大象传媒

We kids lived in Bitterne Park, Southampton with my father, by trade a landscape gardener and about to be in the army. My mother had died in childbirth when I was about 4 and a bit.

As a seven-year-old in 1939, I only had a vague idea that war was coming and that I was to be evacuated. This was some thing that had never happened before in England 鈥� we hardly knew what evacuation meant.

Three days before war was declared my sister who was ten, myself, my brother who was just six were assembled at our local school. My father told my sister that she should make sure we all stayed together. We were given white labels with our names on which were tied to our coats. We had our gas masks over our shoulders and some luggage in either a small suitcase or a bag. We were taken by bus to the Central Station in Southampton, along with about 40 other children.

LYMINGTON

The train took us to Lymington 鈥� a place we had never heard of- but it was supposed to be safe from the expected bombing.

There we were all taken to a hall where the ladies of the locality chose which children should go to which local homes. Gradually the numbers of children diminished until we were the only ones left. Nobody wanted three children.

So my sister went to one council house to be looked after and my brother and I were sent to the house next door and put in the care of an oldish couple.. My sister was told she would be in a certain room for a while and then be moved to another later. She noticed a strange smell about the place and it turned out that the lady鈥檚 mother had recently died and was laid out in the other room. War was declared three days later and we heard about it when we came out of Sunday School.
We were not happy there. We wet the bed a good deal.

My brother and I were pretty wild and misbehaved quite a lot. We enjoyed scrumping apples and once I recall we were in a phone box giving the operator some lip using some new words we had learned. Somehow she

alerted the local bobby who cycled up, dragged us out, boxed us round the ears and gave us some good advice.
We did not dream of vandalising the phone.

Soon after the declaration of war the local ice cream factory was closed down and all the children were invited in to eat as much as they could. Great!

At the local church school they tried to force me to write right-handed and being left- handed I did not enjoy this very much. Evidence of war at this time was limited to wondering what a huge circular water tank with SWS written on it was. Was it for swimming in?

BOURNEMOUTH

After three months our foster parents had had enough, so my brother and I were moved to Bournemouth to some other foster parents who did not really want us. It was not very pleasant. At school there I can remember being accused of stealing a farthing from a girl in the class. Being innocent I learned that life is rather unfair at times
Bournemouth had a few bombs and sometimes we had to sleep in the cellars of a big department store on blankets we had carried there. We started collecting shrapnel and cartridge cases. There was a story going about that a German pilot had bailed out of his aircraft and had come down on some telegraph wires and had been sliced up.
At one time my brother and I set fire to the heath at Wallisdown. Later we learned that it was thought to have been be caused by enemy action!

LYNDHURST

After about a year, when I was 9, we were moved to a home for children at Lyndhurst called Wilverley House (now demolished). I suppose there were about 35 boys there - all from problem backgrounds because of the war. And we slept in dormitories with about 6 to a room. A Mr Dimmock who I remember as being very fair ran the home. The setting in the Forest was lovely and across the farmland one could see another large house called Foxlease which became or was a centre for the Girl Guide movement.

We attended the Lyndhurst elementary church school. I remember going to church parades at the church opposite the school and also being prepared for confirmation by the vicar. However, I decided I was not convinced by his beliefs and declined to go though with the process.

Up the road from Wilverley was a bomb disposal unit, housed mostly in tents as I recall.

I remember going to the small cinema in Lyndhurst 鈥� I think it was the Lyric 鈥� and seeing a film called 鈥� Sailors Three鈥� starring Tommy Trinder. It involved a merchant ship carrying a cargo of bananas. As we had not seen a banana since the beginning of the war our tongues were hanging out at the sight of thousands of them.

Near the home there was a farm and I recall the farmer plastering his hay crop with molasses in a large tank. We enjoyed eating the black treacle when we managed to get hold of a drum of it.

While at Lyndhurst I became aware that something had happened at Dunkirk. This was because many of the French survivors were billeted nearby. This was probably my first sight of a foreigner.

