大象传媒

This story has been written onto the 大象传媒 People's War site by CSV Storygatherer Callington U3A on behalf of Bethany Farr -aged 10 years - and Michael Farr. They fully understand the terms and conditions of the site.

Michael Farr was born on November 18th 1938, in a small hospital, in Bristol, about a year before the war was declared. His parents were called Elsie and Grahame Farr. Elsie, worked as a governess, for a rich family. Grahame, worked for a printing firm, but when war was declared he volunteered to join the army, so he was away for six years, starting on the third of September 1939, when Michael was only one
year old.

At the start of the war it was possible to buy ice cream. A man had a box in front of his tricycle and sold Walls ices - but he had only a few each day and people queued a long time for them. During the heavy bombing it was not possible to buy ice cream.

Elsie and Michael lived in a house, in Horseshoe drive, halfway between Bristol and the docks at Avonmouth. A lot of lorries, guns and ammunition, going with soldiers abroad, went along the road outside his house and the railway line beyond it.

Michael and his mother had a steel shelter in the dining room. It was about 2 metres long and 1 metre wide and high. The sides were made of wire mesh and they slept on the floor in this , it was like being an animal in a cage at the zoo.

All the neighbours had air raid shelters in their gardens. Some people built big shelters of brick with thick concrete roofs. Others were made of corrugated iron and dug into the ground.

When people knew German planes were approaching they sounded an air raid siren and everyone was supposed to go into their shelter. If you were outside and away from home there were public shelters by the roadside.

About eight bombs landed nearby, but only one exploded, which broke the windows and doors and shifted the chimney pots of the house but, luckily nobody was injured.

There were no new toys but shops took in unwanted toys and sold them. If you saw a toy you wanted in the window when the shop was closed you got up early to be first in the queue when the shop opened. Michael got his first train set this way and conductor's outfit.

You couldn't even get teddy bears in the toy shops but his next door neighbour promised to knit one for him. You could only get wool with clothing coupons so she found an old pullover, which she unpicked and rolled the wool into a ball to knit the teddy - which Michael took with him everywhere.

Every Christmas Michael and his mother would go to the Cathedral in Bristol and leave a toy at the big Christmas tree. These were then given to children whose houses had been bombed.

One Christmas towards the end of the war the Dean (the man in charge of the Cathedral) told them that as his father was away with the army he could have a toy that year. Michael chose a red drum!

Michael had a hard first seven years, because although people were very kind it was hard as none of the dads of the other children in their street went to war as they were doing important jobs like piloting ships to Bristol docks.

Early in 1945 Michael's auntie invited Michael and his mother (and Michael's teddy bear) to stay with her in Scotland. They went north on the night train, which stayed for 2 hours in Crewe. No lights were allowed on the trains in case an enemy aircraft saw it so it seemed a very long but very exciting journey.

In Scotland, food was not in such short supply. You could even buy ice creams! He was in Scotland on 8 May 1945 when peace was declared and he was allowed as a special treat to stay up to hear the King's radio broadcast at 8pm, but fell asleep five minutes before it started.

Due to the heavy bombing , from the Germans, Elsie had moved with
Michael, to the country. In 1942 they went to Temple Cloud, a village, on the Bristol to Wells road, where Elsie, had previously worked and they lived in a cottage, with the family she had worked for.

Michael learnt a lot about country life at Temple Cloud. The food was good because as well as rations the country people grew their own vegetables and fruit and had hens for producing eggs and eating. Everybody shared the food.

Food and sweets were rationed - you had only a very little each week and the grocers had to mark off in your ration book, All children were given a bottle of real orange juice (lovely) and a bottle of cod liver oil each week. Michael was very lucky because he was allergic to fish and was allowed to have two bottles of orange juice and Michaels father,kept posting food parcels, which were free except for the cost of the stamps, which he collected.

Michael's father also posted letters, to tell him how life was, in the five contries he visited, which were: Madagascar; Kenya; Burma; and Ceylon, which is now known as Sri Lanka. Grahame Farr returned home in July 1945, to Bristol where his family had returned, at the end of the bombing.

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