大象传媒

In 1939 I was six years old and an only child at the time, we lived in Caversham near Reading in Berkshire near a great golf course. My grandparents lived in Reading itself. I remember going down to the Infants School at the end of our road it was just a little school with the golf course right opposite us. My father worked for Gascoyne Milking Machine Company and delivered the machinery to the big farms. My mother was a housewife, she owned about four or five goats and chickens and two pheasants. She was able to help the neighbours by providing them with goats milk and eggs. It was quite rural then. There was a Mr Farmer who lived at the end of the road who had a vegetable plot which stretched along to our garden and he supplied all the vegetables for the local community. People also used egg powder and things like that as everything was on ration and you were allowed only a little bit of this and that. Ration books were brought in because things were not getting into the Country and therefore things had to be rationed out. I remember it being 1939 and my mother put the radio, we didn't have television or anything like that at that time. I remember to this day that Churchill came on and declared war with Germany. Although I was too young then to understand, I realised it was something serious going on.

At that time my father was working for Gascoyne Milking Machine Company. He was asked to take ammunition to the Ports, as although the Milking Machines were innocent items inside was hidden the ammunition to be loaded on ships, it may seem like smuggling, but he was doing this for the war effort. He was mainly going to the Port in Southampton. He never knew whether he would come back as at that time anything could have happened as the Ports were being bombed.

During the war he was a brilliant marksman. The first time he ever flew he was asked if he would go up in a Lancaster to pin point something because of his skill. So his record was of skill from the First World War. He had to lay face down on the floor of the plane with this glass dome underneath to be able to pin point where to drop the bombs and they were spot on target, I cannot remember where this was over Germany. This was just a one off thing he did.

I went to School at the end of the road and my mother was on her own quite a bit but she used to go often and see my grandparents. The fields that my mother used to look across has now got the University on it. My brother said that our grandparents old house is still there, although I haven't seen it.

I remember going down to feed the goats, but I don't remember very much as I was only 6, but my mother was one of those people that would always say, "Come on now my Darling you are going to help me", and you would do what you were told.

I remember one night we went down there and we saw this red cross falling down in the sky and it was a plane which had been hit and it was just like a flaming cross and my mum tried not to let me be scared by it and she said, "Don't worry", but you could look across towards London and see the lights and glows of the fires burning during the Blitz. I know Plymouth was badly hit. St Andrews Church was just a shell. The funny thing is that the old part of the Barbican that we learnt years later never got hit.

My mother had quinsys during the war where the throat closes up and she had sort of an absess on the tonsils, I didn't understand, I remember I was helping her and she couldn't speak, she could only drink through a straw and she had a temperature of 105 and she still went down to those goats and I went down with her, she even struggled down in the snow to feed the hens and collect the eggs. Although I was only young I had a sense that there was something serious going on and that I had to help my mother as we didn't know when my dad would be back, or whether he ever would come back. Although he wasn't away all the time when he did come home we always gave a sign of relief when he did, as the German bombers were all round the Ports.

I remember the searchlights at night, and the black-outs. You didn't dare open the front door unless you put the light out first, everything was in darkness. I do remember one time when my dad was at home there was an Air Raid Warden along our road and we heard this noise like a dronning and he came and knocked on the front door and I remember him saying, "You come and have a look at this", I was the first outside the door and when I looked up, I have never forgotten it, it was our aircraft overhead going off to Germany and they were wing tip to wing tip, a fantastic sight, although some of those planes never came back.

My uncle fought in the RAF, but he came back, he was my mother's brother, he was very young, but most of them didn't come back. My auntie worked for the Red Cross she was in tbe Berkshire Nursing Hospital, she lived in Reading with her parents. She use to go down to the station, there were train loads of troops and she would help with the nursing and escort them to the Hospital.

I remember my mother gave lodgings to two ladies and they were Wireless Operators and they marked the maps with spots to show where the different planes where. Everyone was asked to help in any way they could. The two ladies use to spoil me and baby-sit for me. They stayed with us throughout the war.

You only had little pats of butter in those days that would have to last you the week and a small packet of sugar had to last a while too, everyone helped each other, if someone had a few extra rations they would help each other out. You don't see that today. Although there was a war, and it was a horrible war somehow people seemed to care a lot for one another, there was not the nastiness that you get today. People were lovely, we had a Mrs Davies who lived next door to us and her daughter they were very nice people and would help in whatever way they could. I know the world wasn't a perfect place, even between the wars, but at least people were decent, neighbours and that.

