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Mrs Blackwell understands the site’s Rules and Regulations and has agreed that this story can be entered on the Peoples’ War site.
A FEW MEMORIES OF THE 1939-45 WAR
You could say I was in it from the start!
In August 1939, my husband and I were returning from a holiday, visiting my husband's relatives in Sask - Canada. (they had emigrated there in 1907!). On reaching Montreal at 6.OO pm on August 25 1939, before checking in at an hotel we went to the docks to ascertain the sailing of our ship and were told that the RMS Ausonia on which we were booked to return to England, had sailed the previous week for Southampton to be refitted from a passenger lire to a warship. We were lucky to be welcomed aboard a sister-ship, RMS Asconia and set sail at 8.OO pm that evening. All ht portholes were painted black, and there were strict rules - no smoking above deck after sunset, as we zigzagged our way across the Atlantic.
On the last evening we were chatting to an officer and he said "If I were you, I wouldn't undress for bed and keep your life-belt handy. If war is declared, the U-boats are here waiting to sink us! The next day September, Sept. 2nd, we docked at Southampton and after disembarking went on to Ealing Common, S.W. London, where we were renting a flat and arrived there around 8.OOpm. Our neighbours in the above flat informed us that we were required to have blackout curtains. As it was late in the day we put thick cardboard in our windows as a temporary measure and then went out the shops - they were open until 10.00pm and bought groceries for the weekend and also black curtain material. The following Sunday morning September 3'd 1939 War was declared and three hours later the RMS Athenia - full with American and Canadian citizens, was sunk sailing across to Northern Ireland. There were some survivors but the vast majority were drowned.
My husband, as a teacher at the Acton Technical School, was regarded to be in reserved job and could not join up for service. (He was a Canadian citizen). Most women and children were evacuated but I remained as a voluntary member of the St John's Ambulance service, and also volunteered to provide lunches for some of the teaching staff. One winter's day, while a dog-fight was going on overhead during a raid I decided to go out to buy meat for lunch and with an umbrella over my head for protection - I started down the road. Keeping close to the houses with my eyes on the fight in the sky. Suddenly the umbrella came down heavily on my head with a thud. My first thought was that I had been hit by shrapnel - then I thought "Well, I'm still alive" and cautiously lifted the umbrella and looked. What a relief! It was only a fall of snow from one of the houses.
The year of 1939 was relatively quiet - a phoney war we called it, with air-raid shelters being built for civilian use and everybody going about their usual business carrying boxes with gas masks. No lights at night and torches were masked and people wore something white when travelling at night. However, things changed in 1940 as the City was heavily guarded with barrage balloons and anti-aircraft guns - the bombers found it difficult to penetrate and so the suburbs, especially south west, bore the brunt of the raids. Acton, being an industrial town was heavily bombed during the next two years. The bombers first came very high at night time and so the bombs dropped indiscriminately. We would go out in the morning to find houses destroyed, glass everywhere with rubble and gas and electricity pipes and wires to pick one's way over.
I bought a navy blue siren suit which I wore day and night. We had an Anderson shelter issued to us and my husband dug a deep hole in the garden and put the shelter inside, with earth on top and an entrance door at one side. One night we were awakened from sleep by terrific bangs and vibration - the whole earth shook like an earthquake. When we tried to open the door it was stuck. Four houses which stood about 150 yards away at the bottom of our garden had received a direct hit and the debris had fallen on top of us. We were trapped underground. My husband, brother and our neighbour all pushed and shoved and after great deal of effort managed to move the door enough to let us get out. My husband went to look at his prize marrows and brushing aside dust from the rubble said "Look! They are not even scratched!".
Then we heard shouting coming from the house next to our own and discovered that although the windows and doors were blown off our house, three others in the terrace had their entire back walls torn away b y the blast from the houses that had a direct hit. One of the women was crying and screaming "I haven't got a kitchen!. I haven't got a kitchen!". We were all very sympathetic for her and everyone came into our house for hot drinks. Then the sirens sounded again and it was back to the garden shelter for the rest of the night.
One sunny morning, with an unexpected lull in the air-raids, I was busy hanging out washing in the garden when suddenly, out of the clouds, swooped a German fighter bomber and a shower of incendiary bombs started to drop. I panicked and instead of going into the garden shelter I ran indoors and crouched down between a brick washing copper and a gas stove. A stupid thing to do if the house had been hit there was the danger of being gassed!
This was my lucky day - the bomb s fell on either side of my house and the fires started were soon put out. The bomber disappeared as swiftly and silently as it had come, away up into the
FRANCS BLACKWELL AGED 93

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