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I was 12 years old when the war started on the 3rd of September, 1939, and lived with my Parents and Sister in Runwell, Essex.

Our side of the Church was considered a safe area, (because our side was Chelmsford Rural district and the other side was Billericay) so we were not issued with an ‘Anderson’ Air Raid shelter. These were reinforced corrugated iron shelters set about 4 foot into the ground. The top was covered with more soil for added protection ad some people grew plants on top for camouflage. Deck chairs were used to sit in, but the shelters were very cold and a lot got water in when it rained.

At the outbreak of war, all Government offices, banks and important buildings had piles of sandbags outside for protection and blast walls were built in front of doors.

War was declared on Sunday and as soon as it got dark, the first air-raid siren sounded. A neighbour had told my Sister and I so many dreadful tales about how Hitler was going to use poisonous gas on us, that we put our gas masks on and would not take them off again until after the ‘All Clear’ went. The warning proved to be a false alarm.

As we had no air raid shelter, our beds were raised up on bricks, with another mattress on the floor. When the raids got bad, we went under our beds, hoping the upper mattress etc. would protect us from any debris.

When the war first started we did not return to school for the Autumn term, as there were no shelters, so we did not go back until around Christmas. There were still no shelters, so we had to go to various parts of the school when the sirens went, as far away from windows as possible. The windows were all covered in a very fine sticky net to stop glass from flying if a bomb came too close. My class had to go to the girls’ cloakroom when the siren went.

When we first returned to school, the local children went on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The children who came by the school buses came on Tuesday and Thursday. Then the next week we changed days.

We all had to stay for dinner as we only had half an hour. The dinners cost 4d a day or 1/6d if we paid for the week, (This was in old money)

School finished at 2p.m. so we could all get home before the ‘Black Out’ and before the raids started. We could always tell when we were going to get a raid, as the radio went silent. There was no television in those days!

We did finally get shelters at School. They were built out on the playing field; five for the girls and five for the boys. They had no lights in them, so we spent hours sitting in the dark singing songs.

All the male teachers were called-up for National Service. One lady teacher, called Miss Freitog, was interned because of her German connections. (Many doctors and staff at Runwell Hospital were also interned for the same reason)

Children from the Southend area and inland as far as Rawreth were mostly evacuated. Many houses stood empty, especially around the Airport. Police were on duty at all railway stations and turned people back who wanted to go into the Southend area, unless they worked there, or had a good excuse for going there.

Barrage balloons were attached by long wires to boats off Southend and when a raid was expected they went up very high, so that shipping could not be bombed. If the planes came in low, they would have got caught up in the balloon wires. London and many aerodromes also had barrage balloons.

There were huge coils of barbed wire all along the seafront, so we could not go on the beach throughout the war.

Tank traps were built on some roads. They were usually at the bottom of hills or around sharp bends. There were two or three rows of them staggered across half of the road, so as to let cars through, and others were nearby ready to be dragged into place and bolted into position when necessary. They were made out of reinforced concrete and looked like huge sand pies.

Every house was issued with leaflets telling us how we could put a tank out of action. One method was to wedge big logs into the tracks. All of us kids thought we were going to wipe out the whole German tank force on our own!

There were no lights anywhere after dark. All windows had to be blacked out with heavy curtains and if we wanted to go outside, we had to make sure no light showed when the door was opened or the Wardens would be after us!

Torches had to have a thin layer of tissue paper on the inside of the glass so there was nota bright beam. Batteries for the torches were very hard to get. Trains and buses had dark blue bulbs inside, which made it quite impossible to see if anyone was sitting in the seat. So quite often we sat down on somebody, or they sat on us, or we fell over each other’s feet. Car headlights (for those allowed to use their car) had hoods over them with 3 or 4 horizontal slots in the mask, so the light was kept down on the road and would not be seen from the air. All road signs and sign posts were taken down in case of invasion, and all railings were taken from the parks or gardens and were melted down for munitions. All paper, rags, bottles and bones were collected and recycled. Sometimes a mobile unit would come to the school to show us how everything was used. The bones were used to make glue, much toall of the dogs’ disgust!

