大象传媒

This story has been written onto the 大象传媒 People's War site by CSV Storygatherer Robin.D.Bailey on behalf of the author Richard Holloway. They fully understand the terms and conditions of the site.

This is a tale of Rusty, our Cocker Spaniel, living in Bristol during the Blitz. Most evenings my Father would take Rusty for his last walk of the day at about 9.30 p.m. But if there was going to be a Blitz later that night, Rusty would not go outside the door. As with so much else, we just accepted this at the time.

It gave us an extra warning, but every night anyway, we all slept in the kitchen, our safest room, with a corrugated iron shelter over the window, a stack of candles and every pan and bucket filled with water.

What remarkable sense did Rusty have ? Could he hear the throb of the planes on their way ?

Now some of my other recollections as a boy aged 7 to 13:-

Part of my school was burnt out by incendiary bombs, resulting in my form being transferred to the hall of a Theological College.

Sunday afternoon walks to see the anti-aircraft balloon based on the Downs.

After every Blitz I would hunt for "treasures" which were kept in an equally treasured shoe box, - pieces of shrapnel, the nosecap of a shell, the tailfin of an incendiary bomb.

We all lined up in the Avenue to have our gasmasks checked, an hilarious sight, but I felt suffocated and unable to breathe in mine.

A train journey from Bristol to Exeter which was so packed with people that I was standing on the moving plates where two carriages joined, with tremendous draughts coming through the joining 鈥渃oncertinas鈥�.

The whole anguish of the Blitz, with the City Centre destroyed, churches burnt out, houses bombed, businesses lost and overall the anxiety and distress of everyone with relations and friends away fighting or at home in the ARP or Fire Service and so on.

My Father had been in the Territorial Army ever since his service in the Great War, hence he was called up when the war started, soon to be invalided out. My Brother in the 6th Form was on fire watch duties at School. Later he was in the Royal Marines through Holland and Germany. On top of the anxieties this caused, my Mother kept those of us at home fed, queuing at the shops with little scope for anything beyond our bare rations. I know now how much she starved herself to keep us fed.

Although, as a child at the time the war was to me the normality, it has had a profound effect. One hears much of the heroism, comradeship, humour - but this is not war, it is a defence. The real war is horror - uncertainties, nauseating worry, destruction, injury and death. It doesn鈥檛 just happen in films, or to other people in far off places. - It happens to you, to your family, to your life.

It left me with a hatred of war!

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