大象传媒

September 3rd 1939 鈥� My Dad鈥檚 birthday, and the day World War II started. My earliest memory was when I heard the first air raid siren. I was six years and two months old, and it really frightened me. I remember lying in bed at night and the siren would go off, as most of the action occurred when it was dark. My Mum would call my brother and I to get up and we had to into the cupboard under the stairs or out to the garden and into the corrugated air raid shelter. We could hear the planes overhead and the thundering roar of the anti-aircraft guns that were positioned about a mile away. When we asked our Mum what it was all about, she would tell us it was the Germans wanting to invade our country.

When I was about eight years old and things were getting worse, Mum and Dad took us down to Bournemouth, where it was quieter, away from the air raids, to stay with some friends of my Auntie. Mum and Dad went back to Sheerness. We were able to go school whilst in Bournemouth 鈥� all of the schools on Sheppey had been closed. I remember that the other girl at the house I stayed at came from London 鈥� her name was Doris and she was very kind to me; she gave me a doll and lots of dolls clothes, I was thrilled to bits. I remember having to learn the address of the house I lived in, just in case I got lost. I also remember the lady of the house, her name was Mrs Mason and she had a daughter called Ona and a son called Jack. I cannot recall a Mr Mason, but I am sure he was there. We had been there some weeks or maybe even months, when a bomb dropped not too far away. That was it for Mum and Dad 鈥� they came and took us back to Sheppey, as I missed my sister very much. She was 15 years older than me; she got married on the 1st of September, two days before the war started. My sister Win was a hairdresser. Her best friend鈥檚 father had decorated a bungalow for her and her husband as a wedding present (it was at The Halfway). It was called Sydney House, incidentally, many years later, it became the home of Michael Crawford 鈥� he lived there with his grandmother. Unfortunately owing to the war starting and her husband being called up to do his bit in the army, Win never did live there, as she did not want to be there on her own.

Another memory comes to mind 鈥� the blackout. You had to make sure that no light was showing through windows at night. At first we used thick black paper, but eventually we had black curtains. If any light was seen through your windows, an air raid warden would soon be knocking at your door!

One Saturday afternoon, I was walking to the shops with my Mum when there was an almighty bang, obviously the sound of a bomb dropping. Mum said that we must lie on the ground, at that moment, a lady came out of her house and dragged us indoors. We found out that afterwards that it WAS a bomb and that it had dropped in Maple Street, demolishing two houses, though fortunately nobody was at home at the time.

Another memory I have, this was probably before we went to Bournemouth, was of Dad and I going to Minster on the bus and having a drink at the Prince of Waterloo. It was on a Sunday morning and I had to be in the garden with my lemonade and crisps Dad had bought me 鈥� Dad would bring his pint and sit with me. On the way home, I discovered that I had left my gasmask on the bus going to Minster. I was so upset, Dad could not console me, but we were able to get it back from the lost property department. Gasmasks came in different shapes and sizes; children from about five years of age had the same as adults, smaller children had had what were referred to as 鈥淢ickey Mouse鈥� ones, with a floppy nose, while babies were laid in a ventilator-type thing that encased the whole body.

Food was not plentiful during the war 鈥� everything was rationed. Children under five had green ration books, I had a blue one and adults had buff ones. At the beginning of the month, my brother and I would be able to buy sweets. The shopkeeper would cut coupons from your book; by the middle of the month they had all gone, so there were two weeks without sweets! The war ended when I was twelve, but food was still rationed for a long time afterwards. Despite this, at least the air raids had finished 鈥� thank God. My sister鈥檚 husband came home from the war, along with the fathers of my friends. There were lots of street parties; it was as though a big black cloud had been lifted. And of course, it had.

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