During our time there we were bullied quite a lot so one day I persuaded my brother and another boy, Barry, that we should run away heading back to our homes in Southampton. We decided to leave after lunch on a Saturday, as that would give us the maximum time to get clear. We rendezvoud in a rhododendron bush before we left at about 1-30,. We walked to Lyndhurst and then set out on the road to Southampton. I knew which it was as the Hants & Dorset buses went that way. In order not to be seen (by Mr Dimmock in his Ford 8 - DHO 158, I have never forgotten the number) we walked, where possible, parallel to the road some forty yards in the Forest. When we got to Hounsdown Hill I was dismayed to see how much further we had to go.

When we got to Millbrook I made the mistake of going to the centre of town instead of going towards Winchester Road. We reached the Bargate and I felt we should turn left into Hanover Buildings but we could not since the road was closed because of an unexploded bomb. We made our way through to St Marys and sighted a tram going to Bitterne Park Triangle which we knew. We eventually got there and my brother and I separated from Barry who lived in Woodmill Lane, and found our house in Dimond Rd at about 7-30. Our current stepmother was there and we were delighted to be given a boiled egg each. About three days later we were shipped back to the home and I do not recall any bullying after that.

ANDOVER

After a couple of years I won a scholarship to go to Itchen Grammar School which is in Southampton. I did not know I was sitting for it. One day a teacher said, 鈥淎lan go into that other room and do that paper that is on the desk鈥� This Southampton School had, itself, been evacuated to Andover so my brother and I were shifted to Andover and lodged with a fresh set of foster parents who were not very keen on us at all.

The school was divided into three houses, Exeter, Ajax and Achilles; named after the three Royal Navy destroyers that caused the German battleship Graf Spey to scuttle itself. The first bit of good news for the navy since the war started.

I only went to school in the afternoons while the Andover pupils went in the mornings. I recall noting the progress of the war in the North African desert. I used to look with interest at the maps in the newspapers showing Monty鈥檚 advance in North Africa and I felt certain that we would win in the end. Anyway, Hitler only had one ball.

One day a friend, Brian Best and I got into a small church north of Andover and rang the bells 鈥� later we learned this was a signal that the invasion had begun!

The foster father had a job painting camouflage on top of aircraft hangers at nearby Weyhill aerodrome. Again we were not really wanted in the home 鈥� naturally their own son was treated much better than we were. A rotten memory was of the two of us being caged in under a Morrison shelter while the foster parents went out for the evening.

At this time I saw the local Home Guard training with pitchforks in the local gravel pits.

My Dad was invalided out of the army so we paid occasional visits home travelling on the Sprat and Winkle railway line from Andover to Southampton.
I recall watching aerial dogfights over the town. We鈥檇 cheer madly when we saw a hurricane or a spitfire do the victory roll. This would indicate that the pilot had made a kill.

One night during a raid we saw a parachute coming down in our back garden. We feared it was a land mine as some had hit nearby Woodmill Lane the night before and done much damage. It turned out to be a flare, which had not ignited. We took the parachute indoors and subsequently all the females around enjoyed silk underwear.

One morning I was walking with my Dad down Ashtree Rd going to get a breakfast in the British Restaurant at Portswood. While we were there an unexploded bomb went off in Ashtree Rd and destroyed three houses and we saw the wreckage when we walked back.

As well as serving in the Home Guard at this time my Dad was an ambulance driver. His worst experience was when the Art Gallery at the Civic Centre was bombed killing dozens of school children that were sheltering in the cellars.
It was said his hair turned white overnight.

PENNINGTON

We stayed in Andover for approximately four months and then we were re-united with our Dad (Jan 43) who had funnily enough settled at Lower Pennington near Lymington where we started. After a spell working for Wellworthys ( piston ring makers) he got a job as gardener for Sir Cyril Deverell, a retired Field Marshall who, I think, headed up the National Savings Movement. The gardening job (拢3 pw) came with accommodation over a large garage where we lived.

Moving school was interesting. At Itchen Grammar School the first year was called the second year and I started in 2c. It was followed by 3rd, 4th. 5th , a shell year and finally the 6th form.
When I transferred to Brockenhurst County High School they asked me what year I was at Itchen. I said 2c and they put me in their 2c so after one term I was now in the second year. I can only put this down to lack of liaison
between county and the town educational authorities.
Because of this I found learning French very tough, but the other subjects were not so bad.

