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This is Beryl Moore’s (nee Mabbutt) story as told to Kathleen Pounder. The author is aware of the implications and conditions of adding her story to the ´óÏó´«Ã½ website.

I was eleven when that siren went, we’d just finished two weeks holiday in Ramsgate. We were listening to the Prime Minister on the radio and then at the end of the speech the siren went, the last word was barely out of his mouth when the siren sounded.

Everybody from the guest house went down to the railway Undercliffe, just where they’re building the new houses now. That was the only place we knew about so it was pretty full. It was a gobstopping sound – it made you freeze for a few seconds and then you ran to the nearest shelter.

That same day we went home on the Grey Green Coaches to Leyton East London, and from there we were by my older brother Bill. As we pulled into the station we wondered what on earth he had on his arm as we got closer we realised that they were gas masks one each for me, your two younger brothers, and parents. No cases just the gas masks hanging from his arm! After that we never went anywhere without it!

I was evacuated on the 16th September, my mum’s birthday, to Bedford, Kimbolton Road for one year and then I had a second billet after still in Bedford, but I can’t remember that road but we had a lovely time there. Betty Stevens and I were both at the second billet, which was a lot more fun, we stayed with a widow and her son and daughter. One day she sent us up to the attic to empty the trunk to play with all the old dressing up clothes. The widow also had two lodgers, one was called Rinso, I can’t for the life of me remember why! We all got well especially at breakfast when all the different jams and marmalades came out on the tray, everybody chose their own and it had to last a month, so we learnt to be very sparing we soon learnt to choose the jelly ones which spread further!

Sweets were in short supply but I remember the Victory V lozenges or jellies, oh they blew your head off.

While I was evacuated we only went for half days, we shared the school with Bedford High School and the Secondary Modern.

I went home to Woodford Green during the school holidays and I remember going back to Bedford once on the train when it was packed and I to stand out in the corridor. I must have looked as scared as I felt, a soldier smiled at me and made me sit on my upturned case, he sat next to me and then showed me his photographs of his family, he had two children and he was a lovely man. He looked after me for the rest of that journey.

At the end of the two years I came back home and carried on my schooling at Woodford County High School.

When I left school I joined the Inland Revenue the day after I was 16 in Woodford Green. I was a clerical assistant and enjoyed it. My desk was beside the French windows and the wooden shutters didn’t cut out the fanlight, I often sat under my desk watching the doodlebugs pass by. We had a lot of fun then, it was the only time we were allowed to talk at work!

I was with several other girls all about the same age and we kept each other informed about boyfriends and general chitchat and the other older women told us about their families.

My mother was working at Aquascutams in Walthamstow and then they needed a part time clerical in my office, I was asked if I knew anybody and asked my mum, she jumped at it, it saved her the travelling and was easier all round.

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