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As a young boy, of some 12 or 13 years of age, the War was an exciting time. The beaten, but proud British army had sucessfully returned from France. The 大象传媒 Radio was keeping us informed of how things stood now that the Battle of Britain was underway. Evening reports of losses and winnings kept us on our toes. As youngsters, we were forever listening for the names of our "fighter-pilot heroes", the newspapers carried photographs of some of them, especially those being decorated at the Palace.

Essex saw a lot of air battles; enemy aircraft were as familiar as our own Spitfires and Hurricanes, but from a different height. The opportunity to see "one of theirs" could not be missed. Near to Rettendon Common, near to Wickford, an enemy plane had crash-landed. It was a Messerschmidt ME110 that had "belly-landed" due to damage sustained by "one of ours". The crew of two were sat on their plane waiting for someone to come and take them away. With my young brother we crossed the field to where the aircraft lay and began speaking to the crew, asking typical questions like "Where have you come from mister?" The answer, "France", was to throw everything we had heard of completely out of our understanding. Germans come from Germany, so these chaps could be quite friendly. Having looked in and around and seen some of the bullet-hole been its downfall, we were rather startled to hear a voice shouting, "get away from them, they are Germans!" It was an old WW1 soldier who had become a wartime policeman. Needless to say, two young boys beat a very hasty retreat.

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