大象传媒

My two most significant memories of the war are cycling down to Thurleigh Airfiled to see the planes landind, such as B-17 Bombers. The landed on the main runway, and were taxied round the perimeter track to the dispertion point right beside the main road. The pilots lept out, and were collected by a jeep. They all looked very tired out, after flying at up to 30,000 feet for possibly 8 hours. Of course, not all who set out returned. It could be that 24 left, and only 18 returned.
Sometimes when there was nobody around, we went to inspect the planes. We were chased off several times.

As we shared our school in Bedford with Owens school in London, we had the afternoons off to cycle around Bedford.
We had one bombing raid, in which hundreds of Incendiaries were dropped in the Goldington road area. These were a new type of bomb, which had a 6 inch tip which exploded if the fire was being dealt with. We had a sandbag in the front porch, and a Stirrup pump. Everybody had Stirrup pumps.
They stood in a bucket of water, and were operated by a person, while a second person held the hose lying down on the ground directing a jet or mist on the fire, before it got too large.

The house opposite 137 Goldington road had an incendiary bomb through the roof which set fire to the setee in the front room. This was tackeld by Mr. Pullinger, the owner, and put out.
Thatb was an exciting night we almost ook as ordinary.
Various incendiaries which did not ignite were collected and laid on a pile of sand in the front garden nearby.

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