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In 1939 Bill was 6 years old and 12 when the war ended. His family were living in the High Street of Bourton-on-the-Water opposite the slaughter house, which today is a florists Cotswold Flowers. Bill has lived all his life in Bourton-on-the-Water and will be 72 later this year. One of Bill’s grandfathers was a miller at the mill in Bourton and the other one worked on farms hedge-cutting and ditching as well as being a poacher which fitted in very well. After one of his sortie’s he would say to Bill’s mother, ‘Go and look in the pantry’. They all did vegetable gardens, so were never short of food. Bill’s family moved into the bungalow he still lives in today, when he was 7.
“I can remember troop movements along the Fosseway every now and then and one night they stopped on the Naight Fields (now part of the new school playing fields). They came in groups and seemed to be meeting up there. Tanks and lorries and field guns were parked in the hollow of the Naight Fields. That night they made sure that everyone turned out their lights early and that the blackout was complete. Lots of women in the neighbourhood cooked and brought what they could for the men to eat. They might have had their own rations but they were very pleased to see rabbit pies and other food not normally in their diet — just what the people roundabout were living off. They were there for 3 or 4 days and then suddenly they were gone and no one heard them go.
“All the able bodied men had gone into the army and the old ones had to do Home Guard drills with broom sticks for practice. Eventually they did get a few rifles.
“My father was a carpenter for a local builders firm, but during the war he worked up at the aerodrome above the Rissingtons repairing damaged planes when they came back, mostly with balsa wood, bound with material, glued to the aircraft and then painted with camouflage. Planes were sent off to different places in three’s.
“Children from towns were evacuated to families in Bourton and some of them have remained life-long friends.
“We had an air raid shelter in the garden next door, which was meant to do for two or three families. Bourton is on gravel so when it was dug out it just filled with water, even though it was concreted as recommended. It was no use at all. After the war it was filled back in again and three Victoria plum trees were planted on the site. They are there no longer, but produced masses of plums in their prime.

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