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02/07/1940 5pm.

This was the day when me and my friends Maureen Dalgliesh, Eileen McDougal and Brian McDougal. We had to take the accumulator to be topped up. We lived in Swan Street. We went up two blocks of Stanhope Street, turned to the right into Auison Street. We got the accumulator done and were on our way home when this massive plane appeared in the sky. Well, we were waving like mad and it started firing. The windows in Loughran Library were just shattered. He even fired at MacMorran Fish Shop. Just after that the siren went and a lady in Stone Street opened her door and took us in. We stayed there until the All Clear. When we got in my mam had been looking for us. I told her about the lady who took us in and she was the only mam who went and thanked her. I was only 7 at the time. This bomber went on to bomb Spiller’s Flour Mill on the Quayside. Of course he was after Vicars and the ship yards.

Another time when the siren went, my granny Nellie Barnet was there. We lived in 75 Wan Street. We lived 2 families to a passage and my mam, Rosie Skeen, took me downstairs into Annie Lorraine’s house to shelter under the stairs. This night we heard the drone of the plane. My granny grabbed me just when there was a big bang. My granny said ‘They got us this time my bairn, me bairn. They got us this time’. The bomb dropped at the bottom of Stanhope Street outside the Black Bull pub. This was the street next to us. The noise made the house shake but again he did not get us.

In 1940 I was evacuated to Windemere. We marched down from Snow Street to Central Station with our gas masks over our shoulder and a carrier with changes of clothing. And I had my green siren suit on. When we got to Windemere it was late at night. There was about 10 of us billeted at Mrs Malison’s. There were about 5 single beds in each room. She gave us hot chocolate but myself, Marian Skeet and Jimmy White didn’t like it so she gave us sour milk. She was well named Malicon she real didn’t like us. I was only there one week. There was a lady over the road who had two girls, Mrs Handcock, and she got me transferred. We used to walk two miles to school .When we got there they used to send us over to hers and we spent our time walking around . We never got any schooling . We used to spend our time being moved, really they didn’t want us there but after 6 weeks my mam was ill and a friend brought me home.

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