Ration books went on right into 1951, the year I got polio and they were still being used for food and clothes, it took a long time for things to recover. We had a couple of shops between Caversham and Reading that we could go to and take your ration book with you as there were only certain things you were allowed to have. I didn't like all the queuing. My mother wouldn't let me have sweets as that ration would go towards something more substantial to eat. My mother did a lot of dressmaking, although material was hard to get it was easier to get than clothes, that was why it was rationed out.

Although there was a war going on, I wish we could go back to those days as the people were decent. People are horrible today.

I remember a bomb being dropped on the golf course opposite to where we lived. I heard this noise like a high pitched whistle and my mother grabbed me and took me behind the setee and covered me with her own body, she knew what it was and tried to shield me, but fortunately the glass didn't break or anything. We didn't go to see where the bomb had landed, we were only told about it.

We always had the radio on at certain times to hear what was going on. Churchill was always encouraging everyone. I remember there was something like London Tonight, Tommy Handley, and my mother use to like listening to Vera Lynn when she was signing to the Troops. My dad always had a newspaper to read about what was going on.

My father was called out one evening to do the ammunition run and I waa sitting in an armchair all curled up with a little bag of sweets which was my treat on the odd occasion, and I said to my dad, "You can have these sweets to take with you", he said, "Thank you". After he was gone I remember I started to cry and my mother said "now what's the matter with you", I said, "I want my sweets back", as I suddenly realised I wouldn't get anymore for a very long time. There were not many newspapers or comics around at that time, I remember the Times newspaper as my grandfather use to do the crossword. There were a few children's papers/comics I remember reading at that time the School Friend, the only children's paper/comic I remember going on throughout the war was the Girl's Crystal, all the others were suspended until 1946 and then they were restarted again. I have a collection of these today, they had adverts for jobs for young ladies and short stories. My granddad use to get me an annual once a year, but this too was suspended.

I remember going to my infant school down the road where I lived it was like a tin hut really, with a small amount of children. They were quite happy times. I then went to the main school in reading after the war. I was 9 when the war ended. My brother was born in 1945 at the end of the war, there was just us two then.

My father went back to the ordinary machine delivery work after the war. He told me that during the war he was staying at a farm and they put him up overnight and another farmer further away said that their bull had got out. My father went out to have a smoke in the yard and was wandering about behind the barn and came face to face with the bull, he turned around and ran like hell with the bull behind him. At one time he was staying at a guest house in the country and it was hit by a bomb he slid out onto the road while he was on the bed, but luckily he was not Hurt. Another time my dad was walking with a friend, they heard the air raid warning when they were by their lorries and hesitated as to which lorry to hide under they both decided they would hide under my dad's lorry, luckily they did as the other lorry was hit, it was that close. My dad was a good story teller.

I remember after the war we moved down to Cornwall and my parents and I went down to the beach there was still barbed wire around for a long time after the war.

When I got over my polio after the war nothing would fit me and it was difficult to get clothes as ration books were still in force for a time, my mother had to alter things the best she could.

I was thrilled when my brother was born, I use to go out with my mum with the pram and when we moved to Cornwall I helped look after him.

I am glad I lived through those times in a way, as now I am older I can look back on a wonderful experience and it should be spoken about more, people should not forget.

We went down to Plymouth for a bit and saw the sea planes which were used during the war and they were still being used after the war.

On VE day we had a little party where everyone gathered together in a little road in Caversham, I was 10 and understood what was happening at that time.

I will never forget the sound of the sirens ever, there was a certain sound to warn you and a different sound to say it was all clear, they had to do that so that people would know what was happening. We had a little shelter in the garden.

I had my tonsils out during the war and I remember the Hospitals were very over crowded with the troops so my mother made up one of our rooms as a theatre and they came out and operated on me at home. They congratulated her on doing such a marvelous job of organising everything. Our neighbour Mrs Davies came in to look after me and at the time I was told to eat a lot of ice cream, but the nearest my mother could get to that was to give me ice cold goats milk. My grandfather came to the rescue as he could get a little bit of ice cream with his ration book for me.

Hitler wanted everyone to be German in Germany, he didn't want any foreigners, any one else he had killed. Although Hitler was at the head it was the Nazis that tortured the Jews, probably instructed by Hitler. They took it to its limits. He was an evil man.

There was terrific unemployment after the war. The ammunition factories employed the women while the men fought the war, when returning there were no jobs for them as ammunition was not now required. Terrific depression.

My father didn't have a car he only drove his lorry. Most people didn't have cars because of the shortage of petrol and rationing. People mostly walked everywhere or caught the bus.

My grandparent's moved to Bournemouth after the war and I am living in their house now.

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