大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by a volunteer from CSV/大象传媒 London on behalf of Brenda Dombey and has been added to the site with her permission. Mrs Dombey fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

At the start of the war our family were living in Clapham North. My father was French and was called back to France to enlist. My mother was left in charge of the family business, a tobacconist. At the age of 8, I and my older brother (aged 11) were evacuated to Ascot in Berkshire. We were placed with the same family but they had a daughter who was a real bully. At that time I was very skinny and not very good at standing up for myself. The daughter used to constantly bully us and on one occasion I can remember her sitting on my head. After a couple of months we were both so unhappy that my brother wrote to my mother and said that we would run away if she didn鈥檛 come and collect us. She came and collected us!

At that time London was quiet with few raids so we stayed at home. However, 6 months later the Blitz started and my mother decided that we should be evacuated again. Our school arranged for us to be sent to Devon. This time although my brother and I were with the same family I lived in the main house and my brother went to live at the farm. We loved it there and I was taught how to cook. Being Jewish my mother insisted that the family did not make us work on a Saturday and on Sundays, although we had to go to church in the morning we did a correspondence course arranged by the synagogue on Sunday afternoons. We were there for 18 months.

In 1941 my father was demobbed from the French army (In France they took into account your age, if you were married and how many children you had). We lived at home again and at the age of 11, I passed my Junior County exams and got a place at the Grammar School in Clapham. My brother was sent to a French School which had been evacuated to Scotland. He hated it there as, despite my father being French, we never spoke French at home so he had to learn the language very quickly as only French was spoken at the school.

At 12 陆, I was sent back to Devon again. Not to the same family, but to the family鈥檚 companion who had now moved to Pyeworthy. The family had 4 sons. Being in the country there was still no electricity to the house. There were oil lamps and the water had to be pumped from the local well. They did not have tractors and worked the farm with Shire horses. They baked twice a week and had two metal boxes on either side of the kitchen fire. They filled these with boxwood and set fire to them. After a while they empted out the wood and tested the temperature of the oven with their hand. They would then assess whether the temperature was right for baking either bread or cakes. To my London tastes, the food was very good!

The school we went to was 3 miles away and it took us about an hour to walk there. I can remember being sent off in the morning with a pastie for my lunch. As we walked along, we climbed into the hedges and picked blackberries and hazelnuts.

In 1998 I went back to Pyeworthy but could find no trace of the family. All four sons appear to have left the area and perhaps, left farming too.

At that time I also joined the girl guides. I had a real battle with my mother to let me join as at that time the guide movement was seen as being directly linked to church institutions. However, I was able to convince her that the activities were not connected to any religious teaching and was able to join.

Despite the regular disruption to my schooling between the ages of 8 and 14, I was still able to pass my matriculation and could have gone to university if I had chosen.

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