大象传媒

I was a young girl of 3 at the start of World War 2, living some 20 miles east of London, so I have many memories both personal and general of growing up during those wartime years. They had an indelible impact on those of us who lived through the experience at close hand. I would like to record for future generations one or two of these memories, which had a particular impact on me at the time.

I remember the morning my mother got me up very early, it was hardly light, she held me up to the window to wave goodbye to my Dad, who was going away to join the army. My mum was crying, it was to be a long time before we would see him again. The only communication would be by letter and once he was sent abroad these became very few and far between.

Dad had built an underground air raid shelter in the back garden before he went away, which was relatively well equipped because he was a carpenter and builder by trade. It had bunk beds and shelving on the walls, on which to stand things such as candles, our only source of light apart from a torch. I was always fascinated by the reinforced wooden door, which we had to crouch down to get through. It had a row of holes made at eye level covered by a sliding panel. I always thought these were peep-holes to enable us to see who was outside in the event of a land invasion. Only many years later did I realise they were for ventilation!

My brother and I were not often put to bed in the shelter, but when the air raid siren sounded during the night my mother would wake us up and we would make a dash across the garden to the safety of the shelter. On one particularly bad night my mother felt there would be a lot of shrapnel falling (large pieces of red hot metal from exploding bombs). So to protect our heads she raided the saucepan cupboard. I, being the youngest, had the smallest, Mum had the bigger size and my older brother, who had an enormous head and very thick hair, had to use the frying pan because nothing else would fit. And so we made our dash hanging onto the handles of these utensils sitting upside down on our heads. I remember us laughing at this comical sight in spite of the seriousness of the situation.

John and I were playing in the garden one sunny day when a formation of Flying Fortresses, about 100 at least, droned their tired way back to base after a raid on Germany. This was not an uncommon sight over our house and we would run up on top of the mound which was the roof of our underground shelter, just to get a better view and to count them, because sometimes we had counted them going out. On this particular day, to our horror and disbelief, one of the planes suddenly veered sideways, hitting the plane next to it, and they both came diving out of the sky, hitting at least one other plane on the way down. John and I ran shouting into the house, telling Mum that the planes were crashing, but it was so unthinkable that our mother didn't believe us. We then ran through the small copse opposite to where we could see on the other side of a large cornfield, the fire of the crashed planes. An airman, parachuting to safety, appeared to land in the fire, but from a distance one's view of things can be distorted. I told myself that this was the case. In those extraordinary days such local happenings did not make the news, so we never learned any details about how it all happened or whether any of the airmen survived.

When I was six I caught pneumonia and was rushed into the small local hospital just down the road from where we lived. At night my fellow patients were put under the bed for some protection in the case of a direct hit, except for myself, who was considered too ill and had to remain in the bed. I am sure my overriding sense of vulnerability in this situation did not aid my recovery at all.

Such was life in those unpredictable times, the memories of which will always be with me.

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