大象传媒

Before I start my story I would like to say that I shall be talking quite a lot about my dear husband who passed away 3rd August 2003 after quite a few illnesses.

MY STORY OF MY YOUNG LIFE

I was born in Guernsey 30 November 1925. When the Germans had taken France the Guernsey States ordered women and children to be evacuated to the United Kingdom. I was evacuated when I was 14 years old, along with my sister who had one child of 3 years and was expecting another, so my parents said I had to go with her. We all had labels put on us with names and ages on. We were flocked to the White Rock where it was absolutely terrible. Parents, children, babies all crying and clinging to our parents saying we didn鈥檛 want to go. Once I was on the boat, I just looked at my Mum and Dad and two brothers waving and crying. My Mother was crying out 鈥淲e will be on the next boat鈥� but I knew in my mind that they wouldn鈥檛, because I heard someone shouting 鈥淭his is the last boat鈥�. We were due to arrive in Weymouth in the middle of the night. We were like animals, finding anywhere to sit. I remember it was bright moonlight and the sea was black and horrible. We saw some things floating and we couldn鈥檛 make out what they were and someone told us the ship before ours had been torpedoed and that it was bodies with life jackets around their necks.

We arrived on the docks and were put in buses to I don鈥檛 know where. We arrived at a station and put on trains. MY dear sister looked so pitiful I tried my hardest to comfort her and my little niece Margaret, we cried together most of the time. We finally sat on the train together. After about half an hour the man came around taking the bulbs out of the lights, all the women with screaming children were shouting at him 鈥淲hat are you doing, we are trying to comfort the children and babies鈥�. He said he was told to do it because there were German planes about and they were following the trains. Sure enough I pulled the black blind away a little from the window and I could see the explosions. I don鈥檛 know what or where they were going, but we were so frightened. Eventually we arrived at another railway station, put in buses and taken to a very large schoolroom, full of hundreds of beds, all next to each other. At least we were warm and we were fed. My dear sister was in a poor state and crying for her husband. A few days later a lady helper came to my sister and said 鈥淚 have a surprise for you鈥�, and in walked my brother in law in army uniform. They also evacuated men from Guernsey who were military age and put them in the 3 forces. My brother in law was in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers with the black flash on his back collar. We spent some nice comforting hours together. He then told us he was posted to Bangor in North Wales. He went down by train and knocked on peoples doors asking them if we could be billeted with them. The people were very kind and took us in. One room had one hot plate to cook on, table, 4 chairs, one sofa and 2 bedrooms for four of us.

I found a job in a cake shop, also doing housework in the flat upstairs, but I felt so unhappy because they all spoke welsh, I always thought they were talking about me, but after a while they spoke English. I went to the cinema one night on my own and a land mine landed quite a way from the cinema, when the sirens went off I ran all the way home because my sister was frightened on her own. The next morning we went to see the damage to all the houses and there was even a person鈥檚 leg on one roof and an arm near the gate, it was awful. I picked up some pieces of shrapnel without the policeman seeing me. I carried them in my handbag for years, but I don鈥檛 know where they are today.

While in Bangor I went to see 大象传媒 鈥楶enny on the Drum鈥� and other things. Billy Ternent and his band lived on the same road as us and we urged my niece to go up to Ron Arnold (I think that鈥檚 his name) to ask him for his autograph. He stood in the street and looked down at her and drew her picture on a small piece of paper and it was lovely, just like a real artist. I didn鈥檛 know him all that well, maybe he was an artist as well as an actor on t.v.

I got friendly with a nice girl who鈥檚 father was a caretaker to the big shipyard in Bangor and we also met a couple of nice navel cadets from a ship anchored in the Menai Straights, we were friends but like everyone else, they all moved on to farther waters.

A while after that my brother in law was invalided out of the army, so he enquired about work. There was nothing in Bangor, so he went up to Manchester on his own to look for work and somewhere for us to live. Again, he knocked on peoples doors asking about rooms to let and we were lucky enough to hear of this woman who already had Canadian Airmen billeted on her, she had a large house, four storeys, so we went by train up to Manchester to live with strangers again, but I did have a room to myself. My sister, brother in law and two children slept and ate all in one room.

