大象传媒

Roger "Brian" Willett who lives in Ipswich records his memories of the War
when he was a boy living on a farm in Debenham.

"I was an Ipswich School boy and one day in 1942 I was on my way in by bus
when we reached the outskirts of Framsden. Suddenly a German Messchersmidt
109 dived down and started machine gunning the bus. Bullets tore the roof
and through the centre of the bus but amazingly no one was hurt. The bus was
a write-off so we waited for another bus and got into town quite late. I
walked into the classroom and was met by the stern voice of the master:
'Where have you been, boy". I replied: "Our bus was machine gunned by a
German fighter, sir." He was not at all impressed and told me to sit down
and get on with my work.

"On Cherry Tree Farm we were fairly close to a USAAF base and one day I saw
some Flying Fortresses returning from a raid on the Ploesti oil fields. They
were running out of fuel and one crash landed in a field behind the farm. I
ran over and was the first one there. I saw a flying boot on the grass and
picked it up. To my horror there was a severed foot inside it. I was sick
and started crying. Then a group of Americans from the base turned up in
Jeeps and took care of me, taking me home to my mother.

"Another day, my mother and I were watching hundreds of planes circling in
the sky on their way to Arnhem in 1944. My mother started to weep. I asked
her why she was crying. She told me: 'I am crying for the ones who won't
come back.'"

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