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This story was submitted to the People's War site by Richard Gorton (´óÏó´«Ã½ Guide) on behalf of Douglas High and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

A Time to Remember — By Douglas High

On the night of July 11th 1941 there was a two-hour raid in which we were among those who were bombed out. I shall never forget it for as long as I live, I honestly thought that our time had come. Our house was at the corner of a terrace; down the side of the house we had a small strip of garden where our bomb shelter was built.

My father and I had built a set of bunks as well as painting the walls and carpeting the floors, my father also fitted a strong door. We had a small oil stove and the means to make a pot of tea if needed: you could say we were very comfortable!

That night in particular we had just settled down for the night when, just after midnight the warning siren sounded and it wasn’t long before you could hear the drone of the enemy planes, there wasn’t a sound quite like it. The next sound that we heard was so dreadful it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up; it was the swishing sound of a land mine as it floated down on its parachute.

My father suddenly came crashing through the door, before he could close the door the mine exploded. I must have blacked out for a couple of seconds, the next thing I knew was my father shouting to us to see if we were all right. My father was on the floor with the door on him, the force of the blast had caused the door to come completely off which forced him to the ground. Fortunately, he was all right apart from a few cuts and bruises. We emerged from the shelter covered in the choking concrete dust; it’s a good job we all had a good sense of humour as we all had a bit of a laugh afterwards at the sight of ourselves.

After the initial shock we suddenly realised that we had emerged to the sight of utter destruction, houses across and down the street were flattened. We could hear the voices of people across the street crying for help, my father and I went to see what we could do. A young couple had taken shelter under the stairs and were trapped near a fractured gas pipe. We could actually see them, but by the time the rescue party had reached them they had already died. The problem of moving the debris too quickly may have caused a spark; this would have resulted in more people dying. Ten people were killed in our street alone; we were the lucky ones!

During 1942 I volunteered for the Navy, only to be told that I was too young and that I should try again in a year’s time. I did exactly that and embarked on an adventure that was to take me half way round the world.

The Black Prince was the fourth in Naval History of that name, a modified dido class cruiser of 6010 tons and built by Harland and Wolff of Belfast. She mounted eight 5¼ inch guns in four twin turrets, six 21 inch torpedo tubes in two groups of three on either side of the waist, also various other smaller calibre armourments.

During the Normandy invasion in 1944, Black Prince was the nearest ship in the Allied line to the enemy coast, and was anchored some six miles from St. Vaast La Hogue, the spot where the original Black Prince himself landed on the 20th June 1346 with his father King Edward III.

In the nine days before shore troops became well enough established, some 1300 shells were fired at enemy troops, batteries and installations. It was then that the naval forces were allowed to withdraw. The invasion was followed by a period of leave during which time the ship docked at South Shields and was made ready for Foreign Service.

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