We had a lot of air raids, we would run to the shelter, shrapnel making pinging noises on the roofs and the wardens shouting 鈥淕et under cover鈥�. When we came out of the shelter all the shops were bombed to the ground. Vegetables, fruit, clothes etc., laying all over the pavements and you just walk over the things. We would not dream of picking any up to take home.

My brother in law found a job for both of us at Fairies Aviation Factory at Heaton Moor; I am not sure exactly where it was. We then found a house that was empty in Cale Green, Stockport. I did stay in Manchester a bit longer because that is where I met my husband. He was a Crewe man and worked in the foundry in Crewe, but they sent him to work at Whalley Range. As a coincidence, he came to live in the same house as I lived in, because the house belonged to his Auntie, so he also lived there. We started courting and got engaged. He decided to join the RAF so I finally went to live with my sister in Stockport. He trained as an air gunner and we decided to get married. We had been married about 6 months when he was shot down over Stuttgart and I found I was two months pregnant. My sister and I were sitting listening to the radio one night and Lord Haw Haw came on and said that they have more RAF men captured and he named my husband Sergeant Lawrence Naylor and some of his crew. I had a telegram the next day to say he had been reported missing over Germany and I was not to speak to the newspapers. The priest came to see me and said to make up warm clothes for him. I had a message from him to say he was in Stalag Luft VII. I wrote to him everyday but the guards in the prison camp never gave them their mail. In all that time I had a baby boy, which he didn鈥檛 know. One night, nearly a year later, I was putting the baby to bed and I heard a noise at the window. I looked down and there was this very handsome man (my husband), looking up, so I picked the baby out of the cot and ran down to open the door. He just looked at the baby and cried. He told us all his experiences of the prison camp. One of my sons has his log book with some of the experiences he had.
One night a bloke got out of the camp and came back with a black thing under his arm, he told the others to get a fire going, he said it was a rabbit. My husband said it was the first time he had seen a rabbit with a long black tail, it was a cat, but they still ate it.

He said that they woke up one morning and the camp was deserted, no guards anywhere. The Germans had heard that the Russians were advancing and they all left. Larry and his mates said they would swim the River Elbe, until they saw the size of it. They met some Russians who nearly shot them. He has photo鈥檚 with the Russians. After a few years he came out of the RAF as Warrant Officer. He tried to settle down in Guernsey, but in the end went back into the RAF. We had a lovely life, 3 years in EL Adem, Tobruk, 3 years Germany, 3 years Cyprus. He applied to go on the Kings Flight at RAF Benson. He was accepted, so we were posted to Benson. He flew with the Royal Family for 5 years. He was with the Queen in Nigeria when her father died and she had to fly back, of course she was Princess Elizabeth then.

He loved flying with the Queen Mother; she always gave him her bouquets to give to me with her compliments. He was a steward and prepared and served all the meals. One time he did some tomato soup for Prince Philip when they were going to the Canary Islands to the floods. Larry put some cream in the tomato soup and it all curdled on the top of the soup, he said it looked awful and he thought I can鈥檛 serve him that! But he thought 鈥極h well, here goes鈥�. He put the soup in front of the Prince and quickly walked away. A little while later, the bell went for the royal lounge, so he thought 鈥楴ow I鈥檓 in for it鈥�. When he got there the Prince looked up and said 鈥淪teward, that soup鈥�..it was really nice could I have some more鈥� Larry was very relieved. He always said he really enjoyed his time with the King and Queens Flight, everyone of them was so nice. They always asked him how I was.

After our time in the RAF we came to live in Crewe. In all those years we had 8 children, 4 boys and 4 girls. It would have been our 60 year wedding anniversary in March 2004, but we had a wonderful life with wonderful children. I could write about the family forever.

