大象传媒

I was 3 years old in 1939 and lived in a council house in Coggeshall at the time. My first memory was the local Council building blast walls down our street in front of each front door. I don鈥檛 think it would have worked very well because all the windows were still unprotected!

At that time Coggeshall was an idyllic village with its own butchers, bakers etc and was just about self sufficient. I started school and went to Woodlands in Church Street which is now offices, and during the first year, evacuee children from Edmonton, London arrived and went to the other school in Coggeshall. I can remember as a schoolchild being put to bed in the afternoon because our sleep was often disturbed at night by bombing raids.

My older brother, Peter told me a story from 1939 鈥� a Hurricane crashed at Palmer鈥檚 Farm which he was fascinated to see had a wooden propeller. A bit later and within 200 yards of this a German night bomber was shot down. Everyone went down to have a look and even my Mum lifted up a blanket which reveal body remains! Later on we saw lots of Doodlebugs on their way to London and again one was shot down at Palmer鈥檚 Farm.

In 1941 thousands of contractors, mainly Irish men bussed in from Southend, arrived to build airfields in this area. There were 50 in a 40 miles radius, our nearest being Earls Colne. The next year the Americans moved in with their Mitchell Marauder aircraft nicknamed the 鈥淲idowmaker鈥�. After the Americans left, the RAF arrived with their Lancaster night bombers. In 1944 the US returned to Earls Colne to fly Boeing Flying Fortresses. The local pub had to have its pitched roof replaced with a flat one because the planes could not clear its roof on their flight path! As children we were aircraft mad and could recognise each aircraft by its sound and its silhouette.

During the War my uncle worked on the laundry vans that went to the airfields 鈥� I was allowed to go with him so I could get a better look at the aircraft. I did not realise until much later that aircraft I saw being hosed down had been hit and it was unfortunately human remains that were being cleared up from the cockpit.

During the RAF鈥檚 stay in 1943 a Lancaster bomber tried to take off but couldn鈥檛 gain enough height and hit a power line. It came down at Fabian鈥檚 Farm (now Honeywood School). Lots of people went along to have a look including me, and I can remember hearing screams from the plane until the fuel tanks exploded and then there was no more screaming. It still upsets me now to think about it. A week later what was left of the aircraft was dumped by the side of the road to be taken away. We went down there and clambered all over the wreckage looking for souvenirs. Coggeshall was no longer the sleepy idyllic village that it had been before the War.

I saw my first coloured person at the Air Base but they were not allowed off site and were still segregated from the white troops, and at that time were not allowed to be air crew.

The nearest public shelter to my house was 录 mile away so we used to shelter under the table at home. We had a dog, Flossie, who used to predict raid before we heard the sirens and run under the table and shake all over. Then before the All Clear sounded she came out from under the table so we always knew when the raid was over!

Our neighbours used to keep an eye on 3 old ladies that lived in the street, the Miss Thames. One night we had a gas warning so we donned our gas masks until the threat was over. Unfortunately the next morning the Miss Thames were found sitting in their house with gas masks still in place because they hadn鈥檛 heard the All Clear!

I saw my first banana in 1945 and tried to eat it still in its skin! The first ice cream I had was just snow so when an American offered me chocolate ice cream I wouldn鈥檛 eat it because it was brown!

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