´óÏó´«Ã½

This story was submitted to the People’s War site The Folkestone School for Girls and has been added to the website on behalf of Olive Roots with her permission and they she understand the site’s term and conditions.

Olive Joan Roots. 10 years when the war broke out. Lived in Blackmenstone a farm near Newchurch Romney Marsh Kent.

When the first siren went off I was at a friends house. She lived near New Romney. Her father took me home but I wasn’t frightened.. it happened so suddenly. We had soldiers stationed on the farm and the best day was Thursday because their rations came in, always got crisps and lemonade. My mum used to do some of the officers washing. One of the air raids was bad one night. Germans came quickly, they dropped incendiary bombs and flares. Three at the front of the house and two at the back. It missed the house but in the morning friends of my brother came and took the parachute silk to make underwear.

During the war we went to Newchurch School and used to take coco sugar in a paper bag and a large potato every day. If there was an air raid we would have something to eat., because we weren’t allowed home. We never had an air raid shelter at the school. So we put the tables together and put this big blackboard up the side. We use to hide underneath them until we were told to come out. One bad one, we were walking home from school, we had to pass the royal artillery battery where the soldiers were. My two friends and I had to get in the ditch because the air raid was so bad overhead and the soldiers made us stay there. Also that day, there was a black German police plane which landed on the hills. It couldn’t get up, we weren’t allowed to look. But before the soldiers got the plane, the Germans set it alight. But the soldiers captured the Germans that were still alive. One Sunday morning a German plane came down at Newchurch my father was in the Homeguard and he cycled to where the plane was and captured the pilot and held them until the soldiers arrived. Always went to school, never had days off. Was one and a half miles walk. Don’t remember being frightened, just carried on as normal.
At my house we had an Anderson shelter in the back garden and we had a dog he was always the first in the shelter. He heard the siren and knew where to go. Had his own blanket in there. The shelter was in the apple orchard, quite camouflaged. Then I moved to dymchurch in Romney Marsh. Planes used to drop their bombs on the way back from the raids.
We went running to the shelter on a bad raid, and one friend was blown in to the shelter cutting all his hands.

In Dynchurch we had a table shelter in the front room. There were a big dogfights. One day I saw a German plane very low, they did this to avoid the sea wall. I saw the pilot sitting in the plane and got a big shock and went into the table shelter, and hit my head on the table it was really sore for a while. I tried to watched the dogfights as much as possible when father wasn’t around. I was never worried.
Spitfires and hurricanes dropped bomb on Romney marsh all over the place because there was a big American camps near us. They had rocket guns and further up the road the ATS had Aka guns. The American came to our house for baths and then we also had three land army girls and they all still, live in Dymchurch. I think I wasn’t really frightened because people were always there and busy. My two bothers and father were in the home guard and coast guard. They guarded the small light railway so we saw the armour. We were not allowed on the sea wall or on the barbed wire. Mines were down the road on a patch of cross road. Loads of jeeps and gun carriers were always in the village. We also saw lots of Italian prisoners because they worked on the farms. I Wasn’t worried about them. I Never went away, I was not evacuated, stayed in Dymchurch for the war. I was happy not to be sent away, and I can’t remember being frightened at all, we just went on with everything

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