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My memories of the war were sitting in our bedroom window with my sister and brothers counting the planes going over our house. We lived between two airfields, Croft and Goosepool. In our Teesside airport at night we would count their lights, red, white and green, to see who got the most. One afternoon we watched a dogfight, as it was called, going on over the fields. Two Spitfires brought down a German ‘plane. We were not allowed near the next day; we wanted to get a souvenir.

We had two empty rooms which the RAF took over. Canadians were billeted in them. They had to get into them by climbing through the window and up a ladder as my mum would not let them through our front door, she wanted the neighbours to know that she ran a respectable house! We had fun going up and down the ladder. One day Mum heard crying, and thinking it was my brother, she went in and found a very young and homesick 18 year old Canadian. We fed him and kept him amused until he was well.

The army had a field kitchen in the park. We often got a meal, or were given huge biscuits called ‘hard tack’ — very true, as it took all day to get through them.

We had evacuees in the village a lot. They had caps on as they had all their hair cut off because of lice. Some caused havoc. Others, like the one we had, Pat, was very shocked when the ‘planes went over. She was from London and had seen her grandparents killed. Mother took her under her wing, with two sisters from another family.

My grandparents lived at the edge of the airfield as they were railway men. They had a huge, steel sided table called a Morrison Shelter. It would be very hard to get the fourth side in if there was an air raid. My granddad ran 7 miles through the fields when a train load of bombs exploded on Catterick station. He found Uncle Joe very shaken and cut up, and very lucky to be alive in his shattered signal box.

Another memory was going to the toilet, which was along way up the yard, and seeing a soldier with a gun in the field next to our garden. There were all these men in canvas suits with yellow circles on their backs. I rushed to tell mum and it turns out they were prisoners of war. They were picking potatoes. We did not like that as we did it for pocket money.

My dad was on coastal defences so never went overseas, but it sometimes a serious and difficult for mum. Dad once brought home a gallon drum of soap or oil: Mum had a bonanza, bargaining with it as rationing was in full flow them.

The days of stiff upper lips all round.

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