大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Sue Smith on behalf of June Blitz and has been added to the site with her permission. June fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.
I was eight years old when war started and along with my two brothers aged seven and nine was evacuated from Cosham to Salisbury. We left clutching our gas masks and carrier bags with egg sandwiches. My mother wanted us to stay together and so when we stood in a hall being looked over by prospective landladies we were left until last because nobody wanted three children. That feeling of rejection remains with me. A woman with one daughter took us for a month but that did not work out so we moved on to another lady who put us in an attic room where we were very unhappy. When my mother and Grandmother came to visit bringing sweets she made us stay in the attic and pretended we were out so we never received the presents. My mother soon realised what was happening and found a rented a house in Salisbury so that we could be together again, although my father had to stay as he worked in the dockyard. We spent the rest of the war there until I took the entrance exam for the Southern Grammar School in Portsmouth. As I was awarded a place we returned to Portsmouth in 1944 so I could start the new term, and happily we escaped the worst of the bombing for the rest of the war.

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