大象传媒

As a girl coming up to her 8th birthday in September, 1939, I wondered how this war was going to affect me in Cardiff. It was not long before the sirens sounded and aeroplanes came over dropping their bombs.

As soon as the siren was heard we had to awaken my father, who had been made deaf in the Battle of the Somme in the First World War. The family would rush out to the air raid shelter in the back garden with a candle or torch. It was a cold, grim place to spend at least an hour or perhaps two - and sometimes there were two raids in one night.

My father, however, would spend the time standing outside the shelter watching all the activity going on overhead, with planes and searchlights. There was a large gun located not very far away, which would fire at the German planes. The next morning I would go out and find pieces of shrapnel in the garden.

Another feature I remember was food rationing. Coupons for sweets were soon used up. When our butter ration was used up my mother would announce that she was sorry but we would have to 'make do' with margarine instead -this was horrible and not like the spreads of today.

I was too young to do my 'bit' for the war effort, but when I was eleven years old my headmistress started a Junior Link of the British Red Cross, which I joined, and some years later graduated into a Senior Link, so you could say that I did my 'bit' in that direction. Unfortunately, my headmistress was killed in a later bombing raid.

When you hear talk of the "war-time spirit" it was true and everyone looked after each other as far as possible - this was the best part of those years, now so long ago.

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