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Typed in by Louise Collier

I was 7 years when the war broke out. The summer had been wonderful and the field at the back of the house was a hayfield so everyone went to help hay make. When war was declared it became a site of one of the air balloons.

My brother and I were going to be evacuated to Canada to a relation there, but just before we were due to go, a ship full of children was sunk so all the evacuations stopped, so we went to my aunt’s in Burton-on-Trent. We stayed until Christmas and Mother fetched us home, as she missed us so much and decided we could take our chance in Hull.

We lived close to Sutton Road Bridge and one night before the sirens
went two land mines were dropped aiming for the bridge but it missed it. We were sleeping downstairs as Mother thought I might be starting with the Measles and she fetched my brother downstairs, as she heard a funny sounding plane which was just as well, as the plaster and all the glass fell onto the beds. Dad was upstairs in bed and pulled the blankets over him when we heard this swishing noise, the land mines had a parachute on them, he looked up to open sky when it was over. Dad’s bowler has was in the middle of the front path, with a huge block of clay in it. We went straight away back to Burton-on-Trent and the builders’ moved in the next day. What was remarkable was only one person died, although there was a lot of damage.

When the house was habitable again we came back and this was Hull’s constant bombing so we went straight to the shelter, as soon as we had our tea and slept there.

Dad was an Air-raid Warden as most people were, if they were not in the Forces. He worked for Bass Worthington. He had an ulcer which used to play up when he lost the wagons. The beer was transported by rail in wagons, but if they were moving troops around they shunted the wagons into sidings, while they moved the troops. Dads office was bombed, when all the town took a beating in May.

Once on the way to school the air raid sounded, we didn’t know whether the do home or go on to school, we went school as it was quite fun in the air raid shelters we used to sing to drown the noise of the bombing.

My husband’s family all worked at Ideal Standard, so they were on essential war work, but they did rescue work at night and would probably be out all night, but still go to work the next day. No counselling for them in those days. They were bombed and they had a black and white dog, all the soot came down the chimney and the dog was black. He ran outside to my brother-in-law and he didn’t recognise the dog belonging to him.

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