I haven鈥檛 yet mentioned the Germans in Guernsey. My Dad had a lot of greenhouses and they used to lay in bed listening to the Germans breaking into the greenhouses to steal the fruit and veg. They were hungry troops as well as the Guernsey people. My Mother used to see 14 year old Germans in uniform hiding by the dustbins waiting to pick the food. My Dad got someone from the flour mill to give them some flour for my mother to make some bread, so my dad told my brother to go at 3 O鈥機lock in the morning to get this flour. 2 German soldiers stopped him to ask for his pass, so he took the carbide lamp off the bicycle and told the German to hold it while he looked for his pass, of course the lamp was red hot and it burned the German soldier鈥檚 hand, so he dropped it on the road and my brother got on his bike and peddled like hell! The Germans came to the house one day to search for radios (crystal sets they were). My brother had one behind the curtain but Thank God they didn鈥檛 find it. One of the Germans took his binoculars off his shoulder and put them down on my mothers table, then he lit a cigarette. He asked my dad to show him the greenhouses and while he was gone my brother hid these beautiful binoculars and when the German officer came back he said to my mum (making signs with his hands) about the binoculars. She looked dumb and said 鈥淣o, no, not here鈥�. He looked around and then left. My brother still has those binoculars.

Well, you can tell I am sitting here alone. I miss my husband very much, but, Thank God I have two daughters living in Crewe, one daughter in Telford, two sons living in Spain, one runs a radio station in Benalmadena, one son who is Mess Manager W/O Sgt Mess at Dhekalia Garrison in Cyprus and one son in Plastic Moulding in County Durham. So I Thank God for children. I love them so much. I sincerely hope that this is not too boring.

FORGOTTEN THINGS JUST REMEMBERED

When I was working as a machinist on Capstan Machines and B.O. Machines at Fairies Aviation we worked 8pm to 8am. There was usually air raids, as soon as we saw the red lights flashing we knew the sirens was going, you could not hear anything only machinery. We would run to the shelters which were underground in the fields at the back. It was good to watch all the search lights in the sky focusing on the German planes. We did see one plane caught in a barrage balloon, that was horrible.

In the factory we had a Barracuda Aircraft in the hangar and we were able to go and people would show us the parts we made and where they were in the plane, quite interesting. I remember Lord George came around and spoke to us. I didn鈥檛 know who he was and I still don鈥檛 know. I left the factory to have my baby.

One afternoon I decided to go to the cinema up the road. There was a little sweet shop next to the cinema, so I went in and handed the man my ration book, he looked at it and said 鈥淵ou have used all your sweet coupons鈥� (which I knew), so I looked so sad and said 鈥淥oh have I鈥� and he grinned and said 鈥淥h go on, I鈥檒l give you a bag full, I can鈥檛 see you craving for sweets in that state鈥�.

When we lived in Manchester, one day the air raid had started and we were going to the shelter, but we heard this awful noise and looked out of the window and couldn鈥檛 believe our eyes. A German fighter flew down the street, with his guns going. He was so low we thought he would crash, it frightened us to death. The same evening the siren started again and I said to my husband 鈥渃ome to the shelter鈥�, he said 鈥淣o, if I鈥檓 going to die, I鈥檒l die in my bed. We all ran to the shelter, snow on the ground, freezing cold and when I came back later, my husband looked up from the bed covers and said 鈥淵ou see, you could have stayed in the warm鈥�.

When we lived in Stockport the snow was very deep. About 3 days before Christmas day we had a very bad air raid. I was 8 months pregnant, my sister ran down the stairs and I followed her and I ran to the front door, as I opened it and looked out, a flying bomb was just passing on with the flame coming out of the back making a terrible noise. Then the noise stopped and it nose dived straight down. Our hair stood up on end and the glass from the door fell on our shoulders from the explosion. We stayed in the shelter till morning and my sister said that she was going to give my two nieces their Christmas presents. I asked why and she said 鈥淚鈥檒l bet we鈥檒l be dead by Christmas day, they might as well enjoy them now鈥�. We had to have candles in every room for weeks. Men came around to board up all the windows and I shall never forget that when we looked in the bathroom, there was a massive piece of glass from the window stuck in the wall opposite the window. If anyone had been in there they would have had their neck cut off.

My son who lives in Cyprus working for the MOD has my husbands log books, very interesting.

All these memories are still real to me, but you will probably find them boring because I know a lot of people have more exciting stories than mine.

Cheers and good luck

P Naylor

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