大象传媒

"This story was submitted to the site by the 大象传媒's Peoples War Team in the East Midlands with Ann Betts permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions."

On a July evening in 1940 we had a dramatic thunderstorm. I lived in a house overlooking the town of Derby, at the top of Burton Road area. I was 12 years old. There were many barrage balloons hovering over the town to ward off enemy planes. They were supposed to be lowered in the event of a storm, but this night they weren鈥檛. The lightening struck and most of the balloons caught fire. I and my family stood at a bedroom window watching until they all got flopped to the ground. We never found out if they had done any damage.

My father was in a reserved occupation by way of owing a small engineering works, which was commandeered to make steel base plates for shells. After a stray bomb dropped in Jackson Avenue, Littleover, he decided to make a steel cage for our protection at night. This was installed in the dining room. It had a solid top and bottom and had steel mesh sides. The theory was that if the house was bombed and fell down we would be safe inside. When the siren sounded my mother, two sisters and I slept on mattresses inside this cage, whilst father spent his nights at the local ARP post as a warden. I recall it was some time after the war before this monstrosity was dismantled and taken away.

After Dunkirk my mother, who was a member of the red cross, was one of the liaison officers who met wounded troops at Derby Railway station coming to the Derbyshire Royal Infirmary for treatment. Later she visited them to issue comforts such as soap and razors etc. Then she would obtain details of their relatives and contact them re visiting. This involved arranging travel warrants and accommodation in Derby.

We often had to literally knock on doors of houses in the London Road area and beg for beds for distressed wives and mothers.

At the end of the war she received a British Red Cross commendation medal from King George 6th at Buckingham Palace and I and my father were able to accompany her. I do remember receiving a pale blue taffeta dress, which had been a pre war bridesmaids dress, from a grateful soldier鈥檚 wife. I proudly wore it as an evening dress and was the envy of all my friends in the days of utility clothing.

When I was 14 years old I was responsible for my two sisters after school, when my mother was doing her bit. I remember clearly in the winter taking hot coals on a shovel from the kitchen range to the next door sitting room, so that we could have a fire in the grate for the evening. No central heating in those days! Fortunately there were no accidents during this dangerous procedure. Apart from a shortage of sweets I don鈥檛 think we suffered too badly from lack of food, but we did get food parcels sent to us from relatives in Ireland. We also grew vegetables in the garden and our next door neighbours kept hens.

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