大象传媒

I was nine years old. The second world war had started about a year ago. This had had little affect on me, all I knew, was that a clown like individual calld Adolf Hitler, had been foolish enough to declare war o Great Britain. My parents had hidden the fact that we had taken a terrible hammering in France, and said nothing about the ensuing retreat from Dunkirk, in an attempt to shield us from the horrors of the war. We passed our days complaining about the shortage of sweets, and having to carry our gas masks everywhere. Frequent practice air raid alarms, would interrupted our schooling, when all the children would goose step across the playground, pulling their hair over one eye, and putting a finger along the top lip, in a defiant ridicule of the fuehrer. Then herded into the shelter, we would sit, sometimes in the dark, giggling and shivering. The realities of these exercises were soon to come true. It was on the second night of the Sheffield blitz, that this diversion in my life took place. We had rushed into the shelter at the very first wailing of the sirens, for the previous Thursday, Sheffield had taken a pounding from Hitler鈥檚 Luftwaffer, so on this very cold, clear frosty night, we knew exactly what to expect. Three days previously, seven o'clock in the evening of Thursday the 12th, December 1940, three waves of German planes, Dorniers, Junkers, and Heinkels spilled their loads of high explosives and incendiary bombs across the city. The fire bombs came first. It was said at the time, to light up the town to guide further waves of planes to the target. Others, more knowledgeable, knew that high explosives landing on burning buildings spread the devastation even more, by throwing flaming debris to nearby buildings, and spreading the fires even more. Six hundred high explosives, several pairs of land mines, and thousands of incendiary bombs fell within a three hour period. The city centre seemed to be the main target. The Moor, Sheffield鈥檚 main shopping area, lay flattened. All the departmental stores, except for Cole Brothers, were either gutted by fire, or flattened by the explosions. It was this knowledge that made us hasten to the shelter, mum clutching what she called her survival kit. This ranged from woolly car rugs, and blankets, right down to biscuits and sandwiches and the insurance policies. Yet without fail, once settled in the shelter, she would remember something else she needed, of vital importance. Most homes had been issued with an Anderson air raid shelter. Designed to withstand all bomb attacks except a direct hit, there were instances when entire buildings had collapsed on them, and still they had protected the occupants from injury. But there was one thing they had not been designed for, comfort. They were always cold and damp, and ours was no exception. Father had bought a "Valour" paraffin stove, in an attempt to try to combat these problems. In doing so, he had created an even bigger one. It gave off the most horrible acrid fumes. We had to keep opening the shelter door in an effort to breath. Because of the restrictions on showing lights in the blackout, every time we opened the door we had to blow out the candles. On top of all this, we would get even colder with the door open. It was everybody鈥檚 opinion, these problems made the heater a complete waste of time. All of us had plenty to say about it, especially Mum, but it was father's baby, so we had to bear with it. The bombs that night, fell much closer. Several explosions moved the shelter, yet I never remember feeling frightened. Mum and Dad had done such a good job in boosting the Anderson and assuring us of its ability to withstand all explosions, that I鈥檓 sure we thought we were immortal. It was in one of the lights out door open sessions that we heard the voices. The door was quickly hauled up. We sat in the dark, Dad hanging on to the rope to make sure no one could get in. All of us wondering who could possible be in our garden in the middle of an air raid?. As our eyes became accustomed to the darkened shelter, we looked at each other for explanations as the voices came closer. Now I was frightened. "have a look outside Syd". "I'm not putting my bloody head out there" Dad replied to my Mum. It was one of the very few times I had heard my father swear. We sat, tense, trying to listen between the cracks of the
anti aircraft guns and the thud of the falling bombs. Minutes passed, and then in one of the quiet moments, there was a pounding on the door. Dad took a firmer grip on the rope. Then in a broad Yorkshire voice, somebody shouted, "Is anybody in there". A sigh of relief went round our family, I'm sure we had all been convinced the Germans had arrived by parachute. My Dad, still not opening the door, shouted back, "What鈥檚 the matter". The voice outside shouting above the noise of the bombs, replied, "you'll have to come out, there's an unexploded bomb close by. Dad let go of the rope, the door went down, and we rushed out. I don鈥檛 know who was first on the lawn. The door was only two feet wide, but the next thing I remember, all five of us were outside, staring over the hedge, and into next doors garden. We learned later that it was a land mine that had caught up in overhead wires as it had landed and had