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My father, Harry Percival, was born in 1898, in Southwark, South London, the youngest of six children, four boys and two girls .At the outbreak of the First World War he was 15, too young to sign up, although plenty did. His older brothers, Jack, Bill and Ned, all volunteered and in turn were posted to France. His sisters married and moved away, starting their own families. It was left to my father to stay at home and look after his mother who was a cripple and had been confined to a wheel chair for most of her life.
Later in the war conscription was introduced and when he was 18 received his call up papers and joined the Rifle Brigade.
The point of this story is that my grandmother had four boys who all served in the army, three from the outset, and saw action in the trenches, and all survived virtually uninjured. This must be a very rare occurrence for the time. Perhaps the Lord thought my grandmother had suffered enough during her life, but I am sure she considered herself extremely fortunate.
An interesting addendum to my father’s military career is the story of when in transit from one posting to another his regiment had to change trains at London Bridge station. The troops all stacked arms on the platform and were told they would have to wait a couple of hours for the train to complete their journey. My father told his pal he lived less than a mile from the station and asked him if he would care to go and see his mother for a quick cup of tea, and so they left the rest of the soldiers on the platform.
They returned to the station in what they thought would be plenty of time but were amazed to find the troops gone what was to be done? They returned to my grandmother’s for another cup of tea and stayed until the police arrived to take them into custody. They were handed over to the army at the nearest military prison -- the Tower of London at the same time as Sir Roger Casement was being entertained as a guest of His Majesty’s government. Casement was later executed, my father and his pal were returned to their unit to face the music.
In 1936 my mother and father moved to a newly built London County Council flat on the Rockingham Estate at the Elephant & Castle. We were allocated number 34 Banks House, which was at the foot of the stairs leading to four further levels. Forty-five flats in all.. These were luxurious to what most people had been used to at the time – three bedrooms, a living room, kitchen, bath and separate lavatory. The blocks were surrounded by lawns and shrubbery.
In 1939, when the Second World War was looming, giant diggers appeared on the scene, digging up all the lawns, and subterranean shelters were built. Each shelter would accommodate about 100 people. The only thing visible on the surface when the building work was finished was the entrance lobby with stairs leading downwards, and four ventilator traps about four feet square.. The rest was grassed over. One shelter was immediately outside our windows.
My father, being over forty, was too old for conscription into the services but he was made responsible for No-8 shelter; which was kept locked before and after air raids.. He was given the key, which I remember hung from the picture rail in our living room. When the air raid siren sounded, day or night, it was his responsibility to get the key, rush out to number eight shelter and unlock it. When the all clear went he had to make sure everyone had left and locked up until the next raid. Those allocated to No-8 had all their belongings, bedding and so on, left there. So it was necessary to have it under lock and key. There were brick shelters built along the roadside for people to take cover in who happened to be in the area when an air raid was sounded. Anyone was free to use them. My mother, for her own reasons, refused to take us, her five children, down No-8 shelter. She felt safer in our flat, which, as I have stated, was on the ground floor, by the stairwell with four further landings above us. In fact, other residents also considered our flat safer, because when the siren sounded at night neighbours would knock on our front door and ask if they could come in for the duration of the raid. I can remember our long passageway, with five doors leading off, being completely filled with people. Sometimes they were there for hours, depending on how long the raid lasted, on many occasions all night long. I can remember them sitting on the floor and on chairs and my mother handing out cups of tea. Sometimes the noise of bombs exploding and guns firing was deafening and at these times everyone became religious praying for the Almighty to protect them and for the morning to come. In 1940 during the Blitz this went on night after night. Infact things became so terrifying that my mother said we couldn’t stay in the flat any longer. She insisted we take shelter down the Tube. So every evening we traipsed to the Elephant & Castle Underground station and sheltered there for the night. This went on for weeks. We, the kids, would have bundles of bedding which we carried on our heads to the station and queued outside until be were allowed down to the platforms to claim our place. My mother would come along later with the baby; he was born in February 1940. She would carry him and a suitcase. When she found us on the platform – usually always in the same place - she would undo the suitcase, which was the baby’s bed, ready made. One morning we left the station to make our way home. The air raid that night had been particularly bad. We were greeted with the sight of bombed buildings and the smell of the debris (an unforgettable smell) We made our way home to Rockingham Street to be met with the sight of complete chaos. The flats had been hit. There were ambulances, fire engines, the Heavy Rescue, police- the lot. Barriers had been erected to stop people entering the area. We were allowed through because our home was affected. Our flat was a complete shambles. The bomb blast had taken all the windows of Banks House out completely. A bomb had gone through the air vent of the shelter outside our window killing everyone in there. Had we and all our neighbours been sheltering in the passageway of our flat I hate to think what the consequences would have been.

Up until that time my parents had refused the offer of evacuation for the children, my mother insisting we all stay together, but after such a near miss my mother agreed we should all leave London, But my father needed to stay with his job. Within a short time Mum and her five children were evacuated to Diss in Norfolk in more or less just what we stood up in ---- but that’s another story.

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