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This story was submitted to the People's War site by Jenny Christian of the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library in conjunction with ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio Norfolk on behalf of James Arthur Rose and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

As a lad of 14 the War was a big adventure every day. At the start of the War we could only go to school for one hour per day until our shelters were built on the playing field. I think they are still there. So days and nights were spent watching the sky, listening for any noise, you could tell the difference of our aircraft by the engines. Going to school and talking to other boys, what they had seen and heard, so after school it was on our bicycles, mine had cost £2.50 in 1939, but without a pump; it was off to bomb sites, Army camps, air fields, watching planes take off and land. We knew every type; plane crashes, searching for bomb and shell fragments, bits of planes and finding unexploded bombs.

For example going to School after a raid (St. Mark's, Hall Road, Norwich) we found a large crater in Hatton Road, our gym in the playground, one end gone and the walls bowed out too dangerous to retrieve the equipment. The bomb missed the School by 50 yards.

We had no health and safety in those days and most of the Mums and Dads were in the forces or on war work so we had a pretty free life. We still had our jobs to do and mine was to collect rabbit food along the ring road, watching the American lorries speeding along loaded with bombs, Army lorries and tanks.

As a Boy Scout I soon learnt to deliver messages in the pitch dark, from Old Lakenham Hall (1st Norwich) over fields, railway lines, back alleys to the HQ in Earlham Road, but at work driving the tractor and machines there was a vast sky to watch.

Each night after the Blitz nights it was another adventure to go round looking for the tail fins of incendiary bombs. I saw a pile about 6 feet high at the corner of Southwell Road and Hall Road.

The Saturday after the Blitz we decided to walk with our dog to Poringland to see the German bomber that crashed there at the top of the lane. We saw signs laying at the side of the road just past the houses No Entry unexploded bomb, as the sign wasn't standing up we thought it was ok to go down the lane. In a field on the left hand side there were 3 or 4 bomb holes, but there was nothing to be found in the craters so we carried on to the top of the lane to come across a Policeman. "Where have you come from?" he asked, when we told him about the sign he went white and told us not to go back that way and that we had to find a different route home.

Anyway we saw our burnt out German plane, it was guarded by soldiers, but it was a very long way home to Lakenham via Trowse, but we could always try catching rabbits on the way to help out with our meat ration.

When I then went to work as a green keeper on the Norwich Municipal Golf Course (now the UEA) there was a 9 hole Golf Course (the other 9 holes had been ploughed up to grow food) there wasn't a rabbit anywhere. This was a pity because they made a nice dinner, to supplement the meat ration, although as an Agricultural worker we were allowed an extra 4 ounces of cheese. I remember some Italian prisoners of War picking and bagging potatoes on the field that is now the running track at the UEA, they were allowed to take the small potatoes back to camp.

There were always planes in the sky, 350 4 engine Fortress and Liberators circling over head to get into formation, the roar of all those engines gradually fading as they got higher and higher and then moved off in one direction.
The siren would sound about 20 minutes before any enemy activity, but it was wasting so much working time going into the shelter, so we would wait for the additional klaxon warning 4 minutes beforehand, before going into the shelter. Although if you were working outside you saw the balloons go to maximum height; word would go around "the balloons are up", then you would watch and listen. The difference between their aircraft and ours; ours were synchronised theirs were not; it was very distinctive, especially at night.

One morning I watched an aircraft flying low just after take off, I saw something drop from it to the ground, so off I run for another souvenir. When I found it was a large
canvas zipped cover with gun sight on the side, inside the contents was a very nervous gunner, to think that poor chap had to fly for 6 – 8 hours in that condition in a very cold atmosphere.

Another day I was working on the 12th Green and heard and saw 3 Spitfires flying at tree top height along the Yare Valley. One craft tipped upwards and cut the tail off the one in front, which nose-dived into the ground. The other craft glided down with it, its propeller blades bent backwards, this took place between the Norfolk and Norwich hospital and Hethersett.

In April 1944 there were some very strange noises coming from outside, (I was living at Fakenham at the time) and Dad had gone to work, it was getting dark outside so I opened the back door. Looking up into the sky I saw tracers shoot across, a ball of fire that gradually came down over the house. I heard it crashed on farm land at Tuckswood and one of the crew landed on the Tuckswood pub.

Aged 14, just a few days before D Day, I was working on the Golf Course from 6.30am until 5pm, 56 hours a week. Leaving to go to work early in the morning in the dark (double British Summertime) about 6.20am, I was stopped by a sentry with rifle and bayonet telling me that I couldn't go down there, after explaining I was allowed to and was on my way to work. To my amazement South Park Avenue and Bluebell Road were packed with tanks and army transport. Some days later they just disappeared overnight, the only signs left, tank marks on the kerb, some are still there today.

I remember being woken up on the morning of June 6th by this tremendous noise, the sky was full of planes and gliders, going round and round until they disappeared and everything went quiet.

What secret weapon was used on the night of Tuesday, 16th September I shall never know, for in the early hours of the morning over a large area of Norwich there were canister like objects and trailing wires with bombs. I know 3 Spitfires with white stripes collided over the area that is now the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, a B24 bomber crashed on the old City station after hitting the tower of St Philip's Church and the B24 crashing at Old Costessey.

We always enjoyed Harvest time. Just as the binder "with 2 horses" got to the last bit in the middle of the field the rabbits would start to run. I had a very good terrier dog called Peggy. She could pick up rabbits on the run, then we would hide them under the stacked corn and wait until the farm workers turned their backs, if not we lost them.

If people want to lose weight and be healthy they should live on the rations we did and try doing some of the jobs we did. I remember a girl of 19 being fined 10 shillings for being absent from work and a man being fined £25 for supplying several gallons of petrol without coupons and a man was even fined £5 for being late for work 24 mornings out of 37. It did not matter if you were on duty all night or being bombed.

But remember civilians didn't get medals, yet were frequently on the front line longer.

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