大象传媒

'This story was submitted to the People's War site by Jenny Ford on behalf of Mrs. Jozefina Eastham nee Vedts and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.'

I was born on November 14th 1926 and was 13 when war broke out. I lived in Belgium from birth until 1946 in a small village, Haacht, in the Province of Brabant.
In the early years of the war (1939/40) the family became refugees to escape the incoming German Army of Occupation. The family consisted of, our parents, seven out of ten children; the three older boys were away in the armed forces. I was the youngest of the children, the eldest brother being born in 1908 and my mother's husband dying of some illness during her confinement. Unusually for those times, she soon had another suitor and she re-married shortly thereafter. Another son soon followed who sadly did not survive.
Meanwhile, father took to running the family farm, not large by modern standards, but sufficient to feed his family, which between 1913-26 consisted of another two sons and seven daughters. By the time we took to the road to evade the Germans, several of my older siblings had married and had started families of their own, so we made a group of travellers. Along the road we travelled by horse and cart (that my father had made) sleeping on and under it for shelter. A couple of my sisters rode their cycles alongside the cart to leave room for the little ones to ride. We bought our food along the way from various farms, usually this was a bowl of nettle soup or a hunk of very grey, stringy bread (not very nice). By the time we were close to the French/Belgium border my father realised that the occupation was already well and truly entrenched in France. Realising that our plight would be no better, he decided that we should if possible return to our home and so we did.
Upon our return, we were lucky to find the house still intact, although someone had rifled through the hayloft finding all the various pieces of my brother's bicycle that my father had carefully taken apart and hidden there, so much for neighbourhood loyalty!
Life continued along very strange terms dictated by the Nazi Regime. In that they came and measured our land that we farmed, told us what crops we would, not should reap and how much, if any of that crop we were allowed to keep for ourselves. They counted our chickens and again told us how many eggs we had to supply them with. As you can imagine we often had shortfalls from their estimation, in these circumstances my father had to make up the difference from the 'Black Market'. That in itself was a dangerous thing to do. We always used to keep two pigs, one to fatten up whilst the other was butchered and any excess to our own needs, sold. My memory is that we managed to hide one so we were still able to use that one for our own needs. The family cow kept both the Regime and us in order with the quota of milk, etc. Many an evening was spent rocking the butter churn by the stove, although I can't remember keeping much of the butter, the remaining buttermilk was very much welcomed by us youngsters.
Having left school at about 14 my parents allowed me to go to day school in Brussels to train as a seamstress, in those early days of occupation this was no mean feat. I was required to have a special travel permit, else I could be arrested and sent to work for the Germans. My daily journey was over 15 miles by tram, passing the main Airport along the way. On many a journey we had to stop and take shelter in the ditch by the side of the road to avoid being hit by the bombs that were aimed at the airport. I remember one occasion lifting my head off the ground, only to be pushed back down by a fellow passenger telling me not to look up, as I would lose my head to shrapnel. Sometimes the Germans would stop and search the trams, taking off several people and marching them away, you never knew whose turn it would be next. At another time the Germans would not let the tram leave Brussels, then I had to go and stay with one of my sisters who at that time lived in the city, but of course there was no way of letting my parents know that I was safe. A very worrying time for them. The other regular occurrence was, on all public transport, especially trains and trams, the Germans, Officers in particular, reserved a "first class area" for themselves, so obviously the rest of the carriage was very crowded, you had to be careful not to attract attention to yourself, particularly as a girl travelling alone. It was easy to find yourself being propositioned and was very difficult and dangerous to refuse their unwanted attentions. One time I was in such a position, but fortunately a young man from my village saw my predicament and came to my aid, making out that he had been to find me a seat in another area of the train. It is not surprising that my parents asked me to give up my training and stay to help out on the farm.
The family farm, as I call it, was not remote like many, more of a farmhouse along a normal village street. Set in quite a large garden, all put to growing vegetables, fruit, etc. My father also part owned/part rented a large field in which he grew the rest of his crops. He was a very clever man, making many of his own tools, including - wheelbarrows, carts (only taking the wheels to the blacksmiths for trimming with metal, although even this he could and did do himself in later years). He also made his own and the family's wooden clogs, for wearing whilst working in the field. Apart from the main house, we had an outhouse that housed two huge coppers with wood burners under, these heated the water for all our washing needs. As these had to be filled by hand from a well in the garden, they were obviously used sparingly. Cold water washes daily and one hot bath (small tin bath behind a screen, usually one straight after the other) once a week, usually on the same day as the main wash was done to save fuel. Attached to this outhouse was also a brick, baking oven, in which my other baked all the bread for the family.
