大象传媒

I was born on April 1941 in Pontyprydd Wales.
Because she was pregnant with me my mother was evacuated to Wales in order to vacate her away from the East End of London where both my parents were living at the time.
Because of the great distance away from immediate family and freinds she hated being evacuated and was determined to return back to London as soon as I was born.
The very severe bombing on London at that time precluded this and we somehow ended up at a place called Elm Park in Essex almost a stones throw away from the Hornchurch air fighter base, a base which at that time must have been on the list of targets by the German air force. So from a safe haven in Wales we somehow managed to arrive back to a pretty risky enviroment.

One of my earliest memories that has somehow stayed with me right up to the present day was with my mother and myself and our next door neighbor Mrs Smith listening to the sound of "doodle bugs" or flying bombs until their engine stopped and then counting a number of seconds until we heard the " crump" sound. We sat on a bed quilt crouched under our living room table which was surrounded by mesh wire. Although our other neighbor Mrs Little had had an Anderson shelter built in their back garden, which we were always invited to share whenever the warning siren sounded. but my mother wasn't keen on it because the floor was always flooded.

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