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During the war, I remember an incident when I was 8 years old. My father was serving with the RAF in Egypt and I was staying with my mother and 2 sisters at my grandparents’ hotel in Paignton. In those days I was very lucky since all 3 of us children were allocated a maid each to tend to our needs.

One night an air raid started and my maid Mary, woke me up and it sounded as if somebody was shaking a huge box of metal toys at the side of me. I was taken to the reception office on the ground floor where my grandparents, mother and sisters were all sitting. The hotel staff, including our maids, went to the cellars under the hotel, but my grandmother refused to budge and we all stayed where we were.

The noise was horrendous, with glass shattering onto the streets every few seconds. The scream of the bombs as they wined towards us before they exploded was deafening.

I have no idea how long the raid lasted but what I do know is that I was never afraid. I had no perception of the destructive capacity of bombs never having seen television or reading papers etc. My last recollection of this event was glass being swept off the street prior to me being returned to bed.

The following morning I learnt that the new Hall Porter had spent the entire raid sitting on the stair-case since he had no idea where to go during raids.

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