大象传媒

I was at Primary School during the war. My memories include waking up instantly to the menacing hum of the German bombers flying overhead, then being hurried downstairs. My father had built an air raid shelter in the garden, but it continually filled with water so we never used it. Instead, during the air raid my mother and I huddled into the cupboard under the stairs where brooms and polishes etc. were kept. We were often joined by the elderly lady who lived next door whose teeth chattered with fear. Her equally elderly husband was our Air Raid Warden and my father was a Special Constable, and they kept watch outside. I can only remember one bomb landing anywhere near us (about a mile away), but the house shook and the windows rattled. At that time my father was secretary of the Taunton and District Homing Society, and our pigeons were on active service, being used to bring messages from Europe. As a result we had a telephone (very unusual in those days) and maps on the walls complete with coloured pins. I remember the dispatch riders who stayed with us waiting to gather the message carriers from the birds as they arrived and tearing off on their motor-bikes with the coded messages which were written on rice paper. When the Americans arrived we were visited by one or two of them who were interested in the pigeons. I was interested in the chocolate bars they brought with them! We had evacuees from London for a while staying with us, but they were very homesick and decided to return to the East End.
Food rationing forced my mother to be inventive. She would save up sugar etc. and use fresh pigeons' eggs to make little cakes, she mashed up parsnips and added flavouring to make "banana" sandwiches and young dandelions were added to salads. We also went out into the countryside picking watercress, blackberries, mushrooms and nuts etc. to help supplement our diet. We used to cycle into town and queue up at the W.I. shop each week to buy fruit and vegetables, and it is interesting to note that the shop is still operating in the same place, and I still buy from it. My mother and I would also queue up for a tin of fruit (one each) when the grocer had a delivery, and I think my fondest memory is when, just after the war had ended, we were able to buy the first sugar-coated jam doughnuts I had ever tasted - absolute bliss!

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