it gone off, the Anderson, the house, and most of the road would have gone with it. Land mines were huge bombs that always dropped by parachute, and in pairs. They floated slowly to earth, and consequently exploded as they lay on the surface of the ground. This gave them a much greater blast and shock wave. The conventional bomb absorbs much of its energy moving hundreds of tons of earth creating a crater rather than flattening buildings. Although devastating when they exploded, they were a great risk to the German pilots. With one fastened to each wing of a plane, it was imperative that they release exactly together, or otherwise the immense weight of a bomb on one side would unbalance the plane bringing it out of control, and crashing to the ground. One of the pair of land mines fell and exploded in Vicars Road about two miles away, destroying half the street. Its twin drifted down, floating into telephone wires toppling sideways, and gently landed tail first in an allotment. 鈥漄uick, hurry up鈥�, the Air Raid Wardens voice sounded quite frantic, and his urgency had us running after him in the direction of a communal shelter, under one of the shops in Stubbin Lane. The rest of the raid was spent in this smelly, strengthened cellar underneath our local grocers. Fifty or so white faced people, all with big heavy coats, covering pyjamas or night dresses, singing tunes like, 鈥淩un rabbit, run rabbit, run, run, run,鈥� or 鈥� We will hang out our washing on the Ziegfrede line鈥�, These jingoistic songs were repeated over and over again, well into the night. They were sung with defiance as if the enemy could hear, and we all wanted Hitler to know that we would never give in whatever he did. At last the all clear wailed, and we climbed out of the cellar and into an orange tinted, frosty night. Huddling together, peering into the mist and smoke, we waited, until my Father along, with the help of the A.R.P warden, to fetch the car from our garage at the side of the house. We thought he was very brave, going anywhere near that unexploded bomb, and it was certainly not a job to linger on, but Dad was a long time. The whole area had been cordoned off by soldiers, and as they were about to start disarming the bomb, the Army had tried to stop Dad from going near the area, but he eventually arrived with the car, and we all piled in. It was a very slow drive through the debris littered streets. He drove with no headlights the red glow from the many city fires gave adequate light, but the once familiar roads were now barely recognisable. Occasionally, where the smoke was particularly thick, Dad would have to drive with his head out of the window. Sparks floating in our path, and occasionally, flickering yellow flames could be seen through the gloom, completing the picture of devastation. It had been a bright frosty night before the raid, a full moon had lit the city, but none of this light managed to penetrate through the smoke and settling ash. The only illumination came from the burning buildings as the orange glow bounced off the dust laden atmosphere and back down to the devastation below . There was glass, slates, rubble, bricks, and branches everywhere. Filtering through the gloom, yellow flames would suddenly burst into life, and it was impossible to get away from the pungent smell of fire and explosives. 鈥淲here are we going? 鈥� Mum enquired, 鈥滱way from this lot鈥�, was all Dad would say. I don鈥檛 think he had any idea where he was going. I think he just needed time to think and get away from this devastation. As we reached the northern outskirts of Sheffield, the antiaircraft guns started their barrage again, and once more bombs began to fall. The all clear had sounded earlier, but this was a second wave of bombers.
At the outset of the war, car headlights, had been masked, and only the smallest slit of light was allowed, but with the lights of the Austin completely turned off, and now no glow from the fires to help us pick our way, we headed for the moors travelling in nearly total darkness. When asked why we had no lights, Father told us he did not want to show our position to any trigger happy German machine gunner. Looking back it was a crazy thought, but this was how irrational we all were after the ordeal we had just gone through. It seemed we travelled for hours, then an old stone building appeared out of the mist, By this time it was beginning to come light and with Sheffield left well behind Dad risked switching on the car lights. All it showed was a . A lonely isolated place high up on the moors, and Dad was sure we were on the road between Sheffield and Manchester. At the side of this old house, which was in complete darkness, was a lean to building with a corrugated sheet roof. The building had no doors and had probably been designed to tether horses out of the wind. A more foreboding place would have been hard to imagine, but on that night we saw it as a haven, a place we would be safe. Dad drove under the lean to, and turned the engine off. Snuggling up in the blankets from Mums survival kit, we looked back towards Sheffield, watching the flash of an occasional explosion, and the sparkling stars of the antiaircraft shells still showering the russet sky.

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