大象传媒

Life in Britain during WW2 was very different to what it is now. There was no television. (Most people did not have a television until the early 1950s). All we had was a radio, which we then called the 'wireless'. WE always had the wireless switched on at 8 o'clock every morning to listen to the news. During the Blitz, I would wait expectantly for the part where the newsreader would tell us how many bombers the RAF had shot down during the night. (I have since found out that the numbers were always exaggerated. This was done to make sure that we didn't get too depressed).

Towards the end of the war, in 1944 and 1945, I waited for the part, which announced how much closer to Berlin the Russian army had got. The Russians were our allies and were advancing on Germany from the East while we and the Americans were advancing from the West.

There were no streetlights on during the war. This was so that the German bombers could not see where they were. In fact, even houses were not allowed to show any light at all, not even a chink at the side of the curtain. There were men called air-raid wardens who walked around checking that no light was showing from any house. Most houses had specially made frames covered with black material that were put over the windows at night to make sure no light got out. Perhaps that is why it was called the 'Blackout'.

If you travelled on a train at night all the windows were 'blacked out' so that they could not be seen from the air. When a train stopped at a station all the lights were turned off before the train stopped so that no light showed when people opened the doors to get out. As you can imagine, in the pitch dark it was not unusual for people to trip over other people' feet.

There were very few toys in the shops. All the factories that used to make toys before the war were converted to make guns, shells and bombs. Most of the toys I had were given to me by older people who had had them from before the war.

When bombs hit the ground they exploded into thousands of pieces of jagged metal called 'shrapnel'. Most children used to collect shrapnel; I had quite a large collection by the end of the war.

My dad was too old to be a soldier, so, like a lot of other fathers, he was in the Home Guard. You've probably seen "Dads Army" on TV so you will know what the Home Guard is. One thing you may not know is that the men in the Home guard used to finish their day at work and then spend the night, without sleep, doing their Home Guard duty. Next day, they still had to go to work.

We were all frightened of "The Germans". However, our nickname for them was "Jerries" which makes them sound quite friendly. Strange eh?

Because it was obviously dangerous living near London, some children were evacuated to parts of Great Britain, which the Germans did not bomb. This was often way out in the country. Some children were even evacuated to Canada, which did not suffer any bombing at all. The evacuated children were not accompanied by their parents. They simply went to live with kind families who looked after them, sometimes until the end of the war.

I was never evacuated but, whenever the bombing became really bad, I used to go with my mum and sister to stay with my Grandma in Bideford, Devon. My dad had to stay at home to carry on working and doing his home guard duty.

Of course, throughout the war, children still had to go to school. Every school had its own large air raid shelter, which we went into whenever there was an air raid during the day.

There was a shortage of most types of food. We could not get any food from other countries because the Germans tried to sink all the ships carrying food. Food was strictly rationed. Everybody had a ration book. As well as money you had to have a ration book to get food. Every time you bought something, the shopkeeper would cut out a coupon from the ration book. The ration book made sure that no one had more food than they were allowed. To give one example, the ration for sugar was about two tablespoonfuls per person per week. Sweets counted as sugar. As you can imagine, sweets were a real luxury.

Some things were just not in the shops, bananas for example. The first time I ever saw a banana was in about 1951. We had to have ration books long after the war.

Most people used to grow much of their own food. They grew vegetables and fruit in their gardens and kept chickens for their eggs and to eat.

Not many people had cars. This was because they were very expensive an most people could not afford them. Also, petrol was reserved for the tanks of the army and the planes of the air force - all petrol had to be brought from abroad in ships and, again, the Germans tried to sink all the oil tankers.

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