大象传媒

Thgis story was told to me by David Utting of Lowestoft, Suffolk

I shall never forget that day. Instead of a party there I was along with hundreds of other children on a train bound for destination unknown. An exciting moment on that journey was when the carriage door flew open and a young boy called R.Newbury was hanging on for dear life. As I was the nearest I tried to get him back into the compartment by pulling on the window strap but being small I could not manage it. All was saved by a teacher whh saw what had happened and came to help me. After that the door was locked and after some hours and a few tears shed by some of the children we arrived at Glossop. I remember Glossop on seeing it for the first time as a beautiful place nestling between rolling hills and green fields. Of course, for us children who had never seen hills before this was a sight one never forgets and some of us made a promise to conquer them as soon as we could. I have some very happy memories of doing this, then and now, as I still return there from time to time. I remember my first pair of clogs, these were worn by most people in Glossop. You could hear them clip clopping along the footpaths at 6 o'clock in the morning, with people going to work in the cotton mills. One unhappy memory while being at Glossop was the last time I saw my father. He had come up on leave to see me. As he was in the Royal Navy, many of the locals would touch his collar for luck, sorry to say this did not bring him or his family any, as two weeks later Mother received the dreaded telegram to say that Dad had been killed in action. That was a very sad time for us all.

But I have some very happy memories of my stay in Glossop and, of course, the people who made it so. One really good thing that came out of it all was that after returning home I kept up corresponding with a girl who lived next door to where I was billetted and a few years later we married.

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