After France fell, the air raids were non-stop. At one time we did not go to bed properly for three months. We used to change into anew set of warm clothes, lay on top of our beds, then dive underneath when things go too ‘hot’. Sometimes the sky would be full of searchlights and when they caught a plane, all the anti-aircraft guns started to fire at it.

At our home in Runwell we had a very long garden. The furthest part was like a little copse, with small oak and hawthorn trees. One afternoon a group of soldiers marched up the garden and set-up a machine gun nest, then went away as secretly as they arrived.

One of our friends was still able to use her car, so when a plane was shot down, she, her son and I would pile into it and go to see the wreckage. There were always soldiers on guard, but they used to let us have little pieces of the plane for a souvenir. I had quite a collection — little pieces of Dorniers, Heinkels and Messerschmidts!

No church bells were allowed to be rung during the war. They were only to be used to warn us that the invasion had started.

As the bombing raids slowed down, the V.1.’s or flying bombs started. (The Americans called them ’Doodlebugs’.) I did not mind these so much, as they made such a noise and as they had flames coming out at the back of them. We could always hear and see them coming, day or night. The only trouble was once the engine stopped, they nosedived straight down, so when that happened, we all threw ourselves on the ground and covered our heads. These bombs caused an awful lot of damage. They were aimed at London, but sometimes they ran out of fuel too soon, so we never knew where they would come down.

Later came the V.2.’s. They were huge rockets which travelled so high they could not be seen or heard (these were really the first space rockets) When they exploded, they flattened vast areas of property. We had only one V.2. rocket in Runwell, and fortunately it landed in a ploughed field and went so deep it did not do any damage. This was when we were issued with an indoor ‘Morrison’ shelter. It was like a huge iron table made of iron, with very strong metal mesh sides, and it nearly filled the room! We all slept in this and when inside, the mesh side came down to keep away any debris away from us. We slept in this shelter right up to the time peace was declared. As we had been lucky so far, we did not want to try our luck by not using the shelter.

Throughout the war we were rationed with food, clothes and coal. Everyone was issued with a ration book; green for children and fawn for adults. We had to register with a butcher for meat and a grocer for everything else. The meat allowance was only a few pence a week per person. Families used to save up their coupons so as to get a small joint about once a month. We also had offal, such as liver, kidneys and sausages. These were very scarce, so the butcher used to serve his customers in alphabetical order so it was often 26 weeks or so before our turn came around. If you have ever watched Dad’s Army on TV you will know how they went on with the rationing — it was very much like real life.

Fish, bread, fruit and vegetables were not rationed, but sometimes in short supply. Nothing was imported, so people grew as much as they could. Flower gardens and lawns were dug up so vegetables could be grown. Some people kept rabbits to supplement their meat ration, while others kept chickens, either to eat or for their eggs. They were allowed a ration of corn for the chickens, but if they had this, they had to forego their egg ration.

Our rations varied. Sometimes we only got 2oz. of butter, 4oz. of margarine, 2oz. cheese, 2oz. cooking fat, 4oz sugar and one egg each a week. Sometimes it was one egg which had to do 2 weeks. Agricultural workers got extra butter and cheese because they had to take sandwiches when working in the fields. We also had 2oz. of tea and 2oz. of bacon a week each. This was the worst period, but our rations improved later. Sweets were rationed; sometimes we had 2oz. a week and later 4oz., but there was not much choice.

Toilet soap and washing powder were also rationed, and people started to use household soda for washing-up, and nearly all ended up with very red, sore hands.

There were no branded labelled goods of any kind. About twice a year, if available, we got a tin of fruit, a small tin of salmon or a tin of instant coffee per family, but not always one of each. These goods came at the end of the war.

Things like rice or custard powder only appeared in the shops once in a blue moon. Horlicks and Ovaltine was reserved for injured soldiers in hospital.

