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This story was added a csv volunteer at Radio Bristol on behalf of Josephine Clements.

I was five and half years old when war was declared, not having long started school. My earliest memory of this occasion was an Anderson shelter being delivered to our house which had to be erected by my father. However my father was in no way a handy man, remember the neighbours all getting together and eventually erecting each others shelter’s together which I think was good team work in times of distress and sorrow.

We very rarely used ours as my dad used to do shift work at Avonmouth docks and my mother wouldn’t go down the shelter on her own with us children.

Mother would make up beds for us under the stairs which of course we thought was great fun. We were issued with gas masks and the teacher at my school used to have gas mask practice, it meant every morning we had to put our masks on for 10 minutes, this I hated and was very thankful we never had to make use of them.

In school our shelters were in the playground, when the sirens went we had to parade with class to shelters where our names were read out and checked off the register to make sure that everyone was present. I can remember having lovely sing songs which settled most of us youngsters who were scared, especially of the sound of the sirens.

As time went on evacuation came in, fortunately my parents refused to let my brother and myself go, many of my school friends went, in later years some of the children told us stories, some good some unpleasant, but I know I was very glad to have stayed at home.

We did have a bomb drop very close to us in Toronto Road in Horfield, my dad and a neighbour were on fire watch that evening. Dad — Fred Hazel and Mr Clark — had the unpleasant task of helping these poor people out of their ruined homes, unfortunately one man lost his life. Several children and I attended school with either lost their fathers or they were taken POW, sadly I remember having say morning prayers for the families, this of course was later on in the war. It was dreadful what these children had to endure.

As war progressed on, things obviously took a turn for the worse, my mother like most women had to make curtains out of black material to keep all the lights from showing at night, I didn’t like this especially when I had to go to bed, but mum always put little night lights in a saucer of water to help us not be afraid of the dark.

Having lived not far from Filton aerodrome we could hear the German air craft coming over our house, sadly an air shelter was hit near the aerodrome and many people lost their lives. I thank all those men and women who fought and also gave their lives for us and I’m very fortunate to be here today.

Food as we all know was on ration, I can remember mum whipping our butter and marg together to make it go further. All our fruit and veg was grown in our back garden. My father bred rabbits for meat, but us children couldn’t understand my dad, he served 12 years in the forces but no way could he kill a rabbit. A neighbour had to do it for him.

This is just a few of my memories of the war; once again I thank all those people who fought in the war as I’m able to enjoy my freedom today.

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