大象传媒

Wartime memories of Luton and Maulden Part One

Part One of an oral history interview with Mrs. Barbara Lynn (n茅e Price) conducted by Jenny Ford on behalf of Bedford Museum.

鈥淚 was 15 and a half in September 1939. I was actually living in Luton when war was declared. My Mother was in hospital when I had to start work and my Dad and I were living with my sister, just while my Mother was in hospital in Luton. My brother-in-law thought he would be doing a good turn to my Mother so he got me a job in the office of the little tyre company that he was working in, in Luton. He hadn鈥檛 gone in the Services then. Because I went there at 14 when I left school so it was a year and a half actually before the war started. I was working at this small sort of garage come tyre depot where people came and bought all their new tyres for their vehicles. That was funny because the boss of the place was a divorced woman. My sister took me at 14, to the Accountant to have my interview. He just asked me to tot up a long column of figures and I made a mistake I was so nervous and my sister grumbled at me. I remember this Accountant saying, 鈥楧on鈥檛 grumble at her because it鈥檚 nerves!鈥� I started and he came to the firm for half a day. I鈥檇 never seen a set of books in my life and the man whose place I was taking, he鈥檇 got the sack so he wouldn鈥檛 teach me anything. I don鈥檛 know why he got the sack nobody ever told me. But the Accountant came for half a day to show me the books - this is the Day Book, this is the Purchase Ledger, this is the Sales Ledger, that鈥檚 a typewriter and left me with it.

After a some months we moved back to live in Maulden from Luton. I travelled on the bus to Luton. At that time I used to catch the bus at a quarter to eight in the morning and I think I caught one home about quarter to six at night. I did that until I was 18. It was while I was there - at that tyre depot, that Vauxhall Motors was bombed one day and my Dad was working there at that time. I was working with this quite elderly gentleman, otherwise he would have been in the Services so he must have been quite elderly. He was a very quiet man, not familiar with you at all, he was old enough to be my grandfather almost then. Well he seemed it anyway! It was a beautiful sunny day, we heard this noise and we went to have a look. We鈥檇 got big double doors as a garage and we went to have a look and sure enough there were all these blessed planes over Vauxhall which was luckily over the other end of the town to where I was and they were dropping bombs. He realised what was happening and he got hold of me and he threw me behind these double doors and covered me over with his body and of course it tickled me to death that this old boy, who never said a word, was protecting me from this. That was the first thing that happened there.

My boss then told us that we had got to go, if there was another siren went off, we had to go across to what was the called 鈥楾he Moor鈥�, which was a large open space and they鈥檇 built shelters underneath. They鈥檇 dug down into the ground and shored them up, she said, we鈥檇 got to go there. Well, I went once and I was claustrophobic, I couldn鈥檛 stay underground like that, there was no way! I said, 鈥業鈥檓 not going there anymore.鈥� She had a reinforced shelter built inside the garage and we had to go in there if the sirens went. But she also used to send me home in the winter on an early bus before it got dark.

But also while I was there she and I were sitting on the office desk one day and she鈥檇 got this lovely soft top car, it was the envy of everybody in Luton, it was a beautiful black car with a soft top. It was outside the garage and we were sitting on the desk and all of a sudden this huge blast shot us both on the floor, no warning, and it was a bomb that had hit the hat factory in Old Bedford Road, just behind us. It was horrible! Apparently there were pieces of body in the trees and everything then. When she went to drive her car away there was a great big piece of iron from one of the machines from this factory and it missed her lovely car by about that much, it was in the road by the side of her lovely car.

Then she used to send me shopping. She sent me shopping along to a grocery shop, well there was hardly anything in the grocery stores then, but she sent me along this day and they鈥檇 got great big catering tins of soup on the shelves, there was very little else! There again I was standing there waiting to be served and there was this almighty blast again. I think that was when they went for the Railway Station in Luton, it was the station in Luton anyway. One of these great big tins came down off the shelf and missed me! I thought the humiliation if I鈥檇 been killed by a tin of soup in the war! I would never have lived that down would I, killed by a tin of soup!

Of course I was called up to do war work. I wanted to go in the Services and my Dad said to me, my Dad being my Dad said to me, I wanted to go into the ATS, and he said, 鈥楧o they take girls on tanks?鈥� So I said, 鈥業 don鈥檛 think so.鈥� 鈥榃ell, what鈥檚 the best next thing?鈥� he said. I said, 鈥極h, I suppose anti aircraft guns or something like that.鈥� 鈥極h, well that鈥檚 what you鈥檙e going in, no girl of mine sits in an office during a war.鈥� Anyway Mother wouldn鈥檛 sign the papers for me to go, she didn鈥檛 want me to go. And then when it came time for me to be actually called-up they鈥檇 stopped taking single girls into the Services for a while because they weren鈥檛 getting enough going into the factories, the glamour of the Services was more appealing. I had to go into the factory. I was due to start on the Monday and my Mother collapsed and was taken quite ill on the Friday beforehand or something and I had to ring up and say that I had to look after her. So they said, 鈥榃ell just let us know when she鈥檚 better鈥� and I had to have three months off then to look after her and then I went to Commer Cars in Luton.

