大象传媒

I was two years old at the start of the war and I can remember two strangers arriving at my home to take up residence at our home, Bill Angel and Marjorie (we called her Angel!) Bill was stationed at Old Sarum with the RAF. They stayed with us for about 18 months, I dont know where, until he was posted. 'Angel' went back to her home town of Dorchester to stay with her parents for the duration of the war. We kept in touch with them until their deaths quite recently.

My next memory, I was now about 3 or 4, is of my dad and a Mr Lowe, our next door neighbour, digging a huge whole outside of both properties in the lane for the Anderson shelter. This was then covered with the remaining soil from the hole and then covered in grass. It had a ladder with about six steps which in heavy rain we trod down into water. Dad and Mr Lowe built bunk beds, and we had an oil lamp for lighting. Matches were kept in a tin to keep them dry and there was also a box of biscuits, when available, to hand. Bedding was taken down with us when there was an air raid warning.

I was about 5 or 6 when this event happened. Our house laid in a dip overlooking Fisherton Meadows and at the top of the hill was Nestle's milk factory. It was in line with Salisbury cathedral. This german aircraft flew so low over our house my brother Bob and I were in the garden and my mother was in the back doorway and we could see everything about the plane and pilot (black goggles and helmut, swastika and all the markings. We had rabbits in hutches, for the war effort, and my mother screamed for me to get under the hutches whilst I am waving to the pilot! Bob grabbed my legs pulling me under the hutches amongst all the rabbit droppings and I was not amused!

As we had the rabbits my brother and I used to go up the avenue in Devizes Road to collect the leaves for bedding and every so many weeks our Saturday job was to take the rabbits in a special little cart and wheel them to a Mrs Moore whose house was on the Newbridge Road tobe killed for food.

Still aged 5/6 I remember having evacuees from Portsmouth. We slept six to the bed, three top, three at the bottom. They did not know how to use a knife or fork and they carved our chairs with a knife!

Going to school I can remember taking a little pink cushion and a gas mask. We were led from the school to the field where the air raid shelters were, sitting on a bench and singing nursery rhymes.Being given an injection for diptheria and my brother giving me a farthing not to cry.

At this time I met my first coloured friend who was billeted in the paddock behind Tedworth House in Tidworth, this was adjoining my aunts home, Mrs Corbett. My abiding memory is of a cup of hot chocolate made with grated chocolate and milk which he made for us and his nickname was of course 'Darky'!

Aged 6/7 I remember the gas works which we could see from our lane and air raid entrance, the fire of the gasometer being hit and the flames which could be seen clearly from there.

Aged 7 I can remember going to Tidworth and at Shipton Bellinger seeing tanks, lorries and a variety of other vehicles covering the hillside in readiness for D-Day. The night before D-Day my dad collected Bob (my brother) and ourself and dad saying as we looked out towards Old Sarum where the sky was filled with, as far as the eye could see, aircraft towing gliders and dad saying to us "this is a sight you must never forget as you will never see anything in your lifetime again like this". This has stayed with me all these years!

Some other memories of the lead up to D-Day include my dad bringing home Americans, Canadians and British troops to be fed by mother with whatever was available. A nice cup of tea went down well! One man remains in my memory, name unknown, he was an American and I remember sitting on his knee. My mum had a work basket which was falling to bits and he said to my 'mom' he would bring her a new basket when thewar was over. He never came back and believe he was killed on D-Day. My brother and I on the days leading to D-Day when the transport was moving to Southampton came hour after hour down the Devizes Road and we would sit on the wall at the top of the lane and call out "any gum chum?"! When collected we took the paper wrappers to school and swapped them to see how many different ones we could collect.

Towards the end of the war on a Saturday Bob and I used to leave home at 7am as the gas works opened their gates at 8am and we could buy 28 pounds of coke which was used to 'eek' out the coal ration. I also remember at sometime I lost three ration books! I was not popular at all! I was sent to the Ministry of Food office in Catherine Street to queue up the stairs into a little room to confess what I had done, this was my punishment.

In the Christmas of 1945 we received a parcel from Canada containing food - a ham that had gone rotten, a beautiful doll which my eldest daughter still has! Most memorable was a simple item we take for granted now but it was a balloon! We had three altogether, a blue one for Bob, a green one for me and a red one for my sister Heather. Dad blew these up and mine was tied to the bed rail and it stayed there as pride of joy until it perished!

My last memory was my brother who did a grocery round on a bike. He was given a banana one for each of us three children which were green. Mum said we will put them in a drawer to ripen. By the time we got to look at them they were all black and it was a long time before we tasted another one!

When I was a teenager I learnt from my mum that dad was sent a white feather and a yellow tie. As he was in a reserved occupation repairing and maintaining telephone communications including the lines for D-Day and during the bombing of Southampton (where he was working at that time) he was not required to be in the armed forces. Nevertheless he was in the home guard and he was also a fire watcher guarding the general post office in Salisbury. He was issued with a rifle with one bullet which had to be signed out and back again each shift!

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