieg in May 1940 came as a surprise and a shock and Dunkirk was not seen as anything but a terrible defeat. I remember the small ships collected in the Medway estuary before sailing for France and then the trains bringing troops up from the coast passing through Rochester on their way up to London. Everyone expected the Germans to land within days and tank traps and slit trenches were hurriedly dug. The Home Guard, or LDV as it was first known, was formed and armed with anything they could get their hands on, but no one expected the Germans to be held for long.

It took all of Churchill鈥檚 oratory to give the nation a sense of purpose and in some strange way the Battle of Britain that then followed and which was fought in the Kent skies was almost a distraction from the disastrous situation we faced on the ground.

Every day we saw the massed German air fleets - the vapour trails on high and aircraft falling from the skies. A Junkers 88 bomber was shot down less than a mile from where I lived. We all raced over to it but the children were held back while the bodies of the crew were bought out of the wreckage and covered with a tarpaulin, then we all grabbed souvenirs before the Army arrived and put a guard on the wreckage. Another time a Hurricane fighter was shot down and the pilot bailed out. He landed nearby and when we got to him - a Sergeant - he gave me his helmet which I had for years until I lent it for an exhibition and it was never returned.

The London blitz started in the Autumn and went on all winter. We lived 30miles from London and could see the reflections of the fires in the sky. There were not many bombs in our area. The nearby Dockyard and Rochester airport were attacked a couple of times but we were 3 or 4 miles from them so were safe, although our village was in reality the storage depot for all the shells, mines etc for Chatham Dockyard. We were always half expecting something but in the event we were in more danger from the local Ack - Ack batteries which seemed to fire in all directions. One night when they were firing we heard a very loud screaming noise and thought it was a bomb. The next morning we found an unexploded shell in the back garden and we were all evacuated to the local church hall while the bomb squad dealt with it.

My main memory at this time is of cold, dullness and shortages - nothing but bad news for the first 2 or 3 years. It got to be nothing but defeats and disasters and it wasn鈥檛 until El Alamein that we had any good news and even then it wasn鈥檛 until D- Day that things really seemed to get better but that didn鈥檛 last as it was about this time that the V1s (or Doodlebugs as we called them) started, followed later by the V2 rockets.

I started work in 1943 when I was 14. I had attended a Junior Technical School for boys aged 11 to 14 with a syllabus designed to prepare us for a life in Industry, ideally to get an Apprenticeship in a local factory. I got an Apprenticeship at Short Bros, the Aircraft Company, working first on Stirling Bombers and then on Sunderland Flying Boats at their factory on the river Medway - wages 14/7 a week,( that鈥檚 14 shillings and 7 pence), about 70p in today鈥檚 money. As an Apprentice, I didn鈥檛 get the big bonuses that most of the workers got but in return I wasn鈥檛 allowed to do the massive overtime that was the norm with most of the workers - evenings, weekends for months, years, some even started 30 minutes early before the usual 7.30 start. As an apprentice, I was allowed to start at 8.0 but, as I had to escort my sister who worked in the Inspection View Room at Shorts I was always in for the 7.30 start.

I carried on with schooling for the National Certificate doing day release and three evening classes a week. It was a long haul to the Tech in town in the blackout from where we lived in the country and buses were scarce and irregular - many a night I walked the 5 miles home. The workers at Shorts may have made big money but there was little to spend it on, maybe a few luxury items on the black market at exorbitant prices. Even basic items were in short supply and it got worse as the war went on. You were lucky if you knew someone who knew someone.

As I said, the Doodlebugs became more and more numerous and one day at work I saw one dive into the houses on the other side of the river and explode with a huge bang and a shockwave that rattled the factory buildings and blew out some of the windows.

It was at this time that more and more American planes were seen as they stepped up their bombing of Germany. One day, a B24 Liberator bomber crash - landed in a field about three miles from my home after being hit on a raid. I got a can of water and some Horlicks tablets from the emergency rations from one of the crew. (I was in the Air Training Corp at this time and we always looked forward to visiting American bases as the Americans were always very generous 鈥� not just in material things although the chocolate bars, or candy as they called them, were very welcome, but also in their interest. They let us climb all over their aircraft and some of us even got the odd flight when they did air tests after maintenance.)
Another time a P47 fighter tried to land at Rochester airport but overshot and ended up with its nose smashing through the wall of the canteen. The pilot was unhurt except for a cut hand, other crews were not so lucky as at least two B17 bombers fatally crashed while trying to make emergency landings there.

The V2 rockets that came in the last year of the war were more frightening than the V1s in that there was no warning at all, the first thing you had was a gigantic explosion followed by the sound of their arrival. Luckily for us in the Medway towns ( as Chatham , Rochester and Gillingham are known ) we were not a primary target and the only ones that hit our area were a few strays , but they were frightening just the same. Sometimes on a very clear day we could see the vapour trails reaching up into the stratosphere from their launch pads in France and Belgium - there was no defence from them other than to bomb their launch sites.

The war in Europe finally ended with a feeling of relief rather than exhilaration. There were celebrations of course and I went up to London with my friends to a big parade in Westminster and we fought our way down the Mall to the Palace to see the King and Queen. But at the back of everyone鈥檚 mind was Japan - remember that it was generally accepted that it would take at least two years to defeat Japan with horrendous casualties on both sides and I and my friends would be in it.

The Atom bombs were at first met with disbelief and then as life savers - there was no thought of moral questions, just the thought that it was a pity that we didn鈥檛 have them sooner.

The final end of the war was almost an anticlimax. By the time it came everything was in short supply and people had had more than enough of austerity. It was a long time before people started to feel other than tired and down and of course rationing not only continued after the war but more items were actually added to the list. It was a good five years before things started to get a little easier and the winter of 1946/1947 was particularly bad. In a way I was lucky, my parents generation had to face the First War, the Great Depression, and the Second War all in one lifetime.

What are my memories of the war ? - a bit of a jumble I suppose - Neville Chamberlain 鈥� Dunkirk 鈥� the Battle of Britain 鈥� Churchill鈥檚 speeches 鈥� the Hood 鈥� Woolton Pie 鈥� the nine oclock news read by Alvar Liddell or Stuart Hibbert 鈥� Band Wagon 鈥� ITMA 鈥� Dame Myra Hess playing Litoff鈥檚 Scherzo 鈥� Nymphs and Shepherds sung by the Manchester Children鈥檚 Choir 鈥� the Radio Doctor 鈥� D-Day 鈥� Arnheim - and VE and VJ day - just the standard memories common to millions.

I suppose in a way I was a witness to history although it didn鈥檛 seem like it at the time, just people living as best they could in unusual circumstances .

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