大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Mairi Campbell of the 大象传媒 on behalf of Ellen, of Renfrew and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully undertands the site's terms and conditions.

My father ran a hairdressing shop in Moorpark. When the war started and the staff left to join up or were called up, we were left with one man who was unfit for call up but nevertheless was called up later towards the end of the war to work in a munitions factory, and a retired hairdresser who had been injured in the First World War. My dad served with the Auxiliary Fire Service and was later called up to the Royal Artillery leaving my mum to run the shop. In 1941 my mum took pleurisy and I got exemption from my final three months at school to leave and help with the shop. During the war we had a battalion of Sherwood Forresters camped in the local school, who were followed by the Marines and then the Royal Army Service Corp (or the 鈥渟kirt-chasers鈥� as we called them!) personnel. Shop life continued pretty much as normal during the war. At night the men who worked in Babcocks but lived out with town, would pop in and let me know they would be in early the next morning for a haircut and I would open up at 8am. There was never any bother, no swearing and no hassle. The only problem was if there was a power cut someone had to hold up the lantern while you used the hand clippers to cut the hair.

One night during an air raid, my mum and I and our neighbour with her children were all camped out in the close when a land mine landed in Mitchell Avenue. We all got such a fright. Our neighbour鈥檚 mum said she could do with a cup of tea and so my mum made the tea and the neighbours son ran into there house quickly and picked up the jug of milk from the table and we all had tea while we waited for the all clear to sound. The next day my mums neighbour told us that the nearby landmine had shaken the tenement so badly that soot had fallen down the chimney and covered her room 鈥� including the table where the milk had been standing! The milk was sooty but nobody had noticed during the blackout because we were all so shaken with fright. We survived though!

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