大象传媒

1 was 6 years old when the war started. The day it was declared my mother gave all four children a shopping list - sugar,tea,soap,matches,candles,and any tinned, food we could get - from the two village shops. Then the Anderson shelter arrived: we helped dig a hole in the garden six foot deep to put the shelter in, my father made bunk beds for the six of us, and a tin chest with candles and matches and food went in the shelter.
We then got fitted with gas masks - we had to carry them at all times. At school the green had tunnels cut under i: they were lined with steel and had benches put in. The sirens went for air-raids and we had to go to the shelters until the all clear went. If you were on the way to school and the siren went, you had to go home or to school, whichever was the nearest, running as close to the walls or the hedges. At home we had two inch sticky tape to put on all the windows to stop the glass from shattering the windows.
At night, we had to have blackouts and all street lights were cut off. In our village we only had incendiary bombs dropped on us and after a night in the shelter we would go and look for empty incendiary cases.

We had ration books with coupons in for food, clothes, shoes, towels, bed lining, and sweets. We were given 2 ounces per week of sweets. Mum made pop with nettles burdock and other hedgerow plants. Our extra sweets were made of Swede cut into cubes.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.