大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by the Dunstable At War Team on behalf of the author and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

The Second World War was an exciting time for us boys in the village. If truth be told, we would have been disappointed if war hadn鈥檛 been declared, we were really looking forward to it in one sense, although I suppose we shouldn鈥檛 have been. I remember Sunday school was disbanded for the day and we didn鈥檛 go to church at night in case we were bombed.

At the beginning of the war the ARP wardens used to blow a whistle to warn of an impending air-raid before the sirens were put in place. If the wind was in the right direction we could hear Dunstable鈥檚 siren but the animals at the zoo didn鈥檛 like the sirens; you could hear the lions roar. At school, when we were all talking in the shelters, we never did hear the all clear go.

At school we had to try and do some lessons with our gas mask on. This was really difficult because they used to get all steamed up and made funny noises, so it wasn鈥檛 very successful. My school in Dagnall was at the crossroads and one day we saw lots of army chaps with massive radios. They said, 鈥淚f you stay here and behave yourself, you鈥檒l see someone important.鈥� That was the first time we saw the King. He was on his way to Ashridge, where the hospital was situated. I thought how small the King looked when I saw him in the back of a massive black Rolls Royce, with Army dispatch riders on motorbikes. A year or two later I saw him again in Ashridge, just after Arnhem I think. A lot of men were sent to Ashridge for convalescence and we had to stand back in a gateway as he went past. General Charles de Gaulle stayed near there, just past Ashridge House for most of the war.

We had evacuees at our school for a while. We had 118 pupils and couldn鈥檛 all sit down together so some went out gardening in the mornings and others in the afternoons. The farmers would come to school at 9 o鈥檆lock and ask for a number of boys to help with the harvest. The first job I had when I was about 11, was turnip and poppy pulling 鈥� those poppies smelled terrible!

We had the first lot of incendiary bombs dropped at Dagnall, in a field about a quarter of a mile outside the village, which set fire to the hedge and part of the corn. My dad picked up some of the metal cases and brought them home. On the side it said they were manufactured by Krupps. He said that in 1918 he was standing on guard outside Krupps factory; of course he was in the First World War.

Not every week, but quite often bombs were dropped, sometimes 20 or 30 in a night. I think it was because we had two and then later three, searchlights at Dagnall and as soon as the lights picked up the planes they used to hit us with bombs. The searchlights were placed on the golf course just behind Mr B鈥檚 house and the other one was just across the road in a narrow lane from Dagnall to Studham. They had massive generators but no guns. You could read a newspaper when all three were on.

I remember 2 bombs were dropped between Dagnall and Ringshall and 2 were dropped near the church on the corner. They were dug out by Polish explosives chaps and the road was closed for two to three weeks. My sisters worked at the laundry cleaning army uniforms as well as ordinary clothes and had to cycle up to Four Ways Garage to get up to Ringshall, because the road was closed.

A doodlebug came over one night when I was with Bob, and just as it got level with us the two stroke motor cut out. We dived into a hedge but it carried on and crashed at the top of the hill coming out of Aldbury towards Ashridge. No one was hurt. Bombs were dropped all the way round the RAF Station. It could have been another reason why we had so many bombs. Some say that the RAF Station at Dagnall was a listening station for Bletchley Park. One day I went to the garage near there and all the hedgerows looked as if they鈥檇 been done up for Christmas. All the hedges were strewn with bits of silver paper. It was something to do with putting the radar out of action, but we didn鈥檛 know what it was at the time.

A V2 rocket was dropped half a mile outside of Dagnall at about 7 o鈥檆lock one morning. It blew the glass out of the window over my bed. The cats always sat on the windowsills in those days asking to come in but we never saw the cat after that. The Chapel looked a mess. I got my bicycle out and two of us went down and picked up an 18inch square bit of bomb but I had to drop it, it was so hot.

Liberators and Fortresses were at Cheddington when the Americans came. I鈥檝e heard since that they couldn鈥檛 take off with bombs from Cheddington because the runway was too short. So they took off and bombed up (filled up with bombs) somewhere in Norfolk. One night an American Liberator crashed into a wood near Dagnall. All four engines came off the plane and it was the first time I鈥檇 ever seen people in asbestos suits. They came up from Cheddington in massive four wheel drive vehicles and used foam to put the fire out. Tracers were shooting everywhere, deadly if they hit you. Some of the planes that got back were unbelievable. Sometimes the damage was so bad, you could see right through them.

A chap called Arthur was getting some straw out of this straw 鈥榬ick when he came across 48 Mars Bars. We were told that if we found anything, we weren鈥檛 to touch it, pick it up or eat it, as it might poison us all. Some adults had a discussion and decided that they would give an old dog a Mars Bar and if it was alright in the morning, then they鈥檇 know they were alright for the rest of us to eat. Well, the dog was alright the next morning and I think we boys were given half a Mars Bar each. Wonderful, when you were on rations.

My father and I went over to Wardown Park one day. As soon as we got just inside the gate, the air raid siren went and we all dashed into the newly built shelter. It was quite long and gloomy. We sat down on the left bench and everyone ended up on the floor. They had built these shelters in a hurry and as there were no rawlplugs in those days, just nails in the brick work, every one of them pulled away from the wall. We all got up, sat down on the right hand side, and all ended up on the floor again!

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