大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Pam Vincent of Age Concern Shropshire Telford & Wrekin on behalf of Vivienne Perowne and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

I can remember the day war broke out on Sunday 3 September. I was sat sewing, altering a dress that someone had given me. Being one of 9, we didn鈥檛 have much.

I had 6 brothers in the Forces. One of them was killed abroad in Tel Aviv. His death was an accident. The Jews wouldn鈥檛 give up their arms, so the firing range was got out. The sergeant fired, but the shot ricocheted on a post and then entered my brother鈥檚 chest. My brother was about 21 then. The sergeant was in a terrible way. He came to see my father, who told him to go home and forget about it, as there was nothing that he could have done to prevent it.

I worked at Rotherwas, near Hereford, which was a filling factory, where we worked 3 shifts. I used to travel to work by a train which came from Wales and which picked up at practically every station.

One night when I was on the 2 鈥� 10 shift, I was late getting home. It was about 1 am. Normally I was home at about 11 pm. I had to knock my father up. He wasn鈥檛 pleased and didn鈥檛 speak to me at all. I think he thought I had been up to high jinxes. Someone told him the next day that there had been a cow on the line.

At the filling station I worked with liquid explosive, trinitrate toluene. It discoloured all our clothes and hair. We had a skin inspection every week. I also worked on cordite, which was strands of explosive, all different colours.

We had the one enemy explosion. I was in the canteen at the time. We all had to get under the big table and were sent home early. We also had an explosion within the factory. One of the people who travelled in was killed. They had been mixing something or other, but it was kept very hush-hush.

There were problems with the rations. My mother coped well. She was a wonderful cook. We baked on Sunday mornings for the week. She even made those clear peppermint sweets. We grew all our own vegetables and fruit, as we had a large sized garden.

I had a brother in the Forces in Germany. He was one of the first few into the concentration camps. He had an accident and was under a lorry for several hours. This left him with one leg shorter than the other. He stayed in Germany for a long time after the war. He never did come back home to see us, although we tried to contact him.

Two of my brothers were in the Air Force and 4 were in the Army. The second eldest was on communications in the desert. The youngest put his age on so as he could get into the Paratroopers. He was only 16 but he said he was 19.

I had wanted to go into the Air Force with my friend. Her mother didn鈥檛 want her to go. My father said that as we already had 6 boys from the family involved, wasn鈥檛 that enough. It was true, so I gave up the idea and went to work on the munitions instead.

The night shift was 10 pm to 6 am. We lived 3 minutes from the railway station. Once when I went out, there was such a thick black fog, that I couldn鈥檛 see a thing and I couldn鈥檛 use a torch. The only way to get to the station was to listen for the sound of the trains. It was awfully frightening, but I did manage to get to the station.

I was sent from Herefordshire to work at IMI in Birmingham. Twelve of us went, but I was the only one who stayed.

When we first arrived in Birmingham on 23 May 1943 we were met at the station by the vicar. He said to us: 鈥淚f you don鈥檛 drink, if you don鈥檛 smoke, if you don鈥檛 go out with men, you鈥檒l have a good life.鈥�

I was supposed to stay at a house in Florence Road, Birmingham. When I arrived the lady of the house had changed her mind and didn鈥檛 want to have anybody. However, she did let me stay.

I worked at IMI for 2 years on war work, making bullets and small shells. IMI stood for Imperial Metal Industries. It is ICI now. I met my husband there, one Sunday morning. He was the overseer.

Life was often run-of-the-mill, thank goodness. We just got on with things. What you couldn鈥檛 have, you did without.

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