大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Deena Campbell from CSV Action Desk on behalf of Elsie Clark and has been added to the site with her permission. Ms Clarke fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

While experiencing the fear, horror and tragedies of the many blitzes on Liverpool, I am going to dwell on the lighter side of my wartime experiences.

I was thirteen when the War started and lived in Waterloo, a suburb of Liverpool. I had just won a scholarship for a two year commercial course at Southport Technical College which included a free rail pass 鈥� a great prize in those days of limited travel.

Southport had no bombing so we Liverpool children were given special treatment. Mattresses were provided in the gym and we were allowed to sleep there in the afternoons, which of course we didn鈥檛 鈥� lots of giggles! Our Southport colleagues envied us this privilege.

I took sandwiches for lunch and my mother had problems finding fillings, one of her regulars was liver which was not rationed. I did not like this and threw the filling out. I still feel guilty about wasting that liver!

We turned a patch of school field into a vegetable patch and also grew tomatoes in the greenhouses (which my friend and I used to come up daily to water during the summer holidays on our free rail pass.) But the most important thing I learned working on the vegetable plot was how to fertilise marrows, and behold, the penny dropped! I had acquired my sex education!

My father reinforced our cellar and put bunk beds in it and we slept there most days, not very comfortable but safer. Our dog was not allowed to join us in case he might turn dangerous in an emergency. After one particular bad blitz our windows were blown out and a dog went missing. After the 鈥渁ll clear鈥� my Father and I went on the shore to look for him and Liverpool was ablaze. We met a soldier who said 鈥淭hey can鈥檛 do this to us鈥� and my father said 鈥淭hey have son鈥� 鈥� we thought this was funny. The dog came home next morning tired but unhurt. He must have run for miles.

My sister was WAAF and stationed fairly close so came home a lot. My father and I used to take her back to Liverpool to get her train 鈥� a hazardous experience as the gutters of Liverpool were lined with auxiliary water pipes which were invisible in the blackout and we used frequently to trip over them!

Before she joined the WAAF my sister used to work in a department in the centre of Liverpool and she used to travel by bus. When the sirens sounded all the buses would drive out of Liverpool into the country without stopping to let their passengers off and the passengers had to find their own way home in the dark 鈥� sometimes several miles and always in the winter.

When I eventually started work I used to cycle the five limes to my work place. Cycling home in the black out was fraught with danger as part of the journey the journey was along tram-lined roads and once you got in them you had difficulty getting out 鈥� you mostly fell out! There seemed to be a lot of fog during those winters.

I acquired a lot of black darning wool and laboriously knitted myself a waistcoat which I embroidered down the front with scraps of coloured wool obtained from unpicking old woollens. I was very proud of my waist coat. At school we had to knit for our troops and as my friend was also a poor knitter we were allowed to knit a pair of gloves between us, each taking a different hand. When we finished they were both the same hand 鈥� I am a left-handed knitter and so knit back to front!

I joined the Women鈥檚 Junior Air Corps (WAJCS) and one of our tasks was to help the civil defence in their mock exercise and be casualties after an air raid. One time when I was a stretcher case I was put in the ambulance and only after we arrived did they find they had not strapped me in and the door was open. We were panic-stricken citizens who had to disrupt the enemy.

We had a small pipe and drum band and because there was no other band available we led our victory march which must have been quite a sight with young girls playing and marching at our usual tempo while the soldiers, sailors, airmen, home guards etc were trotting along behind trying to keep in step.

WE teenagers had no time to think about what we wanted because we were too busy taking our part in helping with the war effort and enjoying our weekly dances and socials in the church halls as well as learning first aid, rifle shooting, economical cooking and lots of other useful things which will stand us in good stead today.

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