大象传媒

I have many vivid Childhood memories of the War. My father home on leave from the Royal Marines was magic: my uncle, a Somme Vetern, sharing his concerns about the possbility of eneny paratroops dropping in the vacinity, was not.

During the 1941 bombing raids on Belfast, we sheltered by candlelight under the stairs while my mother's elderly aunt who lived with us read from the family bible. I remember how it felt safe and paradoxically cozy. The evacuees, who came to share our house, an expectant mother and her son, were our friends.

When my cousin's flotilla came into Lough Foyle, he used to visit us, but his size caused a good deal of speculation because of the cramped conditions on a submarine. But then, every child knew about official secrets...

The flood of US troops that seemed to saturate every town, village and the countryside of County Armagh were great for flagging morale. Their syncopated military music awakened a lifelong interest and their relaxed style was the subject of much comparison with our own much more disciplined approach. Long after they left, we learned that they had been preparing for D Day.

I will never forget the stragely silent crowds that gathered to watch the convoys of German prisoners being taken to Gosford. Doubtless the people were reflecting upon the fate of their own friends and relatives who had fallen into enemy hands.

At the end of the war in Europe, VE Day was celebrated with an open air dance at the courthouse with music privided by 'The Red Shadows.'

Eventually, when my father was de-mobilised, he had given twenty-six and a half years to King and Country, having first joined in 1916. Although he had served in the finest battle ships of the British fleet, like my uncle mentioned above, he never really spoke about action; except once I heard him pondering the sensation of shelling an enemy that couldn't be seen and whose presence was only evidenced by incoming fire.

Instead, he preferred to talk about the vast oceans where land was thousands of miles away and where waves dwafed and constantly threatened to overwhelm the ship. It was there that the work and hand of the Almighty could be appreciated.

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