大象传媒

This story has been written onto the 大象传媒 People's War site by CSV Storygatherer Alison Lear on behalf of Margaret Boyd. The story has been added to the site with her permission. And Margaret Boyd fully understands the terms and conditions of the site.

I was 7 years old when war broke out. My dad worked in the local torpedo factory and my mother looked after their four children (although she helped to deliver neighbours' babies). My baby sister was born later, in 1941.

As well as his day job my dad was an ARP Warden throughout the war.

My earliest recollection was our first wireless which we used to hear how the war was progressing. I remember my dad wanting to listen to Lord Haw Haw to get an idea of what the Germans were doing.

Greenock is a shipyard area on the River Clyde and there was also a large number of tenement buildings near the riverbank which were vulnerable to bombing. We lived in the tenements and so in the first year of the war we were evacuated to Bridge of Weir.
We were only there about three months when my mother dicovered she was pregnant and we returned to be with my dad in Greenock.

Nearly every night of the bombings we had to go into the dungeons (we had no air raid shelter). We had to make sure we had our gas masks with us and my baby sister who was born at home at this time had to have a special mask covering her completely.

During the height of the blitz in 1941 Greenock was bombed continuously. My future husband's brother, aged 13, was seriously hurt in one raid which destroyed his home amongst many other tenements in Bellvile street. Many were killed and injured and he was taken to the Royal Infirmary. He was still alive in intensive care but a building opposite the hospital was bombed and a wooden beam smashed through the window of his hospital room and killed him! What a freaky and tragic accident!

Nearly 300 people died in the Blitz and all their names are on a monument in Greenock cemetary as a memorial to the casualties.

One day when I was at school we heard a tremendous explosion towards the tail of the bank. A French ship called the Maill'e Brieze had hit a landmine in the Clyde and exploded killing hundreds on board. No one survived.
The teacher told us to go home where we discovered lots of tenement windows were blown out.
A memorial of a French cross ( cross of Lorraine) is situated on the Lyle Hill overlooking the site of the blown up ship.
The ship had three crosses which were visible from above the water for years after the war and was a well known landmark until it eventually sank out of trace.

I remember VE day and all the street parties and the jubilation we all felt. This was tinged with sadness when we heard about the atomic bombs. There was also some persecution of Italians who lived in the town. Their shops were vandalised and they were running for fear of their lives. This was not a good side to the end of the war.

This was meant to be the war to end all wars but it has proved not to be so.

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