大象传媒

In 1940 I was 15. I worked at a small engineering firm on Ayre Street. Thursday was pay day and our usual practice was to go to a cinema called the Tivali on Union Street.
It was the usual practice at the cinema to alert the audience to air raids and there were different levels fom 'not imminent' to 'Red (dangerous)' alert, this told us that bomber raids were on their way to Sheffield.
On Thursday 13 December 1940 we were in the cinema as usual and the Red Alert was announced. On previous occasions we had stayed in the cinema but this time we moved quickly out of the building. We all made our way in different directions home.
The Tivali was on Union Street (2 or 3 hundred yards from where I worked)I made my way as best I can remeber through town to Broad Street All the time hearing the bombers, the drone of the bomber's engines will always stay with me - I could tell they were heavily loaded. Then I heard explosions but I felt safe due to the distance they were exploding at.
At the north of Broad Street on my left there was the railway and goods yards where I sensed the bombs were dropping - and there was no let-up - they were dropping consistently. I could also hear anti-aircraft guns by now. This continued down Cricket Inn Road and Maltravis Road by which time the bombs were nearer to me. By Whites Lane I could hear the bombs whisling as they came down! And they were coming down in massive numbers and quickly.
I realised this was too dangerous to continue, I needed to find cover. At this point (Just past Whites Lane) there was a block of houses in the middle of which there was an arched entrance to the rear and I decided to take cover there. I could hear the activity of the occupents of the houses in relation to their Anderson shelters and eventualy someone asked me to come to the shelter with them. The two families I joined were the Knights and Vickers.
What I found fascinating was that at the time, Mrs Vickers was baking bread and even though the family protested she insisted on seeing to it while all the time we could hear the bombing and ant-aircraft guns. The guns were on Manor Lane, quite close to us (near Piggy Weldon's farm), of course this area was all fields then.
I made my way down Maltravis Road passing smouldering bombed out house at the top of Maltravis Place and Maltravis Way on to where I lived, just before Cricket Inn Crescent.
I lived with my parents, six brothers and two sisters. We were all returning home from our places of work (different directions) so there was some delay before we could eat. By now the All Clear had sounded and it was 4am! When we were all ready we got the food out of the oven and it was covered in soot, but we were relieved to find that we were all there especialy since some of us worked in the steel mills which had been the bomber's target.
We went to bed and I shared the bed with my brother. We were asleep when there was an explosions and the ceiling came in on top of us - plaster, laths the lot! We were looking at the sky! It was a delayed action bomb which had landed only about 50 yards away. It had blown a massive crater which came within feet of a neighbour's Anderson shelter in their front garden. The delayed action bomb told me that, contrary to what Hitler had said, he WAS targeting civilians.
Next morning I found that my place of work had been destroyed, so we couldn't go to work. We found ourselves in the Wicker when a farmer from Boston (Lincolnshire) was delivering potatoes and we helped him unload. He couldn't get out of Sheffield fast enough!
From the Wicker we moved on to Fitzallen Square and all the way there were damaged vehicles - trams and buses broken in half. Standing at the top of Commercial Street we could see that all the roads were covered in wreckage from the bombing and were completely impassable. We made our way as best we could to the Tivali and when we got there all we could see was the stage! Nearby was the Sheffield Empire where Henry Hall had been appearing and that had been damaged as well.
Back to our house, it was wrecked so now we had to find somewhere to live. The local council had arranged for us to live at Bachelor's pea factory and they accommodated us in their canteen which was underground. When we got to the pea factory I knew a lot of people from the district where I lived.
Later we were moved to Firth Park Red Cap school on Barnsley Road. I could tell from the families we were living with where the bombs had dropped and how much damage had been done.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.