大象传媒

My aunt, Doris Minards, was assistant secretary of the Dickens Fellowship and the first curator of the Dickens House museum, 48 Doughty Street, London WC1 for many years. She was a keen worker for the Air Raid Precaution movement in peace time and at the outbreak of war she took charge of the organisation of a group of air raid wardens based at the museum.

This is a photograph of the wardens outside the museum. My aunt is in the centre of the picture holding her dog. Also in the picture, second from right, is her sister, Marjorie, later Marjorie White, my mother. I cannot name anyone else in the picture except for John Bousfield, third from the right standing next to my mum, who I knew in my early and teenage years. However, I was told by my mum that the man second from left in the back row was a spy.

Wartime Home Office regulations decreed that only men should hold the position of Post Warden and my aunt was most aggrieved that she had to resign her post in order that this regulation be complied with.

During the war both sisters and their parents moved back to Bedfordshire. The 鈥済irls鈥� worked for a while at the London firm, Nutalls & Co Ltd at Kempston Hardwick. From February 1942 to March 1946 Doris worked for the Ministry of Labour in Bedford where she interviewed people for jobs. My mum stayed permanently with her parents in Kempston and married Horace White in 1947 (my father鈥檚 account of his war experiences 鈥淢y Chindit Days in Burma鈥� is posted on this site). My aunt resumed work at the Dickens House museum until she retired in 1968 when she moved back to the family home in Kempston.

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