Sometimes we got tins of dried egg (it looked rather like dried milk, only was yellow); it was fine in cooking, but when mixed with a little water and used for scrambled egg, it was revolting! Babies and young children got concentrated orange juice, which was a very dull orange colour. A colour of teaspoons full were added to water. They also had cod liver oil, and both came from the local clinic.

We had to queue for everything. If we saw a queue we joined it, not always knowing what was being sold at the other end! If the queue was very long, we used to think it was something worth waiting for. Quite often when it came to our turn the goods were sold out. As fish was not rationed, it was very hard to get, so the fish shops only opened once or twice a week. When they started to fry, people came from everywhere.

In the towns they had ‘British Restaurants’. They served hot lunches for workers and were very cheap, so the people who could get to them saved on their rations.

We got 20 coupons every six months for clothes. If I remember rightly, a dress was 7 coupons, a coat half lined was 15, or if fully lined 18, a pair of shoes 7, 1 pair of stockings 1 ½, a pair of knickers 3. A man’s suit was 26, so he had to wait for the second issue of 20 coupons before he could buy one.

All dress material, knitting wool and household things like sheets also required coupons. In the markets sometimes we could buy linen-type sacks that had contained flour. These were opened out, bleached and then made into tablecloths, etc. Sometimes we could get panels from parachutes. These were like silk and could be made into underwear.

Because we children were still growing, we would have a frill sown onto the bottom of a dress to make it longer. Perhaps two dresses would be taken to pieces and the good material was used to make another one. Then if the elbows of hand knitted jumpers got thin, the garment was unpicked and the wool was used for something else. This was called make-do-and-mend. We tried to wear things that matched colourwise, but it was very difficult. (I think that is why I hate so many of today’s fashions - people look as if they have been to their wardrobes in the dark and put on whatever they got hold of, regardless of shape or colour!)

In the Autumn we bottled everything we could lay our hands on, in old jam jars. These were then sealed with some sort of wax. Some people made apple rings; they were peeled, cored, cut across and hung up to dry. When they wer needed, they were soaked overnight in water, tehn stewed. They often looked rather brown, but tasted quite good. We were lucky living in the country, as so many people had fruit trees. We were able to buy boxes of apples and pears that would keep throughout the winter.

Men who were not able to go into the Services were formed into the ‘Home Guard’ (Dad’s Army). In 1940 they had a weekend exercise against some of the Army, the Red Cross and Womens’ voluntary Service (WVS) were also involved. The Home Guard were supposed to capture the road bridge and all the kids from the village were hanging over the bridge to see what was going on; a right give away for the enemy! Another time they were all crawling on their tummies, holding their guns in front of them, in a field used for cows. These are the most nosy animals, and they all started following behind. Everytime the men stopped, so did the cows. No shots were fired, I think they just had to say ’Bang, bang, you’re dead’.

Also in 1940 the Germans dropped some land mines. These came down on parachutes and one got entangled in some trees at Wickford, exploded and the blast killed hundreds of chickens at a nearby chicken farm. Everybody in the village had roast chicken that weekend!

My father worked in the Registry Department of the Eastern Division Post office in Whitechapel, next to the London Hospital. He was always on night duty, but they had a very deep underground shelter, so he was able to work right through the ‘Blitz’. Sometimes he came up in the morning after a raid and he had to pick his way through all sorts of debris (the East end was very badly bombed) and he came home looking like a chimney sweep and smelling of smoke.

Tilbury was also very badly bombed and the people were rehoused in the empty houses in our area. After the war there was a lot of trouble when the owners returned and wanted their houses back!

Another thing I have remembered is that the Royal Engineers soldiers built ‘Pill Box’ gun emplacements which are still dotted around the fields. When there are no leaves on the hedges, you can see just how many there are. If we had been invaded, this whole area would have been an enormous battle ground.

Everybody, including all of the children had to carry their gas mask and identity cards with them at all times.

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