大象传媒

At the time of the November blitz I was 11 and my brother Bryan was 8 years old. We lived with our parents about half a mile from the city centre.

My father had a grocery shop in a circle of shops with boots, the chemists next door and adjacent to that the local sweetshop. My pocket money at that time was one and a half pence (if i had tidied my bedroom) and my brother had one penny. On Saturday mornings we would visit the sweetshop and buy a handful of sweets, all the time eyeing the walnut whips in the window, which we could not afford.

On that November night mother took four children further out of the city to sleep at a friends house. Father had to stay on duty as he was an air raid warden.
During that night a landmine fell into the centre of the shops blowing holes right through them and depositing all the goods in their windows out onto the pavement. Father was blown down into the air raid shelter in the blast and our pet dog, asleep in the outside brick built toilet, was killed when the roof fell in on her.

Father tried to send a message to mother not to bring the children back but it did not get through and we arrived the next morning to find the most amazing sight, smoke and flames still going, a smell of gas and bricks and glass everywhere. Mother dashed off to find father and my brother and I wandered around outside looking at the devastation. Just around the corner we found the contents of the sweetshop on the pavement and in the gutter. The coveted walnut whips were there for all to see and we unashamedly filled our pockets. Everybody was too busy to notice us happily looting. We were more than happy until told that the dog was dead!

My brother and i were evacuated with our respective schools the next day but we did get our walnut whips thanks to the Luftwaffe!

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