And then I had to catch the bus at a quarter to seven every morning from Maulden to Luton. We used to get off in New Bedford Road and we used to walk up to Biscot Road which ran parallel with the New Bedford Road, we used to walk up one of the side roads. Because we were early, it was a bit too early for work, we used to go to a Caf茅 which was up the road. They had, god knows how they got them, but they had the most beautiful new ham rolls in there, so we used to go in there and have a ham roll. I ate like a horse, I literally ate like a horse and then we鈥檇 go into work. They were making Army lorries. I was put to making up tool kits for the Army lorries and putting them on them and filling the Army lorries with petrol or diesel which ever they were and the soldiers or civilian drivers used to come and collect them and take them to the Army depots.

That morning, of November 6th 1944, it was eight minutes to ten in the morning, they鈥檇 been building for a year a new canteen and offices over the top of the Department where I working. The Clerk of the Works had moved out at 9 o鈥檆lock that morning, finished! Eight minutes to ten, a V2 rocket hit the corner of it and flattened the lot an hour later! That鈥檚 when it happened, there were four people around me that were killed. Two of those I think were killed by the blast, not a mark on them, by the blast. I was funnily enough sitting in the office talking to my boss at the time and that was another funny thing because he had taken the job on, he was retired. He鈥檇 taken the job on to keep it open for his son-in-law who鈥檇 had to go into the Services and he treated me like a granddaughter and I was sitting talking to him waiting for the canteen wagon to come round with sandwiches on. He was never without his trilby on and his glasses and he always used to take his small change out and put it in a bag or something for his little grandson. This day he was standing at the desk, I was sitting by the side of him on a chair he was standing at the desk counting his change out to give to his grandson. With the V2 rocket you get no warning, they travel faster than sound anyway you see. You get the sound of them travelling after the explosion because they travel faster than sound. You got no warning at all with those. One minute we were sitting there talking and the next minute the only thing I remember was that I was up to here (up to Mrs. Lynn鈥檚 neck) in all sorts of bricks and mortar with a metal frame down around me. And this hissing noise which I realised afterwards was coming from the heating system, which used to blow hot air into the huge workshop.

He was still standing up but that鈥檚 what I laughed about afterwards because he鈥檚 still standing like this, but his glasses were hanging on one ear and his trilby was right on one side, like this. Poor old Mr. Willis! Anyway he dragged me out and took me to people that were running everywhere because of what had happened, he was going to hand me over to some men that had been in the Caf茅 up the road. They came tearing down and some of our men, well they were Ministry of Defence people actually, Inspectors that used to inspect the lorries, they came tearing down. As he got me out I looked backwards and there was a driver there that used to come down from Scotland one or twice a week and pick up a vehicle and take it back up to Scotland again. All I could see out of the rubble was his head. I remember saying to Mr. Willis, 鈥楧on鈥檛 worry about me see to him.鈥� Anyway Mr. Willis handed me over to these fellas and again the humiliation of it, I was taken to the hospital in a Brewery van which happened to be delivering to the canteen at that particular time. Laughter! They said there were 365 casualties on the day, there were some dreadful ones, dreadful ones.

Anyway ages afterwards when as I say this man, who was still alive, I said to him, 鈥楢ll I could see was your head.鈥� 鈥業t鈥檚 a good job you couldn鈥檛 see anything else Barbara I hadn鈥檛 got a stitch of clothing on from the blast.鈥� It took all his clothing off. As I say there were some horrible injuries. In the hospital there were some bad ones. A little old lady who worked in the Stores with me, a little woman from Shillington, oh, she was terribly injured, it had virtually taken her face. She was the bed next to me in the hospital and you could bet your life every time it was meal time she would call for me just as I was going to eat my meal, poor soul she was in a state. I was in hospital for a week.

Then we went back and we had the WVS giving us hot drinks and everything. We were working with duck boards. They鈥檇 made the building safe enough. They started building it again. They started building the canteen and everything again - it took them another year to build it up. In fact I found a little booklet the other day. We had a cartoonist who worked in the factory and I think in that booklet it says, 鈥楴ow we have it, now we don鈥檛鈥� because they said it wasn鈥檛 a V2 - they made us put notices up saying it wasn鈥檛 (a V2 rocket) so of course he picked it up. It must have been the gasmeter if it wasn鈥檛 a V2. It made a heck of mess for a gasmeter. Laughter!

I think they worked shifts in the actual factory. I didn鈥檛 because the Army weren鈥檛 going to come and collect the lorries all through the night or anything. But I don鈥檛 think people realise, they said, 鈥榃ell, Luton didn鈥檛 have anything did it really?鈥� I said, 鈥榃hat it did have, it was nasty.鈥� I don鈥檛 think a lot of people realised just how many munitions were going on there. Because Vauxhall were making tanks, Commer Cars were doing the lorries, Kent Instruments were doing all the fine instruments, Skefco they were on war work, ball bearings, Electrolux were on war work. Every hat factory was making uniforms, it was a hive of military activity really, military connections. I think in that respect that they were lucky. I mean when the Germans did that, it was very fortunate that it caught that corner of the building because, presumably that was what it was aimed for, if it had gone that few yards further, it would have hit the main body of the factory where everybody was. As it was there was probably more ordinary outside civilians than there were people that worked in the factory injured because their houses were all flattened around there.

The 鈥榙oodle bugs鈥�, the V1 that cut out and dropped, I mean you heard those. Because I remember after I鈥檇 been in that lot one of those cut out somewhere over Maulden and I was under the stairs like a shot out of a gun. Laughter! All sorts of funny things happened.鈥�

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.