大象传媒

ERIC PYKE

When the war started in 1939 I was 9 years old and attended Carr Hill School, Gateshead. My sister and I, together with the rest of Carr Hill School were evacuated to St Helens, near Bishop Auckland. We were taken by bus to Gateshead West Station, where we boarded a train to Bishop Auckland and then a bus to the school at St Helens. I remember sitting in the school assembly hall, with my haversack and a label tied through the button-hole on my overcoat.

After a while it was our turn to be taken out of the hall, to what we hadn鈥檛 a clue 鈥� but we (Beryl and I) were taken and billeted with Mr and Mrs Wilkinson at 1 North View. Reg Wilkinson was the son of a butcher and he had a small farm.

We attended school only 陆 a day, mornings one week afternoons the next. When we were off school our teachers would take us on nature walks, unless we could help the people we were staying with. I would spend quite a lot of time at the farm which was away from the house, or at Mr Wilkinson senior鈥檚 butcher鈥檚 shop. All in all we had a very pleasant stay at St Helens, but it only lasted 6 or 7 weeks, when my parents brought me back home, but we always kept in contact with Milly and Reg Wilkinson, and even after the war I continued to visit them.

On returning to Carr Hill School, I found the lower level had been converted into an emergency hospital in readiness for the expected mass bombing of Tyneside.

The open verandas were all protected by sandbags as were the windows, and the junior and senior boys were transferred to Shipcote School where 陆 day schooling was the order of the day 鈥� mornings one week afternoons the next.

I lived at 25 The Avenue, Sheriff Hill and my best pal Fred Brown lived in Springfield Place just behind St John鈥檚 Church Hall.

It was a short time after the fall of France, and it was not unusual to see planes of other nations, France etc., with the national markings still showing. One lunch-time Fred and I had walked up from school, and were standing at the junction of The Avenue and Old Durham Road when our attention was drawn to a plane with French markings circulating overhead and diving down towards the High Level Bridge from the North. It made about three passes, and on the fourth, as it dived, we saw an object fall, then a loud explosion. It had been a bomb, the plane then took off East towards the coast.

The 鈥淔rench鈥� aircraft had been aiming for the largest railway crossing in Britain or the High Level Bridge, but in either case he missed. The bomb fell just West of the High Level Bridge by 鈥淭he Close鈥�. I believe a flour mill was hit.

Within a very short time, the anti aircraft guns guarding the shipyards started firing, the air raid sirens started up and 鈥淏ig Bertha鈥� , the anti aircraft gun situated at Lobley Hill started to fire 鈥� it was the one that rattled the windows whenever it was fired. The plane was shot down just after it passed over the coast at South Shields, I believe by 鈥淏ig Bertha鈥�.

What I failed to mention was that as soon as the bomb exploded, 2 young lads made a very hasty retreat for home.

By this time the L.D.V. (Local Defence Volunteers) were formed, (later to become the Home Guard). Having a bicycle I became a messenger for the street wardens with the headquarters for the area being at Carr Hill School. We held regular practices on a Sunday morning. The wardens had to extinguish incendiary bombs and my job was to report damage, and deliver requests for more assistance.

Apart from the air-raids (when bombs fell on the Sunderland Road area and Saltwell Park areas), and the collecting of pieces of shrapnel from bombs and anti aircraft shells, not much more of interest happened to me for the duration of hostilities.

I also remember during the early days of the war, when the whole school (Carr Hill) were taken onto the 鈥淏anky Fields鈥� - the area on the North side of Elgin Road, later the site of Elgin Senior High School, where we were able to see the launching of the battleship 鈥淕eorge VI鈥� into the Tyne at Walker. Everyone cheered and waved flags.

My mother鈥檚 sister, Nellie Wanless lived in Merriden, Western Australia, together with her husband John and two sons, George and James. George joined the Australian Army and Jim the Australian Air Force, on the outbreak of war.

George was soon drafter on a troopship for England and as they were not allowed to divulge their destination by name, (for security reasons) George had written home and said he would pass on his parents compliments to his aunt and uncle when he landed, which of course disclosed his destination to them. George would only be 19 at that time.

The Australian Expeditionary Force (AEF) docked at Liverpool, and those with relatives in Britain were given immediate leave.

George arrived at our house, I remember him well, a very suntanned man and as wild as anyone could be straight out of the 鈥淎ustralian Bush鈥� 鈥� almost an 鈥渁borigine鈥�. He didn鈥檛 stay with us for long, I was 10 and my sister 8.

His father鈥檚 sister lived in Benwell, Newcastle, and she had two daughters, one aged about 19, hence the move to Benwell. They had a Fish and Chip shop, which oddly enough my brother-in-law bought many years later.

While at Benwell George got caught taking apples off the local vicar鈥檚 tree. The police were called and he was arrested at the police station. He tried to explain in Australia it wasn鈥檛 an offence to take apples or grapes etc, but I think in the interest of Anglo-Australian relations the matter was dropped and George apologised to the vicar.

A few days after this incident a telegram arrived ordering him to report back to Liverpool immediately, it was the temporary end of the war in France and the Dunkirk evacuation.

The AEF embarked and were shipped to Egypt via Cape Town. I never saw him again, he survived the war and died in 1991 six years before I visited Australia in 1997 and met my cousin Jim for the first time.

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