大象传媒

War was declared on the 3rd of September, 1939 and I was 14 on the 25th of Sept, 1939 and shortly after the Prime Minister made the announcement, the air raid siren sounded and a policeman was running along the road blowing his whistle and putting his tin hat on. It was a false alarm but that was the start of a very long war! By May 1940 we had very tired servicemen arriving in Blaydon from Dunkirk. They were lying around the streets until billets were found for them. It was a very bad time for the U.K. Later on we had the Royal Fusiliers (a London Regiment) stationed in Blaydon then, when they left, we had the Border Regiment - some great friendships were formed - and even some weddings! Things were quiet at home but London was being bombed as well as Coventry and other places and the boys & girls were fighting in North Africa. We had the black out, which was awfull and food rationing (mind you dried egg made lovely omelettes). My Mam had a sweetshop + on a Sunday we had to count lots of sweet coupons so that she could take them to the 'Food Office' to exchange them for vouchers to buy more sweets for the shop. Can you imagine just being able to buy 2ozs (sometimes 4 ozs) of sweets a week?

Then the war came to Blaydon-in the night we were bombed. - We were at the pictures at the Plaza when the air-raid sirens went off and normally we came out and went to the shelter, but it was near the end of the film so we decided to stay in and what a good job we did because we would have been walking up the hill directly between the two bombs that were dropped and I probably wouldn't have been writing this! There were six people killed that night, so it was a bad and sad night for Blaydon.

By this time I had a boy friend who was a paratrooper in the 6th Airborne Division. They dropped the night before D-Day (Pegasus Bridge) then they were taken into the Ardennes on Christmas Day 1944 and then they were dropped over the Rhine so that was a worrying time for me. However 8th May 1945 eventually came and the war in Europe was over but the people who had loved ones in the Far East had to wait another three months before their war was over. My boy friend and I got married in November 1944 & this year would have been our Diamond Wedding (60 years) unfortuanetely he is no longer with me. Yes it was a long war.

As related to Steve Lamb - Gateshead Council @ Blaydon

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