School life was quite decent at this stage. The teachers were mostly quite old as the younger men had been called up for military service. The school ran an Army Cadet Force and an Air Training Corps for the older pupils. Sometimes I would cycle to School after my paper round and sometimes I used the bus. On the bus one could check ones homework with fellow pupils.

On day in 1943 I came across a 14 foot sailing dinghy at the bottom of someone鈥檚 garden in a state of considerable disrepair. It was an open boat and had weeds growing through the bottom. Up to that point I had enjoyed sailing around the marshes on a crude raft constructed with oil drums and some old timber. I persuaded my Dad to buy the dinghy for me and he did for 拢25. I was attracted to sailing having read Arthur Ransom鈥檚 books. I wanted to sail it in Oxey Creek and in the Solent. In order to do this the craft had to be registered as a fishing boat. This was done and the large identifying letters 鈥淪U 48鈥� or some other number was painted on the bows. This officially allowed me to sail between Needs Oar Point and Hurst Castle. On my first trip out I took my trusting Dad for a sail and promptly capsized. We crawled ashore on to the marsh, bailed out and then headed home.

At this point he decided that the boat should half-decked in. Timber was very scarce so he sawed several 5 in posts into planks by hand. The wood was then covered with canvas from part of a bell tent. I joined Lymington Town Sailing Club as a cadet and raced regularly. I had a mooring just off the end of the slipway.

Prior to the invasion in 1944 two things stand out. Cycling to school when the roadsides were crowded with vehicles and tanks. They seemed to be mostly American and Canadian. It was the first time I had seen black men. In my saddlebag I would have as many fresh eggs as I could get hold of, since they were the one thing the Americans could not get. Gentle bartering produced much candy, crystallised fruit, and gum each morning.

One of the best-kept secrets of the war was the great Brylcream shortage.
This affected one of my teachers who was proud of his sleek black hair. But the stuff was hard to come by. However I had a source 鈥� a member of the Sailing club was a barber and he received a ration. He would sell me a pot and I would sell it on to my teacher (no profit) every couple of months. My pals would accuse me of trying to get top marks in his subject.

As the Solent filled up with ships of the invasion fleet I used to sail amongst them. It was an incredible sight. I recall many black men brushing down the decks with strange-looking brooms. They used to throw all sorts of things overboard 鈥� including the brooms! At one time I retrieved a large sack of flour that I took home. The outside was soaked solid of course but the interior was fine. Most interesting for me were the boxes of cordite that they jettisoned. They took the shape of little cylinders about a cm in length. I would collect hundreds of them and take them to school and sell them for a farthing each. The boys used them to create key bangers.

At one time with friends we wheeled old pram chassis over to Walhampton
where there was an airstrip for American fighter planes. We would collect discarded extra fuel tanks and wheel them home. They seemed to be made of compressed paper. We cut out a hole in the top and used them as canoes. It鈥檚 a good thing we were not smokers for they reeked of high-octane fuel.

During 1945 I started keeping a diary in which I recorded mostly boyish things but had an eye on the war.
An entry for April 1st, Easter Sunday and All Fool鈥檚 Day, reads 鈥淏rit forces 200 miles beyond the Rhine鈥�. In the afternoon of the same day I record,鈥� Mr Churchill at Quebec Conference鈥�

On the afternoon of the 7th of April I listened to a programme on the Home Service - A Harbour called Mulberry. On 2nd May I note 鈥淗itler is DEAD, Donitz takes his place鈥�. On the 4th,鈥滼erries surrender in N Italy and Austria鈥� and on the 5th 鈥淛erries surrender in NW Germany, Holland and Denmark鈥�.

On VE Day, the 8th, I say 鈥滻 got up rather early and went down town. The place was covered in flags. A banner across the street said, 鈥榁ictory 1945鈥�.
I mention drunken soldiers and airmen, thunder flashes, blank cartridges, flaming sacks and water bombs. Bed was at 1150.
On VE+1 an effigy of Hitler was burned on a pyre of orange boxes.

And so the war was over. Back at school next day saw us kids letting off even more fireworks. My final memory of the war is of our teacher giving us kids ordinary razor blades and telling us to stand up on the chairs and scrape off the anti-blast tape that had been on the windows for five years. Health & Safety!
During this operation I record that I caught a glimpse of Pat Smith鈥檚 knickers. One of the girls I fancied鈥︹�︹��..

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