大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War web site by Karen Elmes at the Building Exploratory on behalf of Irene Watson and has been added to the site with her permission. She fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

At the beginning of the war Irene was living with her family in Cresset Road. She was 16 years old when the war started. Her mother died just before the Blitz started, leaving behind 10 children.

Irene and her family had to move a lot during the war. She recalls an incident when an unexploded bomb had dropped near to her house in Cresset Road. They thought that their house would not be harmed as the bomb had not exploded and Irene nearly went back in to check on the dinner she was cooking. Luckily her young neighbour felt frightened, so instead the two of them went down into their Anderson shelter to play with some games and books they had down there. While they were in the shelter the bomb exploded destroying their house, so Irene had a lucky escape. Irene and her family went to shelter at a school for a few days, and then went on to Paragon Road:

鈥淢y dad found a place in Paragon Rd, and we went to Paragon Rd, and after three days a land mine dropped outside the road.鈥�

After this house was destroyed Irene鈥檚 father decided to move the family away from London to Aldershot, where they stayed for 2 years. Eventually he thought it would be safe to come back and so they moved into a house on Midhurst Road, near Downs Park. This was when the rockets started to come:

鈥淲e were coming home from work, my three sisters. One of them was getting married - my Vera, and she鈥檇 taken Joyce, the youngest, the baby of the family with her to try her wedding dress on. We cut across the Downs, and I looked at my sister and we ran, don鈥檛 ask me why, but we ran, and we just got to the front doors and the rocket came down on the Downs and it took the bay off the front of the house鈥�.

After this house was damaged they moved to Oakfield Road, which was very nearby so they were able to carry the furniture from one house to the other. While they were living in the area Irene and her family used to shelter on Downs Park:

鈥淭here was the shelter on the Downs. My younger sister would give us our blanket and our pillow and our sandwiches. We鈥檇 just change and we went down the shelter, at six o鈥� clock at night. We stayed there till six in morning. We would get up and have a look out. When you came out of the shelter you鈥檇 check the house was still standing. Then you鈥檇 go home, wash, change your clothes and go off to work.鈥�

This story was recorded by the Building Exploratory as part of a World War Two reminiscence project called Memory Blitz. To find out more please go to ^{About links}

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