大象传媒

Here in our new found freedom of peacetime there was still sadness of the war with Japan until they were forced to call a ceasefire, and then we had the celebrations and bonfires all over again. Although still only a child I remember how wonderful looking out from the back of our home and seeing the glow of celebration bonfires and not the glow of air raids. Of course all those that lived through those troubled times will remember there was still the hardship of rationing and shortages of materials for years after the war. Thankfully things gradually brightened up and got better.

One thing that was strange and took time to get used to was having my father around a lot more, because all through the war he had no choice about the hours that he had to work because he was in an aircraft factory at Hamble repairing Spitfires and sometimes they would work on through the night to get a job done. Also on top of that he was in the Home Guard unit on the airfield, so sometimes we didn鈥檛 see him for days.

To be honest we had done a lot better than some for food during the rationing period because we always had plenty of potatoes. We kept pigs and chickens so didn鈥檛 get an egg or bacon ration. But when pigs were sent to the bacon factory, twice a year we were allowed to have a half of a pig back for our own use. Whilst the chickens laid we had plenty of eggs.

Sadly after all that pain and suffering our leaders still can鈥檛 see the futility of war and that in the end it never does any good and the only way things can be settles is around the negotiating table.

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