大象传媒

Sometime during the early part of the war, on a Saturday, my younger sister and I wanted to see a film but my mother and father felt it was too risky. However, we managed to persuade them and off we went to the afternoon matinee ,I forget the film. We returned home that evening, and as we neared the corner of the road we could see smoke and flames, and fire engines lining the street. All that was left of our home was a smoking heap. The feeling is indescribable really, but seeing everything on top of everything else made us numb at first. It was so hard to register what we were seeing and even harder to believe our lucky escape. We soon had to consider the practicalities; it was winter- where were we going to sleep? We had no clothes- what could we do? We had no way even of washing ourselves. And where would we eat? However, the local fire wardens bundled us into a car and took us down to the cellar of a large, fairly closeby shop, and there on the floor were four matresses. This, then was how we would live for several nights to come. Fortunately, a distant relative turned up who let us sleep in his cellar until more permanent accommodation could be found. They eventually found us an empty house in Sydenham, South East London, and within a comparatively short time we had thankfully moved in, and the bare necessities- clothes, household equipment etc. had been provided. Looking back, my sister and I are thankful that we had all gone to the cinema!

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.