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I was sixteen and on holiday in Bournemouth just before the outbreak of World War 2, and returned because of the bad war news. On arrival at the station in London we were confronted with platforms full of children with cases, gas masks, and labels pinned on their jacket waiting for trains to take them to the country. I went to the country, a farm in Hertfordshire and while I was there war was declared on 3rd September 1939. I didn’t see any of my school pals again and those that went with the school went to Wales. I’ve often wondered about my close friend Janet Stagg. Who lived at 79 North Street Clapham, and even though I went to an old girls’ reunion at the Mary Datchelor in Camberwell, nobody knew her or what had happened to her.

We had a small farm in Hertfordshire so I just stayed there and tried to rear four young calves which my dad bought at St Alban’s market. I used to rise at 5.00 every morning to feed the calves with powdered milk and rainwater. Anyway, we had to return to London as it was quiet and meant less travelling for dad, so I had to leave the calves to the mercy of the farmhand, and when I saw them the next spring they were huge.

My father returning form London one evening at the beginning of the Blitz asked me to come to the top of the lane with him as he had something to show me. And there I saw London burning, a mass of red in the sky, the reflection of London burning.

London seemed very miserable after the country. It was foggy, cold and depressing. I used to go most days searching for coal or coalite so that we could have a fire in the evening. I would also make a tour of the food shops to see what was on offer because food was beginning to become scarce. Traders would display notices outside their shops stating what supplies would be available that day and at what time.

I did find a shed that had coalite and I bought a 28lb bag. The next day I took an old pushchair with me and the man let me have two bags of coalite. But when I returned a few days later he said supplies were running out and I could only have one bag and after that there wouldn’t be any. If we had stayed in the country there wasn’t any shortage of wood lying about, so it was easier to keep warm. In fact we used it to cook on.

Petrol was rationed and my dad had a quota to travel between London and the farm. We did have some excitement there in the country. A German plane crashed in a field about four fields away. I actually saw it come down and heard it exploding. The pilot escaped and walked to the village and gave himself up.

Later I got a job in London at Frederick Newton & Son in the city. I worked at five different venues in the city for that firm in a year because they were continually bombed out. I started at Hamsel Street then on to St Paul’s churchyard, then Aldersgate Street, then near Bow Church, and I can’t remember the last venue. Arriving at work after a night of bombing I would be confronted by a bombsite and notice directing me to new premises. We did very little work because we didn’t always have typewriters, chairs or desks. But they would appear in time and just as we were getting settled so Jerry would bomb it and off we would be to somewhere fresh. Set it up, and then in would come Jerry again and demolish it. The firm were export agents dispatching goods to the world, far and wide, but most of the boats were torpedoed and everything including lives lost. But the firm still pushed on day after day. Typical British.

The London firemen had a most terrible job. They never had a break for days on end. When I saw them after a night of bombing they were black and listless. And I think they must have done a terrific job. Apart from water running out in London, they had to try and syphon it from the Thames to cope with the blazes.

When working in the city, we would look forward to pay day Fridays, and go to Lyons the tea shops and see what was on offer. This particular Friday there was ice cream with chocolate sauce. Unbelievable. We had only just been served with this delicacy when the sirens sounded. My friend jumped up and said we must get to the shelter. But I just couldn’t leave this delight, so I bolted it in three mouthfuls and then we ran for our lives for the shelter. Much to the amusement of the lads working in the packing department who were strolling along to the shelter.

Then I went into the civil service, worked in a vast typing pool and earned twice as much money. I received over £2 a week. I had to type out forms for army supplies of clothing. We called them Boot and Shoe forms. We were often moved around from building to building, starting at Great Westminster House, Horseferry Road, and to Trafalgar Square, St Giles’ Court, and finally returned to Great Westminster House just in time for the Doodlebugs. Sirens would sound during the day but most of us stayed at our desk, but one night a Doodlebug dropped near the building and the blast took out all the windows. Even so we had to carry on working wearing our coats and gloves and an extra jumper which we put on our legs through the sleeves, tucked it inside our skirt, because there was no heating.

When bombing got too bad we would return to the country and travel to work each day. Trains were a target for the bombers. Trains would stop outside the station, turn out the lights, so we were sitting in the dark in the train, listening to the bombers droning overhead, watching the searchlights and ack ack fire, then someone would pull down the blinds to blot it out. And the train would only pull out when things quietened down. This happened night after night.

We were back in London. I was on fire guard duty the first night of the Doodlebugs (V1). My father had heard that new type of pilotless aircraft was being used and warned us to be very careful. Our party leader, Mr Gelmimi, a Swiss, told us to stand outside the building and watch for these planes, then when the engine stopped dive for cover. So I actually saw a V1 the first night. It looked like a small plane with fire coming out of the rear.

We didn’t have a shelter in the London house, but we had wooden shutters at all windows. Which we used to close during a raid and the kitchen was semi-basement so we would stay in the kitchen during the raid against the party wall and one night the bombs were very close. One dropped at Denmark Hill Station, the second, the corner of our road, and the third at Camberwell Green. Someone said they were land mines. Anyway, that night I watched my mother’s chair leave the floor and then come down again. I thought I was seeing things. It was caused by the blast from the bomb.

After that we went back to the farm, which was having a hard time. Our tractors were obsolete, and ten tractors were allocated to each county, and as ours were obsolete we applied for one of these tractors, but my father wasn’t in the Farmer’s Union being a Londoner, so we couldn’t get one. The old tractors had to be used and the amount of extra land to be cultivated as laid down by the government inspector became an impossibility. The tractors kept breaking down so the horses had to be brought into use, which was much slower. Consequently we were behind with the ploughing and we fell foul of what was required by the government and were turned out of the farm and a tenant put in. Our one and only neighbour, Dr Vilvander, lived half way down our seven furlong lane which led to the Watling Street. And he said we should make a stand and barricade ourselves in and he would join us with his gun, but my father just walked away.

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