大象传媒

Lily nee Neilson, of Liverpool, served as a teenager with the National fire service in the Liverpool Blitz. In her diary, she describes the horror of bombing and cheers herself up with a new hair style, up rather than down to her shoulders.
Bob Bird was a Government photographer assigned to top secret projects. In 1941, aged 21, he was posted to Ringway to photograph Britain's first paratroopers and looked up Lily, a distant cousin. Romance blossomed.
They wed in 1942, when Bob was posted to RAF Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment, Scotland. He photographed torpedo and Tallboy bomb trials designed to sink U-Boats and German battleship Tirpitz.
Bob flew in flying boats with a cat called Pyro and teamed up with fellow photographer Keith Medley for the rest of the war. They were posted to Sherburn-in Elmet, where the Airborne Forces Experimental Establishment prepared for the airborne invasion of Europe in D-Day. Bob flew in bombers and gliders. AFEE then moved to Beaulieu to be nearer the Allied invasion of Europe and to prepare for the airborne invasion of Japan.
Lily and Pyro also moved to Beaulieu. Pyro was killed by 'friendly fire' in May 1945, runover by a RAF lorry while waiting for Bob to return from a flying mission. Bob continued to photograph top secret projects, including the Flying Jeep, captured German flying machines and V2 rockets.
Demobbed in 1947, Bob and Keith returned to Merseyside to open a photographic business on New brighton promenade, taking pictures of day trippers. This developed into a successful photographic business.
Bob died in 1999. Keith in 2004. Lily lives in New Brighton. Son: Robin Bird has produced a book: 'Top secret War Bird of WW2,' telling their wartime story.

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