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I was 7 years old at the outbreak of war in September 1939 and was evacuated to Reading to stay with an Aunt as we lived in Welling, north Kent, an area at risk of bombing,. The first few months of the war were very quiet while the German Army was advancing towards Dunkirk, ‘the Phoney War’, so I was brought home and resumed school in the district.

My Father, answering the call, ‘Dig for Victory’, had an allotment on the recreation ground at Falconwood, alongside the railway station on raised ground where he grew a variety of vegetables. All around were Barrage Balloons to prevent enemy aircraft swooping over low and, of course, there was a ‘Black Out’ at night but otherwise no indication that there was a war on.

On 15th September 1940 I was assisting him on the allotment. It was a beautiful hot cloudless day and you could see for miles south east towards the Medway towns. Suddenly, in the distance we could hear the continuous rumble of anti-aircraft guns which got closer and closer. Then, as we were packing up to cycle home to safety, in the clear sky we saw a very large formation of German bombers. The droning sound was mixed with the gunfire as they appeared to follow the path of the River Thames towards London and the Docks, a few miles to the north. Screaming in and out of the formation were fighter aircraft, probably Spitfires or Hurricanes, with white puffs of gun shells bursting all around them in the sky. We saw two of the bombers on fire falling out of the formation towards the ground, - a grandstand view of part of the most decisive day in the Battle of Britain, in which 175 enemy aircraft were destroyed and we lost only 25.

After that raids came regularly, changing to night time as the German losses mounted during daylight. In the mornings I would join the other children collecting shrapnel (jagged metal pieces of shells) from the streets to add to our collection. On 18th October 1940, 14, Darwin Road, Welling, where we lived, suffered a direct hit by a high explosive bomb, one of a stick of three along the road. Fortunately we were sleeping in a brick air raid shelter completed only a week before and still smelling of damp and new cement. Once dug out by the Salvage Corps we were safe but other neighbours hiding under the stairs or just in bed were not so lucky. Needless to say, I was immediately taken back to Reading where I stayed until after the main blitz had ended and my parents had moved to Harrow which was not in the main firing line.

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