大象传媒

1940
I was twelve years of age when the second World War was declared,living on the Manor Estate in the City of Sheffield with my widowed Mother, Sisters and Brothers, my Father had died when I was three, he was a young man of thirty seven and developed lung cancer due to working in clouds of grinding dust for years.

One of my Brothers called Joe was serving in the R.A.F.stationed at Stradishall Airfield in the south of England, so there were only me, mother,one brother and one Sister as my other Sister was married and lived at the other end of the block.

One of my jobs, was to fetch grass sods from the fields near where we lived, and build a blast wall in front of the Anderson shelter in our back garden, and to cover over the top of the shelter.
All I had was an old barrow with two wheels and one handle, as the other handle had broken and we were so poor that we couldn't afford to buy a piece of wood to repair it.

I stocked it with bars of chocolate, that I queued for, sometimes waiting for hours outside a shop in the City centre. I knew we would need to eat something if our shelter was buried and we might be unable to get out and I put plenty of water in it also.There was enough food and drink to last five people for many hours.

One night we were woken by the air raid sirens at 0200 hrs. and we had to go to the shelter as quickly as possible, I leapt out of bed and was in such a hurry to get downstairs that I put both my legs into one trouser leg and was hopping downstairs to the shelter.I was teased about this incident for many years by my family and it was a standing joke against me for a long time to come. We had to have a sense of humour during those dark days of the War, as it was a depressing time and we didn't know if we would have a future, because, at that time Great Britain and her Allies were desperately fighting for survival and the War could have gone either way. Had it not been for the rousing speeches of our Prime Minister Winston Churchill, we could very well have lost the War, he inspired the nation to fight for our country, our homes, family and our way of life.

We could always tell if the aircraft coming over were English or German as the engines had a different distinctive sound and as no one spoke through fear,we knew if it was friend or foe in the skies above us. I can still remember the feeling of dread knowing we were about to be bombed and possibly killed.One night my brother in law, was on duty as an air raid warden and he was walking down the side path of our house, when a lump of shrapnel as big as a dinner plate whizzed past just missing him and made a huge hole in our house wall, had it struck him he would have been cut in half. The reason he was there was because, at his medical for the army, they found that his heart missed a beat in every three and he was rejected on medical grounds, the strange thing is that he is still alive and healthy and is now eighty nine years of age and still going strong.

The War Years
Posted Jan 17, 2005 by Hal. Evans

In 1941 I started work as an apprentice motor mechanic at the Kenning Motor Group on a wage of nine shillings per week, ( old money ) I was in fact a grease monkey and the boiler suit I wore was caked in oil and grease. There was no shower at work, so I had to travel home on the bus in those filthy clothes and get a strip wash at the sink before I could get in the bath.
The two years I worked there was a nightmare for me, as I was bullied by the older boys and indeed by the men.

On the second floor of the building, they made Bailey Bridges for the Army to use for crossing rivers and each section had to be constructed on a concrete bed then reamered out for the connecting pins to fit. The huge pieces, made of steel girders were stood on their edge, waiting by the machines and one day a section fell over as I was stood there. It chopped the front of my shoe off and blood poured out on to the floor, I nearly fainted as I thought my toes had been chopped off with the shoe, luckily, the shoes I was wearing at the time were too big and the steel had only nicked my toe causing it to bleed.

Also, nearby was a machine called a profile oxyacetylene burner which I used to cut steel billets to make connecting blocks to hold the sections of panels together, It was fitted with magnetic rollers which moved round a grid and once the burner was lit, and the machine started it cut pieces out of the billet before they were drilled to take the pins for fastening to the Bailey Bridge Sections.

At the end of the year I had to leave the job I had at Kennings and take a job as a lorry drivers mate in the open air as my health was suffering. In entailed delivering cases of bottled beer and minerals in Sheffield and Chesterfield. It was very hard work lifting boxes and barrels up and down the cellars of various shops and the drivers put all the work on to their mate so they could have an easy life. So, after two years I left that job also.

The second World War years were a time of great stress for the civilian population of the United Kingdom, so what must it have been for the members of the Armed Forces who were right in the centre of the fighting, the poor souls must have been terrified day after day, knowing that each day might be their last, my heart went out to them and my eternal gratitude, for the ultimate sacrifice they faced. We owe them our lives and the years we have enjoyed since the end of World War Two, God Forbid that we shall ever have to endure that misery and suffering again in the future.

We lived in fear each day, fear of being killed or seriously injured or crippled, fear of the Nazi's being successfull in their invasion attempts and taking us to the concentration camps, or into forced labour and worst of all, being experimented on by the evil Nazi doctors and bled to death, so they could give our blood to their wounded soldiers, it was six years of unbearable torture, both mentally and physically. during those years, we didn't know whether there was any future, nothing to look forward to or to plan for, all we had was our immediate family and just to live for the day.
We had to remain in the Anderson shelter during the bombing, as shrapnel was flying about all over the place and one night a lump of it hit our house wall and made a hole as big as a dinner plate
Sheffield, as a manufacturer of steel plate and munitions was a target because of the numerous factories contributing to the War effort.
There were two blitzkreig's on our City, one on the Sunday night and one on the Thursday, when the Germans dropped hundreds of tons of explosives and incendiary devices.
When daylight came there were Bits of Buses and tramcars all over the roads,
completely blocking them, also, lots of people where killed along with the bus and tram crews.

After the first Blitz, my Aunty who lived at Bradwell in the peak district, came over to take us back to her home for a few weeks,.to avoid any further danger to us.
We caught the bus and tramcar to Millhouses, on our way into Derbyshire, but before we got out of the city the second Blitz started and we had to run to a large tram shelter and lie on the floor under the seats to escape anything that might have been flying around.We could see, looking back towards the City Centre, the flames, hear the explosions from the bombs which were raining down on the Centre of Sheffield, people being killed and injured, it was total mayhem and confusion as the City was being systematicaly destroyed. We managed to catch a bus from Millhouses to Bradwell in Derbyshire, because the Blitz had only just started and lucky for us the bus had left previously, getting out of the City just in time.
Finaly, arriving at Bradwell at the last thing at night, staying there in safety for about four weeks,during the time we lived in the cottage with my Aunty and Uncle, I used to go on long walks all around the area, which is really beautifull and I remember looking at Earls Cement works near Bradwell on my journeys, before returning home, to the dangers of the City again.

When I was eighteen in 1945, I chose to work down the pit digging coal instead of joining the armed forces, along with many other Bevin boys, the jobs I did involved spreading stone dust and we were forced to breath it, to minimise the risk of explosions due to the amount of coal dust everywhere.
Also, driving the pit ponies, pulling the tubs of coal to the main headings and lowering them down the incline, ready to be taken to the pit bottom.
One day a pit pony knocked my head into a steel girder and it poured with blood and the foreman said, if you go home I shall think you are a softie, so I stayed at work.
I saw a pit Deputy kick a pony to death with his steel capped boots, because it refused to work, after that I felt nothing but contempt for that man and lost all respect for him. Another frightening thing that happened down the pit was when the top weight came on, as the coal was extracted, the pit props were pulled out and the ground above dropped and it sounded like a lot of explosions, down there in that confined place. everyone,including the deputies and the overmen ( bosses )were terrified and we all ran for our lives towards the pit bottom, where it was possible to get on the cage to escape any disaster below ground.

At the end of 1945, I received my demob papers to say I could leave my employment in the pit, as I had served my time below ground and I was happy to leave that awfull job for good. It had been an ordeal for me rather than a pleasant experience,I know it was necessary at the time during the second World War, because everyone had to do their bit during the national emergency.

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