大象传媒

This Story is submitted by a volunteer on behalf of Radio Bristol Action Desk at City of Bristol College.

Walter Froud

I was singing in the church choir when I found out War had started. I was worried and frightened because I didn鈥檛 know what was coming or how long it was going to last. At one point it was touch-and-go because the Germans were only twenty miles away from England.
We dug an air raid Anderson Shelter in the garden that was lit by candlelight and about six by six foot wide and slept four of us. The sirens were this terrible noise that went on all night and we had to go to work the next day. I think it鈥檚 hard for the later generations to understand this terrible sound of sirens. Castle Street disappeared over night and we could see the glow five-miles away. It was a terrible glow of things that had gone like the Castle Street shops.

I started work at the age of 14 in 1939 as soon as I left school and I became a carpenter. I was called up in 1943 as a RAF carpenter and arrived in France six days after D-Day. We were on the move all the time from Calne airfield to Antwerp and Eindhoven. At Antwerp docks we would watch the buzz-bomb rockets fly past and be close enough to watch the flames coming out the back. When the flames stopped it meant the rocket would come down, so we would run and hide in the nearby woods. Believe it or not we would often get told-off for leaving our rifles behind. What damage rifles could do against buzz-bombs I do not know! I was billeted to help the Dutch who hadn鈥檛 eaten properly for years and I would take white bread and jam to the schools. I have been back to see these people again.

We heard about the concentration camps through word-of-mouth and we went near one when we were working on an airfield. My Air-Force life was a romp compared to what some went through. I have been back to Germany with the Bristol Unicorns Youth Marching Band and I have no grudges.
In a strange way I don鈥檛 think I could have missed the War, it made you grow up. It made us feel part of something and united, with lots of Geordies looking after me. They even made me the official linesman for their football team! I was offered promotions but I wanted to go home and I got engaged on VE Day and had 56 years of marriage.
I don鈥檛 want my grandchildren to go through what I did but I have no grumbles about the war. Life is too short.

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