大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Doreen Partridge of the 鈥楢ction Desk 鈥� Sheffield鈥� Team on behalf of J. Drezet and has been added to the site with the author鈥檚 permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

Childhood in War Time London

I was born in October 1938 in Paddington; we lived near to Euston Station, which was a very tempting target for the German planes. My parents had a shop and I used to be put outside of the shop in my pram. I had a narrow escape when presumably, on hearing the siren, my mother took me in. Shortly afterwards, a parachute mine demolished the houses opposite and deposited a large amount of rubble just where my pram had been.

My mother and I were evacuated to Neath in South Wales; she was not enthused with Neath and we returned to Thornton Heath near Croydon

My father worked in a factory making wireless equipment and my mother worked part-time at the Acc. and Tab.

I just about remember the V-1 flying bombs. Other local children and I went out looking for shrapnel in the mornings. Apparently German agents captured in London were turned and they relayed to Germany that the V-1s were overshooting Central London, so they had better shorten their range. Initially, they had got it right for Central London, so shortening the range meant more were landing near Thornton Heath and south London.

I recall on one occasion, I was looking up as I was on the way to the air raid shelter in the garden and I saw a V-1 as it passed overhead. The engine had cut out and it crashed in the local school playing field. Fortunately the school was empty. Although I was small, I realised there was a sporting chance with the V-1, in that if you heard the engine, you were ok. If it stopped, it either glided on or it stalled and fell out of the sky and you had a good chance of it falling on you.

I was extremely worried about the V-2, having visions of disappearing without warning whilst eating my porridge. Sensing my concern, my parents sent me to the family of friends in South Wales. My mother took me to Paddington Station and asked the guard to put me off at Newport. When the train left, she realised she still had my ticket!

I was met by the family at Newport and went to Wellington Road in Abersychan near Pontypool. The family were the Bakers; Bill Baker and his wife were called Bronwen. They had a son called Paul who was about the same age as myself. The family was extremely kind and like many others, we kept in touch after the war.

If the wind was in the right direction, I could hear gunfire and thought I had gone from the frying pan into the fire.

At the end of the war we went up to London to see the Victory Parade in Whitehall. There was also a free film show for the children of servicemen. My mother took me along and explained that my father had been in the French Army, carefully omitting that it had been in 1918! I got in.

A neighbour or neighbour鈥檚 son returned from a P.O.W. camp in Germany. He said that when larking about and the horseplay got out of hand in the camp, the guards used to turn the hoses on them to dampen their spirits. Even then I didn鈥檛 think that was too bad.

My Italian brother-in law was in a British P.O.W. camp in North Africa. They used to play cat and mouse with the guards when they searched the camp for smuggled in food. His command of English is limited but he remembers most variants of the F word. To wind up the guards, they would ask, 鈥淐igarette Tommy?鈥� The invariable reply was, "F... off."

Another Italian relative was captured in North Africa. He was taken to Liverpool and then Sheffield where he stayed a bit. He was then transferred to Wrexham. He worked on a farm; he and the farmer suggested to the camp commander that it would be convenient if he stayed on the farm for early morning starts. This suited the farmer, since he would have a baby sitter if he wanted to go out. He seemed to have a fair degree of freedom. He showed me a photograph of him in his P.O.W. uniform, his bicycle and his girlfriend. Only family pressure made him go back to Italy.

Pr-BR

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