大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Susan Hahn of Darlington Borough Council on behalf of Edith Robertshaw and has been added to the site
大象传媒 WW2 People,s War with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

I was born in Spennymoor, Co Durham in 1934, at the start of the war my family lived in nearby Ferryhill.
My Dad and Grandad were both miners,my Grandad was allowed to work until he was 70 because of the war. My Dad was also a ARP warden.
Bevan Boys came to work in the mine during the war, they were conscipted into the mines instead of the armed forces, some of them did not like it. My dad enjoyed talking to them because some of them had been to University and they had read a lot of books that he loved.
When Grandad was on nightshift Grandma came to stay with us. We did not use the communal air raid shelter, instead we would all shelter under the table.If we had an air raid during the night we did not go to school the next day until 10 o'clock. At school we had air raid drill. We didn't ever have any real air raids during school time, so we didn't get chance to eat the delicious looking lollipops the teacher had in a big jar in her special air raid cupboard.
The only evacuees we had in the village were children who came to live with their Grandparents. The children I knew came from Coventry after it was bombed. After the war they went back home.
My Auntie lived at Billingham,when we stayed there we went to Seaton Carew. We saw the soldiers guarding the beach it was covered with rolls of barbed wire,so we could not go on the beach, but just look out to sea. We also visited Sunderland and saw the Barrage Balloons in the sky. These were a hazard for the enemy aeroplanes.
My Uncle George was a navigator in the RAF,he was killed in an air crash in December 1944.
At the end of the war the colliery provided wood for a spectacular pyramid shape bonfire, which we watched being built. It was even more spectacular when it was lit.We also had a big celebration in the market square where all the school children sang all the local folk songs including the Blaydon Races.

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