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My sister, Sheila Louise Pope, and I were young when the Second World War broke out. She was 2 ½ yrs old and I was 4. We lived in the country at Kingswood Common, just outside Reading. I remember that we had a young refugee girl come to live with us from London.

P.O.W. Camp

Nearby a Prisoner of War Camp was built, which was run by the Americans. My parents ran a ‘Country Garden Café’, which the Americans used when off duty. We became very friendly with them and they would order ‘Welsh Rabbit’ as a favourite. When my sister was 7 ½ yrs and I was 9, the Americans used to take us to the camp to show us around the barracks and to see the ‘Cook House’ full of tinned fruit and all the lovely food, which we were unable to get. They always left us giving us sweets and chewing gum.

Air Raids

We had an Air Raid Shelter in our front garden, which was dug below ground by our parents and neighbours. We had stairs to go down into it and it had a roof made of corrugated metal, which was then covered with earth. At school we were told to get under our desks if the siren went. We used our shelter quite a lot and when we heard the V2s going over and making a loud noise; we knew they would go over. When we heard it stop we knew we would soon hear the explosion. One landed close enough to make the back of our house unstable.

I also remember hearing our planes going over to fight in the war as we were quite near Benson Airport, Nr. Wallingford.

Family involvement in the war

My 17-year-old brother, George Alan Pope, was called up into the Army but he returned safely, thank goodness. However, he has always had problems with his stomach since then, as he was sent to Benghazi and Tobruk and posted in the desert where food and conditions were very poor.

I also remember my father, George Henry Pope, going off to the Home Guard, getting dressed in dark clothes and painting his face black. His regular job was as a maintenance man in Peppard Chest Hospital for TB patients and he was also an ambulance driver for the same hospital. My grandad, George Henry Stayte, was in the R.A.F. police at Shinfield Park during the war.

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