大象传媒

by Janet Snell

I was 2 when the war started.We lived in Addlestone in Surrey, which was near the Vickers works in Weybridge and I remember the barrage balloons. One day one caught on fire and we were all taken into the street to look at it.

A few years later - about 1941 I think, we moved to Esher. I remember the doodle bugs as we called them. We had a morrison shelter in the house; a huge iron table with cages between the legs, and at night when we heard the sirens we got up with our pillow and eiderdown and slept underneath the table in the shelter. This was so ingrained in my memory that years later when I heard a siren on a radio programme I got up and grabbed my pillow etc and came downstairs. My dad said "it's alright love, the war is over!"
My mum went into labour with my brother under the morrison shelter in the middle of an air raid.
I remember the German prisoners of war came to mend the street and all the children lined up on the pavement because we thought they would look strange, - have three heads or something - but of course they were just ordinary young men. We were very disappointed! My dad never went away because he was a policeman. I remember having the car up on blocks because we had no petrol. We used to all go and sit in it in the garage.

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