´óÏó´«Ã½

'This story was submitted to the People's War site by Rick Allden of the CSV ´óÏó´«Ã½ Coventry and Warwickshire Action Desk on behalf of Anne Bailey and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions'.

The Second World War meant very little to me. That may sound surprising, but there were several reasons.
Firstly I was only nine when war broke out and I think my parents were very protective of what I should see and hear about it. For example, when I was 15 and the war was over, I went with friends to see a Sonja Heine (I think that’s the spelling) film. She was a famous ice skater and it was felt ‘suitable.’ When, on my return, I told my parents that the Newsreel had been about the release of prisoners from Belsen, my father said that if he’d known he wouldn’t have let me go. I was fifteen then, and still being protected. I suppose they felt they were doing the right thing.
I was also unobservant. For example, I never noticed my mother getting bigger and to come home one day and find a baby brother in the house was a great shock.
We were what I suppose were, and sometimes still are, called a middle class family. Therefore the facts of life were hidden from us to a large extent.
Also, I had no relatives directly involved in the war. My father was a teacher in a grammar school. At the beginning of the war he was in a reserved occupation and not allowed to go. When he could, he was considered too old. However he did his bit by running the school Air Cadet Force and becoming an Air Raid Warden.
What that meant I had no idea.
We lived on a hill in a semi-detached house. It was right on the edge of Newport. The estate was so new that just below our house the top surface of the road ceased and when we left in 1946 it still had no tarmac.
Our road was supposed to join up with another across the brook that ran along a field below the front of our house. There should have been houses in that field but the war stopped any building. Before the war we played in that field and in other around for there was only farmland around us. We could have been in the depths of the country. The war changed all that.

This poem/story was donated to the People’s War website by Anne Bailey, of the Leam Writers. If you would like to find out more about Leam Writers call 0845 900 5 300.

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