Having such a large family it was difficult to keep track of everyone's whereabouts during the war. One of my brothers was captured quite early in the war and spent most of that time in a Prisoner of War Camp in Germany. Another brother was working on an anti-aircraft gun emplacement and fortunately, being in a hurry for his break, stepped of his stool at the rear of the gun a few seconds earlier than he should, just as he did so the gun back fired and would have killed him if he had been in his proper position instead of shattering his arm, putting him out of action for the duration. One brother-in-;aw had a warrant issued for his arrest and when he did not surrender the Germans came and arrested his parents, threatening to deport them if he not give himself up, of coure he did, he was sent to a P.O.W. Camp, escaped and fortunately remained free for the rest of the war.
The husband of one of my elder sisters was a Harbour Pilot in the Port of Antwerp. This he had done for many years and when the shortages of war started he was in a natural position to obtain "a few extras" as ever one thing led to another and once the round up of local Jews started he progressed into helping them find safe passage on the ships he piloted. This worked very well for some considerable time until he was betrayed to the Gestapo and had to use one of his own escape routes and flee to America, leaving behind his wife and young daughter. Sadly my sister never saw her husband again as she died of cancer shortly after the war ended without managing to follow him. However, after her mother's death, my niece Jose Fernandez joined her father in America and still lives there today.
A school friend of mine, whose finance was in the resistance, was devastated when he was tracked down by the Nazis and shot whilst trying to evade capture. Knowing that even though he was wounded, he would still be tortured to extract any information he had about the resistance movement, he chose to kill himself rather than let that happen. My friend dare not even attend his funeral, as the Nazis were checking up on everyone who was there. They even made the lad's father stamp on his grave declaring that, "his son was a coward and a traitor."
As in England we had our fair share of Buzz Bombs (V1/V11), we kept the dining table permanently placed under the window, so that when the bombs landed nearby breaking the windows, all the children including the very young babies could be sheltered underneath the table. In accordance with government advice my father built a bomb shelter in the garden. It was constructed by digging down into the earth, then forming a shelter to accommodate as many persons as required, then banking it all around with some form of insulation, in our case my father used all the logs he had cut and gathered over the years. I can't actually remember us using this shelter, which is perhaps just as well because many years after the war had ended, when we finally used up all the logs in and around the shelter, there, right in the middle of the pile sat an unexploded bomb!
Towards the end of the occupation we all faced a danger. In their hurry to escape the advancing Allied troops, the Nazis commandeered all possible available transport, this included bicycles, horses and carts not mention any motor vehicle still around. It was imperative to hide any of the above as safely as possible or to lose the lot. We were lucky, others were not so lucky.
The one advantage of this exodus was that the German soldier had to lighten their load to flee as quickly as possible, it's surprising what you could do with a greatcoat, etc. and a needle and thread.
The exodus was inevitably followed by retribution for some of the local villagers, for their collaboration with the Nazis. There were more than a few tarred and feathered heads about on some young girls, I did not kow, nor want to know, what happened to those neighbours who had crept about listening to find out what radio stations were being listened to and whether or not their 'friends and neighbours' were helping the resistance, then reporting back to the Gestapo.
The American soldiers, grateful as we were for our liberation, brought their own problems. Of course we were very pleased to see them but they were naturally a little over eager and slightly aggressive in their approach especially to girls. I remember one occasion when along with two of my sisters, we had cycled to see our brother in the next village. he and his wife now ran a cafe in which there were some Americans having a few beets. When we three left on our bikes to cycle home, they followed us in their jeep, constantly asking us to go out with them, it got quite frightening, so much so that, we cycled up the nearest drive and hid around the back of the house until they had gone before we dared continue our journey home.
The English soldier also came about that time and a Division of R.E.M.E. was stationed in the Bus Depot, about half a mile from my home. One day whilst sitting doing some sewing repairs by the window at home, a young 'Tommy' walked past the window, did a 'double take', then walked on. I later learned that he had told his friend with him that "he was going to marry the girl he had seen working by the window." That was 1945, Frank and I were married in June 1946 and I came to live in England with him. Sadly he is no longer with us, but his memory is.
The main part of the family still lives in and around our home village, now a small market town, quite famous for it's 'Haacht Pilsner Beer' and we have managed to trace and resume contact with my niece who joined her father in America after his escape. Jose Fernandez has recently made a minor name for herself, after painting a beautiful picture in memory of all the fallen of the Twin Towers atrocity, which was auctioned off for that charity and was bought and is displayed in the City Hall of Pell City, Alabama.
There are so many memories that have been lost over the years; it was all such a long time ago. These are just a few that are still clear.

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