大象传媒

Through misted eyes I could see the smoking carriages of the long train taking him away. No longer could I see his figure leaning out of the compartment window, but I could still feel the rough, harsh cloth of his khaki uniform on my cheek. All around me in Central Station in Glasgow, the smoking plumes from the engines soared and curled into the glass roof. The echo of the guard's whistle still sounded its trill in my ears.

He had been just another soldier volunteer in the Royal Artillery, stationed in a disused factory. There they were drilled, route-marched along the 26 miles of Loch Lomond, and trained to be soldiers. For relaxation, a group of musical erks [forces slang for a naval rating or an aircraftman] came to my home, where mother shared out our food and father shared out a love of music. The house was full of music, laughter and talk. James was 11 years older than me and a tenor who had trained at Vienna State Opera House. He had already been selected to be trained as an officer in the Honourable Artillery Company and would be sent away. Now it had happened.

The station echoed with voices, whistles, clacking heels, and engines coughing and panting. I was unheeding, standing alone, until I realised there were other noises - loud reverberating crashes and bangs, thumps, whistling screams and now the crowds were running. Above the clatter and noise the lugubrious sirens whined up and down the musical scale.

I did not care. The war had brought him and the war had taken him away. The comfort of home was what I wanted - only it was 27 miles away. But the bus station was near and a red double-decker bus was waiting with its Balloch sign. The throng filed on board, the bus smelling of tobacco and the windows papered over, we set off, rattling over the Glasgow cobbles. As we neared Partick, the noise got louder. Our ears were assailed by bangs and crashes, our eyes by the windows lighting up and the ever-present tobacco fumes, now mixed with acrid smoke.

Through the noisy flashing streets our metal bus with its prisoners rattled and thundered towards Clydebank. The noise became louder, more varied. Bombs rained down first one side and then the other. We crunched over broken glass and debris as the driver swerved round obstacles. The noise was all-enveloping as bombs dropped all around, tenement walls crashing down, people screaming and shouting, sirens and fire engines wailing, and the futile ack-ack guns popping. By that time the stench of burning buildings had been heightened by the acrid smell of the burning petrol-holding tanks at Bowling.

Our bus driver must have been a very brave man, for he drove over 20 miles through the bomb-ravaged streets, while the blitz was still going on. After a 2 or 3-hour stop, we continued to Dumbarton. Our bus trundled on, swaying and rattling, our ears assailed by the unseen horrors outside. The paper clad windows lit up as bombs fell and fires blazed, our noses were assailed by unidentifiable, acrid smells, our bodies shaken and thrown from side to side, as we tried to peer through the tiny visibility slits at the top of the windows. There was no panic - we just endured, hoping to reach Dumbarton without being a target.

The large flotilla of planes above us droned on and the bombs continued. Already they had found the petrol bank (set up to fight the war) at Bowling and a miasma of stinking fog permeated our bus. The driver kept going. The passengers were down to a handful by Dumbarton at 3 in the morning. We had travelled 20 miles and taken 6 hours.

And then it all started again the next night.

Sheilah Cruickshank. Via Dundee Central Library

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